Attitude vs Aptitude, when employing people what do you look out for? Is it the academic achievements coupled with the years of experience? Sure, when it comes to Lawyers and Accountants, qualifications and experience is non-negotiable, but what about other professions?
In other industries what would you say if I told you that attitude means way more than aptitude? What if I could get better output from a person with the right attitude than I would with a person with the aptitude? Please don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that aptitude is not required, I am however saying that if I had to choose between two people for a position, I would choose the person with the better attitude twice over the one with the higher qualification.
And here is why I am saying this, a person with the right attitude can be taught anything, in fact with the right attitude, one can teach the person enough aptitude that he/she could potentially out perform his peers that started with more qualifications than he/she did purely because of attitude. Also, with the right attitude you could potentially build a better company culture as well. Think about it, if you have a company filled with people that are like minded with a winning positive attitude working together as a team to achieve one common goal vs a company with obvious superior qualifications and experience, but filled with people with an exact opposite attitude – no winning positiveness here, and definitely not working well together to a common goal, more like coming in and working their 9 to 5 to earn a pay check at the end of the month. You would probably end up with lower production numbers or output, a mediocre to unhealthy company culture and all in all a work environment that people don’t really want to be in, and most off all a company where people do not work towards a common goal. What would you prefer, attitude or aptitude?
This does not just ring true for culture, but also delivery, profit, skills retention and sustainability of your company. So, employ attitude over aptitude, and rather supply your people with the additional skills they require than employing all the skills you require but no attitude, as you can teach skills but you can’t teach or buy attitude.
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