The replies are all playing word police and missing the point. Hyperboles are great for getting a point across, except when they're taken too literally.
OP means you should be raising the bar for hiring at your org.
OP means you should be raising the bar for hiring at your org.
I'm not talking about the mythical 10x engineers or anything like that. It's your bar for what skills fit into your company. If you have no bar...you've got much bigger problems than management...
That said, if you lower the bar a bit in hiring, do not lower the bar in expectations. See if that person who you weren't that confident in can catch up fast. Some candidates work very hard and make it. Those who aren't are apparently fairly quickly...you have to let them go.
Incidentally, there is no real "best" when it comes to engineers -- I've found there are two ways to think about the engineers you need: specific skillsets and brilliance. Someones you need someone who really knows a particular technology or area and can do that very well even if that person isn't generally super-capable. Such a person is often much more efficient than any new-comer will be even after several months of training. Then there's certain work that requires learning or general brilliance (which is probably learning fast if I had to define it...).
So what's the bar? How often, in feedback meetings is the criticism technical versus non-technical?
I know I never get specific technical evaluations from managers. Ever. No exaggeration.