One of the most engaging people I have met is a chap named David Lawson. When I first him he was a senior human resources executive with the food and diary manufacturing group Goodman Fielder a conglomerate with over $2.6billion in revenue & employing around 7,000 people. Here is David’s response to the question:  What are the things that impress you / turn you off when meeting people who want to work for your organisation?

The thing that impresses me is that passion, and on top of that, I want to see something a bit different; that ‘glint in the eye’. Occasionally just getting people in with a little bit of eccentricity is a good thing for the culture and creativity. Someone who has a different perspective is really useful. Not collaborating may not be a person’s natural bent, but because they want to make a good impression they go out on their own to try to stand alone. That, in fact, undermines their ability to perform, because in an organisation like this, collaboration is the key.

People demonstrate their perspective in their behaviour. So it will be someone who is comfortable in being themselves and isn’t so concerned about what others think of them. In the interview situation, you know it when somebody is very prepared to just be themselves. They’re relaxed. Their guard is down.

As for turn-offs, while we want people to be driven, if they are going to be so driven that they go over the top of people, or that they are not really able to listen and collaborate, that’s what starts to undo people if they’ve joined the company and they start to not get the results. If we are meeting a group of people, through an application process, and someone hiring felt very uncomfortable about this person’s ability to listen, that is an intellectual empathy to understand what someone is saying, then that will be a turn-off.

Tune into the next post to read another answer from David!

All my best,

James E

James Evangelidis

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Tagged as: conglomerate, David Lawson, passion