So is there an alternative?

What is more important for a company? Culture fit or Culture add?

These are two totally different things.

Culture fit is squeezing someone into the culture that the company has created. According to Glassdoor, more than 250 candidates may apply for one position. This means the leadership team is expecting out of the 250 plus candidates, the hiring managers need to find one that “fits” the culture. If they do not fit, they keep going. Keep ticking off the boxes. Keeping talking to more candidates. Keep wasting more time. Keep raising the overall ROI for each candidate and hiring manager.

Hopefully, when the HR team built the hiring strategy, they did so with the checklist of items that tied into the culture and fit. This is the way that hiring managers would know that the “fit” was right. The strategy is important because if the leadership team and HR does not pass along the right info, hiring managers may not truly understand what they are looking for.

This is also assuming that a hiring manager is right in their perception of the company values because it is not always the leadership team or HR that is doing the hiring and interviewing.

The thought that a new hire must fit in culture could be a predecessor to causing an internal struggle.

Let’s look a story.  A candidate is hired and they seem to fit, but after 45 days something seems off. By this time the company has spent an average of $4,000 to onboard the new employee and they are not a real culture fit.

For the most part, the company will look at the ROI so far and possibly keep that employee on, trying to get them to conform to fit and possibly causing internal strife? After all how much time and energy has gone into training and working with them already?

This will also likely cause some struggles in the company leadership. The leadership team may want to work the new hire out, and start over, where the HR team may believe they can right the ship and help the employee.

Yet all the while, the employee is more than likely actively looking for his next role, one that they may feel better about the culture. If the leadership team and HR feel something is off, so does the new hire.

So is there an alternative?

Of course, there is. The Culture add

When a leadership team looks at what it takes to really better a team, they should look at it with a discerning eye. One that says, what are we missing not who will fit us best.

The missing pieces of the culture should be the addition in the next new hires. They will bring pieces of culture and values from other organizations that truly can help better the workplace and its culture. Cultures are not built on standards. They are not one size fits all.

A great coach in sports will work with the mechanics someone has to better the mechanics, not change them, but better them. It is why you see strange batting stances in baseball, funky jump shots in basketball, and not normal throwing styles in football. A coach worked with what they had to fit the need of the player, not force them to do it the way everyone else does. That is how culture should be as well.

A culture should be built in the eyes of the leaders and employees and how they feel the company should run. Each employee probably feels something is missing. It could be recognition, it could be change, it could be a list of items that they may or may not share. Finding the “add” to a culture is truly the way to a better culture. It may seem that a leadership team feels the culture is right or the way we want it. But this is an old thought strategy that actually will stunt growth and possible sales.

Personally, I feel that the add betters teams to a point that they will not only grow but thrive. The addition of a new hire that brings a different thought, a different angle, or a different perspective can be a great thing. That being said, the leadership team needs to handle this the right way in their values and culture. The biggest way to impact this is in a management style that ties in the major styles.

Leading in a way that brings values and culture to each and every individual is a major key to the culture add. The leadership team needs to be democratic and servant, as well as transactional. Different approaches should be used for each individual, not one size fits all, just like the culture. Utilizing each management style when working with employees, especially new ones, allows them to feel like they made the right decision in joining the company. It shows them their values matter, feelings are important and they have a say in the future of the company.

Therefore, as the world changes and moves to a new place, so should the process of “fitting” into the culture, we should look at “adding” to the companies success and not downfall.