Culture and Fit have been hiring concepts for a long, long time, but they've been seeing even greater weight recently. On the surface, I think that's good. In principle, companies should focus more on the humanity of the humans that make them go.
But, we must go deeper. What are we looking for when we talk about "Fit?" What is the goal of "corporate culture?" Even with the best of intentions, this can be used for Good or Evil.
Culture
The thing about corporate culture is that you will have one whether you want one or not. It's something endemic in groups of humans working together. It's the way things get done, how employees interact, what to expect.
Not only can culture hinder productivity, increase turnover, and otherwise cause a company to rot from the inside-out, it can also boost productivity, retention, and Glassdoor reviews. So, it behooves leadership to get a handle on it. I might argue it's leadership's One Damn Job.
Another aspect of culture is that it is difficult to control. You can set an inspiring mission statement, catch phrase, whatever, but ultimately the culture comes down to the people who are dominant in the company. Not only the people in senior positions, but all the people that influence others, and have an effective force of personality, regardless of position.
Additionally, when a company is growing fast is when it is most vulnerable to culture shift. Each new hire can be a force of change, which may be towards or away from where you actually want to be. Most employees will simply adjust to fit the dominant culture. But, if you are doubling your team size every year, whatever culture you had two years ago is gone.
Tribal
The default culture, if you don't want to bother trying to shape it, is most likely to be Tribal. This means that each group will have its own culture, and it will mostly be centered around "My tribe Good, everyone else Bad." This is not great for productivity, and is generally frustrating for everyone.
I have had a few experiences with managers who really did everything they could to defend, represent, and promote their team. But, they were willing to do so By Any Means Necessary, even at the expense of other teams' welfare, or business goals. The team members are often very appreciative of this, and they should be. But, when it goes too far, it absolutely becomes a Tribe. Then, when you are some poor schlub who's not in that Tribe, but you need to work with that Tribe, you are going to have a bad time.
My Set of Cultural Principles
In full disclosure, I come at this after having worked at a large company that had presumably well-meaning people try to shape their culture, but allowed it to be corrupted into a Kafkaesque anti-culture of my nightmares. I was held accountable for wearing my heart on my sleeve, and sometimes taking things personally, but others who were calm-but-conniving were allowed to thrive. I just want smart, effective, well-meaning people to do well, and I'd rather do without the Machiavellians.
Everyone is Different; We're a Big Tent
I claim that when you are looking for someone to do a particular job, you are looking for these key things:
- Does this person have the abilities to do this job?
Whether it is skill, knowledge, experience, or talent, you have to assess whether a candidate for a position is ultimately capable of doing the job they are being asked to do. Not only do people lie in order to get a job, but you both may have a different definition of the skill being discussed. This generally turns into a test of some kind, solve a problem, etc. - Will this person actually do the job?
Even someone who has all the requisites to do a job may still not do that job. I don't think it is very common, but I have seen it. I don't really believe in laziness, but there are barriers to performance that may not be surmountable. I might call this "wherewithal," "work ethic," or "business acumen." This is much more difficult to assess, so you try to look at track record, or any obvious "red flags." But, mostly, you give folks the benefit of the doubt, and deal with problems if they come up. Unless you are a mind reader, you kind of don't have any other choice. - Is this person going to severely disrupt operations?
It's difficult enough to lose a "head count" to someone who isn't getting things done. But, sometimes people actively thwart progress, on purpose or not. This is even more difficult to assess, even if they have already been hired and working for some time! Sometimes, truly disruptive people are even very productive - in fact I think this is very common. When people feel like they can get away with anything, many of them do. "Power corrupts...," etc.
Limit the Number of Stakeholders
One of the biggest impediments to progress is to have too many people need to agree on something to move forward. To combat this, it needs to be acceptable for decisions to be made independently. This absolutely doesn't mean go form a cabal in a smoke-filled room - decisions should also be made transparently, and with input from people with opinions. But, it should be clear, up front, that only one person is going to make a final decision on a topic, and who that is for that topic.
It is also counter-productive to have that person's decision-making questioned or countermanded by their chain of command. Maybe it is rarely necessary, but it should be a stick wielded with utmost care.
It's OK to Disagree and get Upset
If we have the right team, people are going to feel ownership for their work, and are going to feel passionate about the outcomes. We want that. But, if that's true, some folks will get upset when things don't go the way they feel they should. To keep people invested, that has to be acceptable. Rather than trying to create a completely sterile environment, let's recognize that people are people, they have feelings, and so we should have practices that take that into account.
Escalate When you Need To
Escalation shouldn't be a threat, it's just acknowledgement that a disagreement is at an impasse, and needs some arbitration. And both sides in a conflict should not feel like they have failed because a topic needed to be escalated. It should be encouraged. The chain of command should not resent being escalated to, or retaliate against those that escalate. This IS The Work.
Act in Good Faith
More specifically: Be transparent, honest, and fair, and make a sincere effort to do what you say you are going to do.
Despite all the talk above about being inclusive and recognizing humanity and the differences therein, not doing this is the one personality trait I would make an absolute sin. This is the Anti-Machiavellian clause.
At one company I've worked at, one of the social tenets was, "Assume your coworkers are acting in good faith." But, there was no rule saying, "Always act in good faith." It's one thing to assume that, on balance, your coworkers are acting in good faith, and entirely another to be expected to do mental gymnastics to maintain a positive attitude when it really looks like a coworker is not acting in good faith. As a result of this directive, as far as I could tell, the downward pressure was always on people who complained about people acting badly, not on the people who acted badly but were able to feign innocence.
Make Up Afterward
This is an important corollary to the above. If it's okay to get upset, if the work environment isn't a pristine world of harmony, there has to be a way to keep from developing bad feelings and creating rifts. I claim that even if you are trying to sterilize your workplace, you will still have this problem and you need to do something about it.
The people who are disagreeing may not be able to initiate reconciliation after a dispute. Saying "sorry" is often taken as an admission of guilt. This happens at all levels, despite social maturity being an unspoken criteria of promotion. Even if you are a Mucky-muck Vice-whatever, you have to be aware of conflicts in your organization and proactively try to resolve them. Not by picking sides, necessarily, but by facilitating discussions, and making sure that parties involved can sit together at a table afterwards, regardless of the outcome.
Managers Facilitate, Engineers Build
When the person setting the technical direction for a project also directly manages the team working on the project, you have the makings of a serious conflict of interest. You cannot have a technical disagreement with someone who is also giving you your final performance rating, and supposed to be your representative within the organization. Even if, as a manager, you think you can keep them separated, you cannot.
I think the best environment I've been in is to have a manager and a technical lead who work well together work as peers. There's a dividing line of responsibility there that both sides have to respect, and it sets expectations all around.
It's Personal
I don't believe corporate cleansing of all negative aspects of ego, passion, and emotion works very well. Expecting your employees to act like automatons is really just a way to invite those darn Machiavellians to succeed, as they are happy to maintain whatever façade you want to ask for, if it helps them succeed.
The alternative is simply acknowledging that it's not business, it's personal. We are humans interacting on a personal level. We care about our ideas, our projects, and our teams. And that's good — everyone should. We must operate with the assumption that people will behave like humans, and create an environment where it's OK to do that, and where we know how to clean up after ourselves.