Liam Neeson, Shackleton & the Inadequacies of Job Descriptions

Job descriptions tell some of the story. Or sometimes very little of the story at all. Is that good enough?

More and more, in meetings, managers confess how little their job descriptions describe what they really want from potential candidates. Most job descriptions list what is needed to compete for your open position and don’t explain the passion, heart, culture, values or the why of your organization. HR departments and legal teams (with good intentions) many times complicate the hiring process by explaining what you need from potential employees instead of the why behind what you need.

Finding a great cultural fit, an individual with a solid understanding of what you’re attempting to achieve and why, is more often than not more important to the success of teams, projects and missions than having all the right skills or experience. Most organizations will say that “our people are our most important differentiator or asset”; however, most companies hire for the right skills rather than the right match. Finding individuals who embody your team’s core values is more important and more beneficial than finding people with a very particular set of skills. Organizations and teams who can identify and more importantly define their culture and their primary mission are significantly more likely to achieve better results than companies who piece together role players who have all the right skills.

Hiring people with a firm grasp on why you do what you do is vastly more important than hiring employees who understand how or what you do what you do. As the leader, your job must be to work with your team to define the “why” for your organization.

An amazing story that explains this concept very well is the account of Ernest Shackleton’s 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. The Irish-born adventurer set out to be the first man to hike across Antarctic – north to south – passing through the South Pole.

The legend goes that Shackleton posted a short job description in the London Times and received over 5,000 applicants!

“Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in event of success.”

Short, sweet and to the point. Beyond this, Shackleton was clear throughout the process that he was screening for the right character over the right technical skills for his open positions. He wanted people who bought into his vision and dream over people with the right experience or skills.

 He ended up selecting 56 high character individuals to join in his dangerous journey. In the end, this journey ended in disaster and they never completed their intended mission. But amazingly, throughout all of their adversity and over a year lost at sea, because of Shackleton’s conviction of screening for the right match over the right skillset all of the 56 adventurers arrived home safely.

Next time you have an open position and engage candidates, make sure that the job description you’re screening from communicates more than just required skills and preferred skills.  Finding candidates that harmonize with your teams culture, core values and overall personality or mission while meeting the general requirements for the role is immeasurably more important that identifying candidates with a solid set of skills. Job descriptions have become nothing more than a compilation of skills and preferred experience. Many times they include the skills necessary to be successful in the position, but more often than not they also contain lists of superfluous expertise that no longer or never have pertained to the needs of the opening, i.e. College Degree required…why? There may be a good reason, but then again there may not be. Challenge the status quo!

Consider some of the benefits of hiring for the right match over the right skills. When you hire the right match, you hire candidates that may not know all the answers but people who know how to find the answers. You hire candidates who know the right thing to do without being told. The right match will not cause or seek out petty disagreements with coworkers. They will be on time, won’t cheat, steal or deceive. Candidates will meet and exceed your expectations in regards to your organizations core values.  They will seek out solutions to problems instead of creating problems or running to others to have their problems solved.

Teams built this way have satisfied customers, happy shareholders and loyalty to you and the company as a whole.