Half Science, Half Art and Half Magic
Posted by Melanie Phung on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 at 11:17 pm
… that’s been how I’ve described my job as SEO. Now add to that 50% management. (Nothing less than 200% will do!) I resolved late last month that for the next 2 quarters at least, I’m going to commit half my time to management. This includes recruiting and hiring, professional development, and raising the profile of my team and our projects. That sort of stuff.
One of the biggest priorities for 2007 for me, according to a recent discussion with my manager, is building up my team. That’s a big change — up until now I’ve been very hands-on with all of our projects, ensconced in the minutae of optimizing individual pages, just because I’ve had a hard time trusting anyone else to sweat the details.
That clearly needs to stop, since there’s just not enough time and way too many projects that are in need of some strategic leadership.
The good news is that I’ve filled one of my openings (the online marketing assistant position), which solves 2 issues: a) less energy needed to fill the remainining position(s) and b) more hands and brainpower to actually execute on the zillion ideas on our to-do list.
Building an SEO team from the ground up is proving to be an interesting challenge, and it will continue to be one as I continue to hire people without a background in search engine optimization, per se.
Any tips from someone who’s been in my shoes? Do you think it’s foolish of me to hire people with no SEO experience and rely on them to learn on the job?
To be honest, yes I do think it’s foolish to hire people with no SEO experience. I would look for people who understand at least the basics of SEO and who have applied them before, at least for their own projects.
Jim - I’m not sure I understand your comment, but I’d be interested in learning more about this management concept. Can you provide a link?
Kai - it’s possible you’re right. Certainly I wouldn’t hire anyone with no relevant experience whatsoever, as Jim implies, but employees with actual SEO experience, as opposed to simply having related online experience, don’t come cheap.
I think as I move forward and start to higher more mid-level people I’ll certainly have to keep that in mind.
Damn I wish I could go back and edit my own comments. … Of course I meant to type “hire” not “higher.” Geesh.
Only senior managers would hire associates with “no” working experience because they were qualified to train them on the job.
Dr. De Bono’s “Six Thinking Hats” management concept is quite effective in promoting creativity and facilitation in a team environment.