Any anecdotes from past experiences would be great!
1) A history of high retention. People want to work for them.
2) Actual management training. They know who Deming, Christensen, Senge, and Ohno are and have opinions on their work. Some people kinda fall into management positions and figure it out as they go. That’s not a good plan for a small business.
3) A history of high performance teams. The candidate should have a story about how they changed a process, worked with a stakeholder, or some other deliberate action to improve team performance. The signal is be looking for is an accurate diagnosis of a management type problem before making changes. You don’t want someone that randomly changes things and sometimes gets lucky.
4) Somebody who won’t try to copy-paste big business processes into a small business. You want someone who will never say “that’s just how it’s done.” I’ve seen this before and it’s cancerous. Agility and flexibility are one of the few advantages of a small business. Don’t let an unthinking manager give it away.