Hiring a chicken to do a duck’s job

Growing up in Singapore, we are never far from hawker centers, where we can easily find our fill with a good, delicious and hot meal for about S$5. One of my favorite meal is the Hainanese Chicken Rice. People have their favorite stalls, and so do I, but chicken rice in Singapore is such a staple dish, so much so, the standard is pretty good across board.

When I was a kid, I considered chicken and duck to be ‘about the same’, with the key difference being just the rice. The chicken rice has more pandan fragrance and is pale yellow, while the duck rice is more savory and is usually dark brown in color. To me, the chicken and the duck, hanging at the hawker stall, looks pretty similar; it taste similar, albeit, the duck is a bit more gamey, and slightly tougher than a chicken. Other than that, the way it is cut and served is the same. Both have 2 wings, 2 drum sticks, 2 thighs, similar breast meat; both fowls’ eggs can be cooked in the same way, their innards too. Of course chicken feet and duck feet are cooked differently. To me, at that age, a chicken is like a duck, but with a slightly different taste. As you tell, I don’t have the refined palette of a gourmet, at best, I can attempt to be a gourmand, if my health KPI permits.

Sometimes, in the workplace, when we are standing at a distance, many people look about the same. A chicken is just like a duck to you. Before you scream fowl, er, I mean foul, we do this more often than we realized. For example, when we do capacity planning at a high level, we look at headcounts, without distinguishing a chicken headcount, from a duck headcount. Of course, some of the more discerning, will start to look at the ratio of chicken to duck, etc. But is that sufficient? Not all chicken tastes the same, there are kampung chicken, black chicken, free-range chicken, spring chicken, and even silky chicken, which is more of a pet than a meal.

Is there more that we can do, to differentiate between a chicken and a duck in corporate hiring?

Some time back, I had an experience where we had to optimize the number of ducks in our coop. Many of my energetic ducks flew out of the coop, but we lack the budget to replace the ducks.

The duck had a unique role which needs to be filled. For simplicity of illustration, let’s say, the duck’s role is to waddle from point A to point B. The duck had other roles, but 80% of the time they waddle from point A to point B. We looked around and found our best chicken, who can also waddle just as well from point A to point B. So, with great relief and fanfare, we told everybody, “No worries, we don’t need to look for ducks outside our coop, the chickens that we have are just as good, if not even better in waddling from point A to point B!” This saves us some money, and it gives progression opportunities for our chicken who aspires to be a duck.

So, we reassigned our chickens to do the duck’s task. For a while, they waddle just as good from point A to point B. Everybody loves the chickens, they waddle more gracefully than the duck, and sounded more pleasant too.

Not too long after, the weather changed, it started to rain.

Because the ground was uneven, water gathered into the depressions and parts of the land started ponding. The rain got a bit more severe and the ponding became too deep for the chicken to waddle through. At that point, our sassy chicken got stuck at the edge of the water logged area, unable to complete the waddle from point A to point B.

It was then, that we were ‘forced’ to remember, why we needed a duck for the role instead of a chicken. 90% of the time, our projects run smoothly, we just do the usual professional waddle from point A to point B and everybody is happy. However, 10% of the time, it does rain. Sometimes, when it rains, it really pours and about 3% of our projects turns red and ugly, profitability becomes an issue, resourcing a big problem, team morale drops, etc. In other words, it floods.

In those 3% moments, we don’t just need someone who can waddle from point A to point B when the weather is sunny, but also someone who can swim across the pond when it is flooded.

We were caught out! Our chickens had similarities to our ducks, when the expertise required of them taps on similar innate capabilities, they are ‘fungible’. However, when the terrain shifted, when the environment changed, when specialized expertise were required, when the roles were redefined, the chickens were found lacking.

I am not saying, the ducks are better than the chicken. The same story can be told flipping the analogy around <example: try getting a duck to dig into the ground, or crow at dawn.) Each fowl has their unique and specific abilities, what might look the same 80% of the time, isn’t the same 100% of the time. People can stretch and a chicken can be made to waddle like a duck, but no matter how much training and coaching we give to a chicken, it might never be able to swim as comfortably. The chicken can probably survive for a while, straining its best and struggling to swim and stay afloat. Worse yet, after a while, the chicken could also collapse in exhaustion.

We need to realize, when it is time for a duck, we need to get a duck.

One of the lessons I’ve learnt here is, we can shift, bend, stretch and twist only so much, beyond a certain point, we still need to have the right competencies, at the right time, for the right situation. Some competencies can be trained, some are more innate.

Many says that, people can do anything, it is just like a computer CPU, plug in the right program (a.k.a training) and they will have the skill (e.g. in the Matrix trilogy.) But we forgot that there are specialised CPU, for specific functions. NVIDIA's stock price is soaring, while Intel's is tanking, both makes CPU, but one is more suited for the current AI hype than the other. Can Intel's chip do the work of the NVIDIA's chip? Sure, but much slower and consumes more energy, just like a chicken trying to swim.

We immediate understand that we can’t teach a chicken how to swim, but many of us refuse to admit (in public) that not everybody can be trained to do everything. We try to be generous, giving false hope to chickens that they can be a duck, especially when we have other organizational constrains upon us.

We cannot hire a chicken to do a duck’s job.

We cannot assume if it fits 80% of the time, it is good enough. Of course we might not be able to find a candidate with 100% fit. The key is for us to know clearly what are the non negotiable, necessary competencies, even if we need it just 3% of the time, because when it floods, the damage can be severe. For every red project, it takes me anywhere between 7 and 15 green projects to recovery the loss.

For those of us who are in position to hire, and/or form teams, let us put in a bit more effort to understand what are the necessary competencies for each team role, even if it is to be used just 5% to 10% of the time, these could become choke points and possibly critical stumbling blocks to success.

Don’t assume that if someone fits the role 80% of the time it is good enough. We need to make sure the critical competencies are within that 80%.

One fun fact to share as I close… a duck needs more ‘personal space’ than a chicken. Chickens prefers to roost higher if they can, and ducks prefers to roost on the ground. For me, I still prefer chicken rice over duck rice.