Intrinsic Role Matching©

We explore the person behind the CV because rolefit is an art, not a science

The shortlist tells you who can do the job. We help you determine who is most likely to thrive in it.

You've narrowed your candidates to the final two or three. They have the qualifications, experience and capabilities to do the job. But which person is most likely to flourish in this particular role, within your organisation, alongside this team, and in the environment you are creating?

That is the decision we help you make

Intrinsic Role Matching© adds the human dimension to your hiring decision, helping you understand how each candidate's natural talents, motivational patterns and working preferences relate to the demands of the role, the team and the wider organisational environment.

Because the right person is not simply someone who can do the job. It is someone who has the potential to make a meaningful contribution and develop within it.

Make your next hiring decision with a deeper understanding of the people behind the CVs

Discuss Your Final Shortlist

"The biggest gains businesses will see in the next 10 years will lie within hiring the right managers and maximising the strengths of every single employee"

Jim Clifton, GALLUP Chairman

The missing piece in recruitment

Qualifications tell you what someone has studied. Experience tells you what they have done. Competency-based interviews help you assess what they can do.

But these things do not necessarily reveal what energises someone, how they naturally approach challenges, what conditions help them flourish, or where the demands of a role may create issues.

A candidate can be highly capable and still find themselves in a role that continually works against their natural patterns of thinking, motivation and contribution.

Equally, someone whose potential has been overlooked by conventional selection criteria may have precisely the qualities an organisation needs.

The question then is not only whether someone fits the job description - it is whether the relationship between the person, the role, the team and the environment creates the conditions for success

That is the additional perspective Intrinsic Role Matching© brings to recruitment.

A more informed decision at the point that matters

You do not need to start your recruitment process again or ask us to produce another pile of CVs.

Our model is designed to work with your existing recruitment process, once you have identified your final two or three candidates.

We add a focused assessment of the human factors that can make a difference to how someone experiences, approaches and develops within a role.

We consider:

Natural talent patterns - how a candidate is inclined to think, approach challenges, interact and contribute
Intrinsic motivation - what tends to energise the person and what they need to engage meaningfully
Role alignment - the relationship between the candidate's patterns and the actual demands of the position
Team compatibility - how different strengths, working preferences and contributions may complement or challenge those already present
Organisational environment - the culture, expectations, leadership, pace and conditions in which the person will be working
Development considerations - support in one's Intrinsic Identity© - opportunities and conditions that may help the individual succeed and continue to grow
Over/Under-use Patterns - the patterns and conditions that may sometimes trigger an individual (subject to Strength Assessment)

The purpose is not to label a candidate or reduce a person to a personality profile. It is to bring a more integrated understanding of the individual into a decision that matters to both the employer and the person being hired.

How Intrinsic Role Matching© works

1. You identify your final shortlist

Your organisation or recruitment partner completes the usual screening and selection process. We become involved when you have two or three credible candidates and need to make the final decision.

2. We explore the person behind the CV

Using CliftonStrengths® where appropriate, structured conversations and our strengths-based methodology, we explore each candidate's natural talent patterns, motivations and approach to contribution.

3. We examine the relationship between person and role

We consider the realities of the position, the team, the leadership context and the organisational environment. We look at alignment, potential tensions and the conditions that may support or hinder the person's ability to thrive.

4. You receive an additional perspective for your decision

We bring the findings together to help you compare the candidates more meaningfully. You gain a clearer view of their respective strengths, potential contributions, development considerations and the conditions each may need to succeed.

Your organisation retains the hiring decision. We help you make it with a fuller understanding of the people involved

Why this matters commercially

A senior appointment is a significant investment. The cost of getting it wrong can extend well beyond the recruitment fee or salary

There may be onboarding costs, management time, disruption to a team, delayed projects, lost opportunities and the expense of repeating the process if the appointment does not work out.

Intrinsic Role Matching© is designed to help employers examine an often-overlooked dimension of that decision before the appointment is made

It can help you ask better questions, identify potential mismatches earlier, clarify what a candidate may need to flourish and make the reasoning behind your decision more considered.

It cannot guarantee a successful appointment. No assessment can. But it can provide additional insight at a point when that insight may be particularly valuable.

A relatively small investment in understanding the final candidates may help protect a much larger investment in the future of the appointment

This is especially relevant when recruiting senior leaders, specialist professionals, key team members or individuals whose contribution has a significant influence on organisational performance.

"Disengaged employees have 37% higher absenteeism, 18% lower productivity and 15% lower profitability" - Gallup

More than a strengths assessment

CliftonStrengths® provides a valuable language for understanding natural patterns of talent. It is one of the tools that can inform our work, but it is not the entire methodology.

The differentiator is how we connect the individual to the wider human system in which they will work.

My approach brings together strengths-based development, intrinsic motivation, systems thinking and an understanding of the interdependent relationship between people, roles, teams and organisations.

We do not simply ask, “What are this person's strengths?”

We ask:

How might those strengths contribute to this particular role?
What conditions will help the person use them constructively?
Where might the demands of the role create tension or require development?
How might their contributions complement the strengths of the existing team?
What does the organisation need to understand to help this appointment succeed?

