What are the key characteristics you look for in new hires?
The first thing that comes to mind is creative problem solving. If you ask me what's the single hardest thing to find out there in the market for people, it's creative problem solvers. There are all sorts of people who have worked on successful projects, worked for successful brands, had successful experiences, who--in no way, were part of the formative group of people--who creatively solved the problems that made that project or brand a success. Quite, honestly, in an interview, you can tell in the first ten minutes.
People will often ballyhoo their attachment to a successful product or brand of some kind, which is great. You'll, immediately, ask a follow-up question, "OK, so what did you, specifically, do to make that project a success?" Then, as they start to list those things that they can (often they can't), and when they want to start to list those things, you then say, "What went into that decision? It all probably seems obvious now that that was good. It all probably seems obvious right now that Google's home page shouldn't be a portal but, how did you make that decision?"
Again, ten minutes later, you can tell clear as day whether they actually were one of the formative people who came up with the creative solutions to those difficult problems, because you can tell by their depth of thinking on the issue. When you try responding in an interview, intelligently, to a deep question about which you never, actually, thought very deeply, I can tell you weren't one of the key creative problem solvers on the team. So anyway, a little long winded answer but that's the hardest thing to find, if you're asking.
So cool. So true. Here's the rest of the article:
Christian Chabot, CEO of Tableau Software
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