Hiring is really hard. One of the smartest and highest-performing people I know once told me that only 50% of the junior people he hired were truly good. Economics professor and writer Tyler Cowen and entrepreneur / investor Daniel Gross try to address this in Talent, one of the most interesting books on hiring I’ve read.
Why is hiring so hard? Because many of us are are bad interviewers. We generally want to hire people who are similar to us, either in terms of background or personality. We all think we have the ability to judge talent and ability based on a conversation. We might hire a smooth-talking candidate that underperforms, or pass on a high-performing candidate from a different culture or country who comes across as overly formal.
Cowen and Gross attempt to tackle this in their book, which I found very interesting. If I could distill it down to 2 topics, it would be around interviewing thoughtfully and understanding what you’re really looking for in the hire
Interview thoughtfully. As mentioned above, most people are not great at interviewing others. And most candidates will prep for interviews and have well-rehearsed answers ready. The authors recommend a few strategies to get more data from interviews:
Ask people what they do on weekends / outside of work as this reveals their true preferences / personality. Are they training for a marathon? Writing a book? Spending times with friends? There is no absolute right or wrong answer, but different traits will be better for different jobs
In general, ask more creative questions and push people:
“What are the open tabs on your browser right now?” (you are asking them "how hard do you work” or “what do you really do in your free time” without being direct or inviting exaggeration)
“Did you feel appreciated at your last job? What was the biggest way in which you did not feel appreciated?” (Good way to test to see if they are overly bitter or hold grudges)
If you ask somebody “tell me about a time you balanced priorities” and they give you an answer, keeping asking for more and more examples. Do they run out after 1, or can they give 5 or 10?
Try to get people out of their comfort zone or routine by doing an interview as a walk, or going to a coffee shop halfway through. This may result in them “letting down their guard” (not in a bad way) and providing more revealing answers.
Realize what you’re looking for: Pure intelligence is over-rated for many jobs. Different jobs require different traits (customer service = friendliness, for example) and you should focus on those as opposed to looking for the perfect package
The most interesting part of the book, in my opinion, was the discussion of underrated characteristics of high performers. A few they give are:
Stamina: the ability to produce a lot of work / output over a long period of time and have high energy levels - an example given is Bob Dylan, who has released dozens of albums over 60 years across genres, starred in movies, published multiple book of paintings and drawings - while continuing to tour.
Self-improvement: can somebody learn and self-improve quickly? This is like compound interest, where someone who learns slightly faster will be way ahead after 10, 20, 30 years. They suggest focusing less on people’s absolute skill levels and personality and more on their “rate of change” and ability to grow
Sturdiness: getting work done every “with extreme regulatory and without long streaks of non-achievements”
One to avoid is “demand avoidance” - people who “have a hard time knucnkling under bosses. They are usually very smart and perceptive, and acutely aware of workplace hierarchies and markers of status and power at work. As a result, they have a hard time being told what do do and “sucking it up.” While they might be a great entrepreneur (as they can be their own boss), you don’t want them working for you
A few reactions:
I read this primarily from the perspective of somebody who is selling their own talent as opposed to selecting talent, as I’m not running around and hiring dozens of people every year by myself. So the discussion on what traits make somebody valuable resonated from that perspective.
Agree with the importance they place on stamina - the highest performers I’ve worked with all have an extraordinary ability to “get things done” and produce a very high volume and high quality output of work. If you are a worker, your question should be, “how do I improve my stamina?” Increasing your physical stamina - how fast you run a mile, for example - is fairly straightforward. But there isn’t really much discussion about how to generate lots of high quality work consistently (or even how to focus for sustained periods of time). Part of this, I think, is because work stamina is less of a discrete skill and more of a lifestyle / habit - it’s what your actions are for many hours every day.
I think you can try to work on things that interest / engage you and set-up your environment to maximize focus (e.g., block distracting websites, don’t get desktop notifications from Twitter).
Any other ideas here?
I appreciated their discussion around not favoring people who sound smooth over those who might be more formal or even sound like a “weirdo” (to borrow their term). I feel like in the mid-2010s, everybody was obsessed with “executive presence” and how they came across. For whatever reason, that has gone away a bit (likely driven by 1) Zoom calls and 2) people realizing that this concept can introduce a ton of bias). I think this is a good thing!
I also liked the discussion about trying to define what exactly you are looking for. Feels like many employers all want the “total package” (e.g., great school, multiple prestigious jobs in highly competitive industries), when all of that stuff might not matter.
They also provide a number of interview questions they think are useful - a few of my favorite ones below:
“What is one view held by the mainstream or as a consensus that you wholeheartedly agree with?”
“In the context of the workplace, what does the concept of ‘sin’ really mean? And how does it differ from a mere mistake? Can you illustrate this from the experience of one of your co-workers?”
“In what ways are you not WYSIWYG [what you see is what you get]?”
“How do you think this interview is going?”