Hobby Analysis

The serious information conveyed by what applicants do for fun

“Hobbies of any kind are boring except to people who have the same hobby. This is also true of religion, although you will not find me saying so in print.”—Dave Barry, syndicated columnist, author and humorist

TRANSITIONAL OBJECTIVE/Image: Michael Moffa

It’s speculation, but it stands to reason that a hobby is always more than just that—especially in the United States, where hobbies tend to be far more revealing of individual character and personality than they are in cultures such as those of China and Japan. In those cultures, having simple, pedestrian hobbies that are indistinguishable from the next person’s is the norm,

Not Many, Not Special

There, people tend to have only one hobby—the result of the severe twin constraints of time and space, unlike the many among us who have multiple recreational passions and relaxations. It’s not only because of bad grammar that the Japanese always ask, “What is your hobby?” (—although many young, leisured Japanese in recent years have embraced multiple and Western hobbies such as wind-surfing and snow-boarding.)

In China, among the most visible hobbies is what I call “parking-lot badminton”, the tame pastime of batting a shuttlecock back and forth over a small stretch of, yes, a parking lot or any other available urban space, almost always without a net or rules. It seems to be even more commonly cited as a hobby than ping-pong is and far more conveniently indulged, since no hard-to-find table is required.

The other most easily observed hobby is the foot shuttlecock that Chinese of all ages kick around in pairs of players or in large circles on street corners, in parks or, again, in parking lots—often with incredible skill, as the Chinese domestic counterpart to the hacky sacks they export to us.

A second reason that a Chinese or Japanese job applicant’s hobby is very likely to be the same as another’s is that any Western-style pressure or encouragement to stand out like the proverbial “squeaky wheel” or a “show-and-tell” star is more than offset by comparable incentives to not be “the nail that gets hammered down” in virtue of sticking out.

Note: This is something to take into account when interviewing an Asian candidate who, through culturally-sanctioned self-effacement, modesty or understatement, may seem less impressive than he or she really is.

Many and Special

Here, at home, if a candidate casually or in print mentions that his main and special hobby is “kick boxing”, not only will your mind instantly crank out inferences about him from that, but also he probably will want you to make as many of these inferences as he wants you to avoid making.

The inferences, some rather obvious, that he probably wants you to make include that he is

• Healthy
• Fit
• Strong
• Powerful
• Energetic
• Disciplined
• Young
• Unafraid of competition
• Win-oriented
• Stoical
• Confident
• Masculine
• Not easily intimidated or daunted
• Willing to learn and be trained
• Focused
• Dedicated
• Determined
• Not a quitter
• Goal-oriented

That’s quite a lot packed into two simple words—“kick boxing” (let alone one, if you prefer “kickboxing”). And that much is all good—very, very good. Such inferred and advertised traits are excellent qualifications for most jobs, including the job of recruiter.

But then there’s the downside and the risk that you may infer negative traits as well—or worse, instead. These can include his possibly being

• Belligerent
• Excessively competitive
• Over-compensating for something (having been bullied as a kid)
• Predisposed to violence
• Paranoid (about needing to be able to defend himself)
• Obsessive (about training and probably about other things)
• Too hard on himself and others (“men-don’t cry” tough love and tenacity)
• Inflexible (about when to shift gears and maybe “give up” on an idea or a goal)
• “Testosteronly” (hormonally-challenged and perhaps lacking tact, diplomacy, self-control or a useful soft side).

Therefore, the question that begs to be asked is why the candidate would run the risk of eliciting such negative inferences about his character or personality by mentioning this hobby.

The simplest and likeliest explanation is that he mistakenly assumes that because “it’s all good” from his perspective, his hobby and, therefore, he will be viewed that way from yours. If the good pluses didn’t vastly outweigh any possible minuses, if the benefits didn’t eclipse the costs and if the respect he gets, hopes for or expects didn’t dwarf any suspicions of others or his own, why would he, or anyone else, have such a “hobby”?

Unpacking a Recruit’s Hobby

This kick-boxing example of “hobby analysis”, although largely a “no-brainer” in being so easy to grasp is instructive for precisely that reason: It makes it obvious that a hobby is a package that can be unpacked by an observant and astute recruiter to make shrewd guesses and predictions about a candidate.

True, it takes some effort to do the unpacking. However, the positive and negative inferences deserve attention—equal attention—from you, to ensure that the overall impressions and inferences are not lopsided.  Merely grasping this concept of “balanced inferences” makes it far more likely that it will be understood that the reflective task should be undertaken and that it will be accomplished.

