It’s Easy to Say ‘I Need This.’ It’s Harder to Find Solutions; New York Times, 10/3/13

Adam Bryant, Corner Office, New York Times; Interview with Lars Albright, C.E.O. of SessionM, a mobile advertising platform: It’s Easy to Say ‘I Need This.’ It’s Harder to Find Solutions: "Q. How do you hire? A. The most important thing for me is seeing how someone connects with people. Part of that is how they connect with me as an interviewer, but more deeply it’s about whether I can get evidence of connections with people in other parts of their life. So I’ll ask people about their families. I’ll ask about their friends, past colleagues. How do they interact? Do they have strong relationships? Are they someone who can be flexible with different types of people? I typically get a sense very early on if someone’s going to be a fit. First impression for me is very important — that gut feel you have about their excitement and also their style and approach. Q. Anything you have an unusually low tolerance for in terms of behavior? A. The “I need” syndrome, where people say: “I need this. I need that.” And part of me thinks: “But then what? What’s your solution? What are you going to do about it?” Because it’s easy to say, “I need 10 more employees.” I think there can be this syndrome of people feeling like they should get a star for saying, “I figured out what I need.” But they’re not helping push the conversation through to what’s going to solve the problem."