Imagine finding the perfect candidate for your open position during the recruiting and hiring process. Everyone agrees they’re a fantastic culture fit so you hire them, and you’re thrilled to have found the right person for the job.
But then they start work and things don’t exactly pan out like you expected. They were supposed to be a superstar but their productivity is low and performance is weak, and you’re wondering where that “go-getter” attitude is that you saw during the interview process.
Or maybe they started and thrived, exceeding all expectations. Maybe they shined and you patted yourself on the back for snagging such a star. But their productivity and high performance have waned. They just don’t seem as motivated or engaged as they were before — and you’re wondering why this once stellar employee is now underperforming.
Did you make a hiring mistake? Did you pick the wrong person for the job? Are they a bad employee? Do they need to be let go? Not necessarily.
Underperformance could be the result of poor job fit, like when an Optimizer is put in a role best suited for a Relator, or a Visionary is assigned a job that is a much better fit for a Driver.
- Good job fit occurs when the right person, with the right skills, motivations, experience, and abilities, is matched with the right job.
- Poor job fit occurs when the right person is matched with the wrong job or role, or their perfect-fit job changes over time.
Remember, that stand-out candidate or stand-out employee stood out for a reason. They might just need a new role or new responsibilities that better fit their strengths and motivations.
Why job fit matters
Getting job fit right is vital for organizations that want to cultivate a high-performance culture, as it results in happier employees who try harder, achieve more, and stay longer. If you want your company to run like a well-oiled machine and your teams to achieve remarkable outcomes, you need the right people in the right roles.
An employee who experiences good job fit is engaged, productive, and motivated to give it their all and do their best.
- They are happy, fulfilled, and energized by their work.
- They have more creativity and are better problem-solvers and strategic thinkers.
- They make fewer mistakes.
- They feel connected to their coworkers and team.
- They feel more loyalty to the organization.
An employee who experiences poor job fit is detached, unproductive, and unmotivated to excel beyond the standard norms.
- They find their day-to-day tasks draining or stressful.
- They put forth the minimum effort and feel unsatisfied with their work.
- They lack creativity and struggle with problem-solving and strategic thinking.
- Their progress toward objectives is slow and they make mistakes.
- They feel frustrated and their work relationships are strained.
When you consider that your human talent is also your greatest area of investment and potentially your greatest asset, it’s easy to see why you can’t afford to put the wrong person in the right role or the right person in the wrong role or allow what once was an ideal match job become a poor fit job.
Job fit problems put your highest-performing, most valuable people at risk
You may have heard experts making the case for and selling leadership development say, “Good people don’t quit companies, they quit managers.” But what if the issues that lead to your best people quitting aren’t caused by their managers? What if their voluntary exits were the result of poor job fit and their managers weren’t yet equipped with the tools and resources to recognize it?
I’d like to hear experts say, “Good employees quit because of poor job fit.”
Getting job fit wrong damages employee engagement and puts high performers, high-value employees, and high potentials — those who could become high performers — at risk.
- Matching the right person with the right role gives them an advantage and sets them up to perform at their best, exceed expectations, and stand out.
- Matching the right person with the wrong role puts them at a disadvantage and sets them up to struggle, just meet expectations, and blend in.
High performers and high potentials in the wrong roles feel undervalued, underutilized, and unappreciated. They hate busy work, not making an impact, feeling unchallenged, and picking up coworkers’ slack. Plus, making them spend 40 hours/week in a job that drains their energy and sucks the life out of them is a massive management mistake. It’s death by 1,000 tiny cuts; frustration builds over time, and finally, they’ve had enough and walk out the door.
While large-scale companies and enterprise organizations might be able to absorb this loss, for small and mid-sized businesses, the consequences of high performers quitting can have a massive and lasting impact.
Why companies struggle with job fit
Identifying job fit is a critical part of successful talent acquisition, talent development, and talent retention, and getting it right requires more than well-written job descriptions, skills assessments, on-the-job training, and evaluating a candidate or employee’s education and experience levels.
Smart, skilled, driven people who are great organizational fits end up in the wrong roles for a variety of reasons:
- People are pushed to identify a career path too early in life and not given the tools needed to identify a career that lights them up and sets their souls on fire. Not knowing which roles are best aligned with their core motivations and drivers of success, leads to applying for or seeking out the wrong roles.
