In 2006, Joel Spolsky mentioned in his article that you want to hire developers that are Smart and Get Things Done. Yes, later on he issued a whole freaking book with the same idea.
Does it only apply to developers though?
The day before yesterday I had yet another 1-on-1 meeting with one of our truly engaged employees. Not someone senior, not someone responsible for huge budgets, not someone working on company-level-critical projects. Yet I felt that it was very important to interact with this person on a personal level to gather feedback, provide feedback, and make sure our short-term and long-term expectations are aligned.
In the course of “free debate” phase of our conversation, it came around a question: “what distinguishes a high-value employee from a mid-value employee?” from a CEO / founder perspective. Yes, we assume we don’t have any low-value employees. We do not, right? ))
Well, at least we hope we do not. 😉
Anyhow, to answer this question I had to really think about it. I mean — any obvious question with an obvious answer should be rethinked from time to time, just to make sure your obvious answer is right. This time I felt that my obvious answer was incomplete, so I gave it some more thought after our conversation.
And while re-formulating the answer, i also understood why it was so important for me to speak with this specific person.
Yes, I personally value people who are Smart and who can and do Get Things Done. To me it doesn’t matter if this person is a developer, QA engineer, Product Owner, UX designer, Accountant or just an Office Manager.
By Smart I mean that a person can really understand the initial problem that has to be solved. Not just some step-by-step instructions, but the root cause we’re solving. Also, this person has to be able to propose a solution, or solutions, to this problem. The smarter this person is — the more creative solutions will be provided.
By Get Things Done I mean ability to actually implement the chosen solution. To delegate properly, to divide into sub-tasks and control the result, to do everything manually if need be. It doesn’t really matter — the result is of value, not the effort.
In other words, the same principle that Joel applied to developers, can be and is already applied to managers, content writers, marketologists, office managers, HR managers, and any other role there is. It’s a damn pain to work with people who are not Smart. Usually they are unable to Get Things Done as well. As not Smart people are not able to grasp the original goal, and tend to proceed doing senseless work until you face-palm and get involved. It is a whole lot of pain to work with Smart people who cannot go out there and Get freaking Things Done. They forget what has to be done, they pass tasks to other people without controlling the results, they don’t let you know there are blockers, they generally behave like 5-year-olds with no sense of responsibility.
And i cannot start to explain how painful it is to work with people who are not Smart and cannot Get Things Done. Please, please let’s not venture that way.
All in all, it makes me so happy that most of the time I can work with Smart people who can Get Things Done. Oh joy, oh happiness! 🙂
PS Thank you very much, Ksenia, for this specific insight I had. It is a pleasure to work with you. 🙂