Culture-add interview questions are questions you can ask job candidates in order to determine what they will add to your organisation. This is contrast to the idea of finding candidates who “fit” company culture, which often leads to hiring biases.
As a recruitment professional, you’re likely familiar with the term “culture fit”, which refers to hiring individuals who fit into your team and who are a good match with your company culture.
For example, an outdoors company, hiring for culture fit could mean hiring individuals who are into camping, hiking and outdoor advenutes.
More broadly, hiring for culture fit means short-listing, and hiring, candidates who have experience or education similar to that of current employees—or individuals with similar traits or interests.
However, hiring for culture fit does have its disadvantages as it can often promote homogeneity and a lack of diversity within your organisation. If you’re overly focused on culture-fit during the recruitment process, you might be missing out on qualified candidates.
Further to that, studies have found that ethnic diversity and gender equality positively correlate with profitability and that companies with above-average diversity show a 19% increase in profits due to innovation.
While employers believe “culture fits” move faster when executing familiar tasks, when it comes to exploring new and unknown territory and innovation, diverse teams with “culture adds” come up with better ideas, execute them faster, and need fewer resources to do so.
So how do you implement the change? Begin focusing on “culture-add” throughout the interview process to find and hire employees who will add value and different perspectives to your workplace culture and organisation.
When hiring for culture add, there are culture add interview questions you should ask each candidate—and questions you should ask yourself—to determine the skills and value a potential employee could bring to your organisation.
Describe a time when you helped a coworker or direct report with a work problem.
Describe an occasion at work when you had to do something you didn’t agree with. How did you handle it?
Describe a time when you received feedback from a supervisor or someone on another team. How did you react? What was the end result?
What have you learned in the past year that you’re more proud of?
How do you maintain work-life balance?
Here are also some questions to ask yourself:
Could this employee challenge our way of thinking and suggest improvements to our current processes?
Does this candidate represent a voice or viewpoint for our customers that we’re missing? Or would they help us better communicate with prospective customers by having this voice or viewpoint?
Organisations with a reputation of hiring for culture add, not culture fit, tend to attract more diverse candidates and have an advantage over competitors when it comes to talent acquisition.
By making culture add a significant part of your employer brand, you’ll be able to hire and retain employees who can help improve your processes and your revenue.
If you would like to know more about how you could use Vieple to add diversity to your workplace, contact us today or click here to start your 30 Day Free Trial