Topgrading

An excellent question was recently raised about early implementation of Topgrading.  The question is, who should be allowed to make final hiring decisions?  This is an especially pertinent question for companies who have just begun to implement Topgrading processes because it is likely that there are more non A players in the organization than A players.  In our experience, even most A players have less than a 50% hiring success rate, and non-A players have a much poorer track record than that. 

 

Non-A players are usually struggling, corners get cut in the hiring process, and hiring mistakes are made.

 

The simple answer is to only allow trained A players and (perhaps) those with A potentials make hiring decisions.  A Talent Review should be done to determine who the A players, A potential, and non-A players are.  The A players and A potentials should be trained and those people are the main players in every hiring process.  Though a non-A player hiring manager may be a secondary part of the interview team, the business leader (CEO, President, etc.) or a trained A player should make the final hiring decision