I Had to Hire Someone
Why you should listen to me: I work at Lucid, the world’s largest platform for human answers. If Macgyver worked at a tech company, he’d do what I do. I’m the CEO’s right hand man. I see everything and execute on most things.
If you were watching closely you recall me mentioning that I am a VFA fellow. Since they don’t pay me, this is not going to be me banging the VFA drum (do your own damn research). What is more interesting is the job I have, and figuring out how to replicate it in a smart way. Traditionally, we only hired a fellow to report to the CEO, but recently, we decided to hire a fellow to report to our COO. The thought behind this is simple. There is more than enough experience to go around, so why not expose as many young people to how a company actually works. Noble, right? I know, Lucid is fantastic. We lead industry. We kiss babies and create jobs like none other. Enough about the company and more about me. I’ve learned a few things throughout this process that will most definitely stick with me going forward.
Hiring is a deeply ethical action
I did not fully grasp this. When you commit to hire someone, essentially you are saying, “We will be responsible for how you purchase food for the foreseeable future.” Perhaps I treat matters too philosophically, but this hit me hard. I admit, this was (and is) a hard thing to fully grasp. This is probably why this piece, more than any other, will leave you asking, “what was his point?” There is no point here. I simply wrote this so that I can look back and reflect on it once I become even more of a learned scholar and gentleman.
Most people are full of shit, even when they aren’t
As I stated, a job is (usually) directly tied to livelihood. That means that in an interview, people will perform in ways that they wouldn’t normally perform. In Macgyver terms, people are full of shit. But in a good way most of the time. Like I said, hiring is an implicit signal that affirms your competencies and deems you worthy of compensation. Compensation is usually money. Money buys food. People need food. Thus, people are going to be full of shit when they think you have influence over their employment.
Now, most normal people are going to say some fluff around this entire matter.
“Having good people continually reinforces a healthy culture!”
“blah blah”
“blah blah”
Yeah. That’s all well and good. Companies aren’t really complex. Employees (more or less) have to provide some measurable impact. This impact must exceed the cost of employing said employees. If this does not happen, the business will not succeed. So, whether you realize it or not, this mental calculus does occur in your head. The outcome is always the same — people present a contrived appearance to
get.
that.
bread.
I was able to learn this early, which enabled me to call a spade a spade (actually, don’t say that shit. words matter, thanks Brett).
I’m going to go ahead and contradict myself. I just spent some time speaking to the cold logical steps that lie beneath the surface. It was a dirty little trick that philosophers do — create a controlled environment outside of reality to make a compelling point. Usually, this compelling point does not exist in reality, but it looks damn good on paper.
Well, my previous point was right and wrong. On the one hand I do believe that the steps I laid out happen on behalf of the interviewee. However, the interviewer is not as cold as I presented her. The reason for this is the importance of stories. This is the wildcard. Stories help to get employees to be more productive. Plain and simple. So, that means that what really matters is how well you fit into a larger narrative. This is something that you cannot fake. The contrived way you dress, the way you speak, the image you put forward will not help you in the long haul (as we all know, respectability politics won’t save you).
So wait. If you recognize the larger narrative, can’t you just adjust to that? Possibly. Also, why is this in italics? Because this is a dialogue with yourself, of course!
This is a long, stream of consciousness piece that has no real point. Why? Because I don’t have enough data to go ahead and tell you what to do. Also, I’m reading On the Road and I’m all about borrowing artistic styles.
Did I miss something?
At the end of the day you always wonder: did I make the right decision? No amount of self-reflection or clever words will help to answer that. Only time will tell.
Why you shouldn’t listen to me: I just took 4 minutes from you and didn’t offer any value at all. Why are you still following me?
