Kind Snacks founder Daniel Lubetzky: Here's the No. 1 type of valuable employee that most CEOs overlook

Daniel Lubetzky isn't a fan of hiring people who remind him of himself.

In his experience, his best employees have different qualities and skills than he does, says the billionaire founder of Kind Snacks. "You want to be careful not to hire the same person you are," Lubetzky, 56, tells CNBC Make It. "We tend to make the mistake [of looking] for clones by nature — we like ourselves. But that's not actually how it works."

Instead, Lubetzky — who was announced on Wednesday as the newest series regular on ABC's "Shark Tank," ahead of fellow billionaire Mark Cuban's planned departure from the TV show next year — preaches the value of surrounding yourself with people whose strengths are your weaknesses.

"You need to find complementary skills. If you're not good with the numbers, get somebody that's good with the numbers," says Lubetzky. "If you're not creative, hire somebody who's creative. You need complementary skills."

This tendency has a couple names in psychology: the "similar-to-me" effect, or affinity bias. Humans are more inclined to collaborate with, befriend and even form romantic relationships with people who have similar interests, education, skills and values.

In the workplace, affinity bias can play into hiring decisions and promotions: A boss could be more inclined to give opportunities to those who they see themselves in. But a team full of people with the same opinions is tantamount to surrounding yourself with yes-men, which means you'll rarely get honest feedback or called out when you make a mistake, Lubetzky told Make It last year.

"[That makes it] so much harder to [achieve success] because you can go into 'I'm amazing' mode, and not realize when you are screwing up," he said.

Lubetzky learned the value of working with people who have opposing viewpoints at his first company, PeaceWorks, he says. The company sold specialty foods made by people who lived in conflict regions in the Middle East, and Lubetzky recalls getting into a disagreement with his business partner about a divisive basil pesto.

"We had a basil pesto [that] tasted like grass to me. I didn't want anything to do with it," says Lubetzky. "But my partner insisted that I needed to order some [more]. I was like, 'Why would I order this stuff? I don't like it.'" Ten years later, the pesto made up 90% of the company's sales, he says.

There is one quality that bosses and employees should always share, Lubetzky says: values. You're more likely to have a positive work culture when everyone's collectively working toward the same goal, he notes.

Fifty-six percent of U.S. professionals won't even consider a workplace that doesn't share their values, according to a 2022 survey from Qualtrics. More than half of US employees (54%) would be willing to take a pay cut to work at a company with better values.

"You want to make sure that people in your team all care about the 'how' just as much as the 'what,'" says Lubetzky. "That you're all doing this for the right reasons."

Disclosure: CNBC owns the exclusive off-network cable rights to "Shark Tank."

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