Over the past so many years I have remained very impressed with Jim Collins’ concept of ‘First Who, Then What’, as he eloquently explains in his book Good to Great. It is always about the person (the who) more than the job (the what).
We hire or get hired for who we are, what values do we live by, how regulated and driven are we, rather than how we best fit into the job that we are expected to carry out at any given time. I am often asked; what skills do you seek in a candidate, when you hire. My answer almost always is, I hire for values first and skills next. This is my ‘who’ first and ‘what’ next. These “Who”s are not necessarily the strongest or the most intelligent; these are the ones who can manage change the best. No wonder they survive the longest. Remember Charles Darwin?
Let me explain, first with an analogy and then with an example. A bus full of passengers, all qualified and skilled is being driven from point A to point C, through a tough mountainous terrain. At point B somewhere in the middle, they find a landslide and the driver realises to his chagrin, no way can they proceed. They need to change course and even move destination to a new point D. Now, are all the passengers capable and willing to travel a different path and reach a different destination? If yes, they immediately set off to a new journey, to a new, unknown destination. If no, the driver takes the bus back to point A, off-loads all or all unwilling, unwitting passengers, fills in new ones, replaces himself too if required and the bus sets off to a new journey from point A to D. The landslide here is the inflection point. This is where things change. We have seen changes in environment, regulation, Government, laws, technology, customer preferences, competition activities, even change in lifestyle due to a rarest of rare occurrence as a lockdown due to a pandemic. The routes and the destinations are our day jobs and goals respectively. Skills are specific to a particular job or objective. Values are for embracing any change, adapting to altered routes and accomplishing modified objectives. Skills are required for a particular job and new skills for another but values see us through changing environments.
An example to further demonstrate this is my favourite, ITC. A very admired and valuable company with great leaders and sound values. What is ITCs main business? Cigarettes. Their revenues from tobacco business is 46% in 2020, must have been much higher earlier. Now, there is a huge campaign against tobacco and its ill-effects. In print, on TV, in cinemas, in the digital space and everywhere else. It is almost impossible to miss and appreciate a message that consumption of tobacco causes harm. Therefore, it is likely that ITCs share of revenue from tobacco business would have a declining trend. So, what would a great company like ITC do? They would diversify. Today ITC is a market leader in almost all segments it operates in; foods, agri-business, hotels, paper & packaging, information technology and possibly some more. What happened to the people in cigarette business? Most of them would have got consumed into important roles in the other diversified streams. Would that be possible if they were not great people with great values, only immensely skilled in cigarette business? No, they would have had to get off the bus.
This topic of ‘First Who Then What’ cannot end without another favourite of mine, the Bahadurs of Sholay. I have always believed in movies; always regarded them as a repository of very profound learnings of life. There was this retired jailor from Ramgarh, who lost both his hands to atrocities of a dreaded, tobacco-chewing dacoit. He went on to hire two iconic crooks to seek his revenge. When he proposes a sum of money to these two petty thieves for a job, one of them, who would become Bollywood’s megastar, inquires in his deep baritone; kaam kya hai (what’s the job)? A very legitimate and wise clarification to seek. You would remember what the retired jailor retorted. A response that would elevate the level of discourse to a totally different level; Bahadur ho toh iski fikr kyon karte ho (why worry if you are brave, capable and willing)? He goes on to add in Kaam jo main chahun, keemat jo tum chaho (You name the price, I name the job). I am yet to find a better depiction of Jim Collins’ ‘First Who Then What’.
