How to Hire A-Players: Finding the Top People for ... - GIT home page

Define Your Organizational Strategy
To keep your A-players, you need an organizational strategy. As
I touched on briefly in Chapter 1, a simple and surprisingly effective
tool in this regard is an organizational chart. Start with the
business goals that you want to achieve. What does success look
like for your business? Then create the right organizational chart to
achieve these objectives. What are the key results for each role?
How do these connect to your larger business goals? Trust me, clarity
in this area goes a long way. If you take the time to clarify your
goals and sketch out the right organization to achieve them, you
will be ahead of many businesses.
Once you complete this chart, you’re ready to start writing in the
names of your current team members. This is a great process because
it’s a quick gap analysis of the team that you have versus the
team that you need. Here’s what you are likely to find:
You’ll have a few people (the A-players) whose names are easy
to write in. In fact, you could write them into almost any box
in that chart.
You will also have some people who can become A-players if
you help them get up to speed.
You’ll also have folks who can be valuable, but in a more
limited capacity.
Finally, you have employees (C-players and below) who don’t
belong in your organization at all.
A-Player Principle: An organizational chart is a quick
and effective tool to analyze the strengths, weaknesses,
opportunities, and threats inherent in your current team.
Conclusion 193
If these descriptions line up reasonably well with your organization,
what do you do with each of these groups? Here are some
steps to follow.