What The Houston Astros Tell Us About Focusing Hiring More on Soft Skills

The Houston Astros are setting Major League Baseball on fire right now. The defending champions have a cadre of starting pitchers who are allowing fewer than 20% of batters to get a hit, and allow a paltry average of 6.5 hits and 9.3 baserunners per game, according to a Wall Street Journal article. 

Not surprisingly, baseball teams have a lot riding on their success. Teams are notoriously secretive about what works for them, igniting accusations that they are doing something wrong like doctoring the baseball before they throw it to batters.

How else do you explain the change in Houston Astros’ starting pitcher Gerrit Cole. A preseason acquisition from the Pittsburgh Pirates and a No. overall draft pick, Cole gave up an average of 4.26 earned runs per game last year. This year, with the Astros, he averages 2.20 earned runs per game and is leading the American League in strikeouts.

Knowing What To Seek

Another pitcher in the Astros bullpen, Collin McHugh, told the Wall Street Journal “maybe there’s a small difference in philosophy that unlocks some things for guys.” The comment elicited a smile from Cole, but no comment. 

“They know exactly what they are looking for,” McHugh added. I’m not going to tell you what it is, but they know exactly what they’re looking for.”

Employers looking for the best fit among new hires could learn from the Astros. Most employers don’t know exactly what they are looking for. They focus on what we have for years and years. They know what technical skills they want and need their employees to have. That list, drawn up over years of experience, is ironclad and all-too-easy to check off. 

What isn’t as clear, largely because no one has focused enough attention on it, are employees’ soft skills.

Helping Employers Find The Second List

Serious Soft Skills, a company I co-founded with Dr. Tobin Porterfield, has been working to help employees and organizations of all sizes determine their existing mix of soft skills among their employees. We have uncovered a staggering list of 55 soft skills that employees can use in the workplace. (Want the list of 55 soft skills, then go here.) 

We have been working to help employers and their employees make sense of this expansive list. We also are helping them to put those soft skills to work in new, powerful ways that empower teams and improve productivity, collaboration and innovation.

Like the Houston Astros, though, employers have to focus their lens on the right metrics. So far, employers have preferred to complain that prospective employees don’t match their needs, again and again. Yet how can they be so sure if they aren’t evaluating effectively what they need in soft skills to complement their existing staff, and are not probing their applicants on how they might enhance the situation.

Finding the Combination

To be clear: We are not advocating that technical skills, the more concrete requirements of the job, do not bear consideration. They do, but they should be the baseline. Has the applicant done accounting work? Has he or she a CPA? Does the applicant know the software or software similar to what we are using? These check boxes are essential, but too often they are the full list.

On the flip side of the checklist, we would include a second set of criteria. We would ask about the person’s experience in handling various accounting situations — an upset client, a potentially questionable or illegal practice, an error. The discussion surrounding these questions is more apt to tell a company if the person is a good fit. Is the person honest, can they admit to mistakes, can they learn from these situations? These skills enhance organizations.

Using Your Advantage

The Houston Astros are outliers in Major League Baseball, although they have the World Series rings from last year to show for it.

Companies that know “exactly what they are looking for” in new hires can earn something more valuable that a gold ring. They will have latched onto an affordable strategy to gain a big competitive advantage. The talent pool will expand and improve, and importantly, hiring decisions will become easier. The right people will be doing exactly what they should be doing, and they will be happier and more eager to do it.