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Talent or Culture?

One question I have for you, write this down.

Do you hire for jobs?

Or do you hire for talent and culture?

There’s so much pressure on people to achieve this, whether it’s a sales target or a customer service target, and yeah, those disciplines are absolutely fantastic.

You’ve got to get that.

But sometimes, you’re just taking a step back and looking at the people.

Are they in the right roles?

• Are you giving them enough to do?
• Are you allowing them to be creative?
• Are you allowing them to, sort of, deliver for your business?

Something surprised me this week.

Not in the… outlandish thing.

I know I said earlier, nothing surprises me.

But, we did an expo up at the BuyYorkshire, with the Yorkshire Mafia, at the Leeds First Direct Arena.

I’ve got two young people, one 19, well, nearly 19, and one, 22, in my team.

One of them’s an apprentice, but you wouldn’t think it.

The people turned up to the show.

They’d put the hours in before.

They got things ready

Team Meetings

We had a bit of a team meeting, before, about what we expect, what was the game plan to get the best out of the investment for the trade show and what our goals were for it.

That was it.

People were coming up to the stand.

We’d got it dressed pretty well, some really high-value collateral at the front.

These people just started talking.

I sort of took a step back.

I actually put those two to the front of the table, and I sort of did like a back office role.

They started engaging with prospects, talking to them.

When I actually listened to both of them, and bear in mind, one’s nearly 19 and the other’s 22.

A couple of years experience, nearly three years experience with one, and six months experience in the other, and they’re absolutely perfect, pitch perfect.

I suppose it’s, they may hear me speak in the office or speak with clients, and they were picking up, they were questioning people, qualifying them correctly, engaging with them, helping them, serving them.

It was more of pride, really, that I’m thinking, wow, these guys represented our business so well.

They both are enjoying networking events, BNI, Women in Business events and things like that.

I’m so proud of them to go out.

It’s not actually until you get to the coal face, and you physically sit there with them and watch them.

They weren’t nervous.

There are some big job titles on the badges that came to the stand and things like that.

They weren’t nervous.

They just actually went out there and delivered it.

So, I think I look at the cost that businesses are having to underwrite, from not letting the lead off the talent and not identifying, then letting people do the job.

Sure, they want training.

Sure, you’ve got to make sure that there are limitations to protect the business, themselves and the customers.

But let them go.

Set them a path, and let them go and I’m telling you, you’ll be absolutely blown away by the talent in your team.

So, as always, sit down with them.

Find out what they really want to go.

Set them a challenge and give ’em that responsibility and I’m sure you’ll be seriously surprised.

So, as always, have a great day.

Hope you find that useful.