What types of people are most successful in BizOps?
As I described in my Keys to Success post, the most important ingredient for success in BizOps is a talented and highly engaged team. So how do you go about hiring this great team?
There are two types of skillsets to consider for your BizOps hires: technical skills and “soft” skills.
In a BizOps role, the soft skills are far more critical to success.
But first, technical skills: valuable skills include process design, strategy, root cause analysis, and data synthesis. Many BizOps teams hire people with Big 4 consulting backgrounds as a “shortcut” because consulting firms give formal training in industry standard techniques for breaking down problems and designing solutions. (Full disclosure: my current team members are all former consultants.)
However, MBA programs and other strategic roles also provide great training grounds. Anyone with strong problem solving and critical thinking skills can generally be taught BizOps techniques.
Which is why I believe the soft skills are actually more important — they are harder to teach, and they are much more central to handling day-to-day interpersonal challenges on a project.
There are 3 main soft skills to look for when hiring for BizOps:
Customer mindset
BizOps is a customer service function, and all candidates should understand the importance of relationships, establishing trust and credibility, and collaboration and partnership as core values. Flexibility, a willingness to work with a variety of stakeholders on different types of projects, and the ability to influence are also useful.
Desire to be challenged and grow
A great BizOps team is continuously raising the bar for themselves, the team, and their business partners. Team members are challenged to constantly learn by working with new business functions, innovating approaches, adapting to different working styles, and diving in to unfamiliar content areas. They need to be able to make decisions without all of the information, and bring clarity and structure to ambiguous situations.
Knows when to lead and when to be a team player
Collaboration is the name of the game in this role, and understanding the balance of when to step up and drive, versus when to support, build consensus, and enable others — both with our customers and internally within our team — is a key to success. Teamwork, a willingness to partner, and checking your ego at the door are highly valued. We’re not looking for solo artists; we’re a band.
In the BizOps interview process at Zendesk, we evaluate candidates for both types of skills. We have two interview rounds — a round-robin behavioral interview that explores their soft skills, and a case study presentation to a panel where the candidate can demonstrate their technical skills. In the next two posts, I’ll explore each of these rounds in more detail.
