Leaders: Hire People Who Walk With A Limp
Adversity builds character. I find that the people I admire have not always had things easy. Somewhere, at sometime in their past, these people overcame circumstances in their lives that changed them. They walk with a limp.
Through my 15 years of interviewing, hiring and training people I discovered that finding people who walk with a limp is often an indicator of their character.
In the business world, competency is the price of admission to any job or leadership position. Competency alone is not a differentiator when hiring today. This is a buyers market. There are competent people everywhere looking to fill open positions in good companies.
I write and speak often about character being an individual’s and an organization’s key to success. But character is difficult to determine in the hiring process. How can a leader determine if the person they are interviewing is of high moral character?
Adversity Builds Character
Hire People Who Walk With A Limp
Some of the wounds of my best team members and peers included:
- The unexpected passing of a spouse.
- Leading a failed start-up venture.
- A long illness that they overcame.
- Failure at a job in their past.
- Experiencing loss of life on the battlefield.
- Losing an athletic scholarship due to injury and having to pay for college themselves.
- The experience of being a whistle-blower.
Each of these circumstances left these high character people walking with a limp. The lessons they learned through the adversity they faced shaped who they became.
Not everyone who encounters obstacles in their lives responds in the same way. The ones I did not hire were the ones who could not articulate what they learned and how it changed them.
Some people choose to retreat in self-pity rather than advance towards a new and better self. Many do not have the insight into themselves to look in the mirror and see the opportunity to adapt and grow.
The people who grew and changed as a result of their negative experiences usually became my most trusted team players and friends. Their experiences gave them:
Perseverance
What many considered obstacles, they saw as speed bumps
Courage
When others would back down, they stepped forward.
Perspective
When some griped and moaned about small annoyances, they kept a positive outlook and often lifted others up with them.
Based on these attributes, I believe we would all want to work with people who have character that was forged in the fires of adversity. But HOW do you find people who walk with a limp?
HOW is a question not always addressed in these conversations about hiring for character. There are two reasons for this:
1. Character Is Hard To Measure
There are no metrics for character. We live in a business environment where senior leaders and HR professionals demand objective measures for everything. Since character is hard to measure, we tend to use our gut to determine a person’s character. More often than not what we are determining is whether we like the person not whether they have high character.
2. Professional Interviewers Abound
Today teaching people how to interview for a job is an industry. If a hiring manager continues to use standard interview questions, most savvy candidates are so well prepared for them, the insight gained into that person’s soul is minimal. Face it. Who isn’t going to say their biggest strengths are work ethic and integrity?
In this day and age, we must become better at interviewing. We must dig into a person’s character with more probing questions. One area to question is this area of adversity they faced in the past.
Some questions I have learned to ask through experience and research:
- Tell me about an obstacle you faced in your life?
- Tell me about the toughest person you ever worked for?
- Tell me about a time when you failed to measure up to your own, or someone else’s standards?
- What one experience in your life do you think shaped who you are the most?
Notice I did not add “and what did you do about it”. I want to see if the person in front of me automatically shares how they solved the problem or addressed the issue.
If they don’t share that, I should be concerned about their initiative. I do not want to work with people who need me to remind them to do something about the problems they face. High character people see a problem and can’t help but address it.
Also notice that I did not ask them about a time they showed integrity, perseverance or some other desirable trait. Again, asking a question like that plays right into the hands of a professional interviewer.
There are a couple of books that I recommend leaders to read when they decide to focus on hiring for character. Hiring On A WHIM and Hiring for Attitude are two great resources that you can link to here.
The Bottom Line:
Find the people who walk with a limp. These people were wounded once in life or in business, but adapted and grew as a result.
People who walk with a limp know the scars that they have. But, they have healed and are well past the pain. They have made the choice to be a better person as a result of their wounds.
Question:
What circumstances in your life left you with a limp? How did that shape your character?
I agree with the bulk of your article and assume that “walking with a limp” is a metaphor for people who have been forced to confront and overcome significant adversities in their life. This being said, there also appears to be an assumption that others admire the same qualities, or attributes in others. Therefore, the focus seems to be on how to determine the attributes and/or qualities that are indicative of “a person walking with a limp”.
As a paraplegic who has struggled to succeed in the Defense Industry for over 20 years as a disabled American veteran, I would consider myself to be more than qualified to be characterized as “a person walking with a limp”. Moreover, I’ve spent the majority of this time working in Senior Project and/or Engineering management positions. So, I’ve amassed a wealth of experience working as a hiring manager in search of people with the necessary leadership attributes (walking with a limp) to excel in a leadership position, and an individual being considered/interviewed for a leadership position.
In the capacity of a hiring manager, I agree with the majority of your article and actively seek individuals who have demonstrated the ability to overcome significant adversities. However, as an paraplegic and sole provider for my family, I have constantly been forced to overcome major adversities. Encountering adversities in my personal life was expected, but I was surprised at the adversities I confronted in my professional career.
Despite the assumptions that “a person walking with a limp” demonstrates attributes worthy of admiration, there is tremendous bias in the industry, and in life, against people who have had to overcome significant personal adversities in their lives … especially if those adversities manifest themselves as noticeable disabilities.
I find that many people don’t know how to manage, or work with people that have physical disabilities. Perhaps it makes them feel uncomfortable and uneasy in some way. Likewise, perhaps some individuals believe people who have had to overcome physical and/or personal disabilities in their lives have done something in their lives to deserve those adversities.
This being said, it has been my experience that most hiring managers are looking for leaders who have demonstrated the potential to overcome major adversities in their life. However, while it’s not universal, there are definitely hiring managers in the industry who will deliberately pass over people with disabilities, especially those with major physical disabilities.
You can’t argue with the leadership attributes developed or enhanced in people who have had to overcome major adversities in their lives. Without question, the bulk of these people will have demonstrated significant leadership experience, or significant leadership potential.
While most hiring managers would advocate the same principles for identifying leadership attributes, it has been my experience in working with and observing other hiring managers that individuals with disabilities are held to a higher standard during their interview(s) for leadership positions than those without physical disabilities. Likewise, individuals with physical disabilities are held to a higher performance standard than others in similar positions.
I know there will be many who would disagree with my assertions, but the basis for my assertions comes from practical experience working in management positions before and after the incident that resulted in my paraplegia. Although I was fortunate enough to overcome my adversities as a paraplegic and succeed in my professional life, I always felt my success required working longer hours and performing much better than my peers.
Dave
Dave-
Your insight is valuable to this discussion. While I used the phrase as a metaphor, you have a level of experience on the subject I can not match.
Thank you for your thoughts. The point of my comments was that the character of the candidate should be actively sought after in the interview process. A person’s physical limitations should not factor into the decisions.