Textio: Is being friendly becoming more important than skills when hiring new talent?
Hiring managers are more likely to offer roles to candidates they like, according to new research from Textio. Company Co-Founder and Chief Scientist Emeritus, Kieran Snyder, tells UNLEASH exclusively what HR leaders need to know.
News in Brief
How much does likability impact your decision-making process when hiring new employees?
Textio, which generated $7.6 million in revenue in 2024, has shared new research stating that candidate likability may be becoming more important than skills.
Textio Co-Founder and Chief Scientist Emeritus, Kieran Snyder, speaks exclusively to UNLEASH to explain the findings in great depth.
Is likability becoming more important than skills?
New research from software company Textio found that hiring managers are more influenced by candidate likability rather than by whether they have the relevant skills to fulfil the role.
The study, which interviewed more than 10,000 participants through written interview assessments and candidate experience, found that candidates who receive job offers are 12x more likely to be described as having a “great personality” than those who don’t.
Additionally, successful candidates are 5x more likely to be described as friendly and 4x more likely to be described as having great energy than unsuccessful applicants.
In an exclusive conversation with UNLEASH, Textio’s Co-Founder and Chief Scientist Emeritus Kieran Snyder, shares the inside track.
Skills-based hiring versus likability
After interviewing, women and men were found to be described very differently by hiring managers.
Men were 7.5x more likely to be described as level-headed and 7x more likely to be confident compared to women.
On the other hand, women were described as bubbly 25x more and pleasant 11x more than men in interviews.
Hiring managers are also 39% more likely to write feedback for unsuccessful candidates, with women 17% more likely to receive feedback than men.
This being said, 84% of unsuccessful candidates aren’t given any feedback on their interview performance, with successful candidates receiving the most amount of feedback.
At Textio, we’ve researched performance feedback for years. Time and again, we’ve found that vague, personality-based feedback doesn’t help people grow and limits an organization’s overall growth as a result.
“Our latest research shows that this kind of problematic feedback begins even before someone is hired.”
Candidates are also likely to be able to predict for themselves as to whether they’ve been successful or not, with or without feedback (81%).
Specifically, men and candidates over 40 were found to be the most confident at predicting their success.
However, assessments based on skills and performance evaluation were found to be stronger predictors of hiring success, with better-documented assessments leading to stronger candidates being hired.
Supporting this, candidates hired based on skills-based interview assessments were more likely to remain in the organization for three years or more.
“Too often, hiring teams rely on their memory of an interview, which is not reliable, or the ‘vibe’ they got from a candidate, which doesn’t tell them much about how well that person will perform.
“When feedback about job candidates focuses on their personality rather than their skills, the eventual hires perform worse on the job and leave their organizations more quickly.”
So, considering this research, are you more likely to offer candidates better feedback while being more conscious of likability bias?
