Hiring Great People

"There's something rare, something finer far, something much more scarce than ability. It's the ability to recognize ability."

- Elbert Hubbard

From Seth Godin:
Most successful (and honest) real estate agents will tell you that their business is about the listings, and that sales ability comes second. All other things being equal, the agent with a better home to sell will make a better sale.  

The same thing is true for baseball managers - if you have a better lineup you're more likely to win the game. And of course that's true for the sushi restaurant with fresher fish. And the tech company with better programmers, and the college with better professors...

If this is all so obvious, why do we spend all our time trying to find cheap average inputs and then make them special through our magnificent sales and management skills? Why do we industrialize the hiring process, spend very little time on scouting, and seek out the replicable instead of the special exception? Our ego demands that we spend all day polishing the average instead of seeking out the exceptional.

Better to invest the time and money on special people and raw materials instead.

My added input:

Look at The Container Store for example. They have proven, paying great people 50% more = 100% productivity improvement over the average employee. They conduct 30 interviews to hire one great person. Every performance indicator from store sales to profitability to market share rank #1 in their industry. They understand Seth's point above.