LenderHawk analysis. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Acquisitions Anonymous.
Brad Smart explains why most hiring systems fail: screening tools are easy to game, résumés often contain significant falsehoods, and reference checking is usually too shallow to verify performance. He lays out the Topgrading approach, centered on chronological interviews, a truth motivator that gets candidates to arrange reference calls, and job scorecards with measurable accountabilities to improve hiring and reduce early turnover.
Small-business owners, operators, and acquisition entrepreneurs who need a better hiring process for evaluating candidates, managers, and newly acquired teams.
Most screening tests and personality tools are poor filters for hiring because candidates can game them, which means they may exclude strong performers as easily as weak ones.
Resume inflation is a material risk in hiring; Brad cites research suggesting roughly half of submitted resumes contain significant falsehoods or omissions.
The biggest hiring mistake is relying on title and dates verification instead of speaking to managers who can describe actual performance.
A chronological interview reduces deception better than a one-off behavioral chat because it forces candidates to walk job-by-job through accomplishments and failures.
Job scorecards work better than vague job descriptions because they define measurable accountabilities and remove surprises after hiring.
Topgrading works in both normal hiring and acquisitions because the buyer can use it to evaluate incumbent managers before closing and decide who to keep.
Virtual interviews are good enough for most hiring and reference-checking workflows, especially when the candidate arranges the boss calls at the end of the process.
Recruiting should be treated like a marketing function: if a company wants better candidates, it needs stronger job ads and a clearer employer value proposition.
The candidate is told upfront that the final step is arranging reference calls with prior bosses, which encourages honest self-assessment and discourages weaker candidates from continuing. Brad presents it as Topgrading’s central mechanism for getting more truthful information.
When to use: Use it at the end of a hiring process when you want candidates to self-sort and make verification easier.
A structured job definition that lists measurable accountabilities and how success will be judged, rather than a vague role description. It aligns expectations before the hire and improves later performance reviews.
When to use: Use it before recruiting for any role where clarity on outcomes and responsibilities matters.
About 25% of upper-level hires were high performers without expert screening, and Topgrading improved that to about 33% in the early client experience Brad described.
Brad recounts the problem that pushed him to build his interviewing system.
A Wall Street Journal-backed research summary Brad cites suggests around 50% of resumes contain significant falsehoods or omissions.
He uses this to explain why résumé-based screening is unreliable.
The candidate-arranged reference-call process can be completed in a couple of days for executive hires and even in one day for mid-manager or individual-contributor roles.
Brad argues the method is not as time-consuming as many employers assume.
New York and California prohibit asking salary history, and Brad says several other states and cities have similar restrictions.
He notes that hiring teams need to check local employment law before using older Topgrading questions.
Brad says he has written roughly 6,500 reports after four- or five-hour interviews.
He uses that volume to argue the chronological interview reveals durable patterns in candidate behavior.
His son’s company, GH Smart, has about 100 people and is run virtually across multiple countries including India.
Brad cites this as evidence that virtual work and virtual interviewing are now normal for his business.
A small company license for Topgrading is about $1,200 per year.
Brad frames the cost as low compared with the cost of one bad hire.
Tell candidates that reference calls with former bosses are the final step before hiring and have them arrange those calls themselves.
Why: A players usually welcome the verification, while weaker candidates often drop out before the offer stage.
Use a chronological interview that walks through every job, including accomplishments and failures, rather than only asking generic behavioral questions.
Why: The sequence reveals patterns, hardwires, and recurring weaknesses that a résumé cannot show.
Replace vague job descriptions with job scorecards that spell out measurable accountabilities, travel expectations, and performance standards.
Why: Clear expectations reduce early attrition and prevent surprise misalignment after onboarding.
For acquisition diligence, interview incumbent managers before closing and treat people evaluation as a condition of the deal.
Why: A company can be the right acquisition even when the existing team contains the wrong managers.
Treat recruiting as a marketing budget item and improve job ads as seriously as product ads.
Why: Stronger role messaging helps attract A players who need a clearer value proposition.
Check employment-law limits on salary-history questions before using older interview scripts.
Why: Some jurisdictions ban those questions, and compliance matters even for small companies.
Use the topgrading process to identify who should stay, who should leave, and where the role or system needs to be adjusted around the person.
Why: The interview process can inform role design and development plans, not just selection.
Brad describes starting as a PhD-trained interviewer who then checked the real outcomes of his recommendations and found only about a third became high performers. That disappointment led him to build the Topgrading system around verification and truth rather than polished interviews.
Lesson: Hiring systems should be judged by downstream performance, not by how professional they feel in the moment.
Brad recounts a company where employees sometimes simply failed to appear and later labeled it a personal day. He uses that as an example of why managers must set explicit cultural and attendance expectations during recruiting and onboarding.
Lesson: Culture fit includes operational norms that need to be stated clearly, not assumed.