---
title: Hiring and judging character
#feed_description: 
author: Issa Rice
creation_date: 2015-06-21
last_major_revision_date: 2015-06-21
language: English
status: notes
# accepts "CC0", "CC-BY", or "CC-BY-SA"
license: CC-BY
tags: judging, character, hiring, Yishan Wong, talent
#aliases: 
---

- [We Can’t \(Simply\) Buy Capacity](http://blog.givewell.org/2013/08/29/we-cant-simply-buy-capacity/)
- the connection between hiring people for a job and judging the
  character of people fascinates me (e.g. for finding good friends, or
  for romantic relationships).
- both are clearly important: you need to hire people to get tasks done,
  and you want to find good friends/partner(s)
- both can take quite a bit of commitment to accurately judge
- both can end disastrously (due diligence)
- in both scenarios, there can be multiple people doing the judging, so
  there can be some gossip among those "in the know"
- sometimes it can be *really hard* to tell the difference between
  someone who is an *extremely* good fit, and someone who is a terrible
  fit.
- [How do you distinguish 10X software engineers from the rest?](https://www.quora.com/How-do-you-distinguish-10X-software-engineers-from-the-rest)

    - Yishan Wong:

        > Look to referrals of referrals.  Look for the best person
        > according to the best person according to the best person you
        > know (yes, that's two levels).  If there is consensus among
        > several of your best people, this is a fairly reliable
        > indicator.  It is difficult to go more than 3x per "link"
        > though - people are typically unable to discern the difference
        > between someone 9x as good as they are from someone who is 3x
        > as good as they are; this is why you have to do the "best
        > person you know" referral twice.  First, you hire all the best
        > people you know, work with them for awhile to find the best
        > amongst them, and then find all the best people *they* know. 
        > It is a multiple-stage approach; many people don't know this,
        > and just assume that "refer the best people you know" is the
        > end of it.

        Similarly, stalking someone's friends might be useful if you
        want to determine their character.

- many more Quora questions about judging character (many by Alex):

    - [How to evaluate someone's ability to be an exceptional judge of character](https://www.quora.com/Judging-Character/How-do-you-evaluate-someones-ability-to-be-an-exceptional-judge-of-character)
    - [Is Elon Musk an exceptional judge of character/talent?](https://www.quora.com/Is-Elon-Musk-an-exceptional-judge-of-character-talent)
    - [How can you become a good judge of character?](https://www.quora.com/How-can-you-become-a-good-judge-of-character)
    - [How do you judge people's character?](https://www.quora.com/How-do-you-judge-peoples-character)
    - decent answer: [Sridatta Thatipamala's answer to How can you become a good judge of character?](https://www.quora.com/How-can-you-become-a-good-judge-of-character/answer/Sridatta-Thatipamala)
    - [How do I judge the character of a lady/girl?](https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-judge-the-character-of-a-lady-girl)

        - observing ppl under stress might be important

- one important question: does the person have the same life goals as me?

- "Are you at peace with your past romantic partners? Do you feel at peace with their joys though the joys may be mutually shared no longer?" ([source](https://www.quora.com/What-single-question-would-you-ask-someone-if-you-were-trying-to-find-out-if-they-are-a-good-person/answer/Chantal-Murthy-1))

- Yishan Wong([source](https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-best-way-to-indicate-in-a-job-posting-that-youre-looking-for-10x-or-ninja-type-people/answer/Yishan-Wong)):

    > the lesson here is that sometimes "10x people" are so good that
    > they don't really look for jobs in the same way other people do,
    > so you kind of have to find them via unorthodox means [...] [Y]ou
    > often have to make your job posting indicate a bit of quirkiness
    > in just the right way so that it happens to stick out to them when
    > they're casual perusing job ads 
    >
    > [...]
    >
    > the main idea is to visualize the personality and character of the
    > type of people you want to hire, and then put a message out
    > publicly that only those types of people will respond to or
    > provide a correct answer to.

- GiveWell has [The process of hiring our first cause-specific Program Officer](http://blog.givewell.org/2015/09/03/the-process-of-hiring-our-first-cause-specific-program-officer/).
Talking about senior hiring, they list some general principles:

    > -   The best way to evaluate someone is to work with them. The ideal way
    >     to make a senior hire would be to have a longstanding relationship
    >     with someone, perhaps as a part-time consulting arrangement.
    > -   Interviews are highly unreliable. The evaluation process should be
    >     designed as much as possible to mimic working together.
    > -   References are extremely important, and it can be useful to talk to
    >     many people about the candidate (including people who weren’t
    >     specifically offered as references).

    Also:

    > When a candidate didn’t mention a major aspect of the criminal
    > justice reform field, we would ask about it and see whether they
    > were omitting it because they (a) had strong knowledge of it and
    > were making a considered decision to de-prioritize this aspect of
    > the field; (b) didn’t have much experience or knowledge of this
    > area of the field.

    (So the general lesson here might be "do your homework" before trying to hire people.)

- [Why Not To Break Up With Friends](http://www.jimterry.net/blog/why-not-to-break-up-with-friends/)