And yet this candidate seemed perfect. His CV perfectly matched the position to be filled, he brilliantly passed all 15 stages of the recruitment process, convincing everyone he came into contact with. He was the perfect person to help the company turn a corner.
And yet…
His results were disappointing, his impact disappointing. Sometimes the disappointment was slight, but sometimes it was a real failure.
In short, it was time to say good-bye (or to himself decide to end the experiment), and everyone kept asking “why?
There isn’t a company that hasn’t experienced this. Note that the opposite is also possible: a person from whom little is expected who, through internal or external mobility, turns a corner and achieves exceptional results. But those are less talked about.
And this is true in every field. In our favorite sport, we all remember that sportsman or woman who was transferred to a gold medal-winning team, from whom everyone expected a lot because he or she could only function, and who could no longer put one foot in front of the other once he had joined his new team.
You never succeed or fail alone
I often say that when something goes wrong, it’s 94% because of the system and 6% because of people. That’s at the operational level, and I don’t know if the proportions are the same in the case we’re interested in, but it’s already an eye-opener.
What made a person successful in previous positions? Talent, of course. But is that all?
The company’s managerial model may have helped them to express themselves and grow. As did its organization. And of course its culture.
And his colleagues. Here we’re talking about both soft and hard skills. Could he rely on them, or were they a hindrance? And independently of any skills, there’s also the notion of knowing to what extent the complementarity of his team members was a factor in his success.
Finally, there are a host of other things, such as the work practices (collaboration, remote work….) he was comfortable with.
All of this conditions a person’s success, over and above their own talent. Individual talent can help make up for many shortcomings, sometimes working miracles, but it has its limits, and in the long term it’s not enough.
In interviews, we like to say that we owe our successes mainly to ourselves and that our failures are mainly due to others, the system, the organization, the culture. That’s human. But the truth is that we succeed as much as we fail thanks to others and thanks to the system.
The proof: when a person is appointed to a position that implies certain responsibilities, you’ll find that they often start by wanting to reproduce the environment they left, and recruit some of their former colleagues.
Why do they do this? Because it worked, so it’ll work again, because it’s reassuring. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.
The truth is, when you recruit a person, you recruit…a person. You’re not recruiting his colleagues, his manager, you’re not importing a corporate culture or processes.
You recruit their talent, but none of the elements that have made them successful in the past. You’re gambling on many of the things that will make it work or not.
Personally, when a candidate tells me about his achievements, I try to see how aware he is of the importance of context in his success and that to obtain the same results in another context, he will have to work completely differently. That doesn’t mean he can do it, but at least it shows he understands.
Let’s take the example of our sportsman. Maybe it was a system of play that made him good, maybe it was his partners who allowed him to shine because they complemented each other so well, maybe it was a coach who managed to get the best out of him?
What happened to the players who made up the Chicago Bulls “Dynasty” when it was dismantled? They had decent careers, but were never as dominant elsewhere as they were at the Bulls and around MJ. Only one kept winning: coach Phil Jackson. Perhaps because he imported his system into a team already made up of talented players but lacking something.
Hence this tendency for clubs to want to (re) form duos, trios….
A question of adaptation
How can we make things go as smoothly as possible? By going beyond the CV and trying to understand the reasons for a person’s success (or failure), but this is anything but obvious, as few candidates are capable of understanding it themselves… until the day when they run into difficulties in their new position and realize what they’ve been missing, or, on the contrary, when they reach a new level and realize what they’ve been missing until now.
In short, the key skill to identify is adaptability. Can they do the same thing as before in a different context? Cook the same dish but change the recipe? Can he forget and relearn without losing his qualities?
Another possibility: adapt the business. Let him recruit his former colleagues, transform the processes, to replicate his previous environment. A good idea?
It could be a good idea if your business is in the process of (re)structuring and you want to import what works elsewhere.
In other cases, it could be the worst idea in the world, as you run the risk of creating a business within a business, a clan war, a clash of cultures, and the cure will be worse than the disease.
Here’s another example from the world of sport: we’ve seen teams completely transform themselves to serve a newly recruited star player. The result? Sometimes (rarely?) success, often huge disappointment.
But I’m also reminded of a business leader who once told me: “I wanted to poach some talent from a business that had one thing more than us… in the end I realized it wouldn’t work. So I bought the company and we had time to learn from them. They didn’t fit in, we tried to fit in with them“.
Bottom line
When you’re recruiting a person, you’re only recruiting a person, their talent, and not the many ingredients that made them successful in their previous position: colleagues, cultures, processes, etc.
But the reverse is also true: a candidate who has been only moderately successful elsewhere may find in you the context that will make him or her exceed all your expectations.
Image : failing employee de Freedom my wing via shutterstock.
