Fitting In: What Interviewers are Really Looking For

By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

How do hiring managers choose candidates for jobs at top firms? According to Northwestern University research, it’s all about personality.

Based on analysis of the hiring practices of elite professional services firms, Lauren A. Rivera, Assistant Professor of Management and Organizations at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, found that interviewers give far more weight to “fit” than they do to technical skills or academic achievements. After all, hiring managers reason, most Wall Street firms accept entry-level applications mainly from graduating students of Ivy League universities. For the most part, even being able to apply to these top jobs implies a baseline level of competence, and whatever they don’t know, they’ll pick up through a comprehensive analyst or associate training program at the firm.

For applicants, that means getting a job offer is less dependent upon proving smarts or skills, as it is convincing an interviewer they’ll fit in at the company. For interviewers, it means they’ll be sure the person they hire can get along well with team members, who they’ll be spending about 80 hours per week with anyway. This should help boost retention, employee engagement, and all the other good things that create a productive workforce, right?

In her article, “Hiring as Cultural Matching: The Case of Elite Professional Service Firms,” Rivera says she is not so sure. At some point, all this focus on cultural homogeneity is bound to produce a groupthink culture, one which keeps valuable voices out and ushers in people who may not be as qualified for the job.

Most companies claim they want real diversity in their offices, but Rivera’s study shows that diversity of thought may not falling by the wayside.

Who are You, Really?

In her article, which was published in the American Sociological Review, Rivera argues “that hiring is more than just a process of skills sorting; it is also a process of cultural matching between candidates, evaluators, and firms. Employers sought candidates who were not only competent but also culturally similar to themselves in terms of leisure pursuits, experiences, and self-presentation styles.”

In one exercise, she asked interview screeners for various companies to review resumes for fabricated candidates, who possessed different academic backgrounds and skill sets. Nevertheless, the key differences that screeners focused on were found in the “Personal Interests” sections on the resumes.

Candidates were selected or passed up for seemingly irrelevant factors in the name of cultural fit. For example, one reviewer turned down applicants who indicated they played squash and lacrosse because they wouldn’t fit in with the “scrappy” culture of the firm. Conversely, the same candidates were the only ones selected by a reviewer who felt the fact that they played these kinds of sports meant they would fit in well with her firm’s white-shoe culture. On the other hand, a reviewer at a third firm turned down any applicants that indicated an outside work passion because he felt they wouldn’t be 100 percent devoted to work. He said his firm liked boring people best.

She explains:

“A majority of evaluators described firms as having not only particular organizational cultures (e.g., interdependent versus independent) but also distinct personalities, derived from the typical extracurricular interests and self-presentation styles of their employees. They contrasted ‘sporty’ and ‘fratty’ firms with those that were ‘egghead’ or ‘intellectual.’ Some companies were ‘white-shoe’ or ‘country club,’ while others were ‘gruff ‘ or ‘scrappy.’ Evaluators who believed a common personality characterized employees in their firm frequently looked for candidates who fit this image.”

The fit factor was at play beyond the resume level as well. Interviewers were often looking for people they shared personal interests with, and at the final deliberation table, interviewers were more likely to champion or fight for the applicants with whom they shared a personal interest, disposition, or background.

“When explaining the importance of fit to me, evaluators cited the time-intensive nature of their work. With the long hours spent in the office or on the road, they saw having culturally similar colleagues as making rigorous work weeks more enjoyable, although not necessarily more productive or successful,” Rivera writes.

What’s more, the focus on fit didn’t really reflect the realities of the work candidates were applying for. She continues, “fit was least important in consulting, where work is most interpersonally focused, and it was most important in law, which has the least interpersonal demands during the first years on the job.”

Research Implications

At the individual level, the research suggests that job applicants should indicate a broad range of interests on their resumes, and seek out ways to connect with interviewers on a personal level. When they are asked the common interview starter, “tell me about yourself,” applicants should share more than their academic or career backgrounds, but delve into their passions and interests as well. They should seek out opportunities to highlight their similarities with their interviewer.

This tactic can be empowering for women, people of color, and those with non-traditional backgrounds. Rivera writes that personality fit transcended sex and race as key factors in influencing hiring managers. If applicants can bring up a similar interest to demonstrate how they complement a firm’s culture, they may overcome the hurdle of perceived difference.

But at the institutional level, the fit factor may be actually be damaging firms’ attempts to cultivate real measures of diversity, ensuring that the companies keep hiring the same types of people in order to replicate their culture – even if that culture is stagnant or toxic. This was a particular salient issue in terms of class, she writes.

“Moreover, evaluators tended to favor extracurricular activities associated with the white upper-middle class and that were acquired through intense, prolonged investment of material and temporal resources not only by job applicants but also by their parents… Given that less affluent students are more likely than upper-middle-class students to believe that achievement in the classroom rather than on the field or in the concert hall matters most for future success and focus their energies accordingly… the types of cultural similarities valued in elite firms’ hiring processes had the potential to create inequalities in access to elite jobs based on parental socioeconomic status.”

Rivera’s research provides interesting insight into how one person’s beliefs can influence the culture of his or her firm by influencing it hires. If companies are really concerned about diversity, they should work to cultivate a more nuanced and thoughtful version of cultural fit, one that transcends what sports someone might have played in college or what kind of music they enjoy, and focuses instead on how their skills, abilities, and personalities can maximize the firm’s potential.