5.4 Person-Organization Fit and Person-Job Fit

The first step in recruiting is to find qualified candidates. Companies must assess a candidate’s ability to perform the job duties and whether he or she is a good “fit” for the company– i.e., how well the candidate’s values and interpersonal style align with the company’s values and culture.

Person-Organization Fit

Person-organization fit refers to the degree to which a person’s personality, values, goals, and other characteristics match those of the organization.

Person-job fit is the degree to which a person’s knowledge, skills, abilities, and other characteristics match the job demands.

When people fit into their organization, they tend to be more satisfied with their jobs, more committed to their companies, more influential in their companies, and remain longer in their companies (Anderson et al., 2008; Cable & DeRue, 2002; Kristof-Brown et al., 2005; O’Reilly et al., 1991; Saks & Ashforth, 2002). One area of controversy is whether these people perform better. Some studies found a positive relationship between person-organization fit and job performance. Still, this finding was not present in all studies, so it appears that fitting with a company’s culture is not necessarily a strong predictor of job performance (Arthur et al., 2006). In today’s organizations, most people are required to work within teams. As a result, fit within a team is as vital as company culture fit.

Arc’teryx

78% of employees say Arc’teryx is a great place to work. Arc’teryx is a high-performance apparel company in North Vancouver with a ‘ Live it” company culture. ‘Live it” is a shared understanding amongst employees (teammates) that time spent outside doing sports is crucial. A staple program is gathering to share their ‘Live it’ experiences! (Great Place to Work, n.d.)

“Managing Human Resources” from Fundamentals of Business: Canadian Edition by Pamplin College of Business and Virginia Tech Libraries is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.—Modifications: Used section Where to find candidates.

“2.5 The Interactionist Perspective: The Role of Fit” from Principles of Management from Saylor Academy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.—Modifications: Used paragraphs three and four, edited.