Hired a Staff Who Knows It All?

You finally found them. The experienced professional with years of industry knowledge, a strong network in your sector, and a track record that made them look like the answer to three of your current headaches. You hired them — probably paid a premium to do so — and expected them to hit the ground running.

For the first few weeks, things were promising. Then the pattern started. They dismiss ideas they haven't tried yet. They challenge decisions — sometimes publicly. They treat feedback as an accusation rather than an input. And somewhere between their third "that's not how it's done" and their first quiet word to another team member about your judgment, you found yourself wondering whether you made a mistake.

Here's the question most leaders skip before reacting: What if they're right?

Not about everything. Not about the way they're going about it. But about some of it — maybe the thing you're most annoyed they keep raising.

Two Lenses, One Problem

When a senior hire starts showing resistance, most advice defaults immediately to the same diagnosis: the hire is the problem. Stubborn. Ego-driven. Set in their ways. The prescribed solution is usually some version of "set firm expectations and hold the line." That advice is sometimes right. But it is not always right — and applying it when it's wrong can cost you a genuinely valuable perspective, and sometimes the hire altogether.

Lens A: The hire is stuck in their ways, fearful, or driven primarily by ego. They want authority without accountability. They haven't accepted that moving to a new organisation means adapting to a new operating environment. In this case, leadership must set clear boundaries and establish alignment expectations that are non-negotiable.

Lens B: The hire sees a genuine blind spot — a flawed strategy, a naive risk assumption, a mistake the organisation is heading toward that they've watched play out somewhere else before. Their resistance is real, and it has merit. The problem is not that they're speaking up; the problem is that they don't yet know how to advocate effectively inside your specific organisation.

In practice, the truth is almost always somewhere between the two. But the lens you lead with will determine the path you take — and whether you get the best out of what you hired.

The TACT Framework: Before You React, Diagnose

Whether you're dealing with Lens A, Lens B, or the messy combination of both, the same four-step diagnostic applies. I call it the TACT Framework — not because it's a call for politeness, but because it gives you a structured way to act on the right problem rather than the most visible symptom.

Five Questions to Ask Before You React

1. Have I clearly defined my company's mission, goals, and ways of working?

Experienced hires carry default settings from their previous environments. If your company's objectives and operating norms haven't been explicitly communicated — and documented — they will fill the gap with whatever worked before. This is not stubbornness. It's human nature, and it's a gap you created at the point of onboarding.

2. Is their resistance rooted in fear — or in evidence?

Some experienced employees resist because they've been through what happens when things go wrong. Three economic cycles, two failed product launches, one company that didn't survive an ill-timed expansion. That memory lives in the body. Ask: "What specific outcome are you worried about?" Then treat the answer as data, not defensiveness.

3. Do they respect leadership — or do they see a gap in leadership's experience?

This one requires honesty. If the hire has navigated economic environments you haven't, managed teams larger than yours, or built functions you are still learning how to oversee, there is a credibility question that leadership has to answer — not with authority, but with demonstrated competence. The kind of authority that doesn't need to assert itself constantly is the kind that actually earns alignment.

4. Are your ways tested — or just familiar?

This is the uncomfortable question. Some of what businesses call "our way of doing things" is actually just inertia — a decision made years ago under different conditions that never got revisited. If the experienced hire is pushing back on something you haven't examined critically since you implemented it, their pushback may be useful, not obstructive.

"Show them the why behind your methods — not just the what. Where you don't have a compelling why, that's the thing you actually need to fix."

5. Is their behaviour harming team dynamics — or exposing them?

If other team members feel silenced, that matters and must be addressed. But if one hire speaking candidly is causing others to disengage, ask a harder question: are they the problem, or are they simply the first person in the team who has felt safe enough — or bold enough — to say things others have been thinking? A culture that rewards compliance over candour will produce exactly this situation.

Two Paths Forward, Depending on What You Find

Path 1: The hire is genuinely inflexible

If the evidence points to ego-driven resistance — a pattern of dismissing ideas without alternatives, operating in isolation from the team, or framing every interaction as a status contest — set the tone, establish non-negotiables, and frame every feedback conversation around shared business outcomes rather than personal authority.

The most effective approach here is: "Here is what we are working toward. Here is the standard we hold ourselves to. Here is how we make decisions together. Are you willing to operate within this?"

Path 2: They see something you don't

If the evidence points to unskilled advocacy — a legitimate concern being raised in a way that creates friction rather than resolution — your job is not to shut it down. It is to channel it. Ask them to write a one-page brief: what is the specific risk, what past experience or evidence supports their concern, and what would they propose instead. A brief forces precision and creates a shared artefact to evaluate.

Teach them the language of structured challenge: "I've seen this fail when X happens — could we test for that?" rather than "that approach won't work." And — this is the one that requires the most courage — be willing to change your position publicly when the case warrants it. That is not weakness. That is what credible leadership actually looks like.

The Practical Self-Assessment

Alignment is not the same as agreement. A well-functioning team has people who challenge decisions — they just know how to do it in a way that moves things forward rather than grinding them to a halt. Your job is to build the conditions for that.