Finding and Empowering Employees

You have to have the right people to be in this business, so empower your employees. The way to empower someone is to give them not only the full responsibility, but also the full authority and power to assign who will work on each project and how it will be done. Executives and managers need to know I won't micromanage them, but they will be held responsible for things that go either right or wrong.

The way to "disempower" people is to set limitations on what they can and cannot do. Recognize when they do a job well. It doesn't cost anything to give someone a pat on the back, and when we interview top-notch talent to come join our firm, even though the pay is good and the benefits are good, we find that people don't come for those reasons, and people don't stay for those reasons. One major reason people quit jobs is that they don't feel recognized for the job they're doing. Part of empowering people is to recognize them when they've done well. Don't be threatened by it. Recognize and reward people who are doing phenomenal work. It's as simple as that.

How do we find these high-performing individuals? Without question, referrals are a very important aspect of hiring. It's very easy for people who have personality flaws - the kind of person who'll fly off the handle and start screaming four-letter words at people in an effort to motivate them - to hide those personality flaws during an interview. But if you know someone who has worked with that person, they will give you a good window into what that person is like and how easy it is to work with that person. That's why referrals are so helpful to us.

To qualify people the first step is a screening interview to determine whether a person is a good candidate for the position. The second step is an interview where we talk about our values. It's important to understand that by the time people are of working age, their personalities are usually set for life. Unless faced with some life-altering event, adults don't usually change their values. As an organization we've been around for 10 years, and we probably won't change, either.

We let people know the key values of our business. We try to learn what their core values are. We give them a skills test on the area they are applying for. For salespeople we have an online exam that seeks to determine whether they have the strengths that will make them a good salesperson. On the technical side, for our development people who do training for us, we have a technical exam.

We ask people to assess themselves on the front end. We ask them how good they are at specific tasks they will most likely face in their job here. We ask them to rate themselves on their knowledge of specific elements of the job - "10" if they wrote the book, down to "1" if they can't find the bookstore. This gives us a very good idea of how well they assess their own skills versus where they really are.

The last step is a meeting in which the potential new hire will meet with people he or she would be working with. The people have to unanimously agree that this person is fit for the business; if they don't agree, we don't extend an offer.

We need to share the same fundamental values to build a team that will last. I am a big believer in commitment and hard work. There must be core values for the company, as well. The team needs to share those core values. Obviously, there has to be enthusiasm, passion, and excitement, because great things don't get done otherwise. A final thing would be great communication. For us to be able to work together effectively as a team, we need to have a plan, and we need to be able to communicate to each other changes or new things that pop up between one another in the loop. Solid communication skills are a final key ingredient.