Hire the highest level of talent you can find, recognizing talent does not mean a great deal if you bring someone in who does not fit the culture.
In addition to hiring for attitude, great leaders succeed in identifying candidates who are strong cultural fits, especially at the executive level.
The decision to fill a position with an internal candidate or external depends on many factors, from how much internal knowledge is required to how much change the hiring leader wants to introduce. When hiring early and mid-career associates, whether the person can be successful is largely decided by two factors: ability to perform the work and fit with the team. When hiring senior level individual contributor positions, influence becomes an additional critical success factor. Hiring at the executive level introduces additional complexity. While culture fit is important in all hiring decisions, it can overwhelm any qualifications an executive hire may bring and render him irrelevant before he ever gets started.
For example, if your company culture leans toward command and control where decisions come quickly but are the realm of a handful of leaders, hiring a person who prefers to ponder possibilities and gain consensus will oftentimes create stress and lead to failure. Or, if your company culture is consensus oriented and an executive leader is hired who insists he can make decisions alone to keep things moving along he will find things slowing dramatically due to lack of alignment. Interviewing external executive candidates for cultural fit by asking questions about how they behave in certain scenarios leads to a greater chance for success. Questions like the following can be helpful (assuming an external candidate):
- How would you describe the culture of your current company? What do you like about it and what would you change?
- How are decisions made in your company and in your direct team?
- How is conflict generally addressed in your company?
- Share a time where you worked with others to create consensus on a contentious topic. Specifically, how did you achieve alignment?
- Are you an active volunteer / do you participate in community service activities? (for organizations that emphasize community involvement)
This begs the question, at what level should new talent be externally hired? I have come to believe for most organizations it is best to hire external candidates into individual contributor and mid-level manager and leader positions and hire internally for senior leader and executive positions. Like all things in life, this is a statement of balance, not absolutes. As an example, the following external hiring provides for new thinking and perspectives while allowing external hires to grow into the company culture and providing internal candidates plenty of opportunity:
- 10% – 15% of executive positions
- 10 % – 15% of other leader positions
- 30% – 35% of individual contributor and mid-level management positions
This approach also allows for observing people early in their careers where culture risk is lower, and mistakes are more easily forgiven. And it lets them watch and learn, to emulate other successful associates they see. It also allows for external senior hires where culture fit is clear. Across the companies I have worked for, I estimate that fewer than 50% of external executive hires were successful, meaning the person remained in place for multiple years and was recognized and accepted by peers. The other half exited relatively quickly, usually within 18 months. Some opted out, some were fired. Almost none were released due to a skill gap. It was a culture gap.
Hire the highest level of talent you can find, recognizing talent does not mean a great deal if you bring someone in who does not fit the culture. Interview for culture fit and construct your team with this in mind and your likelihood of success increases considerably.
Share your thoughts below.
As an interviewer, what questions do you ask to determine whether a candidate is a good culture fit for your company and team?
Leave a Reply