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Attitude Over CV Top Bosses Reveal What Gets You Hired

1 hour ago

Charlotte Tilbury, Marcia Kilgore, Charlie Nunn and other founders share the one quality they look for when hiring and how to stand out.

What gets someone hired and helps them climb? For six business founders and leaders, the answer has little to do with a flawless CV. They point instead to attitude, curiosity, communication and a willingness to take chances. Each shared the qualities they notice most and the advice they would give to anyone trying to get ahead.

Beauty mogul Charlotte Tilbury says the biggest driver of her career has been refusing to let other people decide what she can achieve. "Nothing is impossible in life - it's only your own limitations you give yourself," she says. Plenty of people told her she was "mad" or that her ideas would fail, and her advice is to ignore them. She also reframes failure. "I don't think about mistakes, I think mistakes are opportunities," she says, adding that the toughest challenges she faced made her a stronger leader because "challenge is opportunity and it leads you to greater places."

Skills can be taught, attitude cannot

Charlie Bowes-Lyon, co-founder of the deodorant brand Wild, weights character far above technical ability. "For me, it's 90% attitude and 10% skills, as skills can be taught, attitude can't," he says. He wishes he had understood earlier that even successful people rarely feel as assured as they look, describing it as "everyone is faking it until they're making it."

Bowes-Lyon also has a practical warning for interviews: prepare questions to ask at the end. "Candidates who say they have no questions rarely get the job," he says. One he recommends is to ask the interviewer what success in the role actually looks like.

Marcia Kilgore, the serial entrepreneur behind Beauty Pie and Soap and Glory, says curiosity is one of the main things she hires for. She looks for people who will "roll their sleeves up, ask lots of questions and think about how they can be useful." She also rates communication highly, having learned early in her career that a breakdown in communication is often what causes things to go wrong.

Her tip is to slow down before speaking. "Listen to what's being asked and take a breath or five," she advises. "Your response doesn't have to be immediate, but it does have to be considered."

Say yes, and match EQ to IQ

Anabel Kindersley, chief executive and co-owner of Neal's Yard Remedies, believes the fastest way to build skills is to keep accepting new opportunities. "Do everything and say yes to everything - it might feel uncomfortable but do it anyway," she says. It is a rule that has shaped her own path, which moved from child actress to author and later into business.

Kindersley adds that honesty counts for a lot, urging people to be truthful about their experience while staying confident about what they bring. When she hires, she wants "equal EQ as IQ," placing emotional intelligence on the same footing as raw ability.

Charlie Nunn, group chief executive of Lloyds Banking Group, points to curiosity and resilience, along with a growing readiness to consider how AI tools can be put to use in the future.

Taken together, the leaders describe a shared checklist that has less to do with credentials than with mindset: back yourself, treat setbacks as material to learn from, ask questions, communicate with care, and stay open to work that stretches you.

career advice, job interview tips, Charlotte Tilbury, Marcia Kilgore, Charlie Nunn Lloyds, hiring qualities, workplace success, attitude over skills

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