- Recruiters and hiring professionals focus on the wrong criteria when matching a candidate with an open position. Resumes tell the story of past opportunities and what a candidate has done, not what they are capable of and have the potential to do. Skills and strengths-based assessments fall short because they don’t take motivation into account — and a high performer will struggle to achieve high performance even when doing a job aligned with their strengths if the job is unmotivating.
- Leaders and managers’ instincts are to reward their high performers and recognize the contributions of their most valued team members by promoting them. Providing the opportunity to rise in the ranks and move up the corporate ladder feels like it’s the right next step. It feels like a gift, but because those promotions also change roles and responsibilities, they might not produce the expected results.
Recognizing and overcoming poor job fit
Overcoming poor job fit isn’t easy.
You can invest heavily in the development of an employee to help them improve, but if they’re in a role that is incompatible with how they’re motivated, it won’t matter. A better bet is learning how to identify signs of poor job fit and recognize when they show up so roles and responsibilities can be adjusted.
Signs of poor job fit:
- A highly engaged employee has pulled back and now seems unengaged and unmotivated.
- The cadence, quality, or tone of an employee’s communication has shifted significantly.
- A superstar employee starts missing deadlines.
- An employee requires far more coaching and support than other employees.
- An employee has the right skills and abilities but is not delivering quality work consistently.
- Skill improvement isn’t happening at the pace needed.
- An employee mentions feeling frustrated, anxious, bored, underutilized, and undervalued.
- Tasks that used to be completed quickly are taking much longer to get done.
- A positive, driven team member is now underperforming and introducing negativity.
When signs of poor job fit are identified, they must be dealt with right away to ensure employees remain happy in their jobs, minimize loss of productivity, and prevent “negative spillover” that could affect their teammates’ attitudes, productivity, and workplace motivation.
First, consider organizational fit:
- Do they fit with the culture of the organization?
- Do they fit in well with other employees and their teammates?
- Do their skills fit the job requirements?
- Will additional training or coaching get them where you need them to be?
If organizational fit and team fit are not good, you may have to have a tough conversation about the longevity of that employee. If organizational and workplace fit is good, have a conversation that explores the potential for poor job fit.
Ask questions related to job fit, such as:
- Do you feel that your role supports you at your best and your work at its best?
- Do you believe you’re using all of your strengths, skills, knowledge, and experience?
- Could you contribute to your team or this organization in a more effective or better way?
- Is the reality of your day-to-day job different from what you expected?
- What work environment or culture leads to you feeling most productive and happy?
- What is your preferred work style?
- Has anything changed in your role or responsibilities that you’re not happy with?
- Are you dealing with personal issues that are affecting how you show up at work?
- How can we better support you and help you succeed?
Use their answers to better understand the reasons for low performance or the factors that led to changes in performance. Then assess overall job fit. Is that employee in a role that will empower them to live up to their full potential? If the answer is no, consider making changes to their role, responsibilities, or the way their assignments are shaped.
Win-win jobs: How to get job fit right
What if poor job fit can be avoided? What if you had the tools to not only match the right person with the right role every time but also coach your people to achieve their full potential?
It’s not enough to just have the knowledge and skills needed to do a job. You can be using your strengths and skills and still not feel happy or fulfilled in your work. This is why you must also be motivated to use your strengths and skills to the best of your ability.
To thrive at work, a person’s job must align with the type of work that drives them to engage, relentlessly pursue objectives, and achieve success. Pairing a candidate with a job that taps into their strongest motivations — what they’re naturally wired to do well — unleashes their full potential. It turns them into a high performer, inspiring team member, and valuable company asset. It also leads to deeply fulfilling work experiences that build loyalty and boost retention.
For example, Learners thrive in work environments where a high degree of knowledge or expertise is required and they will have opportunities to teach, demonstrate, or write about the wisdom they have. They function at their best when there is freedom to explore new ideas and research is the core of their work responsibilities.
