“Wow. That was a waste of time.”
Is this something you’ve said to yourself after interviewing a candidate who seems to have low potential?
We’ve all been there. After experiencing such an interview, most of us have the urge to tighten the screening requirements and only interview candidates with better credentials.
According to researchers, taking this course of action will produce the exact opposite results you’re looking to achieve.
Why? It’s because avoiding failure has become your objective.
Organizations who focus on avoiding failure tend to perform at a lower level compared to those who encourage it.
You’ve probably heard the story of how Babe Ruth entered the history books after hitting his 714th home run in 1935. Remarkably, less than 24 hours after setting the home run record, he also set the record for the most strikeouts.
Ruth’s record for strike-outs stood for almost 30 years. Who outdid his illustrious accomplishment? It was hall-of-famer Mickey Mantle. But, Mantle doesn’t currently hold this record. He was eventually surpassed by hall-of-famer Reggie Jackson.
It’s obvious these world-class sluggers were comfortable with striking-out. Ruth once told reporters, “If I just tried for them dinky singles, I could’ve batted around .600.”
Failure and High Repetitions
The connection between failure and high-performance is not just a sports phenomenon.
In his highly acclaimed book, The Best Place to Work: The Art and Science of Creating an Extraordinary Workplace, Dr. Ron Freidman shares research demonstrating the same connection is valid in many other areas.
For example, history books reveal “creative geniuses” tend to be people who understand the importance of high repetitions and common failures.
What do Shakespeare, Dickens, Tolstoy, Picasso, Monet, Bach, Mozart, Wagner, Schubert, Brahms, and Dostoyevsky all have in common?
They produced far more content than their contemporaries. Dr. Friedman points out:
Today, [these high-performers] are remembered for a mere fraction of their complete body of work. Creative geniuses don’t generate masterpieces on a regular basis. Yet the quality that distinguishes them would be impossible with out the quantity of attempts.
The high repetition of failure to success connection is quite common. It shows up in business as well.
Success stories are often characterized by a long string of failures. You probably know that Steve Jobs failed many times (Apple I, Apple II, the Lisa, the Newton, and NeXT hardware) before experiencing some of his biggest successes.
However, did you know that Google has more failures than any modern company?
Perhaps you don’t remember Froogle, Google Reader, Google Web Accelerator, Google Answers, Google Video Player, Google Buzz, Google Wave, or Google X.
These are products Google tried and later abandoned (Google X, a home page customization tool, only lasted one day). They were failures.
Another Google product called AdSense could have been added to this list as well—it started in a similar way inside Google. However, it now produces $10 billion/year in revenue for Google.
Interview Repetition and High-Performers
Google hits an occasional home run by getting a high number of “at-bats” and not fearing frequent strikeouts.
The same principle applies to recruiting.
This is especially true if your goal is to hire high performers.
You’ll have to interview and engage dozens of individuals (most of whom will not successfully complete the hiring process) to capture just a few agents who will perform at a high level.
Most of us are not comfortable with this reality. It’s a lot of work, and those “singles” Babe Ruth ignored don’t look so undesirable.
For recruiting, giving into this mentality destines you to hiring a team of mediocre players.
High interview repetition and a willingness to fail lead to a better place.
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