Most of us working on opening the Mirage were overwhelmed – there was so much to learn to do what we had to do. Every day we tackled challenging projects and fought hard to complete them on time. I frequently write here about our philosophy to ‘hire for attitude and train for skill’ – when we first adopted this, it was just one of so many new things we were implementing back then that it nearly got lost in the shuffle. We were so heavily involved in researching which attitude to hire for that this overall concept seemed small by comparison. Forgetting for the moment that we decided to test for general optimism, the concept of placing more emphasis on attitude than education, skills, and experience was terribly challenging for our hiring managers. They’d always looked only at experience as the determining factor in hiring and were resistant to change. It's been nearly 40 years since we started down that road and I still find hiring managers who still hire only for experience and are likewise resistant to changing to hiring for attitude. But every time – then and now, I explain the benefit and am proud when they come around. And after all this time, I am amazed that what seemed like just one more thing in that large group of things has endured and become a relatively big thing in the world of hiring. The moral of this story: pay attention to the little things today.
Robert Brault (born 1938): American author known for his insightful, concise observations on life, love, and the human experience.
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