08/20/2026 - Hiring the Right People with Predictive Index

This CG Operations Call features Austin McCurdy of Sharper Business Solutions breaking down how real estate investors can use Predictive Index (PI), behavioral assessments, and cognitive assessments to make better hiring and management decisions. The training focuses on putting the right people in the right seats—especially acquisitions and transaction roles—while helping leaders understand employee motivation, communication styles, training needs, and how company culture and systems should influence hiring profiles.

What This Call Covers

• Hiring the Right People for Real Estate Roles
  • Use behavioral data alongside resumes, experience, and interviews
  • Determine whether candidates naturally enjoy the work required by the position
  • Recognize that someone can technically perform a job while still being poorly matched to its day-to-day demands
  • Better job fit can translate into stronger performance and retention
• Hiring Acquisitions Reps
  • Treat acquisitions as buying and negotiating, not traditional sales
  • Traditional sales experience doesn't automatically mean someone will excel at direct-to-seller acquisitions
  • Evaluate whether candidates naturally fit seller conversations, negotiation, decision-making, and the company's acquisition process
  • Don't rely exclusively on previous real estate experience when evaluating talent
• There Is No Universal “Perfect” Acquisitions Profile
  • The ideal behavioral profile depends on your company's culture, systems, leadership, and sales process
  • A profile that performs extremely well at one investing company may struggle in another
  • Build hiring targets around how the role actually operates inside your business
  • Use the performance of existing top producers to help refine hiring criteria
• Using Predictive Index for Hiring
  • PI behavioral assessments identify what types of work and environments people naturally prefer
  • Assessments should not be interpreted as determining what someone can or cannot do
  • Use behavioral profiles as one part of a broader hiring process
  • Compare candidates against role-specific behavioral targets instead of making decisions based on personality impressions alone
• Cognitive Assessments & Learning Speed
  • Cognitive scores can help estimate how quickly someone may learn and process new information
  • A lower score doesn't necessarily mean someone cannot succeed—it may mean they require more repetition, training, and time
  • Consider the complexity of the position and the amount of support available when evaluating cognitive fit
• First Hires vs. Later Team Hires
  • Your first acquisitions rep or first TC may need stronger learning agility because there is less infrastructure around them
  • Small business owners often need early hires to become productive quickly and operate independently
  • A later hire can potentially succeed with a lower learning-speed profile if strong SOPs, onboarding, training, and experienced teammates are already in place
  • Hiring standards should therefore reflect the maturity of the business
• Building Stronger Training & Onboarding
  • Adjust training based on how quickly each employee processes new information
  • Employees who need more repetition may still become strong performers with sufficient structure
  • Mature organizations can support a wider variety of candidates because systems reduce dependence on individual learning speed
  • Consider whether your business can realistically afford a longer ramp-up period before making the hire
• Using Assessments for Management, Not Just Hiring
  • Behavioral assessments can help managers understand what motivates individual employees
  • Use employee profiles to improve communication, delegation, feedback, and coaching
  • Recognize that identical behaviors can come from very different underlying motivations
  • Avoid assuming you understand someone's behavioral profile simply from observing them
• Leadership Self-Awareness
  • Effective management starts with understanding your own behavioral tendencies
  • Leaders should recognize how their communication and management style affects different team members
  • What motivates the owner may not motivate an acquisitions rep, TC, or other employee
  • Use behavioral data to adapt leadership rather than expecting every employee to operate like the founder
• Avoiding Assessment Mistakes
  • Don't make hiring decisions from one score or assessment alone
  • Avoid guessing someone's profile based solely on whether they're outgoing, quiet, detailed, or talkative
  • If assessment results conflict with what you're seeing in interviews, investigate further
  • Use additional interview questions and real-world evaluation to validate concerns
• Keeping Hiring Practices Consistent
  • Be careful when allowing candidates to retake assessments
  • If one candidate receives a second opportunity, consistency may require offering the same opportunity to others
  • Build standardized hiring procedures rather than changing the process candidate by candidate
• Key Investor Takeaway
  • As a real estate company grows, hiring shouldn't rely solely on gut instinct or whether someone has previous industry experience. Combining behavioral fit, learning speed, company culture, role requirements, and the strength of your existing systems can help investors build acquisitions, transaction, and operations teams that perform more independently and scale with the business.