How to help newcomers fit in
As HR professionals we may have spent time sourcing, selecting and on boarding high potential people to fill key roles in our organizations. Occasionally, after some time, we come to regret our choice as we watch them ‘crash and burn’ having been unable to integrate with the powerful majority of ‘insiders’. Their valuable knowledge, skills and insight are lost and never come to benefit the organization in the way we hoped. Insights on the outsider advantage provide valuable pointers on how HR professionals can support newcomers realize potential.
Outsiders can provide valuable lessons to ‘insider’ communities but have to work harder to be accepted. Adrian Farnham, professor of Psychology, University College London states that outsiders can thrive because they have developed the following advantages:
Vigilance: the powerless have to be a lot more careful of the powerful than the other way around and this can make the outsider perceptive of attitudes which can help in negotiations and when people need to be persuaded to do something new.
Understanding: outsiders have to learn rules, they have not absorbed them from the beginning. This means that they can be insightful on why things are done a certain way and this may make them more adaptable.
Flexibility: being able to compare how things are done in different organizations enables movement between the systems. Potentially this flexibility produces optimal solutions for current challenges.
Although Furnham is referring to minority groups of all kinds when he discusses outsiders, I think much of his thinking applies to outsiders and insiders in an organizational setting when the outsider is new and not familiar with the rules which govern the way things are done. Sometimes we need to support newcomers to see their potential strengths and use them to achieve a successful integration with the relatively more powerful group of insiders.
What helps
Pointing out new recruits that they need to be aware of how much pressure they may be putting on themselves to make a good impression and that this may be counterproductive
Helping newcomers understand that there is value in spending time on building relationships and understanding organizational politics and that using outsider skills can help with this.
Supporting others in the organization to see the worth of the newcomers perspective by ‘showcasing’ the newcomer’s work, if possible
Encouraging them to use the wonderful but short-lived lens of their outsider status to analyze the organization’s dynamics, processes and procedures in a way that will not be so easy once they are fully integrated.
Resources
Furnham, A. ‘On Your Head: Beware outsiders - they’ve learnt to be stronger’ The Sunday Times, March 03 2013.
