The Hiring Manager Eventually Hires...

What do you think?

Sep 15, 2024

three people sitting in front of table laughing together — Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash

I was invited to speak at a career workshop a little while ago.

In this workshop, I started with a little icebreaker to warm the audience up.

I asked a series of questions, one of which was a poll. I have posted this poll below so you can try to answer it before looking at my proposed answer.

Take 30 seconds to answer it and submit your vote.

Here you go:

Time’s up!

So, what was your answer? Remember to click on it.

Here’s What I Think

The hiring manager eventually hires…

“The most skilled person”

Actually, nope, it’s the person they like the most.

I will share my thoughts.

Hiring managers hire not only for skills but also for likability and team fit. No matter how skilled you are, if a hiring manager does not like you, then you are not getting the job. Period.

Hiring managers will prefer to hire a less skilled person they like and try to upskill them by providing mentorship and training opportunities.

They prefer to stick with their guts rather than choose the most skilled person who doesn’t fit in or might cause team imbalance.

Closing Thoughts

The key takeaway is that you shouldn’t focus on your hard skills alone. You also need to have a great personality and be likeable.

If you are highly skilled but struggle to land jobs after interviews, you might seem like a different person to the hiring manager.

Hard skills are great, but soft skills can take you further than you think.

Let me know what you think in the comments.

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The Tools I Use

Here are the tools I recommend (affiliates):

Siteground to power my ultra-fast website
Notion to organise my workspace for maximum productivity

Banji Alo

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