Beyond the Resume: Why Culture Fit Matters in Hiring

In this insightful episode, Dr. Leslie Sukup dives into a crucial hiring dilemma: skillset versus culture fit. Drawing from real student stories and workplace examples, she explores how hiring for culture not only reduces conflict and turnover but also builds stronger, more resilient teams. Whether you're a manager, HR professional, or future employee, this episode offers fresh perspectives on creating positive organizational cultures where people truly thrive. 

Transcript

Welcome to the Business Administration podcast.

Hello, I'm Dr. Leslie Sukup and in this episode I wanted to continue our conversation from the last episode with a focus on hiring perspectives.

I mentioned in our previous episode that many organizations focus on hiring solely based on skill set versus culture fit.

There are some jobs that are essential to be hired by skill set,

however,

there is much value to also hiring by culture fit.

In other words,

you can do both I have witnessed and have spoken to many employees and employers who are dissatisfied with their work environment because of a coworker or employee who seems to be the odd fit.

Based upon my observations and discussions,

the root cause was the person the odd fit was hired for their skill set and not if they were able to fit into the culture of the organization.

Now,

if you look at this at first it doesn't seem like a bad idea hiring by skill set.

However,

as time goes on this odd fit individual,

you will notice that there will be more conflict in the workplace because they're not in alignment with the culture.

This creates a domino effect where yes, you have conflict occurring in the organization,

but now you have your workforce becoming stressed and now the managers and leaders of this organization are starting to see that their day is getting filled up with problems that normally would be far and few between if the individuals were also hired considering their culture fit.

As a hiring manager,

you may feel that your hands are tied,

especially in today's work environment.

It's difficult and you want to get employees into the seat because you have a dire need.

However,

you want to consider the lasting benefits to your organization by hiring in addition to skill set culture fit,

you'll find that your organization will have a healthier organizational climate.

Your organizational culture will be much more positive,

and a byproduct of that is that your employees are going to be happy coming to work and happier employees mean that they will be willing to stick around with your organization even during trials and tribulations.

When your organization is experiencing these,

this means that your organization are not going to experience those costs associated with high turnover rates.

And we all know that turnover rates for organizations can be costly and quite high depending upon how high your turnover rate is.

Because not only are you losing those costs associated with recruiting,

hiring, training the employee,

those lost man hours involved as well with usually numerous people.

But probably the most important is that tacit knowledge that that employee has that's forever lost because that knowledge isn't something that can be trained,

it's something that is experienced over a period of time that you learned by experiencing challenges or opportunities and how you deal with them.

And that's hard to capture and move over to a new employee.

It's really hard to do.

And this also strikes the importance of maybe, maybe there is something to this Hiring by Culture Fit.

In my classroom we discuss with me and my students,

we discuss whether organizations should hire based off of just the skill set or what that benefit may be of incorporating Culture Fit as well.

And it's I love this part of the semester when we talk about this and as my students share stories, it is interesting to see that many of them have experienced more so being hired by skill set or just their availability.

And few students experience being hired by Culture Fit or having that included as part of the hiring process.

And of course some of them may not realize which bucket they fit into.

But as we talk about their experiences in the workplace, it becomes pretty obvious which bucket they were in for their the hiring preferences because they have stark contrast in what they experience in the workplace.

The students who were hired based upon skill set or their availability experienced a more variable work environment.

Many of these students viewed their job as a stepping stone or or rather just having a paycheck come in to basically pay for all their expenses or to give them additional pocket money.

And many of these students who were hired by skill set or availability had no problem calling into work for varied reasons because they didn't want to go.

Many also experienced conflict in the workplace,

personalities,

values that clashed with their fellow employees or with their managers,

and overall didn't see the work environment as being overly positive.

There were good days, but there were also some some pretty negative or bad days.

But then you have the students who were in a smaller group.

There were fewer of them in this bucket that were hired based upon culture fit or that was also part of the equation with the hiring into the organization where they were employed.

