OPUS-FOCUS Newsletter
Focus on People, Productivity and Profitability
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What, Me Worry About Personality?
Here's a question we've heard from other folks that may be on your mind as well.
Have you thought this way? "The job market is so tight these days for the skill set that we need, we can't really 'worry' about their personality type and how they'll fit into our organization. Frankly, if I could find the person with the right background, I would hire them no matter what their profile was, so why should I care about their personality type?"
But, does that mean that you do not want to understand the motivation and behavioral strengths of this person? Of course you do. This person is going to be a key asset for your business, and you owe it to yourself to maximize your return on this asset. You'll benefit by taking this person through the profiling process early in your interview process in the following ways:
- You'll know what motivates them. This will help you in your sales pitch to get them to join up with you. If this person is all the things you think they are, then you'll have lots of competition for this talent.
- You'll know what their behavioral strengths and weaknesses are. This will help you prepare the remainder of your organization to work effectively with this person.
- You'll know how similarly or differently they look at things as compared to you. If you understand that they have a completely different outlook on life it will help build trust between the two of you.
So profile Mr. or Ms. Perfect. Not because you want to include or exclude them, but because you want to be sure you are doing everything in your power to maximize the immediate and long-term results of your investment in this manpower.
Oh, by the way, could someone be such a horrible fit from a profile standpoint that you might decide that the personality trait challenges outweigh the knowledge? Maybe. You might find out things about their personality that have caused them to be somewhat less than effective in similar roles. If that's the case, then maybe the selection isn't as much of a slam dunk as you think. Please remember that people get hired for technical reasons, and fired for behavioral reasons. We see it happen all the time.
These stories ran on the same page in the Wall Street Journal in late February. The first was about the RadioShack CEO agreeing to resign as a result of inflating his educational credentials. He said that he had a B.S. degree but really only had a Thg (theology) degree, but when push came to shove, he couldn't prove that either. Well, it does seem that he had a degree of B.S. in him, doesn't it?
The other story was about Lawrence H. Summers resigning from his position as president of Harvard University. I loved the way the Wall Street Journal described Summers in the article: "A strong leader who would assert his authority over entrenched fiefdoms." Think he might be a High Dominance profile?
Do you think OPUS could have saved these organizations a coin or two? RadioShack is making a severance payment of $1.5M to a person that misrepresented their undergraduate degree. Unbelievable! What would they have given him if he said he was a PhD?
Hard to put a dollar figure on what Harvard lost, but I bet it hasn't been real pleasant for anyone involved with that situation. So let's review both situations.
People lie on their resumes. Do we care? We better, for if they can't sell themselves honestly, how will they represent us? Companies that knowingly hire someone that has specific misstatements on their resume regarding education and work history are looking for trouble. An organization can only be effective if people are honest and trust each other, and trust isn't built on falsehoods on resumes.
As for Harvard, do you think that the hiring committee had a pretty good sense that Dr. Summers was a High Dominance person when they considered him? Probably, as his style was well known in advance. So then, would profiling have made a difference? Perhaps, because it would have caused them to deal squarely with the behavioral nature of the person.
What are some of the things that drive the high dominance person crazy? How about dealing with bureaucracies and trivial interference? And what do you think it was like for Dr. Summers to deal with "the Corporation" (so called internally by Harvard to describe Harvard's seven member governing board)? Had they gone through the exercise of looking at Dr. Summers behavioral style and compared it with the people he was working with, the problem would have been discussed and dealt with prior to his employment. After all, I don't think his behavior was in any way unpredictable. They got exactly what they should have known they were going to get. No surprises on the behavior, but big surprises on the result. Dr. Summers will have served the shortest stint as president of Harvard since 1862. Not exactly what everyone had in mind.
Interesting stories, especially to break on the same day. And good reminders to all of you as to why clients utilize OPUS services to better understand and evaluate their potential candidates for hire. We can't change who the person is, but we sure can tell you what to expect, and how that person will fit in with your team. Knowledge is power, and we want that power to be in your hands.
Endless Referrals by Bob Burg
A new completely updated edition is out for this underground bestseller that has already sold more than 150,000 copies. Burg is a master at showing how to turn casual contacts into solid sales opportunities. Here's his golden rule: All things being equal, people will do business with, and refer business to, those people they know, like and trust. Check out his ideas for Internet networking.
