Having a detailed and very specific job description including the job responsibilities and expectations with education, experience, hard and soft skill requirements in “must haves” to “nice-to-haves” is also a good start. This enables you to further identify the core competencies and characteristics needed in doing the job well. This will enable you to determine the exact questions you need to ask to uncover hard evidence in the applicant’s background that fits the job and the environment, which would facilitate growing / progressing in the company. Mr. Welch’s rule of thumb was to not hire someone into his or her last job unless it’s to be head of a function or CEO.