And these students remarked that they often had more positive experiences in the workplace. Yes, they did have those days where there may have been disagreements,

but what they noticed is that the fellow employees,

the managers,

were okay with disagreements,

that it wasn't something that was a molehill taken into a mountain,

but rather seen as an opportunity to look at things from a different perspective and to see, well, maybe this is an indicator of something else that may be going on in the organization that needs needs addressing.

So it led to less conflict occurring in the organization.

Many of these students also shared that the managers or fellow employees were willing to go above and beyond to help,

even to the point where if they were done with their job, they would Step in and help others who maybe had other tasks to complete before they were allowed to leave for the day.

And overall, the these students relayed that they were less likely to call into work because they enjoyed getting up and taking the opportunity to learn more in their workplace.

So stark contrast there in the different experiences among the students.

Now, I want to share a story with you that reinforces this concept of, okay, hiring solely by skill set or adding in culture fit, which I think there is significant value there.

I had a prior student who took my classes,

and this student was a leader in their organization, had just taken on a new management role,

which is the reason that they were returning back to the university to get a leadership and supervision certificate.

And this individual had a large role in who was hired into their organization.

Prior to the student being promoted into this management role. They were just a normal employee in their organization and was doing a stellar job, which is why they got promoted.

But this student had noticed that people were hired based upon,

okay, we have a whole,

they have the skill set,

let's hire them and get them plugged in.

So basically they were hired on their availability and skill set.

But after taking my classes,

and especially after we did the deep dive into hiring based upon skill set or culture fit,

this individual took the opportunity to see,

okay, what can I change that is within my power in this organization to start to affect positive change?

And they started hiring not just by skill set, but also based upon how well they would fit into the culture of the organization.

And when I was talking to the student,

they had at first relayed that they were a little nervous going down this path because it is a big change.

And they shared that they had to let a lot of people go,

you know, that weren't,

that weren't going to fit into the culture. So they had to say, sorry, you know, you,

you're not who we're looking for.

And they would continue interviewing and move on to other candidates until they found someone who was not only skilled, but also was able to fit into their culture within their organization.

And the student shared that after they started doing this and some time had passed to where they were able to realize a significant positive change in their organization.

The student relayed that instead of their day being taken up by fires that would erupt within the organization,

mainly based upon conflict,

because you had that odd person that just didn't fit into the culture,

they noticed that they were able to focus on bigger issues of more importance that they could,

they could really dive into and work on to help the organization Continue moving forward.

And this is awesome to hear,

but it also relays the importance of, of hiring by culture fit. And it's not to say that you're not going to have some conflict, some disagreements in the workplace by hiring with culture, but it's going to be fewer and far between.

And a nice byproduct of hiring by culture fit is that your organization starts to be one where people want to work.

It's amazing how word of mouth travels,

and there's a lot of power in the word of mouth.

You're going to place higher value on a friend that you trust sharing information rather than an advertisement on TV or on social media or the radio or whatever medium.

And that's powerful. And when people learn that your organization is such a positive place to be,

well, you're going to have employee potential employees knocking on your door wanting to work there.

So there's something to be said about that.

And this means,

especially in today's environment where you are hurting for employees,

you're never going to be in that situation.

You are going to have people wanting to work at your organization because people love it or they really enjoy going to work because of the culture, because of the organizational climate and the organizational culture, they feel like they fit in.

Such a positive thing.

And happier employees are going to stick around,

you know, pay.

Even though another job may open up that may pay a little bit better,

it may not be the most positive work environment.

And I have actually seen personal friends turn down opportunities because they really enjoyed where they worked.

And pay wasn't enough of an incentive for them to move into an environment that was not going to give them much value and be a little bit more negative.

Well, I hope what I shared with you today resonates with you and may spark some,

some thinking in regards to your hiring perspectives.

Until the next time, be safe and be well.