I’ve blogged about 7 Things I absolutely Need in a New Creative Hire and my slightly tongue-in-cheek 7 Quirky Questions to Ask a New Creative Hire, but there is another important viewpoint to consider – that of the person you’re hiring. What does the person you’re thinking of hiring absolutely need in order to say ‘yes’ to the hire? Things your new hire absolutely needs from you. ‘Need’ and ‘want’ aren’t the same, remember. In many ways, we all need the same things. What we want varies. We need food, but some of us might want an expensive Vita-Mix to blend, mix, puree, or process recipes to make that food. Wants are flexible, needs are not; not if you want a motivated, contributing, satisfied creative employee.
The interesting thing about uncovering what a person needs is that it can help you decide if they are the right person for the job.
The interesting thing about uncovering what a person needs, is that it can help you decide if they are the right person for the job. It lines up with my earlier blog, 7 Things I Absolutely Need in a New Creative Hire. I’ll skip salary talk; that’s related to budgets; yours and theirs, and stick to more universal needs. I’ve been a business owner for many years, so I trust my experience and my instincts when I hire, but I’ll quote the behavioural coaches here. Mostly, my views align. I see all of the following as ‘needs.’ No one is ever going to answer in neat little phrases like in the list below, but if you listen carefully, you’ll see what their needs are and which ones are most important. It’s my feeling, that you owe it to your business and to your business’s culture, to see if you can satisfy those needs.
Just because we’re in charge, doesn’t mean we don’t have our own needs and goals.
The list below was put together on LinkedIn by business coach and author, Rick Conlow (I’m summarizing here, the full link to his piece is below) and in my view, warrants repeating and reviewing once in a while, even if we’re not thinking about hiring anyone new. It’s something we all need to check in on. Are the people we’re working with getting their needs met? Are we as business owners and managers getting our own needs met in the jobs we do? Just because we’re in charge of a business or organization, doesn’t mean we don’t have our own needs and goals. Are we getting the same things from our own environment as that new hire is expecting? As I mentioned, I feel Rick’s guidelines are essentially universal and apply to all of us, so don’t think of them as just about the people you’re hiring or have already hired. They apply to all of us. Are we setting or getting:
- Clear expectations and goals.
- Recognition and praise.
- Regular communication with leadership.
- Growth.
- Trust.
- Responsibility.
- Respect.
- Pride in their work.
- Ongoing opportunities to learn.
- Achievement.
I think as Business Owners and Managers, we have a responsibility to remind ourselves, ”I know what I need from the people who work for me and how it relates to what the business needs, but what will this new person need?”
Rick’s ‘driving-it-home’ point: “If you want your people to be better, you have to be better as a leader.” I agree. Getting back to that new hire, I think as Business Owners and Managers, we have a responsibility to remind ourselves that “yes, I know what I need from the people who work for me and how it relates to what the business needs, but what will this new person need? Will this job match and meet (at least mostly) their needs?”
Essentially, it’s a symbiotic relationship; if the needs of the person we’re thinking of hiring don’t match fairly closely with what we can deliver and what we believe people really do need, then trouble brews.
This article was syndicated from Business 2 Community: Things Your New Creative Hire Absolutely Needs From You!
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