Organizational Culture
In a post last week, I mentioned that I was reading “The Seven Day Weekend” by Ricardo Semler…I am still reading the book (I’m slow OK?) and have been reading chapter seven. This chapter begins with Ricardo discussing an organizations’ culture and the need to be very careful not to create an organization of sameness. Ricardo argues that one trap that most organizations fall into is the trap of hiring ‘the best and brightest MBA’s from the best schools’. An excerpt from the chapter is below:
By drawing students from the same social strata, subjecting them to the same system of rewards and punishment, and immersing them in the same theories, attitudes, prejudices, and practices, graduate schools of business produce an astounding level of uniformity among MBA recipients, a uniformity that is a danger to an organization.
-Ricardo Semler, The Seven Day Weekend. Page 144.
How true.
We’ve all seen the job postings out there that say “MBA from top school” or something similar. I’ve always wondered about the thought process behind that…if you only hire people with MBA’s from Stanford, Harvard, Chicago, etc aren’t you overlooking a good portion of society? By limiting the selection pool, aren’t you ultimately predetermining the type of person you hire?
By hiring only those people with certain pedigrees, an organization is predetermining their future by hiring only those people with the same backgrounds and outlook on business.
Why not take a chance and hire someone with an MBA from a bottom-tier university and see what type of outlook they bring to your organization? Or better yet, why not take a chance and interview someone as far removed from a top-tier MBA program as you can…they may bring a completely new outlook to your business.
[tags] organization, culture, Ricardo Semler, MBA [/tags]
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