When I founded Atikus, I wanted the company to stand out in terms of its offering on the market, but I also wanted it to adhere to a certain set of values. Our Targeted Search solution establishes a strong match between the candidate and the client, which creates a win-win solution for both parties. This custom approach has helped to build a company with a strong emphasis on professionalism, high levels of trust, and unprecedented quality of service.

At Atikus, we give people a lot of ownership when it comes to management of their assignments. We also encourage them to take responsibility early and make their own decisions. This is another part of Atikus culture that stands out because it can be found not only internally, i.e. inside the company, but it is also reflected in our relationships with clients and candidates. We always respect the decisions our clients and candidates make, even when those decisions are not necessarily in our favor. This may seem counterintuitive, however it helps us to build lasting relationships and ensure that every party in the process is completely satisfied with the outcome. We flesh out the roles we work on to the minute details. We get the DNA of the candidate dead right. This allows us to keep the closure rates extremely high, while maintaining a people-oriented approach.

Quantifying the Business Culture

I’ve been doing recruitment and executive search since 2006, and I know how challenging it can be. Even before we started to use Attuned, I was always looking for a specific type of person to hire in order to deliver the best to our clients. Once we exhausted our networks for hiring and started to hire people that we didn’t know very well on a personal level, it became more difficult. Some people wouldn’t fit the culture, while others couldn’t deliver the results we hoped for because they were not very motivated. That’s when I became an early user of Attuned because it was able to give me more data points on a prospective candidate. Of course, nothing can completely eliminate mis-hires but you can dramatically reduce them by looking at the person’s values and motivation. I like that the Attuned survey is hard to manipulate; it has no right or wrong answer to each question and is able to show a realistic overview of someone’s motivation. Around the same time, I was looking for ways to quantify our corporate culture in order to have a better understanding of how to motivate employees and be completely transparent with potential new hires about the environment Atikus can offer them. Attuned came in handy for that task and we’ve been using it ever since.

Managing with Insight

The top motivators for Atikus are Financial Needs, Status and Competition. In general, we look to hire people who are motivated by something similar. It doesn’t have to be an exact match but there should be enough overlap to be able to relate to our culture as a whole. In certain cases, if the gap between the individual and the company is too wide, we stop the interview right there because we see clearly that the necessary connection between the individual and the company cannot be established. In other instances, I see how some motivators would be a lot harder to fulfil due to the nature of our business. For example, no matter how innovative we are as a company, the groundwork will always come down to dealing with people on an individual level. This can be somewhat frustrating for someone who is very strongly driven by Innovation and doesn’t enjoy working with people as much. We take factors like these into account when hiring.

Somewhat accidentally, we have also used Attuned for conflict resolution purposes. We had two members on a team with gaps in motivation, which made it harder for them to work together. When the conflict erupted, we looked at their motivators and it was fairly obvious who was staying true to themselves and who was adding unnecessary drama to the situation. Also, by being aware of each person’s motivators, it helped us to find the resolution quickly and efficiently.

Overall, I’d recommend Attuned to anyone who is looking to quantify the company culture and be a better leader. It’s amazing how minor adjustments in the management style can have a profound effect on the rest of the company.