Summary: Most small business owners know the pain of hiring the wrong person. You spend time posting a job, reading piles of resumes, doing interviews, onboarding—and then within weeks, you realize it’s a bad fit. You’re back to square one, frustrated, and out thousands of dollars.
Dr. Michael Neal knows this story all too well. We had a great discussion on the State of Work Today podcast.
He’s an optometrist by training, but like most private practice owners, he’s also an entrepreneur, manager, and recruiter—whether he likes it or not. Early in his career, he and his wife Amy started a successful eye care practice. And for years, they hired like most people do: based on resumes and interviews.
The result? Turnover. Stress. Missed family time. And a constant feeling that work was harder than it should be.
But then something changed.
"We Were Hiring Like Doctors—And It Was a Disaster"
Michael didn’t set out to become a hiring expert. But after hiring mistake after hiring mistake, he had no choice.
“We were hiring people we thought we could help. People we could ‘fix,’” he says. “That works in medicine. It does not work in hiring.”
Like many entrepreneurs, he and Amy were bringing on team members based on personality, potential, or just gut instinct. On paper, these people seemed fine. In interviews, they said all the right things. But once hired, they often underperformed, clashed with the team, or left within weeks.
At one point, they cycled through 26 employees in a single year. Only two stuck. The rest were a revolving door of turnover, retraining, and frustration.
“It felt like chewing glass and staring into the abyss,” Michael says. “We almost got divorced over it.”
Hiring With Fresh Eyes
The turning point came when Michael enrolled in an executive coaching program and began studying how elite organizations hired top talent.
He looked at companies like Disney and the Four Seasons. What he found shocked him.
“They weren’t trying to find the right person. They were focused on eliminating the wrong ones,” he explains. “They’d pour thousands of people into the top of the funnel, and use assessments and systems to weed out the ones who didn’t fit—long before anyone ever looked at a resume.”
This insight hit home. And it was especially fitting for an optometrist. As Michael puts it, “I had to look at hiring with fresh eyes.”
So he and his team built an entirely new process. One that had nothing to do with resumes or gut feelings. One that was based on psychometrics—the science of measuring people's cognitive and behavioral traits—and real data.
The result was Build My Team, a company that now helps other small businesses, especially in healthcare, use this exact system to hire more effectively.
The Results: Fewer Staff, Better Performance, More Profit
Michael didn't just test his system—he lived it.
In his own eye care practice, he applied the Build My Team approach and started replacing team members based on psychometric fit, not experience.
Within 18 months, he reduced his team from 14 full-time employees to 10.5.
And here's the kicker:
· Gross revenue went up by 50 percent
· Net income nearly tripled
· Team morale and culture transformed completely
How did fewer people produce more?
Simple. They were the right people—placed in roles that matched their natural strengths. They didn’t need micromanaging. They didn’t bring drama. They didn’t quit after a few weeks. They showed up, did great work, and made life easier for everyone around them.
“I tell people this story and they don’t believe me,” he says. “Until I showed them my tax returns and payroll numbers on another podcast.”
Why Most Hiring Fails
Michael is quick to point out that the real issue isn’t bad people—it’s a bad system.
“Resumes are mostly made up. And interviews? They're just people saying what they think you want to hear,” he explains.
He’s not wrong. According to research from Korn Ferry, 70 percent of resumes are rejected before a human even sees them—screened out by algorithms. That’s before we even talk about AI-generated resumes or job applications submitted by bots.
The traditional hiring process simply doesn’t give small business owners the information they actually need to make a good decision.
“You’re looking at a stack of needles and trying to find the one magical needle,” Michael says. “But the better approach is to design a system that filters out the ones that can’t do the job—before you ever waste your time.”
How the New Hiring System Works
The Build My Team process flips hiring on its head. Here’s the basic flow:
1. Start with the role, not the resume
They write a job ad using language that attracts the type of person who will thrive in the role—based on personality and work style, not just skills.
2. Use assessments to test fit
Applicants are sent through a short series of assessments that measure things like learning speed, stress tolerance, attention to detail, and how they prefer to work.
3. Eliminate bad fits early
The system is designed to reject about 97 percent of applicants automatically—because they’re not aligned with what the role actually needs.
4. Finalists record a short video
This ensures a real person is applying, and gives the hiring manager a chance to see how the candidate communicates and presents themselves.
Only then do humans step in to review the finalists.
The kicker? The entire process is automated and runs through text messaging—not email—because studies show entry-level candidates rarely check their email more than twice a week.
Culture, Engagement, and the Real Cost of a Bad Hire
Most small businesses want better culture. But they try to fix it the wrong way—throwing pizza parties or hosting off-site retreats.
According to Michael, none of that matters if the wrong people are on the team.
“Culture isn’t something you create. It’s something that shows up when you hire the right people,” he says. “A-players don’t want to work with C-players. And they’ll quit if they have to.”
What’s worse, bad hires don’t just hurt culture—they’re expensive.
It’s estimated that replacing even a low-level employee costs 50 to 200 percent of their salary when you factor in recruiting, training, lost productivity, and team disruption.
Michael ran the numbers for his own practice. Even firing someone after just two weeks still cost him $5,000.
That’s why getting it right the first time matters so much.
Who This Works For
Build My Team started in healthcare, and it continues to serve private practices in optometry, dentistry, chiropractic care, and more. But the system works in any industry where roles are repeatable and performance can be predicted based on traits—not just experience.
That includes roles in customer service, admin, operations, and even roles like locksmiths and nannies.
The key is having a clear picture of the kind of person who thrives in the job—not just what’s written on a resume.
Three Actionable Takeaways
Whether you’re running a healthcare practice, managing a small business, or hiring your first assistant, here are three takeaways you can apply today:
1. Stop relying on resumes and interviews
Resumes rarely tell the full story. Interviews are often filled with canned answers. Instead, focus on assessments that measure how people think and behave—what they’ll actually do on the job.
2. Attract the right people with the right language
The job post is your first filter. Use language that speaks directly to the kind of work style and mindset you want. If you want someone who thrives in routine, say so. If the job requires empathy or speed, make that clear.
3. Move fast on good candidates
Top performers won’t wait around. If you delay the process or go dark for a week, they’re gone. Build a system that engages quickly—ideally through text—and shortens the time between applying and interviewing.
Final Thought
Hiring doesn’t have to be broken. But to fix it, we have to stop doing what we've always done.
It took an optometrist to remind us: sometimes, all it takes is looking at the problem with fresh eyes.
And when you do, the results might just surprise you.
Listen to the complete episode on the State of Work Today podcast here.
