I am again vacationing for the summer in the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York: the weather here is beautiful and the solitude good for the soul. These are remote areas and the local businesses have difficulty finding employees: one newly purchased restaurant remains closed for lack of staff. But one we found open last night had a waitress that the proprietor referred to as a ‘gift from heaven’: smiling, engaged, proficient and fun. When I asked where he found her he told me she was a friend of a friend who was referred by another friend: meaning she wasn’t hired because of some complex assessment process. She was, in a word, wonderful: you couldn’t fake or train the passion she had for being a genuine service professional. Which goes back to my theory about hiring for attitude and training for skill. Focus on hiring employees like this by learning how to discover what comes naturally in each of your applicants. It’s the only way to successfully operate your business today.
Barbara Ann Corcoran (b. 1949): American businesswoman, investor, speaker, consultant, syndicated columnist, author, and television personality (on Shark Tank).
No comments:
Post a Comment