Hiring as a ‘not no’ vs a ‘yes’

By Duncan Anderson. To see all blogs click here.

Reading time: 6 mins


Summary: Good outcome for new hire = 1. Hiring process + 2. What happens after hiring

  • “Hiring” doesn’t stop after someone signs the contract.

  • IMO “2. What happens after hiring > 1. Hiring process”

    • IMO it doesn’t matter how many good people you hire that could potentially work out if you butcher things after they start. 

    • 1. Hiring process = have the wrong people screened out

      • This is still a very important step 

    • 2. What happens after hiring = have the right people to work out

  • Life doesn’t get easier… but you can slowly get better at it. 

    • I like to think I slowly get better at life. 

    • This is a positive way of saying that, of the hires that haven’t worked out at Edrolo in the last 8 years, if I was better at ‘2. What happens after hiring’, then I think 80% could have worked out. 

  • Hiring heuristic: ‘not no’ vs ‘yes’? 

    • What this means is that I think a more appropriate hiring heuristic is ‘not no’ vs ‘yes’. 

    • IMO one can’t know for sure if a new hire will work out… but can have high confidence a ‘not no’ hire will work out if a good job is done ‘2. after the hiring’. 

    • A ‘not no’ heuristic (vs ‘yes’) shifts the nexus of responsibility into the appropriate place of ‘2. What happens after hiring’. 

  • Jingle: IMO hiring is much like dating, a good first few dates doesn’t precipitate a good long term outcome. IMO it takes ongoing work from both parties to get things to really sing. 


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Details

Expectations expectations expectations

  • They say real estate is ‘location location location’. I often think management is ‘expectations expectations expectations’. 

  • An often repeated mantra is ‘hiring is your most important task’. 

    • While I think the hiring process is very important, I think what actually matters more for whether someone works out or not is what happens after someone starts (vs ‘getting the interview process right’). 

    • Hiring is very important...

    • … however, everything after hiring is even more important. 

  • The stages of hiring:

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  • There is a lot of emphasis placed on “selecting” and “hiring”...

  • ...however I posit that what we do in onboarding and beyond plays an even bigger part in a candidate succeeding in the company

  • Three categories of hires: 

    • 1. Those who definitely won’t work out => which you can screen for in the interview process with a ‘no’

    • 2. Those who work out if you do a good job post hiring => you get a ‘not no’ in the interview process and then you need to do well after they start for things to work. 

    • 3. Those who will definitely work out => despite poor execution post starting working the person works out. 

      • Very rarely you get a ‘hard yes’ in an interview process IMO. 

  • “Try to go to bed a little wiser each day.” Charlie Munger. 

    • Slowly over life I hope to get wiser. 

    • IMO one key component of management is ‘expectations’:

      • Expectations Equation = 1. Figuring out expectations + 2. Setting expectations well + 3. Regulating and guiding people towards the expectations in a firm but fair fashion

    • Comment:

      • In hindsight, IMO at the founding of Edrolo 8 years ago I had stuff all idea of what ‘positive sum expectations’ were for different role types let alone was any good at the rest of the Expectations Equation. 

      • Of the people who haven’t worked out during my 8 years at Edrolo, I’d say 80% could have worked out if we had done a better job post hiring. 

      • If you want a school analogy: a good classroom with happy students learning and working as part of a community is IMO far more on the teacher than the luck of the draw of which students the teacher gets. 

      • I’m not saying hiring doesn’t matter, I’m talking about the percentage of the people who work out after we hired them. 

        • Let’s say you are hiring for one available role:

          • you receive 50x applicants, phone screen 10x and do 5x in person interviews

          • Based on criteria, and some intuition, we’ve picked the person who we believe will have the best chance at succeeding in the role and at the company. 

          • However, could any of the 5x in person interviews have worked out? Quite possibly. To get to this stage, it’s very rarely an obvious decision

      • Of the people you hire that don’t work out, IMO possibly 80% could have worked out had we done better post hiring. 

      • If someone didn’t work out, 5 years ago Duncan thought ‘we hired the wrong person’. Today Duncan thinks ‘5 years ago Duncan’ thought wrong about hiring people. 


Some key factors that matter for a new hire to work out well: 

  • 0. Quality hiring process

  • Factors that matter after a new hire starts: 

    • 1. What the job entails is well understood (eg defined vs undefined job descriptions)

    • 2. Expectations around role set correctly before starting

      • Funnily, part of a start up’s expectations usually involve ‘not knowing what the future holds’

    • 3. Person has skills needed to succeed prior to starting the job vs person has expectations that they’ll need to level themselves up 

    • 4. Person builds relationships with appropriate people to sufficiency+ (eg this blog)

    • 5. Onboarding is sufficient+

    • 6. Ongoing management is sufficient+

    • 7. Vision of company is sufficient+

    • 8. Progress of company towards vision is sufficient+ 

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  • Comment: 

  • I think doing well at all of the above factors is important. 

  • However doing well for different types of roles means doing different things. 

  • Good managers manage different people differently… 

  • ...but we are also ‘all players, we are all coaches’ (ie it’s not only the managers responsibility to get things to work out. It takes two to tango. 

  • Ultimately, different businesses have different ways of operating, different cultures etc. 

    • I don’t think a business exists that would be a perfect fit for every single person in the world

    • The relationship needs to be two ways

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Set Job Descriptions vs Undefined Job Descriptions (doing something new)

  • For a job with a defined job description you can either 1. Buy the expertise or 2. Have strong training to build the expertise post hiring. 

    • Eg professional development here is key. 

  • For a job with an undefined job description (aka need to figure things out) things are different.

    • Eg levelling someone up to be able to do ‘professional self development’ here is key. 

    • In many respects the path to a successful outcome is almost the opposite for a role with a defined job description.  

  • Examples: 

    • Set job description: someone hired to be an Administrative Assistant at real estate office

    • Not set job description: someone hired into a team to help figure out what a brand new product should be (eg Year 7 Science textbook)

    • Set job description: someone hired to be a tax accountant for an established business

    • No set job description: someone whose role is specifically ‘undefined’ for a team with the purpose of ‘making sure things work’. 


Another lens: reportability vs responsibility

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  • IMO for a job with ‘Secondary school’ level of responsibility you should be able to train people well (eg professional development). 

  • IMO for a job with ‘PhD’ level of responsibility, for the hire to succeed they will need to be able to do ‘professional self development’ well. 

  • So the expectations are significantly different in what is needed for a hire to work out. 


If you only take away one thing

  • Hopefully you think you have grown vs yourself 5 years ago. 

  • If this is the case then if you were to encounter some of the circumstances you encountered 5 years ago instead of a bad outcome occurring a good outcome would occur. 

  • To me, in many ways this is equivalent to saying you are now better at “2. What happens after hiring”. 

  • Which is perhaps equivalent to saying in 80% of the circumstances you encounter a bad outcome if you had done things differently you might now be able to get a good outcome!