User:Kharden444/Geoff Smart

Geoffrey H. Smart (born October 7, 1972) is Chairman and CEO of ghSMART & Company, Inc., and is the New York Times Bestselling co-author of Who: The A Method for Hiring (Random House/Ballantine Books, 2008).

Born in La Grange, IL, he received a BA in Economics with Honors from Northwestern University. Smart is listed by Northwestern University’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences as a Notable Alumni. He went on to receive a MA and Ph.D. in Psychology from Claremont Graduate University, where he was a student of management guru Peter F. Drucker. While conducting research for his acclaimed Ph.D. dissertation, Management Methods in Venture Capital: Toward a Theory of Human Capital Valuation, Smart founded ghSMART & Company, Inc., in 1995.

In addition to serving as Chairman & CEO of ghSMART since its founding in 1995, Smart has been an international public speaker on the topic of hiring, since 2007 has been an investor and board member of a private equity-backed company called Crestcom, and since 2002 has been a sponsor and classroom volunteer for Junior Achievement.

ghSMART & Co.
ghSMART is a management consulting firm that uses its expertise in human behavior to help CEOs and investors build valuable companies.

In 2008, Harvard Business School published two case studies about ghSMART, describing the firm as a “pioneer” in the field of management assessment and development. Today, the firm is considered a leader in its field, according to BusinessWeek, the Private Equity Analyst ,and Buyouts Magazine. The firm is 100% employee-owned by its consultants and staff members.

Thought Leadership
In 2008, ghSMART consultants Geoff Smart and Randy Street published the book Who: The A Method for Hiring (Random House/Ballantine Books).

Who achieved the rank of being the #1 bestselling book in the United States on Amazon.com within two weeks of its release, and became a New York Times Bestseller, Wall Street Journal Bestseller, USAToday Bestseller, and BusinessWeek Bestseller.

The book offers managers a method for hiring which was developed through research with the University of Chicago Professor Steven Kaplan, through field interviews with over 20 billionaire business leaders, and by leveraging the firm’s experience serving hundreds of CEOs and investors over its then-13-year history. The ghSMART A Method for Hiring is described, which has 4 steps: 1) Scorecard, 2) Source, 3) Select, and 4) Sell.

Book reviews of Who were published by The Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business School Bulletin , and by management writer Tom Peters.

Geoff Smart is also known for co-creating in 1997, with his father Bradford D. Smart, the management approach called Topgrading®. Topgrading refers to a process of creating shareholder value through hiring, retaining, and developing talented managers and employees.