🎯 Work Smart Wednesday - May 15, 2024

Red flags when hiring freelancers, how I like to rapidly scale teams, and a quote on zero sum games

May 15, 2024

Work Smart Wednesday

👋 Hey there!

Here is your weekly dose of Work Smart Wednesday

In these emails I will share with you 3 things to help you work smarter in 3 minutes or less. That leaves you with 10,077 more minutes to conquer your goals this week

1. 🚩 Red flags when hiring freelancers

Whether you are a freelancer yourself, or you hire freelancers, it is worthwhile knowing which red flags to look out for.

This is a great Twitter thread with some solid gold responses so you know what to look out for.

My favourite red flags mentioned:

Poor communication skills
1. This was the most common answer by far. More details in the thread.
Misses deadlines, inaccurate turnaround time estimates.
1. Always give your self “buffer” room. Underpromise and overdeliver.
Doesn’t ask clarifying questions about the scope/project.
1. How can you deliver value if you don’t know what the specific client values?
No portfolio of past work or portfolio is scarce on details.
1. SHOW you have solved their problem before.
No website at all.
1. It is so cheap and easy to have a website now. Try Carrd.co or 60sec.site
Bad mouths past employers / clients.
1. Like talking about a “crazy ex”, all is does it make others trust you less.
Doesn’t follow instructions on application.
1. Don’t give generic responses or ‘shotgun’ replies. The work starts when you apply, your application should show your quality of work.
Pixelated media on their website or poor design.
1. Shows they don’t care about the details.
Hotmail or yahoo email account (no branded domain).
1. Sloppy, unprofessional.
No contract.
1. Everybody should know exactly what they’re agree to. Looks more professional.
Charges too little.
1. Counterintuitively, charging less increases risk. You get what you pay for, amateurs are cheap.

If you are a freelancer, how many of these red flags do you currently show to potential clients?

If you hire freelancers, what would you add to the list? Let me know in the comments below.

2. 🏗️ How I like to rapidly scale teams

One of my more recent clients is at a point where we need to rapidly scale his team. He runs a social media agency that guarantees clients 30 million views within 90 days, and needless to say it has been popular. We are getting great results, repeat referrals, and we are growing the business rapidly.

I have explained before why you hiring is the last thing you should do, but eventually we often get to a point where we really do need to hire somebody.

Here is what I like to do:

Recognise the risk
Hiring too fast is one of the most common ways to kill a business. When you hire, your overhead costs basically never go down. You lose the leverage to say no as you feel obligated to take bad projects to pay your people, which hamstrings real growth.
Building teams of freelancers is often better in the beginning as it is more flexible (and they usually have more experience and entrepreneurialism!). The extra “cost” in dollars per hour is almost always worth it. Flexibility is business life or death.
Create a tasklist
Write out every task in the business that needs doing. You might think you need to hire one person, but actually you may need to hire for a completely different job when you look at where time, value, and energy goes. Besides, you need to know which tasks the person you hire will need to do.
ESAD, and prioritise
Before hiring anybody, look through that list and identify areas that you can Eliminate, Simplify/Systematise, Automate, and then Delegate. Ask yourself “what happens if I just didn’t do this anymore?” and “if I couldn’t hire anybody, what would I do to make this more efficient?”. This unlocked a huge operational improvement for my client before we hired anybody. After, prioritise the tasklist by how critical that task is, how long it takes, how it affects your energy.
Identify skills required, and rank by trainability
Training takes a long time. When you know which skills are required to complete the prioritised task shortlist, you then identify skills (“soft” and “hard” skills) required to complete the tasks to a high standard and rank them by how critical they are to completion and how easy those skills are to train. Hire people who already have the most critical skills that are hard to train.
Warm outreach
Ask your network for recommendations for good people with those skills before posting the jobs anywhere. It is easier and quicker to act on a good recommendation than to hire “cold” via applications.
Add friction
Interviews are expensive, they take multiple people’s time and energy. Add friction earlier in the process to make sure you only interview highly qualified candidates (e.g. add a quick skills assessment, ask for a portfolio, or project). P.s. you get more, and higher quality, applicants if you pay people for their time and effort (e.g. paying people to complete a task. The best people know their worth)
Document, and train
Whoever is currently completing the tasks that are to be hired for should document what they do. I like asking people to take screen recordings that they explain over. Let the new hire shadow, and be shadowed, and make sure to train them sufficiently. This is where most businesses go wrong.

3. 💡 Quote I'm pondering

"Situations can initially be perceived as zero-sum are actually win-wins when you expand the horizon - talented people are attracted to those who care about them.
When you help someone get promoted out of your team, it’s a short-term loss, but it’s a clear long term gain. It’s easier to attract people, because word gets around that your philosophy is to help people” - Chris Granger

This is a good lesson in both business and life more generally, it is worthwhile to zoom out to see the bigger picture. Like a chess game, consider what the future moves will be.

If you treat someone well - an acquaintance, a departing employee, a client you offboard - then the temporary loss can be far outweighed by the tailing opportunity.

Rejecting or firing somebody doesn’t have to be a negative experience, we can help them to move onto something that is a better fit for them and everybody will win. Your reputation precedes you, look after it.

👋 Want to work together?

When you’re ready, here are 3 ways I can help you:

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🔍 Clarity Call - Paid ($195). We will discuss your situation and create a step-by-step action plan together so you know exactly what you need to do next for maximum impact

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That's it! I can't wait to hear what you think. What did you find most useful? What do you want more or less of? Reply to this email now and let me know

Also, if you have anything interesting to share, I want to know about it😊

Have a great week,
John

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