Hire people with potential. 

In busy times, the old joke about job qualification was that an applicant merely needed to have a heartbeat to qualify. This is funny, but sad. Does it really serve our organizations well in the long term to hire the first available person with a heartbeat? If their values, potential, and abilities aren’t aligned with ours, we may have a revolving door of turnover without success that burdens leadership with what can be perpetual staffing challenges. Every hire that doesn’t go well restricts the possibilities of that department. 

We started employing the hiring practice of screening applicants with the “4-C’s” framework: 

Character: If honesty and integrity aren’t present, they are very hard to develop within an individual 

Chemistry: Is there the potential that they will be a good fit for the respective department and leadership in that area?  

Commitment: Although, hard to measure on the front end, does it appear they may have values and goals that align with your organization that could facilitate them contributing to team for the long term? 

Competence: I specifically place this one last because almost anyone can be taught to do the required tasks of a particular job.  A candidate who is teachable and willing can have competence developed within them.  There is an undeniable attraction to individuals who have experience, but we need to be cautious not to place too much importance on this. If a person has all the experience but is inflexible to adapt to our team, or our unique way of doing things, then that competence is no longer an asset. 

It needs to be said that there is a 5th C that plays into the success of employees, but this isn’t part of our mandate to screen the individual because it describes our organization. The 5th C is Culture. Do we have an attractive workplace? Is there an openness to new recruits? Are there good training and advancement possibilities? Are there good people who will make it a priority to help new team members to be successful? What is the morale like? 

John Maxwell has said that “the only way any venture is ultimately sustainable, is if it develops leaders, who develop leaders, who develop leaders”. 

Do we have Big Picture thinkers? Do we have a good balance of Teachers and Developers? 

Is there a motivation to understand why your team-members are motivated to come to work for your organization? Do we know what the “WHY’s” are for our people? Has every department named their top 20% and engaged a strategic plan for developing that top 20%? Do our leaders understand and practice proactive accountability? 

Probably one of the key elements that needs to be present is for the leadership to see farther and with more clarity than that of the competition.  Not only what’s on the horizon, but what’s beyond that?  How will we predict change and adapt proactively? 

There’s no substitute for thinking ahead! 

Warren Peters (President of Atlas Industries)