Wisdom Flows Both Ways – Don’t Fear Hiring Experienced Wisdom
- Jan 6
- 4 min read
Updated: Jan 8
Harvard Group International has been successfully helping clients fill critical and strategic hiring needs for three decades. As a consultant in this field, HGI regularly provides analysis and advice to executives and professionals who seek the firm's assistance. The door is always open to employers and individuals for courtesy discussions.
This is among those realities in business that are obvious until one is face to face with it. In the Executive Recruiting practice, it’s encountered too often; Hiring Managers concerned with hiring candidates with greater experience, more select or broader, than the hiring managers themselves. Sure, there is always “politics” within business teams, but the best leader doesn’t fear the addition of wisdom and abilities to their team. Personal insecurities? Maybe. Rapid growth and change in businesses can be among the reasons for filling team leader openings at times with a person whose confident maturity has not yet caught up to the assigned responsibilities. Often, they in turn need to fill open team positions. And Executive Recruiters are then faced with presenting only candidates with less experience and attained wisdom.
Inferred, even heard – “older people will not respect or follow a younger boss’s directions”.
Will disrupt the team by second guessing.
Can represent an unspoken challenge to authority.
May undermine a boss’s position in the eyes/mind of upper management.
This is where the hiring manager’s supervisor needs to provide guidance and encouragement. It’s easy to demonstrate where the addition of certain wisdom enables greater success for a department or division to the credit of the team’s “boss”, in business-type entities for sure, but similarly in sports or even the military. Good leaders warrant respect because they give respect. It’s even true that the wisest of candidates appreciates opportunity while at the same time appropriately valuing team structure.
Not required for a team leader to be the most informed, skilled, or wisest of the team
Good leaders organize experience, skills, resources, and wisdom in the most effective way.
While not hiring those of evident superior wisdom, skills, and abilities can usually be a mistake, the contrived efforts of a boss to discredit as a means to eliminate such team members is most often particularly negative in its effect on the team overall. One hires individuals for their distinct abilities, of course, and that should include wisdom in the form of certain select knowledge and ability. The best leaders bring such advantages to bear on behalf of the team, rewards rather than ridicule, making such wisdom into team advantages.
This is about wisdom, not ego.
The best leaders learn from taking considered chances
To include installing wisdom from which they themselves will gain.
How a new hire will fit into a team or department is a viable point of evaluation and decision, for sure. One should interview not to exclude those of wise distinction among candidates, but rather to sort out the few who may not reflect the values of team abilities over those of the individual. While most hiring managers look for candidates of evident accomplishment, for some department, division, or similar leaders, maybe earlier in their own career, the real aspect for which to probe is how a candidate has respected and supported those of higher authority as they, the candidate, provided a measurable contribution to previous employers.
Don’t make it a “qualification” to be of less experience and wisdom than oneself.
Do assure the qualification of “team player” in finalist candidates.
Except maybe in cases of critical individual contributor roles.
Hire wisdom combined with humility and experience.
In summary
Some hiring managers have concerns about hiring a person of greater experience and or ability than they feel with regard to themselves. Age is typically not a factor and less of an indicator than maybe first anticipated and applied. This complication is more common than thought from the view of executive recruiters. Top managers respect and seek wisdom from their teams. Successful managers seek to have team members who can add to the team as well as provide council to they, themselves, the hiring manager. Where insecurity is an issue for a hiring manager, it can usually be addressed with counsel and time.
P.S. Age-influenced, time-tested wisdom is usually a positive attribute. Then again, it has been noted that people tend to learn more from mistakes made by the ranks above them than from those boss’s accomplishments.
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Harvard Group International, Executive & Professional Recruiters
Harvard Group International was founded in 1997 with a primary focus on automotive manufacturers and tier-one suppliers. From its beginning, the culture has been one of providing help and advisory services to clients and candidates alike. As the firm grew, the practice evolved more of a generalist focus, covering almost every industry segment across finance & investment, medical, technology, consumer, and more, to manufacturers and suppliers – US and International. With that history, HGI has helped many of the largest corporations in the world, as well as private businesses and start-ups. The key to success is grounded in the firm's process of thoroughly understanding the clients' needs as well as hiring managers' preferences to enable effective 'digging' into likely sources, and identifying accomplished candidates that require actual recruiting before presentation to clients. Over the years, HGI has become known for professional courtesy, confidentiality, and focused urgency. The associates and directors of the firm have reviewed many thousands of resumes, placing thousands of candidates across a broad spectrum of titles, roles, and diversity.
