In the first of four extracts from a book on hiring and firing, Pamela Marrone, founder and CEO of Marrone Organic Innovations talks about why it is difficult to run a company when you have employees who are not aligned with what you’re doing.

LESSON SUMMARY POINTS

1. Hiring individuals who are technically competent but do not share the values of the company’s leaders can have dire consequences.

2. It is extremely difficult to run and grow a company when employees aren’t aligned with its mission because of the distractions and disruptions caused by staff turnover.

3. When hiring, screen individuals to ensure that they bring shared values.

4. Put your value statement up front, have new employees sign it, and tell them that you expect them to live by it.

This is an edited extract from Hiring and Firing, a new book in the Lessons Learned series from Harvard Business Press and 50 Lessons