Culture Shock: Why Your IT Hiring Process Is Probably Failing

There’s a famous quote often attributed to Peter Drucker, the revered management consultant and prolific writer for the Harvard Business Review. Although he didn’t use these words verbatim, they more or less sum up his managerial philosophy: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”

For over 30 years, TriCom has been at the intersection of jobs and people. When you’ve been in the staffing business for as long as we have, you start noticing some patterns. One of the most important observations we’ve made? Drucker hit the nail on the head.

In our decades of IT staffing experience, we’ve found that most unsuccessful hires aren’t because the candidate lacks the technical skills. It’s because of poor cultural fit.

Most companies rely on job interviews that lean too heavily on the candidate’s technical abilities, rather than their work ethic, intellectual curiosity, or dependability. The reason? Many mid-level managers come from technical backgrounds themselves, and they don’t want to make any hiring mistakes. As a result, they place too much emphasis on experience with certain tools over the characteristics of the worker.

So, what should you be doing differently? Here are some actionable tips you can incorporate into your IT hiring process. Many hiring managers make these mistakes, but you can always stand out from the crowd:

Focus on Problem-Solving Skills

What Most Hiring Managers Do: Plenty of companies use a candidate’s years of experience to judge ability. Job descriptions often ask for three years of X or five years of Y. But what does that mean, exactly? We’ve seen many candidates with one or two years of experience who can do what some people can with three. It can be an arbitrary metric to abide by.

What You Should Do Instead: Focus on how someone solves a problem, especially a problem that they haven’t seen before. What is their process? Whom do they involve? Do they raise their hand when stuck? Can they get themselves unstuck the second or third time without asking for help? These are the questions you should ask yourself along with their current ability with a certain tool.

Ask Meaningful Interview Questions

What Most Hiring Managers Do: Everyone is biased in one way or another. It’s impossible to be completely unbiased. Daniel Kahneman, the late psychologist who authored groundbreaking books such as Thinking, Fast and Slow and Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment, emphasized we’re intrinsically partial and impartial toward various things, even without knowing it. His research often underlined how those predisposed judgments influence hiring decisions. 

“Good interviews might improve the likelihood you’ll be right, say from 50% to 60%,” Kahneman told the Wall Street Journal. Some interviewers try to work around those built-in biases by asking solely about technical capabilities. But going this route can prevent you from learning about the candidate as a person.

What You Should Do Instead: Character, attitude, and motivation make up 70% of a great hire. You can glean this information by asking thoughtful interview questions. Starting a question with “tell me about a time when…” can be impactful because it gives the candidate a chance to display their cultural aptitude, intellectual curiosity, and initiative. These are all solid indicators of people who not only can get the job done, but are proactive in working toward a solution. 

“The simplest thing is to list the attributes of the job before you interview,” Kahneman said in the aforementioned WSJ interview. “Pick maybe half a dozen traits needed to succeed, whether punctuality, technical skill, even anger management. Then think of questions that can help you determine if candidates have these attributes.”

Understand Your Culture

What Most Hiring Managers Do: The best hiring managers have a solid understanding of their organizational culture, so don’t be high and mighty without solid evidence of those around you. It’s about what people say when the boss isn’t in the room, so make sure that you’re reasonable and level-headed about your company culture. The better you know it, the better you’ll know the type of person who works well within it. 

What You Should Do Instead: Take a chance on someone with a 90% cultural fit and 75% present-day technical fit. It’s much better than the other way around. This comes from having a practical grasp on your work culture. After all, there are a lot of brilliant, incredibly talented people who also happen to be total jerks. People work hard together when they’re on the same team.

Here at TriCom, we’re all on the same team, and that includes you. Let us help you find your next excellent hire now. Cultural fit is paramount, and that’s what helps us succeed every day. Our success is your success.

Learn more about how we can assist you today by filling out our online contact form. It matters who you work with.