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Hidden Value: A 3-Part Approach to Hiring High-Potential Employees

Andre Abi Awad
The Freedom Owner
Published in
4 min readDec 16, 2024

French economist Jean-Baptiste Say characterized an entrepreneur as one who “shifts economic resources out of an area of lower and into an area of higher productivity and greater yield.” This expands the term’s literal translation from the French for “one who undertakes” to include the concept of value creation.

Bootstrapping founders epitomize the principle of creating more value with less resources, particularly when hiring. While it may be tempting to try and hire C-level executives with extensive resumes and impressive LinkedIn profiles, smaller businesses often cannot afford those seasoned professionals. To combat this, value creators need to develop a knack for hiring talented people about to blossom.

High Potential Employees, or HIPOs, might have thin resumes — but spotting their burgeoning talent allows you to create significant value that others overlook. This is challenging to do well, however, since most HIPOs have limited credentials for you to evaluate.

Here’s a three-part process for spotting HIPOs, developed by Skubana co-founder Chad Rubin, who built his company to $5 million in revenue with the help of a team of HIPOs before deciding to sell it to 3PL Central.

Rubin criticized the traditional hiring process as “broken.” How can you…

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The Freedom Owner
The Freedom Owner

Published in The Freedom Owner

If you’re like most business owners, you aspire to have the freedom that comes from owning your own business. Unfortunately, growing a larger business gets you further from your ultimate goal of freedom. Read this publication to claim back your Freedom.

Andre Abi Awad
Andre Abi Awad

Written by Andre Abi Awad

Claim your Freedom as a Business Owner — Read more on “The Freedom Owner” publication on my profile. Helping Entrepreneurs in 54 countries since 2008.

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