One quality not measured

So there I was thinking about an interview and failed to get the job. Yet wasn't bothered, the interview went OK but clearly this candidate was not good enough. It was an internal job and there were fewer than a handful of applicants, possibly only three. It began with a short period of a half hour set aside so as to prepare a presentation. The interview would then begin with the presentation and go onto the finer details of questions. These totalled 9. No psychometrics were applied, the panel were all internal incumbent managers who likely know nothing about such things and probably have never heard of a Gaussian curve to say the least. I don't see it as a failure but as a learning experience about myself, a little like writing a post card when abroad and then getting home home and using it as a memory c que to recall the holiday. Quite simply I did not want the job, but this doesn't mean I was the best candidate and it doesn't mean my lack of enthusiam meant I was incapable.  I am passionate about my work, I enjoy it, love the intellectual stimulation and even research in my own time most weekends. It is a good job, but I'm not a occupational psychologist, which would probably be easier than what I do. I prevaricated because the new boss was someone I didn't particularly like and thought was not I could respect.  Perhaps this was the wrong frame of mind to have.  Yet, I saw how hard the previous person worked in that job, they'd done done two jobs not one. Psychologically I was unable to reconcile how I felt and judge this individual and in turn this has affected my career. 

One measurement which is not measured by occupational psychologists when it comes to selecting job applicants is the enthusiasm and passion they have, or the enthusiasm or passion they may well develop in the job they learn what it is and how to do it. Or alternatively how their future passion may wane. The way I see it is humans are adaptable learning organisms, they change their methods and learn the system. I heard one instance of a girl who wanted to work for the civil service. Each year she would take the online tests or exams and fail. She was only allowed to take the exams once a year. So each year she learnt from her mistakes and then changed her answers. It took seven years before she got a job in the civil service, a job she always wanted to do an had a passion to learn and do. Yet the selection process had failed to select this individual the first time round, it clearly failed and failed the tenacity and ability of a great recruit for an earlier 6 years. In real costs the civil service may have lost hundreds of thousands of pounds in productivity.  So the quality I am talking about is passion.

An individual may pass an interview because they have the skills. Lets say, the skill to make widgets, they then go on to do the job and make the widgets. However, this was all the employer wanted someone to make widgets full stop. Yet another individual who may not have the skill to make widgets has the passion to learn how to make them and would then have the passion to spend their own time learning even more about widgets.  They might not just improve their skills but create an even better widget the world has not seen. It is clear sometimes to get a certain job done it is necessary to learn a new ability. An example of this might be spreadsheets, or powerpoint, the ability to use either of these programs is useful to every manager. Though it may not be necessary for them all. One thing leads to another. It is not necessary to have a skill, it is necessary to have the ability to learn it and it is even far better to have the passion to go beyond what is asked.

In my workplace there are people who do jobs and they know those jobs inside out, the job has become something to do to earn money in order to live. It provides no further passion, they have learnt everything about every possible situation which involves their job. And then these individuals are no longer helped to create other skills utilised. Equally there are some people I have seen who like to harbour their own knowledge and don't let others know what they do. Everything is kept under their hat so as to make them indispensable. Or in their mind they feel indispensable, in reality nobody is. So here's a viewpoint, employing someone who knows little about the job but has enthusiasm and passion to learn and therefore clearly has a pathway where they are going to move and be the biggest asset the department or organization may well ever possess. Now that's a thought.

Passion, Passion, Passion.