How to Hire the Ideal Team Player for Your Fleet Operation

To make your fleet operation run efficiently it’s important to hire the right employees. Having the right staff in place can ensure jobs are done accurately and your fleet staff is a cohesive group. This is especially important for operations that function as a team and need employees to work well together.

In his book “The Ideal Team Player: How to Recognize and Cultivate the Three Essential Virtues,” Patrick Lencioni suggests you look for the following three traits when hiring new staff members: humble, hungry and smart.

According to Lencioni:

• Humble: One doesn’t think less of him or herself, but he or she is selfless.
• Hungry: One who aggressively pursues his or her goals.
• Smart: Someone who is emotionally smart in the way he or she interacts with others.

Lencioni suggests not hiring someone who embodies just one of the three traits.

He states that if someone is only humble, then he or she can become a pawn, and can be held back from reaching his or her full potential without having the desire to succeed and the emotional intelligence of a hungry or smart person.

If a person is only hungry, then he or she might not work well with others, and instead will act as a bulldozer who will push teammates aside in order to succeed.

Lencioni adds that if someone is only smart, then he or she could be a charmer who can say all the right things, but who might actually be a slacker who is more talk than action.

Ideally, your operation wants to find candidates who embody all three qualities. To find these employees, Lencioni suggests doing the following during the interview process:

• Interview candidates outside of the standard workplace or office setting. See how he or she acts in the real world. According to LinkedIn, Charles Schwab’s CEO Walt Bettinger takes candidates to a restaurant and has the waiter intentionally mess up the person’s order to see how the candidate reacts.
• Have multiple team members interview a candidate. They can either each interview the person individually or interview him or her in a panel setting.
• Keep asking a question until you get an answer. If a candidate tries to avoid answering a question, or gives a generic response, rephrase the question and keep asking it until you get a real response out of him or her.
• Show how sincere your company is about certain issues. If the candidate isn’t excited about the issue or initiative, then he or she might not be the right fit.
• Test for values that are important to your company. Find a way to see if the person aligns with your values through actions or questions that will help reveal their personalities and traits.