Steve Jobs is attributed with repeatedly stating ‘A-players attract A-players. B-players attract C-players.’ according to Dr. Jim Walsh, a member of Steve Jobs’ team at NeXT Software. His desire, no demand, was that only A-players were hired into every single role in his companies.

But what is an ‘A-player’ and is it feasible, right and affordable for that matter, to hire only A-players into every position in your firm?

Why are we talking about this?

It’s true that if you’re keen on building a great company, and by that we mean one which is consistently successful / profitable and built to last (check out the brilliant research work by Professor Jim Collins for more on this), one of the major influencers on whether your business will truly reach its potential will be whether you are able to secure and retain the right people.

The term ‘A-player’ is widely used but often with little real definition. The assessment of someone’s ability and potential is often left subjective, with interpretations of talent and promise often biased by a hirer’s unconscious or conscious view of what they constitute as ‘great’ and what they, personally, are looking for in a new hire (as opposed to what the business really needs).

And, alarmingly common, is the influence of a founder / leader’s innate fear of hiring someone that is better than them which puts them off certain people. Jim Collin’s definition of a ‘Level 5 leader’ is particularly important here.

Defining an A-Player

An A-player, in its simplest form, is someone who is at the top of the game. An absolute star in their particular specialism or vertical skill set. They can be at any level of the business but must be an excellent performer vs. the specification for that role.

More often than not, A-players will play a vital role in driving progress or even play a core leadership role for the business. So, with this in mind, they must also have the necessary ‘human’ characteristics and values that enable them to inspire, direct and lead the pursuit of progress that transforms the performance of their particular function or pillar. And, with it, the performance and potential of the overall business. Not an insignificant ask.

That’s as far as a generic definition can go though. Afterall:

One company’s A-player is another company’s B-player.

It all comes down to the specific requirements for that specific role for that specific company. It’s, therefore, absolutely vital that time is taken to properly define what it is that is needed within each role. The time invested here pays dividends by reducing the risk of poor hires and the subsequent time and financial costs this incurs.

To do this, and to limit the risk of conscious or unconscious bias that may cloud your judgement as to how good someone really is, we thoroughly recommend you adopt ‘score-carding’ as a mechanism to supersede the often waffly, easily forgotten and frankly out of date job description. A book called Topgrading by Dr. Brandford D. Smart is a very worthwhile read on this front (we love his name too).

So, when should you hire an ‘A-player’?

Not that we make a habit of disagreeing with the late, great Steve Jobs, but is it really practical, and for that matter, affordable to hire only A-players? Probably not, and for two key reasons:

1. A-players, as they’re in demand, will typically cost you a great deal in salary and broader package. You can easily argue there is a clear return on investment (ROIs) to be had, but when P&L and cash flow are under pressure, sometimes even a clear ROI is not possible to pursue.

2. A-players, by their very nature, will always be in demand by other companies, meaning they will likely have a real thirst for progression and / or be tempted away by new opportunities that come knocking on their door. If you can’t promise a promotion or continued progression, the question of whether you are better having an A-player for 18-months or a B-player for 5-years may arise.

Bearing in mind there are also ‘B-players’ (competent and steady performers) and ‘C-players’ (underperformers) out there (and possibly in your team right now), the assessment to be made is what blend of A-players and B-players is right and affordable for you? A blend that balances individual thirst for progression and reward against consistency and loyalty.

And no, you shouldn’t purposefully hire C-players – it’ll only create disharmony and risk dragging down overall team and business performance.

There is one setting whereby hiring A-players is absolutely vital though, and that’s when it comes to the critical elements of your strategy and business operations.

Critical strategic initiatives / business processes

When developing strategy, one step that is often missed is what we call ‘organisation design’. No, this isn’t just about the people structure you adopt, but more the methodical design of how you’ll execute your strategy. Your products / services, your people, your business processes, your KPIs / metrics, your investments, your partners, etc.

As a product of this, it should be very clear which elements of your strategy / business operations are ‘critical’. That is ‘if we don’t get this part right, we fail’.

Temptation may be to label everything as critical – BD processes, internal technology and infrastructure, recruitment, investment raises, etc. But not everything can be. Important, yes. Critical? Not everything. Otherwise you’re building a business that has too much risk.

A critical strategic initiative or business process is something that is make or break.

For example, your business is pre-revenue and therefore 100% reliant on equity investment and / or debt to generate capital and remain liquid. You have a nine-month runway and are planning to raise fresh investment within that time. If you don’t raise it, game over. This is critical. If you don’t get this part right, your business fails.

Another example might be the process of managing customer facing projects. If current customer feedback is not great and demonstrating that you need to do a much better job at planning, delivering and communicating, this becomes a critical business process. If it’s not sorted out, you may start to lose existing customers and, consequently, create a bad name for yourselves. If you don’t get this part right, your business fails.

It’s these critical strategic initiatives and / or businesses processes that justify an investment into an ‘A-player’. Someone who’s been there and done it before. Someone with the right technical and human skills to be a real game changer. Someone who can show you a thing or two. As another famous Steve Jobs quote goes ‘It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and tell them what to do. We hire smart people so they can tell us what to do.’.

The (often sensitive) question for you to ask yourself at this stage is whether the current accountable person leading that particular critical strategic initiatives or business process is the best person in that specialism that you can afford? Do they have the right experience and skills to assure you of success?

If not, mistakes will inevitably be made. Mistakes that will cause delays, cost money and, without exaggeration, potentially be terminal for the business.

So, when should you hire an A-player? When you’re dealing with a critical strategic initiative or business process. For everything else, B-players will do.

It’s then your job to turn them into A-players.