We recently carried out a vision and values workshop session for a new client, they are always amazing days and for any business seriously looking at who they are and where they are going, having a great vision and a solid set of values makes the journey that much easier.
So, recruit for values or for skills? I have an amazing team of people who are far better at recruiting for skills than I am but checking candidates against our own value sets and company culture is really important. We don’t always get it right and it shows really quickly for us and the person we took on that the fit is not right. Tough part is having that honest conversation that we all got it wrong and how we can help make it right. Employment law often gets in the way of honest grown-up conversations, and before all you HR gurus jump down my throat, I do believe that employment law is necessary for the employee and the employer.
This, however, is the main part of my discussion and it goes somewhat to the above: Education and Qualifications. So many job adverts stipulate impossible criteria and get in the way of finding the most amazing people. I am talking about “must have appropriate honours degree and master’s and blah blah blah degree from XYZ institution.” I concede that we need Doctors to be qualified and possibly lawyers but out here in leadership and management world you just don’t. This from a guy who has a joint honours degree in Sociology and Economics, a diploma in management and a Masters in Leadership & Management.
Education is no indicator of intelligence, and not all educated people are intelligent. Our CEO, Leeanne, could not afford to go to university, started her own business aged 19, is a pre-eminent brand and business strategist, the most intelligent person I have met, yet would not be considered for a marketing manager’s role for any of our clients for the lack of a degree.
I am not knocking education, it can show a propensity to learn, but it’s not everything, top of the class does not necessarily make top performer, manager or leader. Who you are, the values you hold, what you have done and what you learned doing it has to be as important as what you studied and where you studied it.
Who’s on the Quazar bus; people who hold our values, people who get stuck in, people who want to share and learn from each other, people who park their ego, people who smile and laugh and work hard, people who care about themselves and each other and our clients. Oh, and some people with a degree or two!
