You need to build a strong team quickly. Should you hire for potential or experience?
When you need to build a strong team fast, the choice between hiring for potential or experience can be tricky. Both have their merits, so consider these strategies to make the best decision:
What strategies have worked for you in building a strong team quickly? Share your thoughts.
You need to build a strong team quickly. Should you hire for potential or experience?
When you need to build a strong team fast, the choice between hiring for potential or experience can be tricky. Both have their merits, so consider these strategies to make the best decision:
What strategies have worked for you in building a strong team quickly? Share your thoughts.
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If you're building the team from scratch, and hiring multiple roles, hire both. A team is about balance, strengths, and weaknesses of its members. The experienced individuals can help carry others coming in the door. You can lean on their expertise to handle more work coming in. Also, having a few people with high potential can turn into rock stars and future leaders in the business. Plus, the best way to master a role is by teaching, so your stronger members will get more satisfaction and growth by teaching the others. In an ideal world, you want about 60%-70% with strong experience, the other 30%-40% that have all the intangibles but room to develop.
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When building a strong team quickly, the choice between hiring for potential or experience depends on the role and business needs. Experience is crucial for immediate impact, stability, and expertise, especially in critical roles or urgent projects. Potential offers long-term growth, fresh perspectives, and adaptability, ideal for innovative roles and evolving environments. A blended approach works best—pair experienced professionals with high-potential talent to balance immediate performance with future growth. Align hiring with your business goals to ensure both quick wins and sustainable success. #HiringStrategy #TeamBuilding #Leadership
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It's never an easy choice to make from potential and experience team like - hiring and experience brings immediate expertise and faster onboarding, which is valuable on the other hand hiring potential can bring fresh ideas, adaptability and a strong will to prove them self. So as per me a balance approach of prioritizing a core of experience individual with a mix of high potential talent can create a team that's both effective now and adaptable in future.
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To Build a strong team faster, it requires a balanced approach. Prioritize Experience for Immediate Impact: Experienced hires can deliver results quickly, stabilizing critical roles. Incorporate Potential for Growth: High-potential hires add adaptability and fresh perspectives, crucial for long-term success. Balance Both for a Strong Team: Use experience to anchor the team and potential to drive future innovation. Assign Roles Strategically: Place experienced hires in key positions and potential-driven hires where creativity is essential. Build a Dynamic, Resilient Team: This blend ensures current performance and adaptability for future needs.
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When speed is critical, I prioritize hiring for potential with just enough experience to hit the ground running. Experience shows where someone has been, but potential reveals where they can go—and that forward momentum is what builds a resilient, high-performing team. The key is finding people who are eager to grow and adapt because skills can be taught, but mindset and drive make all the difference.
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Oh, I've gone through this one. I would say you need to balance both. Focus on potential to leverage people that can learn and adapt fast, specially if you are in an industry that is changing. But you also need people with experience to start delivering right away. And you need those people with experience to drive the strategy at the beginning and train the ones with potential. As most things in business and life, there's not a "one or the other" answer. Depending on your priorities, your urgency, your deliveries, and on the talent that you are finding, you'll need to hire for both in a balanced way.
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Hire for Potential When: Candidates who align with your team’s values and culture can often integrate more smoothly, even if they lack extensive experience.If you have the resources to provide training and mentorship, hiring for potential can lead to a more engaged and loyal workforce.Hire for Experience When: If you have urgent projects or gaps in skills that need to be filled quickly, experienced candidates can hit the ground running.Certain roles may demand a high level of technical expertise or industry knowledge that can only come from experience.If the team operates in a highly regulated or complex environment, having experienced professionals can help navigate challenges more effectively.
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I’d say building a strong team quickly requires a nuanced approach. The choice between hiring for potential or experience isn't absolute. It’s about finding the right balance for the team's immediate needs and long-term growth. When speed is essential, experienced candidates often bring a level of ‘plug and play’ capability,” meaning they can integrate faster and bring proven skills to tackle challenges right away. Experienced professionals can "hit the ground running," contributing from day one without a steep learning curve, which is invaluable when building a team quickly while the candidates with high potential might lack years on paper but bring enthusiasm, adaptability, and a fresh perspective that often drives innovation:)
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KEVIN ASHWORTH
Operating Executive - Revenue Management - Customer Success - Business Transformation
Your question is about “building a strong team” which is the foundation to any short or long term focus and expected results from that team. 1. The shorter the period to perform, the more self directed experienced the team must be. There is less time, thus the been-there-done-that approach must prevail. Think “good mercenary professional”! 2. The longer the period the more important to build a foundation of high experience with the coaching/mentor dimension in about 20 to 30 percent of the seniors to foster adding those willing to learn with great attitudes. These seniors need to allot time for the more juniors to help them learn while the other seniors will be the workhorses for the team with juniors ready to create v1.1.
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Everything depends on the specific needs stemming from the particular role and how well the dynamics will go in the team. Hire for Potential: If the role requires adaptability and the willingness to learn, a focus on candidates with potential brings in fresh perspectives for long-term growth. First Experience: The team requires immediate results or specialized skills, and as such, hiring for experience will go a long way in ensuring that the tasks are efficiently handled right from day one. Balance Both: Ideally, look for candidates who have some experience paired with potential to grow and adapt-this can create a well-rounded team.
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