The assessment is not about finding a type of person. It is about understanding this particular person in this particular context

"Improved Performance and Profitability: Organisations that focus on strengths experience an 8%–18% increase in performance and a 14%–29% rise in profit" Gallup

From recruitment to a more human way of working

"My work has always been driven by a simple question: what happens when we understand people more fully and create the conditions for them to contribute what they are genuinely capable of contributing - matching the individual to the role and environment.

That question led me to develop an approach that looks beyond conventional selection criteria.

Rather than treating a vacancy as a list of requirements and a candidate as a collection of qualifications, we explore the relationship between individual talent, motivation, role demands and the environment in which work takes place.

This connects to my wider work on Intrinsic Identity© and Interdependent Rules of Engagement© - understanding what makes each person distinctive while recognising that meaningful contribution takes place through relationships with other people and the company." Samantha McDonald

For organisations, the practical implication is clear:

Better-informed hiring begins with understanding both the person and the system they are entering

Evidence from practice

"In my Intrinsic Role Matching© process I have seen how a different perspective can reveal possibilities that conventional recruitment processes may overlook, possibilities that can emerge when someone is considered for what they can contribute, rather than being judged only against a conventional career path or a narrow interpretation of their experience. One candidate I worked with, Rehan Christians, described how a different approach helped move him into ERP implementation work that brought together his Information Systems degree (which as a mature student had been overlooked), his strengths and broader capabilities. Rehan had studied Information Systems but was struggling to find opportunities that made use of his degree. His experience in bookkeeping did not fully reflect the broader capabilities he could bring to an organisation.

Rather than seeing him only through his existing job title, I explored his work history, what he wanted to do, the skills he had developed and the opportunities that might better align with his capabilities and Intrinsic Identity©. He subsequently moved into ERP implementation work, where he could bring together his Information Systems background and a broader range of skills. Reflecting on the experience, Rehan described the approach as holistic and refreshing. He also explained how his Strengths Awareness and coaching helped him become more intentional about working interdependently with others." Samantha McDonald

His experience illustrates the principle behind Intrinsic Role Matching©

when we look beyond a person's current role and conventional career path, we may recognise potential that would otherwise remain unseen.

Read Rehan's testimony

Research shows creating an environment for great application of strengths, companies can experience these benefits:

6X higher engagement
36% higher performance
43% higher productivity
35-50% higher financial return
83% more likely to be part of a high performing team

Start with your final two or three candidates

You have already invested time in attracting, interviewing and assessing your shortlist. Before making the final decision, consider whether you have enough insight into the person behind each CV and how that person is likely to relate to the realities of the role, the team and your organisation.

Intrinsic Role Matching© can be commissioned as a focused service alongside your existing recruitment process, without requiring you to start again.

If you are recruiting for a key position, I would welcome a conversation about the role, your shortlist and the questions you still need answered.

WITH-Humanity - making business more human, one hiring decision at a time

"Teams that emphasise strengths see a 29% higher likelihood of employees staying with the company for the next year and a 42% higher chance of employees remaining with the company for their entire career" Gallup

If you like what you've heard and would like to bring an Intrinsic Role Matching© approach to your organisation, designed with effectiveness, optimisation and affordability in mind we'd like to hear from you GET IN TOUCH

I want to take my Strengths Assessment Now

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Testimony

Anchor 1

Read what others have to say about unlocking their Potential ...

Rehan Christians July 2019 South Africa

I first met Sam in January 2018. The company I was working for was looking for an Accounts Assistant but I was in the final stages of interviewing for a lecturer position, which I mentioned to Sam. She decided to interview me anyway to find out more about what I wanted to do with my life. In the end I turned down the opportunity she was offering and decided to try the lecturer position.

I thought that would be the end of it when in November 2018 Sam called again out of the blue and asked if I would be interested in a junior Implementation Consultant Position which had come up. Sam had remembered I was searching for new challenges and had applied for the lecturer position because I wanted something different from the Book-keeping.

I’d also been getting no responses from organisations relating to what I had studied towards, being Information Systems. No one was prepared to take a chance on me. I was a mature student and had my degree in Information Systems, but it took someone with a completely different outlook to take a chance and look at what I had to offer in a new way.

Sam put me forward again for the available position and after some interviews and tests, including my Strengths Assessment, I was offered a position doing ERP Implementations. This is also the first time I am actually utilising my Strengths and the many skills I obtained throughout my degree, at the same time.

I think it was the way Sam chose to look at me as a candidate, as well as what my needs were as an employee, together with the requirement of the organisation. Her approach was holistic and just plain refreshing. This is just not something one encounters in most organisations. I am finally using such a broad skill set.

I have always known my strengths, but the Coaching Sessions, which are part of the recruitment process, have made me aware of how I use my Strengths, and not to let these overpower someone else’s, but rather to become intentional about trying to be interdependent.

Also, not to be over reliant on only my dominant Strengths but to recognise and develop my secondary talents. I feel developing these will make me more complete as an individual and employee and as a partner and father. I feel the benefits could be far reaching beyond just being successful in my current position. All things are interconnected after all, as nothing acts in isolation.

Through the Strengths Awareness I have stopped only concentrating on my own Strengths and now look to others to bring their Strengths too, to assist me in tasks and/or to compliment my own Strengths. I am still relatively new at this, but I do feel I am moving in the right direction.

Become a Strengths Recruitment Candidate