Hiring People Who Are Outside Your Comfort Zone! with Aaron Elder of Crelate

It is all too common to look for the person who brings the skills you deem necessary for your role. But the person who brings all the skills may not be the best person in the role. There are a lot of people who are in adjacent industries or sitting on the sidelines who are open to an opportunity like yours. 

What does it take to find great people? Looking past the skills for evidence of success that will be transferable to your company. As we all know, past performance is a key indicator of future performance.

Today’s Quote: 

“Take a chance! All life is a chance. The man who goes farthest is generally the one who is willing to do and dare.” 

- Dale Carnegie

Our guest today: Aaron Elder, Co-Founder & CEO of Crelate  

Aaron is a  serial entrepreneur with 4 successful products, 3 companies and 2 exits under his belt. He is a designer, turned coder, turned CTO, turned CEO who is passionate about creating products people love and make the world better.

Crelate exists to help businesses continuously align people with opportunities. Aaron has a passion for taking a chance on people who are changing careers - giving people a shot

Today we discuss:

• Hiring outside the norm to combat the talent shortage
• a recipe to successfully hire 

Solution to the talent shortage 

• Taking an age blind approach
• Considering the skills level
• Not just a blind hire

Challenges?

• Casting a wider net- seeing through things 
• Opening the holes in the net
• Look past skills to the ancillary skills
• Career shows you as a non-fact (switching careers-coming in as a jr person). Measure people based on risk rather than
• A propensity for learning new things, being innovative and growing, you will probably be able to bring that to the table

Issue of Compensation

• Is a pay cut really realistic? Taking a shot
• Until you talk to them, you don’t really know. 
• *** Training and investment need to be real. The organization needs to be all in on people development

Rick’s input

• Look for transferable skills
• Adjacent industries
• Evidence of success

How do we fix it?

• Finding the people who are performers and not just seat fillers
• indicator of career changes,
• Tenacity & grit, raw materials
  • Look for evidence of past success
• Hide Easter egg’s in the job post.
• Questionnaires
• Invest in Recruiters- matchmakers
• Have more conversations with people and look past the resume
• Internal training programs
• The long game is the only solution he knows.
• Short term road bumps but long term it is an investment in an approach.
• Be self-aware of the game
  • optimize for the long game (bring investors on board)
• Looking to solve a long term problem - at least a 2-year problem
• Education & training which require intense focus and investment upfront. 
• Benefit? -the path for retention, earned loyalty, path for mutual benefit
• If you are not growing, you will have a hard time keeping people who want to be growing
• Take more chances on people who do not have ALL the skills
• Creating training, review process that career ladder, reviews, culture for people to enjoy
• Invest in systems to automate points 1 & 2 more possible

Key Takeaways:

• Solve the talent gap/shortage by being able to take chances on people, give them a chance to tell their story and see if it fits. Look past skills to underlying achievements, velocity, grit, etc.
• Invest in the long haul - internal learning, time, training, the culture of personal growth and achievement.
• Do what you can to make #1 and #2 more efficient. That means the right tools and processes that fit those goals. Not work against them.