When A Perceived Deficiency Is Actually An Asset

by John M. O'Connor and Bruce Dunlavy

In the process of career planning on one end and hiring on the other end, personality quirks and differences often come into play. A myriad of tests, questionnaires, and surveys can help you identify candidates that may fit your needs and your culture. Unfortunately, there are no ways to become completely non-judgmental about hiring as there are plenty of ways to try to impose values on the results. Without such quasi-objective quantification, there is even more likelihood that personal preferences or biases creep into the effort to match the right person with the right job. How can this be prevented and the best decision for candidate and organization made? 

For the most part, a human resources professional is most likely to be a “people person” who likes dealing with people more than data. This may lead to a bias – conscious or unconscious – toward job applicants with similar traits. After all, how many people like working alongside (and trying to interact with) an introvert? Or a pessimist? Debbie Downer will not likely win Miss Congeniality. 

However, for some jobs that may be exactly the sort of person you want. What? A pessimist might be a great employee to have on staff? Indeed, there are some jobs for which a pessimist might bring a unique and desirable attitude. Furthermore, pessimistic people are not always unhappy or disaffected. They just have a tendency to see and/or expect problems. William Faulkner described one of his characters as “an optimist in the truest sense of the word; she always expected the worst and was therefore always pleasantly surprised.”

One who can see problems everywhere might be just the person you want for a job that involves the identification of problems. Thus pessimists (with other job-appropriate skills) may make ideal candidates for positions such as these:

·      Health and Safety Inspector

·      Auditor

·      Financial risk analyst

·      Actuary

·      Editor

·      Quality Control Specialist

·      Pathologist

Jobs for those with a more introverted personality type could include many specialties in which one works primarily alone or remotely but with assistance as needed. Tasks such as those of an over-the-road truck driver, commercial diver, or laboratory technician may be best undertaken by someone who is focused on the work and not on the lack of pure social interaction that comes with it on a typical day.

Professionals such as:

·      Engineers

·      Accountants

·      Librarians

·      Web designers, and

·      IT network administrators

are almost proverbially introverted. The same can be true of:

·      Scientists

·      Analysts

·      Counselors

·      Writers and translators

Personality type is one thing, but what about a disability? It is of course a given that disabilities are not automatic disqualifiers for most jobs. At least that’s what we believe. Moreover, laws require that unless a disability keeps a person from being able to perform the duties of a job, it may not be used as a determinant in hiring or performance assessment. We understand that the gray area and good intentions can’t always rule the day and even the Americans with Disabilities Act cannot be totally trusted as a hammer. Companies and organizations can be far ahead by hiring someone with a disability. Here is an article in Forbes by John on the subject: https://tinyurl.com/yaez6vnn.

Especially in these days of working from home, a person with a physical disability is rarely prevented thereby from performing necessary tasks. What about intellectual disabilities? Are there jobs where such a condition may actually be an asset?

Of course there are. Many people with cognitive disabilities have difficulty learning new tasks frequently. However, they may not only excel at tasks they have mastered, but be more diligent and less easily distracted than some other people. Persons who have experienced, or are experiencing, mental illness might be well-suited for jobs in the ancillary services of mental health. For example, a pharmacy technician who has been prescribed certain drugs to combat depression, bipolar disorder, or similar conditions may be better able to recognize – and have valuable insights into - the effects of those drugs on the people taking them.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is usually first noticed in childhood and is a common cause of some people’s difficulty staying on task. In a traditional setting for young people, such as the classroom, there is usually an effort made to suppress this personal feature. In fact, both in school and in the workplace, there are aspects of ADHD that can make someone ideally suited for some activities. People with ADHD can thrive on multi-tasking, because their brain is wired to recognize and react to several stimuli at once without being overwhelmed. Thus a high-energy, fast-paced work environment with quickly-changing activities might bring out their best attributes.

In addition, ADHD is often associated with creativity and inventive problem-solving. Those who have the condition may turn out to be invaluable in a workplace where lateral thinking and unusual responses can create effective short-cut solutions. 

In a similar way, dyslexia has a powerful side. While usually viewed as a disability that causes reading problems, dyslexia is actually a mental condition with multiple facets. Those who have it are often creative and resourceful. People with dyslexia include some who are well-known in motion pictures, such as Anne Bancroft, Keanu Reeves, Steven Spielberg, and many others who are not so famous but gifted in their own unique ways. Historians believe that many famous inventors, including Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford, might also have had dyslexia. While it may have slowed down their reading, it intensified their best attributes.

If you are a job-seeker with idiosyncrasies, learn to take advantage of the assets that are associated with them, and market yourself accordingly. If you are an employer, never forget to consider the special skills, reliability, and consistency that “different” workers may provide. If you are a job placement counselor, make it a priority to find matches between jobs and the infinite variety of particular capabilities in the limitless pool of willing and able workers.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

John M. O'Connor: In his 29th year of career strategy coaching, outplacement and best practices in career services, John M. O'Connor has written 45+ Feature Articles and been cited in 300+ Expert Panel Quote publications for Forbes on career and workplace issues. He became the first private practice Reach Branding Certified Specialist in North Carolina and is the first Certified Federal Job Search Trainer (CFJST). With a unique fiction writing pedigree, he obtained a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Bowling Green State University. He has written multiple LinkedIn articles and contributed to career transition stories for Yahoo! Hotjobs, Monster.com, CNN-Money, The Ladders, AOL.com, and in many newspaper publications locally and nationally. His diversified experience includes serving as a college professor and as a United States Army officer. John is a keynote speaker and corporate trainer offering consultations, outplacement and talent issues, best workplace issues and human resource services.

With two degrees in History and thirty years experience in Environmental Chemistry and Biology, Bruce Dunlavy has one foot in the world of ideas and one foot in the world of measurement. Retired from a state government regulatory department (Environmental Protection Agency), he is currently a researcher, teacher, and writer. Although I write fiction as well as non-fiction, my research capabilities align more clearly with historical and multi-subject integration research. Bruce says: I was educated in the classic style to acquire a broad and accessible body of knowledge. I am always looking for the unusual, innovative, and mind-stretching integration of dissimilar ideas. With what Samuel Johnson called "musical wit," I specialize in finding similarities in seemingly unlike things. I see the connection between Rudyard Kipling and Einstein's General Theory of Relativity.