Getting a Worker: Recruiters, Culture, and On‐the‐Job Skilling1

Abstract

This article explores the relationship between employer hiring for skill and cultural matching. Using 68 semi‐structured interviews with recruiters and human resources professionals, I argue that costly on‐the‐job skilling can push employers to try to stabilize their workforce by, among other things, hiring socially similar applicants. Recruiters for high turnover cost roles considered cultural matching essential to their work, while in other cases it played little to no role. I conclude by discussing the implications of hiring‐for‐fit and on‐the‐job skilling for scholarship on labor markets and social inequality.