You may not be hiring right now but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give some thought to how precisely you’ve deployed staff to critical areas of your company. In the legendary business book, Good to Great, author Jim Collins proclaimed, “People are not your most important asset, the RIGHT people are. Get the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats.” I’ve lived by those rules ever since. I’ve advised my clients to think hard about it; hire like it was their last new employee; and, when there was good reason, fire sooner than later. But the idea of warming seats with the “RIGHT” people is perhaps the most difficult part of the equation. It sounds easy enough, but by the time you’ve played a little musical-chair with key positions, you tire from the pain. Besides, you hire people with the right resume and their ability to fit your culture—what more are you supposed to do? The answer’s really simple. Check the resume and be sure they’ll be liked but more importantly match the character to the task. Focus on just three “types” of people for a few really important seats. When you align personality to purpose you get happier employees who make your business more effective and more profitable in the long haul. Here’s why.
The three most important seats.
Not all seats on the bus are that important in the first place. Especially to small business owners and managers. Because data is available, business books usually focus on big business and the challenges of large leadership teams that go with it. It’s a bigger bus, and there’s lots of hierarchy, so there’s lots more to talk about. On the contrary, small coatings businesses are inherently flatter, and so, with fewer people, each person becomes much more important to long-term success. Focus on just three seats in particular. Get those “RIGHT” and you’ve got a fair chance to alter the bus route from a path of just good to almost great. You know these positions well:
- Customer service
- Production
- Supply chain
Three critically important positions, spanning from the frontline to the backend of most small businesses—They’re interrelated and very dependent upon each other to be expert in their functions. But they each require very different “types” of people. Again, there’s a very simple rule of thumb.
Hire the right “type” of people for the RIGHT seats
There is substantial evidence that show employees are more satisfied, and are less likely to resign, when their personality matches the job they are hired to do. Most managers have had the experience of hiring a new employee based on their skills only to regret it later. When it comes to employees, where there’s lack of performance, there’s usually some incongruence between personality and the job they have been hired to do. Like the wrong spray head, it may fit the seat, but it just doesn’t get the job done right.
Employee performance is also partially subjective. Managers, even co-workers, have to rely on their interpretations to make a judgment call: “Larry in customer service does well, probably because he just “lives” at the shooting range after work—they rarely get the best of him.” “John gets along with the vendors well, but hey, he’s a real people-person.” Perception influences our thinking but it’s not entirely a good measure of performance. In this example, Larry and John were not well matched for these positions. Their manager would do well to switch their seats entirely! Here’s what you’re looking for:
- Customer service requires the type of people with positive dispositions who are patient and are genuinely friendly and nice. It’s genetic. They give to the local charities, pick up lost cats, and swerve to avoid a rabbit in the road. You don’t need actors like Larry in CS because one day he’s going to forget the script at your customer’s expense.
- Your supply chain requires the type of people who do fancy themselves as actors. They can put on the smiley face and suck it up on demand. Underneath the thick skin and the tattoos is a ruthless and cold individual (I’m exaggerating) who will not take no for an answer. They put cats out in the cold and swerve to hit the rabbit. John’s way too nice for this job.
- Production requires the type of people who are tenacious and focused. They are responsible for the PRODUCT and need to be protected from the challenges of the frontline and the stresses of the backend. They’re not actors and they are rarely people-people but they fit the culture perfectly and possess values very closely aligned with the company.
I hope you’re hiring soon, maybe you can apply this simple principle to practice.
INSIGHT:
Managers actively engaged in their company’s growth and performance try to head off some of the subjectivity when it comes to matching people and positions. They look for specific personality types to match specific purposes. It’s not enough to select people who seem to posses a combination of desire, interest, education and experience. What you really need is to find the right type of person for the job. I welcome your comments, questions or more discussion.
Illustration: www.samplecar.com