Aspiring business leaders must adapt to differences between school and work

A solid education is an important aspect of any executive’s background. It forms a key part of the foundation that a successful career is built on. However, there are some aspects of the school experience that can, unfortunately, cause certain bad habits to become entrenched in graduates’ minds.

One of the most readily apparent differences between the school and work worlds is that school is an environment where you expect to be micromanaged and the path to success lies in doing exactly what you are told, when and how you are told to do it. When you’re working at a private business, achieving success requires creativity. As was recently discussed on this blog, hiring game-changing innovators should be a major goal for all forward-thinking organizations.

Attaining success in business also requires collaboration. It may be difficult for some to shake the lingering feeling that it is somehow “cheating” to take outside help, but this is actually often a critical part of doing business.

For instance, a company may be actively recruiting accountants, but find itself temporarily short-handed at a critical moment. Rather than hiring the first applicant who stumbles in for an interview or re-assigning janitors to jobs in finance, the best option for a business may be to rely on an outside service that offers financial project consulting. This allows the company to maintain uninterrupted operations while it looks for high-caliber individuals to join its financial team on a permanent basis.

In the same vein, a business may find that it is in its best interest to allow an outside firm of professional recruiters to conduct an important executive or financial professional search. In school, you learned to make friends and get along with those around you. But, in business, you have to learn how to hire well-rounded workers and command the respect of your colleagues.

The staff at recruitment firms have sufficient experience to see past a candidate’s resume and read between the lines to see how they would fit in a particular position at a specific organization. Professional recruiters work full-time, focused solely on finding the right person for the open job at your company.