Summary:

Oksana Lukash, VP of People at Avid Bioservices, shares insights on building and maintaining elite teams in a human-centric organization. She emphasizes the importance of not being the smartest person in the room and highlights the need for a solid team of experts with complementary strengths. Oksana discusses her approach to assessing strengths and weaknesses, finding culture fits in the interview process, and the importance of being transparent with candidates. She also emphasizes the need for speed and quality in the hiring process and the importance of aligning talent with the future direction of the business.

Key Takeaways:

Building elite teams requires a solid team of experts with complementary strengths.

Assessing strengths and weaknesses is crucial for effective team building.

Finding culture fits in the interview process involves being transparent and honest with candidates.

Speed and quality are both important in the hiring process to attract and retain top talent.

Aligning talent with the future direction of the business is essential for long-term success.

Chapters:

00:02:00 Building elite teams and the importance of culture fit

00:05:00 Focus on results and actions instead of politics

00:08:00 Assessing fit through team interactions and candidate experience

00:15:00 Balancing speed and quality in the hiring process

00:16:00 Assessing skill gaps and future needs for the business

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Thanks for joining us.

Oksana Lukash: Of course. Thank you so much for having me.

CheeTung Leong: So tell us a little bit more about what Avid does and what a VP of people at Avid would have to do on a day to day basis.

Oksana Lukash: Avid is a pharmaceutical manufacturer in the liquid pharma space. We're located in Tustin, California.

So definitely have been working very diligently on that ever since.

CheeTung Leong: I love that big enough to matter and small enough to care. And I imagine that as the VP of people, that's got to be a big part of your job like that second half of the model how, does care look like.

CheeTung Leong: It sounds very much like having that human centric approach to building the organization is a big part of what Avid does.

And a big part of what we do on the HR Impact Podcast is to ask about how building elite teams function in different organizations. And in one like Avid, where you have that focus on the human element, how do you go about building and maintaining those elite teams in such an environment? And why is it important to not be the smartest person in the room?

Oksana Lukash: First of all, I think it's impossible being the smartest person in the room. We live in a world where everything is changing.

I wouldn't even say fit. It's more culture ad because each one of us can bring something unique and different. And that to me has [00:04:00] really made a huge difference on my own team. I feel that we all are actually friends. That was not by design it just happened. But we all care about one another.

We're not going to go home and leave somebody else behind to work extra hours where we can stay potentially an extra 30 minutes. And then that way all of us can accomplish something that much quicker together . We have fantastic communication, which allows for us to have very honest conversations, which also selfishly, I would say for me, allows my team to bring anything and everything to me.

CheeTung Leong: You spoke a bit about strengths and weaknesses. So being very cognizant of your own strengths, how do you go about doing that?

And then moving on to looking out for these in potential teammates in interviews, it's not on a job description. How do you go about finding assessing that people are indeed at culture ad and they're just not presenting a front in the interview process?

Oksana Lukash: I think it's takes a very good approach of knowing what you're trying to bet for in the interview. But I would say even before that, if I can take a step back, there's definitely lots of different assessments that are available. For example, I've used DISC and StrengthsFinder for quite a few years.

And then taking all of that information collectively and going back, for example, to the DISC assessment, it does give you the ability to run a disc wheel on your entire team to see where everyone's communication style where their drivers fall and to see where some of those empty gaps on the wheel are to where you can [00:07:00] focus in those respective areas.

For example, depending on the role of the individual that I'm adding to my team, that can help me assess what are the important features and strengths. That would make somebody successful within that role and then be able to really be very thoughtful and intentional about the questions that I will ask in the interview process to really drill down and be able to assess those areas.

But then also what has been successful for me is being honest and transparent in an interview of helping the candidate understand what it is that he or she that possibly walking into. So that way I relate interviewing and that whole entire process a little bit to dating where the success of the interview all comes out to of how well do you know yourself and how honest and transparent are you going to be on that journey.

I think you're increasing your chances for success because they're not going to feel like they've been blinded.

Especially being in the people function, .

CheeTung Leong: I love that. It's a really rigorous assessment and interviewing process.

Given that you, spoke about building that team of experts, so they're coming to the table with strong domain expertise with deep knowledge in particular areas and there are a culture ad and they have to fit. So does it take a long time to find someone?

Because bad hires are very expensive. It could be like cancer to the team, especially if you're really trying to work and nurture a certain culture and a certain dynamic within the team. It's very difficult to build it, but it's very easy to be able to upset it and break it. So that is one thing that I don't want to do.

CheeTung Leong: Has there ever been a case in which you've gone through this process, two and a half, three months, you brought someone in and within the first couple of weeks, you realize, oh, no, I think we made a mistake.

Oksana Lukash: Definitely, it's not perfect and we're all human, we're all make mistakes. I think the important part is then to identify it fairly quickly, be able to see where is the disconnect?

Is it possibly that the individual might just be overwhelmed and is having just a hard time being able to come up to speed. And it's something where the team and myself can rally around the person and be able to help him or her out to be able to be the best version of themselves.

If it is a situation where it's maybe more, the individual has fantastic skills, but the role just was not, is not the best fit for them. Those skills can be utilized somewhere else within the organization. But I think if you just realize it's not a fit for both sides, it's best to be able to be very honest, to be transparent. And you're doing a service for that individual as well, because they're probably feeling it too.

But most of us are usually not. comfortable and usually scared of admitting, but maybe I did not do my best due diligence as a candidate and made the wrong decision by joining this organization that might not as accurately aligned with what I was looking for in my values.

I really like you guys, but... Is there a way we can expedite that process? How do you deal with those?

Oksana Lukash: If you can be. speedy, that's great. So overall, the process can be lengthy just for the fact that you're not finding those right candidates.

But when you do find somebody that needs a lot of the criteria that you have and what you're looking for. Speed is of the essence because to your point, the talented individuals that have those special skills that also tend to have strong focus on culture, strong focus on teamwork, leadership.

At the beginning, I think it's very important to assess and just let the candidate know that your intention and your goal is to have the best outcome for all the parties involved and really understand what are those non negotiables for the candidate and what are they looking for. And if they're looking for that home, if they're looking for an organization that they want to join and grow with them and stay with them for a period of time, then you can go back and focus on, describe your interview process, describe how many steps it's going to be, definitely ensure you're not an organization that has 8, 10, 12 or more interviews. Be intentional on every step, but also don't sacrifice that [00:15:00] quality.

CheeTung Leong: If, I can summarize everything that you've talked about in terms of how do you go about building a solid team of experts around yourself making sure that there are culture at and then balancing that speed and quality through that whole process. How would you summarize these into actionable steps for the listeners?

Oksana Lukash: I would say first as a leader, know your strengths and weaknesses. I would say more importantly, your weaknesses in areas where you're not the best expert, where you need help, be able to assess the skill gaps on your current team. And where you have areas of opportunity focus on where is the business going?

CheeTung Leong: So being very aware of your strengths and weaknesses, understanding where the business is going, and being thoughtful and intentional with speed. So thanks so much for breaking all of that down for us, Oksana, and for hanging out with us today. If the listeners wanted to get in touch with you to dive into any of these in a bit more detail, what's the best way for them to find you?

Oksana Lukash: They're definitely very welcome to reach out to me on LinkedIn. I'm an avid LinkedIn networker, so I would love to connect with anybody and continue the discussion.

Make sure you leave us a review and tune in next time on the HR Impact Show for more incredible insights like what Oksana has shared with us today.