In its April 2007 edition, Harvard Business Review carried a story that drives home not just this point, but the need to honestly be a culture-fit. It entitled it: "What Your Leader Expects of You And what you should expect in return." In that piece, the author, Larry Bossidy, related a real life story in which the executive, who headed Manufacturing, and the one in charge of Marketing and Sales in a certain big business that was functionally structured, didn't get along well. As a result, the function they each led didn't get on well either. The effect? Inventories were always out of balance.
One day, the CEO called them both for a meeting. He told them that it didn't matter if they liked each other or not, but that they simply had to change the way they worked together. Both managers left the meeting with a promise to overcome their differences. That didn't happen. Three months after, their boss called them again. This time, he issued them a separation package, and told them that although he thought they were both top performers individually, their failure to collaborate with each other was hurting the enterprise. At 3.00pm later that day, they came back to their boss, having apparently resolved to work collaboratively in conformity with this core value of the business.
When therefore, applicants with formidable credentials indicative of the potential to be top performers are rejected for reason of culture-misfits, it's really to avoid the kind of incidents related in the above story, and the costs of divorce that eventually go with it. The two managers aren't just so egoist that none has the humility to initiate reconciliation of their difference to the other, they both surprisingly have grudge-bearing personalities that ran counter to the easygoing, collaborative value of the organisation, so much so, it began to creep into the function they each headed.
The hurt arising from inventories that were always out of balance was cost enough to the enterprise. But the costs would have been much more if the two managers never overcame their egotism, reconciled and returned. Otherwise, their exit would have had knock-on effects on the enterprise. The separation packages besides, the enterprise would have incurred replacement costs on the managers, on-boarding costs on their successors, as well as other costs that would be too much of a digression to describe in this piece. Such costs go to the bottom lines of businesses to do damage, and every strategic hiring manager would want to do better to avoid them before hand. Hence they reject prospective top performers that are culture-misfit.
The primacy of a great university degree, formidable industry experience, variety of relevant skills and a coveted professional certification in the consideration of candidates for employment in a choice organisation cannot be overstressed. However, the applicants with such credentials aren't machines, or some inanimate objects. They're human beings first and foremost, human beings with feelings and in-built personalities; they have their likes and dislikes, beliefs and convictions, the sense of what is right, and what is wrong. These need to align with the core values of the organisation, or else they'll be misfits. And being misfit, they can't loyally, passionately and enduringly give their best to their employer. Indeed, sooner or later, a divorce will ensure with its accompanying costs on the employer. Materials that don't have the substance that sticks them firmly together can naturally not hold out for long. So it is with the personalities of job seekers and the core values of organisations.
Mr. Ejiro Edeki is a Recruitment Consultant, CV/Résumé Strategist and CEO, BJ Solutions Inc. His articles can be read at the website: http://www.bj-jobsolutions.com.
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