Who

Publisher's Summary

It's happened to the best of us. You have a job opening to fill. You interview a range of qualified candidates and hire the best of the bunch - or so you think. You soon realize that the person who seemed like a perfect fit during the interview doesn't have what it takes to do the job.

In Who, Geoff Smart and Randy Street, of the management consulting firm ghSmart, combine their experiences training thousands of managers and executives with the most revealing and comprehensive research ever on the subject of how to hire successfully, as well as advice and stories from more than 20 billionaires and 60 CEOs. The result is a simple, four-step method for hiring with confidence, designed for everyone from the CEO on down. Who shows you how to avoid the most common pitfalls of hiring, how to identify "A Players" - people who can perform their job better than 90 percent of the candidates in their field - and how to make sure the best candidate will be excited to join your organization.

Hiring is every bit as important an element of successful business as other key principles, such as leadership and strategy. Who should be required listening for anyone in a management position.

©2008 Geoff Smart (P)2008 Tantor

Great book but need PDF of Scorecard material

Great book and I plan to implement the methodology but this will be difficult without all the detail materials referred to in the book. Author should include a PDF with the critical materials discussed in the book.

11 of 11 people found this review helpful

Top Three Business Book of All Time

I've experienced that having the right people is by far the most important factor to make a business successful. More important than having the best ideas, best strategy, most capital, etc. And THIS book is the best process to use to find and hire the best people. We will be thoroughly implementing this process at Hunter Rowe. My other best business books are Traction (by Gino Wickman) and Good to Great. My favorite business biography is "Titan: The John D Rockefeller Story".

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Excellent guidelines for hiring A players

If you're a hiring manager and use the traditional interview process (gut check), this is a great resource. The book provides a wealth of information and step-by-step instructions to source, screen, select, and sell top candidates. It's a short read (listen) and well worth the time.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Great book, boring voice

The book offers simple but uncommon wisdom. In the past, I have made all the mistakes they list, and have improved my hiring thanks to this book.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Excellent help for hiring

This is a goldmine of macro and micro helps in hiring people, the right people. I even think it would be good to read if you were looking for a job to become familiar with great interview questions.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

great tips

If you could sum up Who in three words, what would they be?

very informative and ground breaking.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Who?

the principals and techniques used

What about Patrick Lawlor’s performance did you like?

clear

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

made me think more about hiring

Any additional comments?

would recommend to anyone

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

interesting technique

Very boring book to listen to. Interesting technique and nicely revealing case study. The entire book could and should be concluded in one concise paragraph, or a simple one page worksheet.

3 of 5 people found this review helpful

Who Review

Really great book. I am actually planning to read again and take notes, because this book provides a lot of useful information.

Hire More People Like Your Best Employees

Think of the best person and second best person on your team. What would happen if they left? It would be a disaster. What would happen if everyone on your team was like them? You wouldn't have to worry about work because the right people are getting it done. The fastest way to improve a company's performance is to improve the talent of the workforce.

After getting past the first chapter of this book (which is a sales pitch on this method), it then goes into a lot of useful advice on hiring:
* Scorecard: Create a list of outcomes that the candidate would need to accomplish and list of competencies that the candidate need to possess (such as efficiency, honesty, integrity, intelligence, analytical skills, and commitment).
* Source: Stay connected with people you want on your team. So when there is a job opening, you have the right candidate in mind.
* Select: Conduct a series of structured interviews. Don't waste time with different individuals asking the same question or with trick questions (that is irrelevant for the job).
* Sell: Make the position attractive to the ideal candidate. If a candidate rejects the job offer because of a counteroffer from the current employer, you just lost the opportunity to hire an A Player.

For those with demonstrated failure in hiring

I listened to the first 37 minutes and it felt like an infomercial. I turned it off and decided to return it, I couldn't stand it any longer. This book is may be good for someone who has no instinctual hiring ability and had demonstrated failure in hiring. The four points to the A method, as little as it was referenced in the first 37 minutes, seemed very novice and common sense to me. It obviously has values to others based on the ratings and the successful professionals that referred me to it.