I was just reading something about "what are the best things to look for when hiring?". Most people talked about the usual things such as hiring the best and the brightest. Looking for experience in the industry and size of company were big recommendations as well. Those are all good things but also organizational fit is important as well.
These days pure individual contributors are rare. Most people need to function as a part of team and as such every team member needs to fit in to a certain extent. I absolutely believe 100% in bringing in diversity into the team but they need to have the ability to work together. I have seen many instances where one caustic personality spoiled the productivity of the whole team. They can shut down creative thinking, create productivity bottlenecks and even be down right abusive. This is lethal to any organization and the leader must deal with it promptly and effectively.
So how do you hire people that are good fits culturally? The best way I have seen is to put together an interview slate that has superiors, peers and if it is a leadership role, subordinates. If you are changing the chemical makeup of the organization care must be taken to select people that will give you all points of view on the candidate. I have had to hand select interview slates to ensure that I got a view of the candidate not for the current organization but for the organization I wanted it to be. You might be tempted to forgo having the organization interview candidates. That is a mistake as well because they are not as likely to accept the selected candidate. You need the teams buy in and having them part of the process helps the acceptance process.
A healthy team is a productive team. Certainly go out and hire the best, brightest, most diverse staff you can hire but also make sure they are good cultural fit for the organization you want it to become. Begin your hiring with ending in mind.
No comments:
Post a Comment