Who likes getting passed over for a job? What…no show of hands?! I didn’t think so. Out of all the jobs I was passed over for, one sticks out in my mind that I was actually “ok” with. I was told that I was passed over because of my personality…and that it wasn’t a bad thing. When I heard this feedback, I was wondering where this was heading. I thought to myself, “How is this a good thing? If I didn’t get this job because of my personality, how am I going to get another one?” It’s not like I can just hang my personality up on a rack and put on a new one at a moment’s notice. But then I was informed of the “why” behind it and things started to make sense.
The job came down to a fellow co-worker and me. We both knew it. We were both good in our current positions. It could have been any one of us, but I had a little more seniority. I was told that the job went to him because the leadership team thought his personality was better suited for the current group of people he was going to take over. The current group of people had a high call in rate to the Human Resources department for various reasons and they wanted someone who could go in there and make the situation better. My style is more direct, authoritative, and task-oriented. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a mean person, nor do I disrespect my people. However, I have a way I like things done and hold my people accountable. My leadership knew that and knew the other candidate was better suited due to his more laid back approach.
Everything I was told made sense to me. For the first time, I felt like I had been given some honest feedback that I could build off of and also not feel like I was a complete failure. As I was reading the lesson this week about the psychodynamic approach and how it deals with personalities and leadership, I was quickly reminded of this situation. An example from the book that highlights this example would be extraversion (Carl Jung’s spelling preference of the word) versus introversion. Northouse (2013) assesses that extraverts talk and like to be in contact with other people, while introverts would rather listen than talk. While I like to listen, I am sure a talker. My leadership called this store a special circumstance because of the people working in it and that they needed a certain type of leader.
Looking back, I’m glad I didn’t get the job. Two months later, I was promoted to another location and made the most of it with my team. I had good things to takeaway from not getting the original job. I received great feedback and I didn’t give up on further opportunities. Does anyone else have a story where the psychodynamic approach played a part in a decision or situation?
Northouse, P.G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Los Angeles: Sage.
Bryan Christopher Martin says
Robert,
This is a really interesting perspective to me. I don’t think I really paid attention to the major roles personalities can play in the workplace until we started to study this module.
From a psychodynamic theory perspective, it makes a lot of sense. In my years in the military (and I believe you’re a vet too) I’ve found that different people respond differently to different leaders. Some people can work efficiently over an authoritative leader, while others crumble under the pressure created by someone yelling at them and disciplining them. I always considered this to be overlooked in the corporate settings, so it’s interesting to hear this type of response from an employer.
Do you feel like it’s really made that much of a difference? That the individual who did get the job was really better suited for the position given all the uncommon variables? I’m curious to do more research and see how much impact personality plays on leadership in business setting.
Chelsea Sade Spruell says
Very interesting post. However, I disagree. It seems the original position you were “unsuited” for could have been exactly what that department needed. “The current group of people had a high call in rate to the Human Resources department for various reasons and they wanted someone who could go in there and make the situation better” Your assertive personality could have leveled off that high call in rate, unless it was at the company’s discretion to maintain the status quo.
Interestingly enough, I had an experience with the psychodynamic approach as I trained for my last position. During training all of the newly promoted individuals took personality inventories which was then co related to scenario profiles of followers. The take away message was as leaders we can’t maintain one profile but maintain a flexible leadership style. Being able to recognize individual followers as extrovert, introvert, task or relationship oriented allowed leaders within that organization to be proactive when interacting with followers thus reducing conflict and increasing organizational effectiveness.
Nicole M Neumeyer says
I can completely relate to this situation. There was a position that became available in my store. I had worked really hard training for. However my managers decided to fill the position with an employee from another store who was also training for the promotion.
After they had made their decisions my managers told me that they had not picked me because of my personality. Unfortunately for me, this other candidate brought different personality traits to the building. My personality was to inline with the current managers. While I was disappointed that I did not receive the job, like you said I was happy that they were honest and it only helped me to grow.