A highly motivated workforce is a high-performing workforce
When employers understand and define the motivations and skills best suited for the roles within their organizations, they can find the right people for those roles. That’s why recruiters and leaders within high-performance organizations use the Motivation Code assessment as part of their hiring processes, team-building and talent development programs, and retention initiatives.
Personalized Motivation Code (MCode) results reveal:
- The core motivations that drive each employee to be the best at what they do — the whys behind their thoughts, decisions, and actions and what makes them high performers.
- The value an employee is uniquely wired to contribute.
- Insights on work environments where an employee will thrive and succeed and those where they will feel challenged or stifled.
- What gets an employee excited to dig in and what frustrates them.
- What an employee needs to show up as their best self.
- How an employee will interact with teammates and where conflict is a risk.
Motivation improves talent acquisition and staffing success at all levels
The Motivation Code assessment is the perfect addition to an organization’s recruiting and hiring process. Its motivational insights supplement the information gained from traditional skill-based assessments and what candidates share in resumes.
Understanding a potential hire’s MCode helps you better understand who they are and what they need to succeed. It also gives you a better interview foundation so the questions you ask and the conversations you have are more strategic and meaningful.
For example, if interviewing an Achiever, you know they are a high performer who wants to play critical and standout roles in bringing success to your organization. They want to be key and have the opportunity to lead and give direction. With this knowledge, you can focus your interview questions on learning more about how their capabilities and motivations align with roles that offer leadership opportunities.
Motivation improves talent development and employee retention programs
Motivation Code empowers leaders to become better leaders by helping them individualize the way they lead members of their team. This can spark better job fit by ensuring motivation is factored into how they communicate, collaborate, and drive high performance.
Using MCode insights, leaders and managers can shape assignments to perfectly fit employees and their preferred work styles. Assigning tasks that are highly motivating is what engages employees and inspires them to push beyond standard norms, exceed expectations, and achieve amazing results. It’s the difference between an employee working hard because they’re forced to and an employee working hard because they’re compelled to — because they’re immersed in work they enjoy.
MCode results will also show managers which type of personal growth and professional development opportunities each member of their team will value and appreciate most. This subtle shift in thinking about talent development can strengthen relationships, build trust and respect, and increase loyalty — all of which also drive retention.
Motivation improves team dynamics and collaboration in teams of all sizes
Motivation Code team assessment experiences are most often piloted with executive and leadership teams, then rolled out across organizations. They give everyone on a team the opportunity to complete the MCode assessment and get their personalized results. Those results are then pulled into a motivational map that highlights the team’s motivational advantages and disadvantages.
- Team members gain a better understanding of themselves and their teammates, which leads to improved communication and collaboration, increased efficiency and productivity, and stronger, more connected, empathetic teams.
- Leaders discover the dynamics at play that are affecting team performance — what drives their team forward and holds them back — as well as how to address potential motivational gaps, job fit issues, and team conflict.
- Teams learn why specific situations have previously played out in specific ways and how to operate as a cohesive unit so they can go farther and achieve more.
Ensure workplace fit with motivation
Organizations large and small must move beyond skills-based hiring practices and integrate motivation if they want to ensure job fit and reap the rewards of matching the right person to an open position.
When companies invest in understanding employees on an individual level and figuring out what they need to engage, immerse themselves in their work, and chase even the boldest goals, everyone wins.
- Employees feel seen, understood, supported, and valued. They know their job is a great fit, their work matters, and they contribute specific value to their team and the broader organization. They are productive, happy, fulfilled with their work, satisfied in their roles, and connected to their teams.
- Leaders are empowered to maintain job fit by crafting intentional, purposeful roles for their highest value employees so their work lights them up and compels them to consistently perform at their best. This also helps them build high-performance teams and confidently lead them to achieve extraordinary outcomes.
- Organizations see increased productivity, improved collaboration, and accelerated results, which drive revenue and profitability. Better job fit across the company also means they enjoy lower turnover rates and higher retention rates.
Bottom line: If you want to get the right people in the right roles — making sure new hires are matched with the right jobs and high performers are in meaningful roles that light them up and drive impact — you need to understand the motivations that a role demands and the motivations that drive each individual in your organization.
Not sure how to do that? Learn more about the Motivation Code assessment and reach out to a member of our team to learn how you can unlock high performance in your team.
