How Do You Find the Right Candidate to Hire?
Stop looking for the perfect unicorn. Define what the job actually requires, hire for the qualities that are difficult to teach, and train the parts your business can teach.
A lot of hiring problems start with a job description that quietly asks for everything.
Someone who already knows your industry. Already knows your software. Has done the exact job before. Communicates perfectly. Learns quickly. Works independently. Loves change. Pays obsessive attention to detail. Wants to grow with the company. And somehow fits the salary you planned to pay.
That candidate may exist.
But you may also be rejecting very good employees because they do not already know things your company could teach them in a few weeks.
What does this person actually need to bring with them on day one, and what can we reasonably teach after they arrive?
Focus on the qualities that are harder to teach
For many small-business roles, two areas deserve more attention than familiarity with your exact company, software, or workflow.
How they work with people
Look at communication, motivation, response to feedback, interpersonal style, reasons for changing jobs, and how their behavior is likely to affect the team around them.
How they learn and adapt
Understand how quickly they absorb new information, how they respond to change, how much structure they need, and whether that learning style matches the actual demands of the position.
This does not mean every role needs the fastest learner, the most ambitious employee, or the person with the highest apparent potential.
Different jobs require different kinds of people.
Hire for behavioral fit, not just “culture fit”
Personality is the more obvious part of the decision.
You are bringing another person into an existing team. They can make that team stronger, introduce qualities the team is missing, or make everyday work substantially harder.
But be careful with the idea of culture fit.
Hiring people because they seem similar to everyone already there can produce a comfortable team that also shares the same weaknesses.
Instead, look for behavioral fit with the role and team.
You are not looking for someone you would personally want to hang out with.
You are trying to understand how this person is likely to behave inside the job you are asking them to do.
Stable, defined roles
Not every position needs to become a career ladder.
Some jobs have clear responsibilities, relatively predictable work, and limited advancement. Own that instead of pretending every role leads somewhere bigger.
Someone who genuinely values stability and becoming very good at a defined job may be a much better fit than someone expecting rapid promotion.
Repetitive, precision roles
Inventory, scheduling, documentation, production, order fulfillment, billing support, and quality checks may involve repetition and relatively little novelty.
That is not a flaw in the position.
Someone who hates routine may be a poor fit regardless of how impressive their résumé is.
High-interaction roles
Reception, sales, hospitality, instruction, and customer coordination require a different profile.
These employees may spend all day handling interruptions, building rapport, explaining information, and responding to different personalities.
The strongest candidate may not be the same person you would choose for your most detail-heavy administrative role.
Growth and leadership roles
Some positions genuinely need people who can work without perfect instructions.
They may need to learn new systems, question processes, solve unfamiliar problems, manage change, and build things that do not yet exist.
In these roles, judgment and adaptability may matter more than having used your exact software before.
Stop requiring candidates to know your company before they work there
Small businesses often shrink their candidate pool unnecessarily.
You require experience with your exact scheduling platform. Your exact POS system. Your specific type of clinic. Your niche product category. Your particular internal terminology.
Sometimes those requirements are justified.
A licensed clinician needs the appropriate license. A technical accountant needs accounting knowledge. Specialized trades may require years of training.
But many business-specific requirements are simply trainable familiarity disguised as qualifications.
Could a capable person learn this in 30 days?
If the answer is yes, think carefully before making it a hard requirement.
You may be rejecting someone with excellent judgment, reliability, communication, and learning ability because they have never used the software your company happens to use.
Build the candidate profile before you write the job posting
Divide your requirements into three categories before you start recruiting.
Must arrive with it
Things you realistically cannot provide quickly.
Can be trained
Things your business should be capable of teaching.
Role-specific traits
The behaviors that make someone suited to this particular position.
Do not automatically ask every candidate to have all of these traits.
The entire point is to identify which ones actually matter for this job.
Interview for evidence, not adjectives
Candidates know what they are supposed to say.
Almost everyone will tell you they are hardworking, adaptable, detail-oriented, and a fast learner.
Ask questions that make them show you instead.
The objective is to observe the trait instead of asking the candidate to claim they have it.
The right candidate fits the actual job
The mistake is assuming every position needs the most ambitious, experienced, charismatic, adaptable, detail-oriented person you can find.
It doesn't.
A stable role needs someone who can thrive in stability.
A precision role needs someone who likes precision.
A highly social role needs interpersonal strength.
A changing business needs people who can adapt.
Leadership roles may require creativity and directness that would be unnecessary in other positions.
The objective is not to hire the objectively “best” person. It is to hire the person whose strengths match what the job actually requires.
Define the job honestly. Identify what success in that job actually requires. Hire for the difficult-to-train qualities the role depends on, and build a company that is capable of teaching the rest.
Get the role right before you hire the person
Aubrenne helps small businesses clarify roles, responsibilities, hiring needs, team structure, and the operating systems employees need to succeed.