Building Robust Teams That Win

Every founder who has hired badly says the same thing afterwards: the signs were there in the first fortnight. They were. What was missing was not perception, it was a process and hiring without one is the most expensive gamble a small business regularly takes.

Hire for the problem, not the CV

A job description that lists responsibilities attracts people who can perform responsibilities. Write down instead the two or three outcomes this person owns in their first year and the interview stops being a conversation about the past and becomes one about the work.

• Name the outcomes before the title. If you cannot, you are not ready to hire, you are ready to be relieved.
• Give a small piece of real work, paid and see what comes back. One afternoon of this outperforms three interviews.
• Ask for specifics until you reach one. Vague answers about a real achievement are still vague.
• Take references seriously and ask the one question that matters: would you hire them again.

The first ninety days decide it

Most people who fail in a small company did not lack ability. They were dropped into an undefined role, given no standard to hit, corrected inconsistently for a month and had formed their working habits before anyone told them what good looked like.

• Write down what success at ninety days is and hand it over on day one.
• Give them something real to complete in week one. Nothing builds belonging like shipping.
• Meet weekly, briefly, on outcomes rather than activity.
• Correct early and quietly. The kindest feedback is the one given while it is still small.

Keeping people is mostly not about money

Pay has to be fair and once it is, it stops being the reason anyone stays. People leave managers, ceilings and chaos. They stay for work that stretches them, a boss whose standards are consistent and the sense that the place is going somewhere they want to have been.

Which puts most of retention back in the founder's hands and almost none of it in the salary budget.

Let go quickly when it is wrong

The hardest and most necessary discipline. A hire that is not working is known to everyone, including the person, long before it is acted on and every week of delay costs the team more than it costs the founder to have the conversation. Done fairly, with notice and without blame, it is the most respectful available option for everyone in the room.