079: Hiring for Cultural Add, Not Fit

There are around 400,000 different flowering plants, over 60,000 tree species, and 8.7 million species of animals! 

Clearly God designed, created, and appreciates variety. 

All too often in business, though, new employees get hired based on cultural fit which can lead to hiring team members who think the same, act the same, have similar experiences, and agree with each other. 

But when team members are hired for the culture “add” of bringing more variety to the workplace it benefits everyone.

In this episode, you’ll get:

• What you need to unlearn to build For Love of Team
• How to fund a team
• Best practices when hiring team members 
• 4 questions to hire for cultural fit 
• The answers you should look for

And you’ll hear the specific differences between cultural fit and cultural add and how you can use that to build a team you love.

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Connect with Winston

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Transcript

Winston Faircloth: 0:00

See, I think this is one of the most important attributes for leaders is to be constantly unlearning what we think we know about the world. They're multipliers it's Winston Faircloth, and welcome back to Episode 79. For love of team. This is the podcast where leaders simplify teamwork helping you surround yourself with teammates doing the work, they love simplifying business processes so that you can serve more focused on the work you love. Last time we met my friend and CEO premier international based in Chicago, Craig would so many great nuggets of wisdom in our time together, I loved it, how Premier, they are blending a team first culture with commitment to outstanding client experience. And I'm going to include a link to their six core values in the show notes here again, as a reminder, and here they are again, just to refresh your memory value one is client first always value two is driven by integrity value three, above and beyond value four, rise to the opportunity, value five, confident yet humble, and value six, one team united, I just love all of those. As you read the statements that follow each of these values, you can feel the guidance, the warmth, the responsibility to one another as much as the duty to the client. Now this is how you blend love of team with the love of client. And yet there was another comment during my time with Craig that really caught my attention and amplifies my core belief about building a team that you will love. It has to do with the concept of cultural fit. I see recently I was leading a workshop for a mastermind where I'm a member and the topic building a team that you love. Oftentimes this journey begins with unlearning much as what we believe or had been taught about teamwork in business. There's so many concepts from the past century of management created during the industrial age that, frankly, are just as not relevant today. And for many first time founders, it's very easy to subconsciously bring those beliefs into our 21st century businesses concepts like delegation, the concept of a manager about command and control or business is built as well oiled machines or businesses to run like clockwork. Now, these are important concepts, but probably not as relevant for the information age that we live in. Today, I'm going to tackle some of these old concepts in future shows. But even I fall back into those concepts by default. And I'm going to suggest that cultural fit is another term that we should reconsider. Now the conversation in the mastermind began with getting people over the inevitable chicken or a question, namely, how do I fund and pay for a team? And once I get past that, what are the best returns on investment for working with your independent collaborators or team members? And then once you get past that we move on to how do I find in hire my team, but believe it or not, I've had this challenge. For now, over 40 years of my career, I've been hiring and recruiting and supporting team members since I turned 20 years old. And I've made both many mistakes. And I've experienced the wonder of when you find collaborators who multiply your vision and your impact. And in the mastermind, I was sharing some of my best hiring practices, including error, a couple of the ones that I referenced all the time hire for curiosity, and not just competency, and then assumed capability looked for fit. on that second tip, I went a little deeper, I share how I rarely hire a person based upon their resume or listed experiences, I typically trust the rest of my team to validate their technical qualifications, or I've somehow satisfied myself with their qualifications just by offering the interview in the first place. So they come in, and I'm assuming that they can do the job. So instead, when I'm talking to folks, I'm asking thought provoking character questions. I've been evaluating the cultural fit of this candidate with our existing team and culture. I do this mostly by asking questions in the third person, like so how would your best friend describe you outside of work? Or tell me a story about a person you most admire? And why I love that question. I'd love the answers. I get to that question. In particular, who's been the greatest influence on your career so far? And why? Here's one that's really self disclosing. What would your last manager say about your strengths and weaknesses? Notice how asked many of these questions in the third person and get them to speak in the voice of somebody else. And in doing that, it really kind of disclose about themselves a lot. And I get to see how they react because most candidates come in ready and prepared for first person experiences first person questions and so asking the questions in this way really gives me some insight into How the person thinks and what kind of makes them tick. But as we wrap up the interview process, ultimately, I'm looking for Spark, I'm looking for their genuine desire to be part of our team. And at this part of the conversation, I'll really let them drop the conversation is described in an earlier podcast, I really feel like candidates collaborators interviewing us as much as we're interviewing them, I come into