Hiring? This is the single best hiring tip to follow

If you are expecting a rich manual filled with detailed steps to follow to hire your best next employee, move on.

What I am talking about is instead something you can immediately apply, starting now. Even more so, I would say this can be applied not only when hiring, but even when thinking about who you would like to be surrounded by.

Now on to hiring. Endless pieces have been written on the best tips to hire effectively. I particularly like this provocative approach, which asks a single question to the candidate "What will you write about your years in this company after you will leave?". Hiring for attitude, more than skills, is key. While the latter can be learnt and taught, the first can't.

Yet, most tips I keep reading seem to forget an essential element: energy. When hiring a person to join your team, one thing is certain. Either yourself, if in a startup, or some of your employees, will spend substantial amount of time with the new hire. So here it is, the single most important tip to keep in mind when hiring: make a note of how you feel before interviewing the candidate, and how you feel during and after.

If your energy level has gone up, you have potentially a person who will bring positive energy to your company.

If not, would you like your employees to feel like that for the next years? 

You could argue that the candidate might have had a bad day, or that you did not feel great on that day. Still, I am convinced some people are simply capable of making your day better. I am not talking about making jokes or being light-hearted, but the positive attitude towards challenges, new experiences, and tough days. These people are typically the "doers", not the "wait we should first align for a month".

Now, if you felt better after the interview than you felt earlier, move on to the other set of criteria you would typically use to select your candidates. If you didn't, don't waste your time, your job is hard enough without people dragging you down.