Job Applicants' Cultural Fit Can Trump Qualifications

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-01-03/job-applicants-cultural-fit-can-trump-qualifications

by 001sky • 14 years ago

5 5 14 years ago

hnwh• 14 years ago

"Especially in this slow economy, more employers are asking “Star Trek or Star Wars?” (as a programmer was recently asked by an employer)"

If you ever ask me something this irrelevant in a job interview, i'm getting up and walking out

johnfuller2• 14 years ago

Great article. Cultural fit is very important. Someone who rubs the team the wrong way in an already stressful environment can spoil the whole batch.

I think the article gets the idea of "cultural fit" wrong though. The problem is that workplace culture is different from regional culture. A developer fresh off the plane from India might be a better cultural fit for me than someone from my own local social circles.

I imagine that having an interviewer determine cultural fit might be a problem unless that interviewer is working closely with the team the developer might be working with. Perhaps a better method might be to have the developer work with the team on a probationary period before being extended a full offer.

Cultural fit is probably also more important for a small organization rather than a large one. If you have a large number of development teams, then a new developer has a better chance of fitting in somewhere as opposed to a small organization where the entire structure is rubbing elbows together.

greenyoda• 14 years ago

"Perhaps a better method might be to have the developer work with the team on a probationary period before being extended a full offer."

Why should someone risk quitting their current job (and possibly relocating) to go work for a company that only gives them a job offer contingent on a probationary period?

johnfuller2• 14 years ago

True, but if it's a bad cultural fit then you will probably quit anyways.

If the new offer was good enough to quit your current job, then you were probably ready to leave anyways.

TheMakeA• 14 years ago

I think that too much emphasis on culture over qualifications could be just as bad.

If your culture lies more on the casual/frat end of the spectrum that tends to breed mediocrity, you run the risk of ending up with a perpetually mediocre company (a lifestyle business). If that is your goal, more power to you.

This is probably less true in major tech hubs like Silicon Valley though, where there is a lot more competence.

Job Applicants' Cultural Fit Can Trump Qualifications

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