Work Together Anywhere

CHAPTER 6Hiring Remote Workers and Teams

“Hire the absolute best people you can as early on as you can. Don’t hire three okay people. Hire one great person who can really help you. Then continue to keep that quality of the team. Ultimately, that’s what’s going to allow you to focus on building the business—as opposed to just running the business.”

—CARRIE MCKEEGAN, CEO, Greenback Expat Tax Services¹

Expert advice about hiring remote workers, whether adding just one individual or an entire team, is pretty much unanimous. Essentially, have a well-developed hiring strategy; have a stringent interviewing process for identifying the right people—not just those who will best fit the team, but also those who can work well remotely; and then set them up to succeed with effective onboarding.

Hiring Strategy: What to Look For

The best hiring strategy specifies all potential aspects of your dream team, including the characteristics needed of the collective members. As NanoTecNexus.org founder Adriana Vela puts it, “Be savvy about identifying the right sort of profile and mind set for new hires.”² So, who are the “right sort”? For starters, the best people you can find.

Hiring the wrong person is the worst thing a business can do. One of my clients wanted to hire more people. I looked at the résumés that came in and I could see that the candidates weren’t qualified. The company also knew that the candidates weren’t good enough. But instead of continuing their search, they said ...