Don’t waste your time hiring people you’ll eventually micro-manage.
The hiring process can be exhausting. You sift through stacks of resumes, conduct Zoom interviews where candidates are often guarded and hesitant. You’re eager to get to know them; they’re nervous to impress you. You follow the usual HR script: asking templated questions, filling out scorecards, and submitting feedback. The entire process feels stiff and unnatural, more like a marathon than a meaningful conversation. But after filtering through twenty candidates, three stand out.
One of them is special. The other two are perfectly fine—nice people—but they lack confidence and the ability to work independently. The standout? They have the “it” factor. They’re a go-getter—a doer, a builder. The kind of person you can trust to seize commercial opportunities. You’ve heard of their work ethic through your network. They currently work for a competitor, and you know they’ve achieved hard-to-reach goals. You want them on your team to replicate that success.
That’s how the hiring process should work: finding high-agency individuals who can make an impact from day one. But too often, we end up hiring someone who doesn’t quite measure up—someone you believed would improve with coaching or time. Their references assured you they were great, but there was no concrete evidence of their work or a portfolio to review.
Who not to hire:
- Someone who requires constant check-ins
- Someone you don’t fully trust with customers
- Someone who moves at a snail’s pace and misses deadlines
- Someone who struggles with decision-making and overthinks everything
- Someone toxic to team morale
- Someone who bypasses you to complain directly to upper management
Instead, focus relentlessly on hiring high-agency doers—the people who will bring real value. At the end of the day, you need individual contributors who make a positive difference and create a low-friction environment within your team. They should be coachable, take feedback to heart, and strive to become the best versions of themselves. Finding these superstars requires effort on your part. Don’t just rely on someone’s word that a candidate is excellent—dig deeper. Investigate their past work, review their portfolio, and ask probing questions that get to the core of their aspirations and approach to success.
Why you should hire high-agency doers:
- They find solutions and troubleshoot independently.
- You can trust them with customers, without fear of missteps or embarrassment.
- They venture out to drive revenue and seize growth opportunities on their own.
- They don’t engage in toxic behavior or constantly complain.
- They make intelligent suggestions for improvement without causing drama or monopolizing team time.
- They reflect on their own performance and continuously seek improvement.
- They have personal career goals that align with, but extend beyond, the company’s objectives.
- You feel proud when they exceed expectations because they’ve embraced your coaching.
- You never have to wonder what they’re doing—they’re always moving the needle forward.
These are just a few things to keep in mind when hiring high-agency people. You’ll quickly identify them by their background and how they answer questions. Make your interviews count by asking tough questions upfront rather than discovering performance issues down the line.
Interview Checklist for Finding High-Agency Doers:
- What are your career goals for the next 12-48 months?
- What steps are you actively taking to achieve those goals?
- Why do customers trust you? Can you share examples of both positive and negative customer interactions?
- How would your colleagues describe you?
- How do you handle stress in your career?
- Do you take responsibility or blame others when mistakes happen?
- How do you learn from mistakes?
- What would you do if you were working alone without any guidelines?
- Can you give examples of working under tight deadlines?
- Do you wait for instructions, or do you take initiative and figure things out on your own?
Ryan Stemen, MBA 