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Nearly every book on leadership or management will encourage some variation of "hire people who are smarter than you." The wisdom goes that if you hire smart people, they will see opportunities you do not and bring new skills into the organization. As a result, the business grows and taps into new sources of revenue. Yes, you have heard this before, but if you look at your org. chart, how many of your recent hires were, in fact, smarter than you?
For as much as we talk about wanting people to challenge us and wanting the best players on our team, we rarely commit fully to that swing. In truth, we feel threatened. We don't like being wrong, and as much as we say we value new ideas, we often hide from that discomfort in a variety of ways.
(Related: The Value of Prospects Who Don't Close)
And how we hire is one of the biggest ways we hide.
Before you can change this dynamic in yourself and in your business, first frame the goal: Effective hiring gives you a path to leaving your role and pursuing the next level. In other words, the people you bring into the team should allow you to step into a higher position and pursue higher order tasks.
Again, this is not groundbreaking. You hire an office assistant because answering phones and managing appointments is not the best use of your time. As your business grows, however, you might forget that the wisdom still applies.
