Hiring for attitude: why undeveloped great teammates beat skilled bad ones

Executive overview

Most hiring focuses on finding the most skilled candidates. But highly skilled people who are already great teammates are effectively unavailable — they're happy where they are. Skilled people who are poor teammates are toxic, not team members.

The only viable hire is someone undeveloped but with genuine good character. You can build skills; you can't build character.

Hire for attitude and coachability, not current skill level.

The four-quadrant hiring matrix

• Four quadrants: good/bad teammate on one axis, developed/undeveloped on the other
• Bad teammate + undeveloped: obvious reject
• Great teammate + highly developed: unobtainable — they won't leave
• Skilled + bad teammate (mercenaries): useful as contractors, destructive as employees
• Great teammate + undeveloped: the only realistic and worthwhile hire

Why mercenaries are a trap

• Confusing skill for character is the most costly hiring mistake
• A mercenary can appear to be a good teammate until embedded in the team
• Bring them in for a specific incision, then let them go — never as a core hire

Why great teammates compound in value

• They raise the performance and morale of everyone around them
• You can teach skills; you create value by driving their development
• Building a company is also a vehicle for growing people, not just revenue
• Former teammates who thrive elsewhere is the real measure of hiring success

Real examples

• Hired an Australian break-dancer running a snow cone business in China — loved his attitude and writing; now running content
• Hired Terri Wilson returning from the Peace Corps; she became director of operations and continued growing post-acquisition
• Both hires would have failed every conventional screening process