Compentency or Attitude Which one would you Hire
Written by: Don Miller
Posted on November 23, 2007
Filed Under Starting your Online Business
Recently I posted an article about Choosing Your Attitude. It was generally well received based on the number of sites that tracked back. However, is attitude all you need to be successful? Let’s give that some thought. People often confuse a confidence with competence. Confidence is a function of attitude. Competence is a function of ability. If you think you can do something that is confidence. However if you know you can do something that is competence. The two are vastly different. Add into the equation experience for which there is no replacement.
Years ago I owned a small business providing repair for restaurant equipment. The business grew rapidly and I was seemingly interviewing potential employees weekly. Like it or not, I usually formed an opinion of the person interviewing within the first few minutes of our talk. I remember the specific need to hire two technicians during a particularly busy time in my business. I probably interviewed 20 people. I settled on one young man that came through the door with a great attitude and a hunger to learn with no experience. I was enamored with his attitude. I considered him the front runner. However my second choice was not so clear cut. He did not have a great attitude but seem to possess an air of competence about himself. After much consideration I hired him as my second choice.
Our work obviously included some mechanical ability. Being mechanically inclined myself, it did not take long to discover I had made an error in one of my selections. While possessing a great attitude my first choice did not know which end of a screwdriver to hold and it was painful to watch. My second choice quickly became one of my biggest producers. From that point on all things being equal, I hired competence over attitude and here’s why.
Everyone has a level of competence in their respective field of endeavor. However everyone has a ceiling on what they will be able to absorb, learn or assimilate. On a scale of one to ten lets assume everyone can raise their competence 2 levels. Now let’s say the person you hire is a 2 in competence with a great attitude. On his best day the most you can expect is a less than average employee, granted with great attitude. You’re not going to get out of that person what is not naturally present within them. Thinking you will get them up to speed is not going to happen. As a friend of mine likes to say, “You can’t fix stupid”. Compounding the problem is the effect it will have on the rest of your team. Even the strongest links in your chain will grow weary of covering for the weak. I have been there, done that. Conversely a great attitude has no ceiling. I can take a person with an attitude problem and grow him to a great attitude with some coaching and mentoring. You can fix that. Remember, Choosing your Attitude, your attitude is a function of choice.
Now, the rest of the story. My first hire on that day lasted 3 weeks in my company. The second lasted 15 years and eventually opened up a branch office in another city for me, where he is today, Making Sales and Making Money for himself. These two young men taught me an important lesson about my hiring practices. Did I start hiring people with bad attitudes? No not at all. What I did look for is someone with a winning combination of all 3 components. Competence, experience, and attitude, which is a winning combination. You don’t find many of those types in unemployment lines. Those kinds are happy and producing for other companies. That’s what you want. Go after those types.
Welcome feel free to look around. Subscribing to my Feed or Newsletter guarantees you don't miss any new content, give it two weeks, you will love it RSS feed. Thanks for visiting! Hope to see you again soon.
Tags:attitude, making money
Related Posts
- Articles
If you like these Subscribe now, Fresh Content Added Daily The Times They are a Changin Social Media and the Power of Giving The Truth About Home Based Business Opportunities So When Do You Make Money Building Rapport and Relationship with your Readers Lead
The Art of Negotiation | TylerCruz.com: An Internet Entrepreneur’s JourneyI like to think of myself as an astute negotiator. It is in my system and I love it. A freind and I were talking the other who I consider the one of the best negotiators I've encountered, (
Choose your Attitude Choose your SuccessTaking Responsibility For Your Attitude Our society today teaches and embraces the idea of NOT taking responsibility for anything, especially if it produces a negative result or circumstance. Most of us are quick to accept praise and frankly we all
Fear of Failure and Home Based BusinessPerhaps the biggest obstacle you will face in starting your home based business is yourself. I interviewed 5 people for this post. Each possess unique knowledge, skills and abilities. Each of them could be successful in business. It is likely
Alexa Rank Improves , Thank youI would like to express a heart felt thanks to everyone who has visited this site. I am not quite sure of how Alexa computes their rankings. However this site has gone form near 9 million in early August to
Why Home Businesses FailBlogging Zoom New Social Network Increases Traffic
One of the smartest things I have done was to submit an article to Courtney Tuttle's The Internet Marketers United Group Writing Project. Almost overnight my site traffic quadrupled and my article on Choosing your Attitude was picked
Get Rich Quick Scams do work…. for the ScammersEvery day, thousands of people turn over a new leaf and decide to start a home-based business. One major downside to this process is the unfortunate abundance of work-at-home scams, cleverly disguised as legitimate home-based business opportunities.
Comments
3 Responses to “Compentency or Attitude Which one would you Hire”
Leave a Reply
Subscribe in a Reader
Tools
You seems to put competence over attitude in this post. As a employee, not an employers point of view, I munch prefer to work with someone with a great attitude.
I can’t stand people with attitude problems.
From that perspective I agree and those issues should be handled by your bosses, however from the employers point of few , competency is a must,
Of course it’s attitude. People with good attitude are always willing to learn so competence is not a problem later…