For those of you who are students of recruiting top talent, and disciplined in your interviewing, you might enjoy a book I’m currently reading:  “Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business” written by Danny Meyer.

Specifically, focus on the Chapter entitled: “The 51% Solution” where the author gets into detail on how his organization has deliberately designed interviewing processes, questions, and scoring systems to help hire the best candidates.  He describes how they learned to hire 51% on people skills, and 49% on technical skills, and details their 5 core emotional skills critical for champion teams:

1)      Optimistic warmth

2)      Intelligence

3)      Work Ethic

4)      Empathy

5)      Self-awareness.

Author Meyer does a nice job of introducing his concepts within the context of his restaurant business and explaining them in this chapter.

As a bonus, his book is filled with examples of leadership learned and honed while building his New York restaurant empire. Humble, humorous, vulnerable, insightful, and inspiring.  I’m enjoying this book as a fun read and as a business textbook.  Hope you do to. Check it out on Amazon. 

PS: Author Danny Meyer’s latest restaurant exploit made its public debut on NASDAQ last week, taking Shake Shack public to an enthusiastic investment community that drove the stock price up 120% in the first few days of trading.  Seems I’m not alone in my support of Danny’s principles and leadership!