Book Review – Who, by Geoff Smart and Randy Street
Monday, October 12th, 2009
Who, Solve Your Number One Problem
“The most important decisions that businesspeople make are not what decisions, but who decisions.”
-Jim Collins, Author of Good to Great
Who is a great book, with lots of excellent real life “hiring” stories from top executives. It also includes examples of how many get hiring wrong, and a “101” plan to turn interviewing into a more thorough, objective process. Geoff Smart incorporates his father’s “Topgrading” hiring philosophy, but does a good job taking the book a bit further, discussing other practices used (commonly or uncommonly) in employee search and hiring.
As one might suspect the book does a fair amount of self-promoting (ghsmart), but for those frustrated with hiring, they’ll find real, applicable solutions; such as common interviewing pitfalls to avoid, tips to determine organizational culture, and the importance of vetting out personal competencies needed in a position.
The frustrated hiring professional will realize lots to sink their teeth into, in terms of creating a “scorecard,” (in my experience most commonly used in executive search businesses), and screening and interview guides. However, if there is an area worth critique, it is in terms of suggested reference questions – they lack creativity and strategy, and probably wouldn’t uncover the real “gold” bits of needed information.