![Executive Chairman of the Walt Disney Company, Bob Iger arrives at the world premiere for the film ‘The King’s Man’ at Leicester Square in London, Britain December 6, 2021.](https://media.nbcconnecticut.com/2025/01/107396784-17122380032021-12-06t173552z_1844814604_rc259r95mzlt_rtrmadp_0_film-the-kings-man-premier.jpeg?quality=85&strip=all&resize=320%2C180)
Executive Chairman of the Walt Disney Company, Bob Iger arrives at the world premiere for the film ‘The King’s Man’ at Leicester Square in London, Britain December 6, 2021.
If you hire someone based solely on their ability to get the job done, you could be missing out.
The best employees share a key personality trait that hiring managers don't prioritize enough, according to Disney CEO Bob Iger: "Genuine decency."
"When hiring, try to surround yourself with people who are good in addition to being good at what they do," Iger wrote in his 2019 book, "The Ride of A Lifetime: Lessons Learned from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company."
"Genuine decency — an instinct for fairness and openness and mutual respect — is a rarer commodity in business than it should be, and you should look for it in the people you hire and nurture it in the people who work for you," Iger continued.
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Skills and experience matter, of course. But so does character, which can help workers gel with their colleagues, making everyone feel more satisfied with their jobs and workplace environments.
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Louie Bernstein, a longtime CEO of an IT training company in Atlanta, told LinkedIn's "Catalyst" video series last year about the time he fired his top-performing salesperson — and the company's teamwide sales quickly perked up.
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The salesperson was stellar at closing deals, but she lacked coachability, wasn't a team player and made the office a hostile environment for the rest of his employees, he said.
"In the end, I felt like we had cancer and I was the surgeon that needed to cut it out to save the company," Bernstein wrote in a 2022 LinkedIn post. "Shortly after her departure, sales picked up along with the attitude and harmony of the office."
Bosses need to be genuinely decent people too, Iger wrote: "As a leader, you are the embodiment of that company. What that means is this: Your values — your sense of integrity and decency and honesty, the way you comport yourself in the world — are a stand-in for the values of the company."
Forty percent of U.S. workers say they'd likely quit their job if their employer took a political stance they disagreed with, according to a 2022 survey from CNBC and Momentive. And most U.S. workers — 56% — won't even consider working for a boss or company that doesn't share their values, a 2022 Qualtrics survey found.
"You can be the head of a seven-person organization or a quarter-million person organization, the same truth holds," wrote Iger. "What people think of you is what they'll think of your company."
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