Are you great?

Today I finished „Winning“ by Jack Welch. I have to admit, I had some prejudice before reading (actually listening, as I have the audio book) because I think from all that I heard before Jack Welch has a fundamentally different value system than I have. And actually it shines through in some moments. Nevertheless I have to say, that I really liked the book a lot and that there are very few things to disagree. Maybe that’s a criterion why this book is not just good, but great. It helps you independently of your leadership style even independently of your value system. One chapter I really like a lot and I want to write about now is the chapter “Hiring”. Mr Welch says, you can only win if you have the right team. I couldn’t agree more!

Yes there is a lot of lip service on this, especially in the software industry. If I remember correctly, in every single interview I did in my life all the companies had an “over the edge, great team of super proffesionals”. I am really lucky to just pick the right companies and I feel very sorry for all the poor companies where only the below average people work. Needless to say, that the reality did not always match exactly the situation told/sold in the interviews.

But back to Mr. Welch: if the team is the most important success factor, a leader should spend a lot of attention to hiring. And again I have to completely agree. If a leader can only do one thing right, he should focus on hiring. So Mr Welch offers a set of characteristics you should pay attention when doing interviews where every employee should score very well (in most if not all points):

Integrity: The first is integrity, which is pretty obvious so I will not write too much about it. But you should obviously never have somebody in your team you do not trust.

Intelligence: Again he is right. It is not so much about knowledge anymore. In times where half of the things you know are worthless after 3-5 years why bother too much for knowledge. More important is the ability learn faster than the speed of light! So don’t confuse knowledge with intelligence.

Maturity: Wow, that is not too often used as criteria I would guess. But he is so right again. It is so exhausting to work with people that are not mature. And this is not a function of age! I know guys who are not even 20 years old and are more mature than others I know who already left their 40s behind. So watch out for this one!

Positive Energy: There are these people waking up with a smile on their face just longing for the work day to deal with the toughest problems. They seem to have infinite power. If you are able to get one on your team, don’t wait a second…

Energize Others: This one is different from the point before. It is not about having energy it is about freeing the energy of others. This is an ability that is so important in tough times. Do you have enough of this in your team?

Edge: This one is hard to explain. There are people who always make the right decisions and more important, know when to make the decision. They don’t need all the facts just enough to make no mistake. As I said hard to explain, but I hope you get the point.

Execution: Execution is about “just doing it”. Simple to describe, hard to do and unfortunately not too wide spread.

Passion: This is the last one. There are people who have passion for their job. And this is what you need. If you don’t feel passion for your job, your doing something wrong (which most people I know do). But that might be another blog entry.

So why do I write this, when most people never have to decide whether to hire someone or not. Simply because these criteria are not only helpful for hiring. Again, most of the people I know would say they are great, outstanding or at least above average. And again, if Gauss is right (and he seems to be), where are all the others? So if you think you are a great employee, a great developer, how do you score in the fields above? Are you mature? Do you energize others (and would they answer the question the same way you did)? Are you really passionate about your job (so when have you read your last book on something about your job)? If you are unsure about the answers why don’t you ask a fellow about his view of you? Being a good (not to say worthy) professional employee is harder than it might look…

Ciao Alex