What If Everything We Know About Hiring Is Wrong?, with William Vanderbloemen

Afford Anything

Paula Pant | Cumulus Podcast Network

Investing, Business, Entrepreneurship

4.6 • 3.4K Ratings

🗓️ 21 November 2025

⏱️ 80 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

#662: Most teams hire for skills. The best teams hire for wiring. What if the reason someone accelerates your organization, or quietly derails it, has more to do with their response time, processing style, or sense of mission than their résumé? This episode dives into the hidden patterns that shape how people work, make decisions, and handle pressure; the clues we often overlook, and the tiny tells that reveal who will thrive. We’re joined by William Vanderbloemen, whose firm has completed nearly 4,000 executive searches. After reviewing years of candidate data, he discovered why some people create momentum everywhere they go and others struggle, even when they look perfect on paper. We explore what “fast thinkers” and “slow thinkers” bring to a team, how to spot agility before you hire someone, and why some workers need a mission while others need a measurable win. Along the way, we reflect on our own tendencies and how understanding them can change the way we build teams, manage energy, and make long-term decisions. Key Takeaways Response speed can signal mental wiring, not politeness, which makes it a powerful hiring clue. The real interview starts long before the formal meeting, which means every informal interaction counts. Agility shows up when plans change, so micro-tests can reveal how someone handles shifting conditions. Many high performers are driven either by purpose or measurable progress, and knowing which matters. Understanding our own lane helps us hire better, delegate better, and build systems that reduce friction. Resources and Links Simon Sinek, Start With Why https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4ZoJKF_VuA Vanderbloemen Group https://vanderbloemengroup.com/ Be the Unicorn by William Vanderbloemen https://www.amazon.com/Be-Unicorn-Data-Driven-Separate-Leaders/dp/1400247101 Chapters Note: Timestamps are approximate and may vary greatly across listening platforms due to dynamically inserted ads. (00:00) What thousands of executive searches revealed (10:35) The nine markers of high performers (22:01) Fast thinkers, slow thinkers, and finding your lane (25:35) Why response time predicts performance (25:48) Testing agility in real-world scenarios (47:16) Why purpose matters more to younger workers (55:13) Why curiosity is a career superpower Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	What if something as simple as how quickly you respond to an email reveals more about your
0:05.4	future success or your fit at a given job than your entire resume?
0:09.9	Now, I know that sounds ridiculous, but today's guest has research and data that shows
0:16.2	that this may actually be the case.
0:18.6	Today's guest has completed nearly 4,000 executive searches.
0:22.7	We're talking placing CEOs, VPs, and senior leaders across every industry that you can imagine.
0:28.9	And after analyzing mountains of data on what makes people succeed or fail in their roles,
0:35.2	he discovered something that changed how he thinks about hiring and how he
0:40.1	thinks about whether or not you're a good fit for the job that you have. Because it turns out
0:46.9	the things that we typically look for, like impressive credentials or years of experience,
0:51.3	or knowing how to give the perfect answers in interviews, these things
0:56.1	barely matter compared to hidden behavioral patterns that many people never notice.
1:03.4	Our guest today is William Vanderbluen.
1:06.8	As the CEO of Vanderbluen Search Group, he has placed more than 4,000 executives.
1:11.9	Prior to that, he was the youngest ever senior pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Houston.
1:17.0	He has seven children, and he holds a Masters of Divinity from Princeton.
1:22.1	He and his team have compiled an enormous amount of research around professional qualifications
1:27.2	to try to figure out
1:28.1	why some people seem to thrive everywhere they go, while others who have identical qualifications
1:35.5	will struggle. What's the difference? And what are the tiny tells? And how can you take this
1:42.5	information and apply it to your own life?
1:45.5	That's what we're going to cover in today's episode.
	...

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