HOW TO CLIMB TO THE TOP OF THE HILL
Source: WILL HINE in Queenstown - Southland Times
At the end of Michael Hill's new book is a hand-scrawled message to the reader: "If you have what it takes to be a winner I want to hear from you contact us on michaelhill.com".
That's right ever the entrepreneur, Hill is using Toughen Up as a recruitment tool.
"There is a hope that people who read it will want to join the company," he told The Southland Times. "Because I can't get to 10,000 staff without more people who have the passion and determination to join me."
Hill said he got so frustrated at meeting people who could not see their own potential that he decided he owed it to them to write a book about his experiences in business.
"Our best people are not the ones you might expect.
"They're not like film stars they're more like people who have come off a farm in Southland or Northland and who have learned the basic lessons of life."
Asked how many readers he was after, Hill said he wanted as many good people as possible.
Those people wanting to join the Michael Hill empire could expect a course in Selling 101. And 201. And 301.
Hill is consumed by the art of selling so much so that he regularly tests the service levels at competing retailers and critiques his employees on how they can improve themselves.
"It's no holds barred. We'll look at the way you present yourself, the way you breathe, the way you talk."
Indeed, Toughen Up recounts incidents in which Hill has critiqued staff who suffer from bad breath, drinking problems, even weight issues. The secret, by all accounts, is to couch the criticism in genuine, worthy praise.
The book has more than 20 short vignettes from employees, many who started at the bottom and worked their way to the top of Hill's mountain.
Like the man himself, the book is chatty, personable and rarely boring.
All proceeds from the book's sale are going to the charity Curekids.