every interview with that kind of mindset. So I'm waiting to see if they're going to be passive about this process, this invitation that I'm giving them, or are they going to be passionate about joining us on this mission, again, are they going to be passive or passionate, ultimately, this is helping me determine if they're going to be a good fit. Here's something I notice about passionate people, they do a few things that stand out from the rest of the crowd towards the end of our time. Together, they often summarize what they've experienced so far, in the interview process, the good the bad, the people that they get along with the people that have questions about the role, the responsibility, they do a good job of summarizing the overall interview experience. Second, they express a heartfelt desire to join the mission and the team. Now, when I was hiring salespeople, or in the nonprofit space fundraising people, I never hired, anyone who didn't at the end of the interview asked for the role. If they won't ask for the role, they're not going to ask for the order. So this, but I want to round this out to say, every time that I've had a successful hire, they've often expressed a heartfelt desire to join the mission and the team. And then here's a third thing that exceptional passionate people do that stand out for me in joining our team is they often send a physical thank you note, not just an email, and this is where they restate their desire for the role. That is a super impressive part of joining the team. And I can say this next thing without reservation every single time without exception, when those three things are present. At the end of the interview process together, we've had a tremendous collaboration, summarizing their experiences, being candid about that, that's number one, expressing a heartfelt desire to join the mission in the team. And then they send a physical thank you note, often asking for the role. Every time those three things are present, it's been a stellar collaboration. So as they set the definition of a cultural fit. Well, I think Craig, in our last podcast interview confirmed cultural fit is not sufficient in the 21st century, the world we live in today, and let me quote him here from the last podcast where he distinguished between a cultural fit and a cultural ad. And here's the quote, what I mean by this is that they're going to add to our culture, they're not going to fit in, we're not looking for people who are just like all of us. And this has become even more evident, as you might imagine, in the world of diversity, equity and inclusion, and a renewed focus we have, and that's an area that we've not made as much progress as we would like, we're honest about that. We're doing things that are within our control to update that. But when you start to think about who's going to add to your culture versus who's going to fit into your culture, you start to interview differently, and you start to look for different candidates. And I think that's what's made our culture better is that we have people who have added new dimensions to it, add a new perspectives to it, and quote, and in that moment, it was an unlearning moment for me. See, I think this is one of the most important attributes for for leaders is to be constantly unlearning what we think we know about the world. And in that moment that I heard Craig explained the difference between a cultural fit and a cultural ad in terms of the value that that brings to your team, and ultimately, your business, I can never unsee that word. Again. cultural fit is not being as valuable to me, as the leader of this enterprise is being more intentional, more mindful and more purposeful in seeking cultural adds to our team. I can't unsee it now. It was a mic drop moment. So that's why I'm coming back this week and really bringing this back out because I think it was such an important lesson out of our last podcast. So as you think about your future team, your independent collaborators, do you want a cultural fit? Meaning someone who thinks acts Griese, or has similar experiences to you? Or will you seek someone who is a cultural add, who's gifting perspective, life experience point of view differs from you and the rest of your team? Now, even from a faith perspective, I find it fascinating how diverse Our planet is, I think about almost any aspect of our creation and just the endless variety of people, trees, plants, flowers, the varieties almost endless. How about each sunrise sunset moment, it's unique, never to be repeated. God loves variety in our team, we we should probably also take that At the heart, and when it comes to building a team that you love cultural additions, not only bring their unique gifts and talents, these new perspectives will help you grow. And so will your team. Now people can get a little nervous about this. So what brings this all together? What brings this diversity all together these different perspectives, maybe even different viewpoints? What brings it together cohesively? Well, we go back to one of my two favorite questions for leaders a shared why a shared why unifies and brings people together under a common purpose and mission diverse cultures blended together for common vision. It's a powerful reason to stop seeking cultural fit, and start pursuing cultural ads. And as we saw it premiere having cohesive, powerful value statements that are really speaking to the team, not just the founder, speaking to the team, not just the clients, and having people all aligned to that is what makes collaboration and teamwork such a valuable part of the founders journey. So how would you like to have a business that you love supported by a team that you love? What could be better than that? And so if you have question or comment about today's podcast, I'd love to hear from you. My personal tax number is 1-754-800-9461. That's a personal numbers, not a text, not bonds come straight to me, you're going to hear straight from me, 1-754-800-9461. And finally, remember, as I say, at the end of each of our times together, leaders simplify teamwork, multiplying your impact your income, margin and freedom in business. I hope you'll be blessed friends. I can't wait to see you soon.