YO BRO IT’S ME LITTY

I recently had a few meetings with Vin and Neal (managing partners at [212] Media) and we decided to hire someone to fill a junior marketing role at Sportsvite. I’ve been trying to execute on all of our marketing objectives on top of my normal business development stuff and it was getting to be a bit much (like Iverson in Philly).

This will be the first time in my career that I will have an employee report in to me. I’m excited to manage. I think I have a lot to offer someone who is just beginning their career in digital media and in start-ups/entrepreneurship. I’ve come to realize that to really get stuff done in business you need to be a great manager. To be a great manager you need to work hard at it. In my previous job there were very few people in the organization who were great managers. Many senior level employees were struggling to stay above water and didn’t have the opportunity to properly manage their department or employees. It made management seem evil. During one meeting I mentioned that I never wanted to be a manager because I didn’t want to ruin people’s lives and have them hate me. The guy who I said it to (a consultant that I respected) looked at me like I was insane. It was one of those defining moments when I realized it was time to reevaluate.

Over the last few months I’ve created somewhat of a mini internship program at Sportsvite. We have about ten interns who work on different Sportsvite projects. It’s been great. Most of them are super sharp, do a great job on the projects they are assigned , and they are very excited and eager to learn.

I am stoked to have the opportunity to add to the Sportsvite team and think it will allow us to accomplish more. I wrote a killer job description and we targeted the top job boards (doostang, linkedin and paidcontent). We received a bunch of great resumes and set up interviews with some interesting candidates.

Today, I conducted my first interview and I was thrown for a loop. I had no framework or strategy and the meeting just seemed to ramble on about Sportsvite as I asked pointless questions. I felt like I was doing most of the talking and was hogging the conversation. I did a poor job of extracting the information I wanted from the candidate and I didn’t do a very good job of focusing the dialogue. I was glad when the interview ended but I felt like I had let down the applicant. To be honest, I have no idea if he is the right person for the position and I’m not sure how to evaluate him.

I now realize that I need to hone up on my interviewing skills. This isn’t rocket science and I’m pretty good in one-to-one situations so I’m sure I’ll get the hang of it pretty quickly. I also can read people accurately and quickly. But, I do need to figure it all out. I already spoke to Vin and Neal and we are going to discuss the hiring process in more detail next week. I’m also going to send out a few notes to people who hire regularly and ask for tips and pointers. Does anybody have any advice for me?

Below is the job description. Pass it on to anybody who might be interested. Just warn them that the guy who will be conducting the interview isn’t as clueless as he seems. Then again, if I’m having this much trouble interviewing the person how the heck am I going to manage them every day?
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JOB DESCRIPTION – Digital Marketing Coordinator & Community Captain