RELATIONSHIPS

IN BUSINESS (I)
MENTOR
MATCHING
WHO WE ARE
NEW WAYS OF THINKING ABOUT PEOPLE





By Professor Steven Reiss, Ph.D

09/04/2013 Relationships in Business I. Mentor matching | Psychology Today
www.psychologytoday.com/blog/who-we-are/201010/relationships-in-business-i-mentor-matching 1/3
The success or failure of a marriage is largely determined the day two
people agree to tie the knot. f they have compatible personalities,
values, and goals, they likely will have a long and successful marriage. f
they don't, they will draw apart over time. n every relationship two people
have the same quarrels over and over again. These quarrels never
resolve because they are rooted in different values.
How should people be matched to give them the best chance of getting
along? n the 1970s and afterwards, social psychologists tested two
hypotheses concerning the formation of effective relationships.
Hypothesis was that similarities attract ("birds of a feather flock
together.") Hypothesis 2 was that opposites attract. They executed more
than a thousand studies, and the overwhelming majority showed that
similarity is the basis for matching people in every kind of relationship
studied. One of the strongest and most consistently validated principles
of social science is that birds of a feather in fact flock together and that
opposites don't bond.
When forming a work group, or even a marriage, complementary skill
sets are helpful. One marriage partner is an expert at finance, the other
at fixing things up. The principle that "similarities attract" is about
personalities, not skills. Two people with complementary skills have the
potential to work effectively, but only if their personalities are compatible.
Precisely because businesses put people together with complementary
skills, they may not pay enough attention to personalities.
Some matching strategies are better than others. believe that value-
based matching is best because it is hard even to imagine how people
with opposite values could appreciate one another. Gregarious people
and loners have opposite values that lead to misunderstandings,
repeated quarrels, and different lifestyles. f they must work or live
together for a long period of time, they might come to disrespect each
other. The gregarious person will think the loner is unfriendly, and the
loner might think the gregarious person is superficial. Competitive people
and conflict avoidant people have opposite values. f they must work or

New ways of thinking about people
by Steven Reiss, Ph.D.
Relationships in Business . Mentor matching
What does employee infighting cost your business?
Published on October 14, 2010 by Steven Reiss, Ph.D. in Who We Are

At work people spend quite a bit of energy opposing each other. Some people just don't like each.
Businesses take their employees on retreats to get them in a relaxed atmosphere where it is more
likely they will bond. They hire outside professionals to build teams by teaching mutual respect and
tolerance. They hire coaches to keep troubled employees whom they need on board. Still,
employees not getting along on the job is a huge cost factor for many organizations.
When it comes to relationships, have a simple idea. Better to marry the right person than to need
counselors to help you get along with somebody else. Applied to business, this means it is better to
form teams with compatible personalities and values than to create work groups based primarily on
complementary skill sets. Businesses should form work groups of people who naturally appreciate
and understand each other.
think change has been oversold. People don't change to anywhere near the degree some
psychologists say. Change is hard work. t's much better for a business to match people than to just
throw them together and then hire life coaches or psychologists to fix the problem.
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Steven Reiss is Emeritus Professor
of Psychology and Psychiatry at The
Ohio State University.
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09/04/2013 Relationships in Business I. Mentor matching | Psychology Today
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live together for a long period of time, they might come to disrespect
each other. The competitive person might think the conflict avoidant
person is a coward, and the conflict avoidant person might think the
competitive person is angry.
At the second annual meeting of the World Society of Motivation
Scientists and Professionals held on the campus of Franklin College
September 15-16, Daniele Gianella and Brunello Gianella, two business
consultants from Switzerland, presented a paper on "Value-Based
Matching in Human Relationships. " They suggested that businesses
should assign people to teams or small groups based on compatibility of
values.
To take just one example, businesses often assign mentors to new
recruits based on first available. The two may or may not like each other.
f they hit it off, the new recruit is likely to learn quickly and form an initial
favorable attitude toward the job and company. f they don't like each
other, the new recruit may learn the job much more slowly and form an
initial unfavorable attitude toward the job or company.
The Gianella's believe that matching mentors to new recruits is a cost-
effective, easy, and quick way to improve mentoring outcomes. They
have created simple technologies that assess the core values of each
mentor at a company. When a new recruit comes along, they assess the
individual's core values and then supply the company's Human Resource
or mentoring program manager with a list of compatible possible mentors
working at the company whose core values match those of the new
recruit. Since the mentor and new recruit have similar values, they are
likely to bond and form an effective relationship for learning.
This is the second of a 14-part series on translational models of human
needs theory. These blogs will comment on innovative methods for
applying human needs theory to business, education, wellness, world-
class athletics, media psychology, and spirituality, everything from high
school guidance programs that assess the needs of all incoming
students, to Olympic Gold medalists who use motivation science to train
for competitions, to multinational companies that have innovated
leadership training, to parents and professionals who use motivation
science to plan the futures of people with autism and intellectual
disabilities, to military armies that evaluate risk of PTSD in new recruits,
and to new efforts to strengthen faith-based counseling. Next up is how
motivational science is being applied to promote understanding and
reduce tensions among business executives. The third annual meeting of
the World Society (www.motivationscience.org) will be held in Vienna in
Fall, 2011 (exact date not yet announced.)
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