THE TALENT OF ATTRACTING GREAT TALENT
A hidden Common Denominator of ALL Successful Entrepreneurs
YOUR MOST VALUABLE BUSINESS ASSET
What is your most precious resource in the company? Where does the real treasure of your business truly lie? What is your most valuable asset? It is not buildings, fleets or patents. No, it is not you're your people - it is the RIGHT people!
Make a list of all your current serious business challenges or problems, whether related to increasing sales, improving productivity, handling important clients, etc. You will find out that behind each of these, there is someone who did not do his/her job. Someone did not do what you expected him/her to do - and you probably ended up doing the work yourself!
You might need to develop stronger leadership skills. But guess what: good employees need good relationship, more than just leadership. Bad employees do not respond to leadership, neither to relationship; they only respond to repetitive orders and threats.
FROM THE MOUTH OF VERY SUCCESSFUL ENTREPRENEURS
Do you want your company to expand and make more money? Do you want to be able to focus on those activities that provide the best return for your business? Well then, here is your most important job: hire people who will genuinely help your company expand and prosper, while leaving you entrusted to what you really love to - and should do! Then, your business will grow with less pain, stress or frustrations!
Expanding your business starts with avoiding to attract the wrong people! Successful entrepreneurs like Howard Schultz (Starbucks), Steve Jobs (Apple), Kevin P. Ryan (DoubleClick) or Tony Hsieh (Zappos.com) would spend 40 to 50% of their time finding top players and avoiding trouble makers! This is where they made the difference. If you hire the right people you don't have to manage them. Most of your wasted energy, your trouble and your frustrations come from a minority of people who should not have been hired in the first place.
"We employ 200,000 people. So I can make the case - and I have for years - that the most important discipline at Starbucks is human resources." - Howard Schultz, Starbucks
"I used to think business was 50 percent having the right people. Now I think it's 80 percent. The best way to be productive is to have a great team. So I spend more time than most CEOs on human resources." - Kevin P. Ryan, Double-Click
"One of the most important aspects of being a superior leader is hiring people smarter than you. Top leaders spend more time putting the right team in place to accomplish their objectives than they spend on planning, strategizing or many other components of their job." - Bob Prozen, author of "Kiss Theory Goodbye."
"I hire people brighter than me and then I get out of their way!" - Lee Iaccoca.
"I have participated in the hiring of maybe 5,000-plus people in my life. So I take it very seriously." - Steve Jobs.
THE NUMBER ONE SOURCE OF BUSINESS FAILURES
The tip is thus simple: Be smarter in your hiring process and you won't need to work so hard later! After directly training over 120,000 business owners around the world in all kinds of industries in the last 30 years, I have concluded that over 55% of business failures and 84% of serious business crises are not due to unfavorable economic environments, lack of resources or lack of marketing power:
They are due to bad/wrong hiring decisions!
Hiring right definitely provides the most powerful leverage for your business. In fact, I call it the 1,000% leverage factor, or the factor of 10 - for the following reasons:
- Hiring is a dangerous bet which can directly impact profitability. A new employee who is fired within 3 months can cost up to 10 times what you invested to get him/her on the job.
- If you fire a bad hire or lose a good one after one year, the consequent financial, organizational and emotional losses can add up to 10 times the yearly salary and other compensations.
- Hire the right person for any job and you will find out that his/her real value in the company can be multiplied by a factor of 10 compared to his/her cost of employment. Besides doing the job, that employee is avoiding you headaches, worries and/or costly mistakes. He/she is also saving you personal time - which allows you to concentrate on what you should be doing to expand the business!
Dunn & Bradstreet's research shows that 96% of businesses in America fail due to managerial incompetence. Specifically, per Jessie Hagen - former VP at US Bank, 56% of business failures are due to hiring mistakes such as hiring friends, relatives or people without checking if they had the needed skills.
WHERE DOES IT START?
Do not make that fatal mistake of ignoring the importance for you to be a top head hunter. Make sure you have control. Being well prepared for your next hiring campaign starts with the following state of mind:
- Recognize that expanding your business at optimal speed and minimal cost (financial, organizational and emotional) is directly dependent upon hiring right. It is a strategic move that can affect your business more than any other decision.
- Get personally educated on the subject of hiring. You need to become a great headhunter.
- Educate your partners, executives and key employees on the importance of understanding and being involved in the hiring process.
- If you work with a professional recruitment firm, do not just "dump" the responsibility on them. Ask to coordinate and be briefed on their working methods. You must be able to understand AND control the full hiring cycle.
- Ideally you want to develop a standard hiring procedure within the company. This is the best way to develop optimal control on the subject and to avoid legal trouble. Too many business owners neglect the potential liabilities related to recruitment. The Department of Labor and the EEOC are enforcing discrimination laws more than ever. So, you'd better be ready!
WHERE DO YOU GO FROM HERE?
The message is clear: one of your top priorities as a business owner or CEO is to be a super competent, A-rated HEADHUNTER. You read it right: you MUST be able and willing to oversee and be involved in the hiring process - from the beginning to the end.
Become a "Hire-Master." Go to www.thehiremaster.com and discover what can be done to make you a real pro in the most important function of your management position: Attracting top talent!
Patrick Valtin,
CEO Hirebox International
Best-Selling Author of "No Fail Hiring 2.0."
Author of the "Hire-Master" Training KIT.
877-831 2299
