I hope each of you enjoyed a great Thanksgiving holiday weekend, and you’re ready to push towards a strong finish to the year.

I asked a friend how his Thanksgiving celebration went and his answer surprised me.

“It was smaller and quieter than normal because one member of our extended family expressed some views on Facebook earlier in the week, and the comments offended several other family members. Both of the parties involved (and their immediate family members) decided not to attend the celebration because of the offensive comments.”

This may just sound like some family politics going too far, but it illustrates a broader point about the psychology of attraction.

People with similar values are attracted to each other. By contrast, individuals with dissimilar values repel each other, sometimes quite strongly.

While you won’t be offering your candidates a turkey leg, many hiring managers frequently do things to repel candidates during the interview and follow-up process.

Today, we’ll learn how to turn the tables and become an attractive force.

The Law of Attraction

This idea is hard for most people to initially grasp because most of us have heard (and believe) the old saying that “opposites attract.”

While this seems true, researchers have consistently proven the inverse to be more correct:

We’re attracted to people who like what we like.

More specifically, we’re drawn to others who have similar interests, attitudes, and values.

This concept has been studied so much, some researchers now refer to this as the Law of Attraction. I found one meta-analysis that documented over 350 studies on this topic.

Donn Byrne, a psychologist at the University of Texas, conducted one of the earliest and most interesting experiments. Here are some details:

In an early study (1966), Byrne asked college students to fill out a 26 item attitude survey. They were then asked to read attitude surveys supposedly filled out by other students (but actually by the experimenter). Finally, each participant was asked to rate the fictitious student on a number of dimensions, based on their survey responses.

Participants’ responses showed that the fictitious students were liked more when he/she agreed more with the participants’ own responses.

Research participants especially liked a stranger when they were told that stranger answered all 26 items on an attitude survey exactly as they had.

Participants also thought the stranger would be more intelligent, knowledgeable, moral, and better adjusted as similarity of their attitudes increased. 

For the purposes of this study, attitude was defined as a person’s opinions, beliefs, likes and dislikes.

Similarity and Recruiting

Let this data sink in for a few minutes.

If an individual believes (hopefully because it’s true) he is similar to you, he starts to believe all kinds of positive things. Suddenly, you’re intelligent, moral, likable, and have many other positive traits.

In recruiting, this is one of the most powerful forces you can harness for your benefit and for the benefit of the candidate. People want to be connected to and work around other individuals with whom they are similar. You’re job (opportunity) is to facilitate this process.

Here’s how to make it happen:

Find out the interests, values, and likes of a candidate. During the interview, ask a lot of questions that will encourage a candidate to reveal this information. It’s easier than it sounds because people like talking about themselves.

Use this information to connect the candidate with people on your team who are similar. Ideally, the connection would be between the candidate and the hiring manager. However, if there’s not a natural connection there, find someone else who is similar.

Use this information to customize communication with the candidate after the interview. When you later send an email, connect on the phone, or meet face-to-face, remind the candidate of the similarities. The more specific you can be the better.

For example, you might say something like, “How’s your preparation for the half-marathon in the fall coming along? Stacy [the runner in our office who the candidate met] mentioned she is up to 8-mile training runs.”

By paying attention to these details, you’ll be tapping into a mysterious force that causes candidates to think happy thoughts about you.

You’ll become attractive.

Questions or Comments?  Reply to your WorkPuzzle subscription email.

Didn’t get the WorkPuzzle email?  Subscribe below.  We promise not to share your email with others or use it for any other purpose but delivering WorkPuzzle notices.