Job Search Questions/Great Answers (Part 8)

Would you rather work for a big company or a small one?

• Hint: The appropriate answer is not a “yes” or “no”.

Your answer should be modified by one of several scenarios, depending on whether the employer is big or small. Of course you might not know since the recruiter may have openings with different-sized employers. Therein lies a resolvable quandary. Read on.

Dilemma

If you say you prefer a big company you may preclude a job with the recruiter’s small company job-openings. If you choose small company, same risk - you might be out.

Not all recruiters are sophisticated students of organizational dynamics. They may not grasp that people successfully switch to different industries, different-sized companies, different everything. Job success, if the person has a realistically-acceptable technical grasp, is determined mostly by personal traits, talents, drive, personality, intelligence, and all the other stuff not displayed on resumes.

Your goal

The recruiter might have preconceived theories of acceptability. So it is prudent to rehearse the answer that will further your goal.

What is that goal? To get the job offer.

Do you understand why the question?

The recruiter is asking to see if you understand the organizational impact of different environments. Size affects job interaction, influence, and possibilities of changing things that need changing.

Prejudices must be accommodated

The interviewer may feel those who have worked for a large entity are more comfortable working in a compartmentalized environment, one circumscribed by manuals, narrow jobs, approval forms, need for corporate OK, a place with lots of resources, and a place of comfortable structure.

This, despite the universal fact that people adapt rather readily to all sorts of working environments. If you doubt people are that flexible, look at almost anyone’s resume who has some ‘seasoning’, AKA older like me. Observe that they have operated successfully in many organizational structures and industries.

The recruiter has power

Right or wrong, it is the recruiter’s call and biases that are important at this juncture in your quest for a job offer. It is your task to get beyond the recruiter to someone who recognizes your brilliance - without offending, too much, the recruiter. I am not suggesting circumventing the recruiter - you need advocates. Demeaning the recruiter is, at best , risky behavior (more about that in later hubs).

Organizational dynamics - big/small

In essence, the recruiter wonders if you can handle the informal nature and sometimes chaos of a small company. On the other hand, if you had worked only for small employers, or no employer for that matter, can you deal with large employer interdepartmental pettiness, layers of management approvals, and fragmented functions where many people do pieces of what you did by yourself in a company with 7 people.

The question

The recruiter is exploring whether you can function in a situation organizationally vastly different from your apparent comfort zone?

And that is a noble goal.

SO?

How to answer in your normal sophisticated, urbane, and persuasive manner?

Consider the following scenarios

Recruiter:

• “This is not a big company. According to your resume, your whole career has been ‘big company’. I am frankly a little uncomfortable. Do you feel you can operate within the limitations inherent in a small company environment?”

• “We do not have all the corporate and staff-help, not to mention financing that is available to a division of a major employer. We are a startup without hard and fast job descriptions. Crises are frequent, individual personality quirks are more important since there are fewer people around. You cannot get lost in a crowd as you might if there are dozens or hundreds of people. In addition, each person must do lots of things not easily anticipated.

• So disabuse me of my misgivings.”

You:

• “It is true I have worked for some very large companies. But those employers were not one big monolith. The work-environment was more characterized as a bunch of smaller and entrepreneurial entities that happened to be owned by a big company.”

  “Certainly we had corporate procedures. But small companies, especially start-ups, could use some procedures such as accounting and cash flow controls, expense account rules, etc. Or they might not get to be a medium-sized company. I think it is valuable to have someone used to working in an organized way to keep focused and control scarce resources.”

• “The division in which I worked acted more like a smaller company owned by a big company. It is true that we had access to corporate lawyers and financing. A small company also has to deal with lawyers and banks, the major difference being they don’t belong to the same company. But those people may be heavy investors. They probably expect more since they have their personal money at risk. So I am not sure there is a large difference. We still had to meet plans, and perform.”

  Our markets and products were different than the other divisions. We hired people without corporate approval, except for the top jobs. My guess is that you can’t hire senior-level jobs without the OK of the Board of Directors who are probably investors.”

• “It was true we had plans that had to be approved but I look at that as a valuable discipline, quite transferable to a small company. My jobs and influence level were not compartmentalized. I was able to expand and modify what I did as the markets changed. In every company I worked in changes were constant. We had to deal with new products, aggressive competitors, cost control, legacy products, and all the things startups, if successful, will need to understand.”
• "I have worked for many types of managers and in markets that grew fast and at times declined just as fast. Far from a negative, my experience with the need for internal controls, drive, and abilities to cope with changes, would be a great addition to your team.”

Enough for this Hub

Next hub - other scenarios - Moving from

1. small to big company
2. growing company to one declining and vice versa
3. one marketplace to another
4. one work background to another
5. government job to private industry
6. armed-services career to civilian marketplace
7. and on and on.

We have some good answers to counter the misgivings of recruiters, i.e. can you make the transition to my employer's work environment?

Hope to see you next Hub in a couple of days. Lots more to come.

You can ignore the answers I am suggesting you consider. But at least you should consider them and prepare your answer - before you go into the interview.