Around 8 years ago, I faced the dilemma of hiring a peer/friend into my team. This friend was working in a different team in the company and had the same smartness and years of experience as mine.
I asked my mentor how to think about hiring someone who is your peer in the “hierarchy”.
The mentor asked, “Do you think he is a good fit for the role?”
I said, “Yes, absolutely”
He asked, “Do you think this guy is political?”
I said, “Definitely not”
The mentor declared “Just go ahead and hire him.”.
The mentor then probed “Are you feeling insecure?”.
I murmured “Maybe” but then deflected, “a better way to put this is what if our roles overlapped and I am not able to add value to this peer hire”.
He explained, “ Venkat, a peer willing to work for you is a good reflection of your leadership capability. You should be proud of yourself. You should give him all the responsibilities and let him thrive. If he does really really well, he could even become your manager one day. Be open about that possibility and you would get the inner freedom.”
He continued, “Another angle to look at this is – You give away all your responsibilities to the peer and you will have nothing much to contribute. That would be a great situation to be in. You can then figure out what bigger things you can take up and execute – those very important problems that you always wanted to solve but never got the time before. That is how you grow in your career”.
Needless to say that the conversation was liberating and opened up my perspectives about hiring smart people in the years that came by.
Thanks, Srinath (the mentor) for this wonderful piece of advice.
