Leaders at DaimlerChrysler Insurance Co. want to look internally first to fill a position, they also see the benefits of looking
outside the company to fill a need. When you do go outside, you want people that are going to cross-pollinate the organization
and bring in things to share and to talk about, says William F. Jones Jr., president and CEO of the $117 million insurance company
that employs 45 people. Smart Business spoke with Jones Jr. about how to find the people who will buy in to your vision and
how to avoid the pitfall of thinking you have all the answers.
Hire people who are going to endorse your
vision. You flesh out a resume. It’s a snapshot. When you conduct an interview, it’s,
‘Tell me more about X and tell me more
about Y. Tell me about your motivation.’
I don’t think there is a right answer, but
the quality of the answer and the commitment behind the answer [are important].
Somebody says, ‘Yep, I went to college.
Yep, I studied accounting.’
Why did you study accounting? What was
it about it that excited you, or what bored
the hell out of you? You can probe a little
bit deeper in the course of questions. What
are people about? What do they do? Do
they like their family? Why did you come to
Michigan? Were you born here? It’s about
establishing some type of common basis to
have a conversation.
Don’t show up to an interview unless you
have questions of your own. An interview
should be a dialogue not simply a presentation of answers you’ve already prepared.
There isn’t a prescribed answer. Truly
smart and motivated people are going to
take you in a lot of different directions, and
maybe they’ll even surprise you with something.
Body language helps convey confidence.
It can make you less assured of a person’s
qualifications if they have difficulty and
struggle with basic and simple questions.
As an organization, we don’t automatically
exclude somebody on the basis of appearance, unless it’s obvious from the way they
come in here they aren’t serious.
This isn’t the type of environment where
you show up in sneakers and cut-offs with
a skateboard under your arm. But you
don’t have to show up in a three-piece, button-down with wingtips, either.
Communicate your vision. We talk to our
employees and conduct surveys. The feedback is anonymous, but you can tell if they
are getting it by the way they respond. We
have core values we live by: integrity, passion, discipline, openness and respect;
financial and social responsibility; inspired
and empowered people; customer focus;
and commitment to excellence.
When people challenge you on the core values or challenge themselves, you know
that they are bringing the passion and the
understanding to the situation that you
want to have in the organization.
Find interests other than your business. We all
have outside interests. There has to be
something you are passionate about. I’m a
sports nut and love to play golf. So that’s
one thing.
You have an outlet. I enjoy friends and
music and daydreaming about some wild
idea or reading something off the wall from
time to time that makes you think in a different direction.
Some folks, what they do is what they
love to do. No matter how far they try to
stretch, the outside and inside are going to
blur.
There’s people that love to ski and look
forward to skiing. What is it that makes
people interesting? It’s not what they do.
It’s what they like. It’s a tremendous ice-breaker to begin with. If you are a Pistons
fan and you encounter another Pistons fan,
right away that’s something in common.
Allow employees to be open and honest. When
it’s tried out, and it will be, you have to do
what you say you are going to do. If I say
we can have open and honest communication, and the first time someone walks into
my office with bad news, you shoot the
messenger, that’s B.S.
It’s, ‘I appreciate you bringing that to my
attention, now let’s find a solution.’ You
can’t say it and then not do it. You have to
communicate it and execute on that basis.
We have to hold ourselves accountable.
Learn from mistakes. You can’t learn from
things by burying things. Once again, open
and honest. Hopefully, we made a mistake
for the right reasons, or made a mistake
trying to do something better for the company, not a mistake because we are trying
to cover something up.
We take that as a learning opportunity
and move along. You’re much better off
getting to that sooner than later. The company has a lot of people, and a lot of people
know what is going on, so you can’t hide
things from your employees. You learn
from it, digest it and move on.
Never think that you have all the right answers. I
think the greatest pitfall would be not casting as wide as you can to explore opportunities to solving problems. If you singularly
think you have all the answers, then you
are heading for failure.
Ask questions and listen. Even if you
haven’t asked the question, listen. Go to
folks, talk to them about it. Talk to people
inside the industry and outside. The whole
idea of gathering intelligence is a 365-day-a-year type of situation. You can learn from
anybody, anywhere, anytime. If you remain
cognizant of that, I think you have a better
chance of success. Even the most successful
people in the world aren’t right all the time.
I may think I know the right answer, but
if we are having a discussion, it’s about validating. Let’s push, probe and see if it
makes sense. If nobody is challenging you,
then you have to say, ‘We’re about to make
a big decision here. What are the risk and
opportunities around it?’
That fits in the realm of proper due diligence around any type of significant decision-making. If you get there and you don’t
feel right about it, then you shouldn’t put an
artificial timetable on it.
HOW TO REACH: DaimlerChrysler Insurance Co., (800) 782-9164 and press 3, or www.insurance.daimlerchrysler.com