Done correctly, this balancing of inferences about character and personality will protect you from the extremes of being snow-blinded by the implied positives of a hobby, while avoiding the opposite extreme of being negatively weirded-out, as the mentioning of the hobby registers with you.

Hobby as Teddy Bear “Transitional Object”

In the United States, Canada and probably most Western cultures, any hobby that is distinctive—unlike, for example, “watching TV”, “listening to music”, and other all-too passive, all-too commonplace pastimes, tends to be very much like what the noted British psychologist Donald Winnicott (1896-1971) called a “transitional object”, a term he coined and used, primarily in connection with his research into child development and “object relations theory”, as a rough analogue of “security blanket”.

The familiar Teddy Bear (named after Teddy Roosevelt) or Winnie-the-Pooh (named after the Canadian city Winnipeg) is such a transitional object—“T.O.”, a kind of chldren’s crutch and bridge in the transition and on the journey to developing their sense of safety, belonging, self-esteem, identity and eventual “self-actualization”.

A brief review of a child’s T.O.’s primary functions will reveal considerable overlap with adult hobbies.

Among the functions of the original British stuffed bear and the modern Teddy Bear/Winnie-the-Pooh, these can be mentioned:

1. To provide comfort and faux companionship during the absence of parents yanked from the home to work in the factories of the Industrial Revolution or in the daily absence from the homes of our modern double-income families or working single parents
2. To distract and occupy children after weary working parents return from work, too tired to pay endless attention to their young children
3. To provide an emotional and behavioral buffer or barrier between the child and the world, including adults, siblings, closet monsters and other kids as the child makes the “transition” to a later developmental stage and greater sense of safety and confidence
4. To allow a child to shape, present and test itself through the T.O. on a kind of trial, experimental basis—as a form of self- and reality-testing, by making the T.O. its proxy, surrogate or “point-man” in various interactions
5. To allow the child to project its desires, traits, fears and states onto and through the T.O., in order to gauge the response it is likely to get when it interacts without the T.O
6. To permit experimentation in bonding, responsible proto-adult care-giving by a child, e.g., playing with an infant doll, or other adult role modeling, e.g., through a Barbie Doll.

Your immediate reaction is very likely to be, “How on Earth could a child’s Teddy Bear teach us anything about a job applicant’s hobbies and the motives or traits underlying them?” Here’s how: Imagine an applicant who says his hobby is building muscle cars or another who says she does yoga. In key respects, both of these are almost certain to function—unconsciously, at least—like Teddy Bears.

The Teddy Bear, the DIY TransAm clone and the yoga—and most hobbies mentioned in a resume or job interview

• Are actively mentioned or presented (not only) in order to motivate a favorable response or prevent an unfavorable one.
• Are core elements of personal identity, however nascent or well-developed, to the extent that they at least partially define, develop, disclose, challenge and test the self, e.g., “Mommy, Teddy is not afraid of the dark anymore!”; “This baby’s transmission is as smooth as butter now!” (“…Thanks to my skill as a mechanic.”)
• Stand as surrogates and badges of the self, e.g., “Love me, love my car”, “Teddy likes you!”, “Yoga is so dynamic in a quiet way!” (…“Just like me!”)
• Help make being alone a non-issue.
• Permit escape from and evasion of others, e.g., “Daddy is busy working on this engine, Sweetie.”: “Play with Teddy, Dear.”; “Barbie doesn’t want to go to the movies, Mommy.”; “Sorry, I’ve got yoga tonight.”

These T.O. functions are just as common among the toys and dolls of Asian kids as they are here or anywhere else, for that matter. However, what is less common is the Chinese adult hobby’s functioning as a T.O.

Show’n Share vs. Share’n Show

Instead of being a badge, a surrogate, a pillar of personal identity or a show-and-tell marker for being “special”, the  one hobby or few hobbies a Chinese job applicant—in China—is likely to have function primarily as collectively, virtually universally recognized forms of relaxation, fun and solidarity with others. For them, there is a much greater emphasis on “share” than on “show”, although, of course, with some of the latter, just as we are motivated to share as well as to show (with the Chinese share-show emphasis reversed on our resumes and in our interviews as show-share).

If, in your recruiting, you can spot the transitional object, T.O. roles being played by applicants’ hobbies, you may not only enhance your understanding of them, but also shape your responses to and predictions from them. You may also come to better understand why a lack of enthusiasm for someone’s hobby—and as Dave Barry’s quote above suggests, his religion (and, by further implication, its T.O. “security-blanket” icons)—is often taken so personally and seriously by him or her.

Finally, equipped with the concept of a transitional object, you can now appreciate the delightfully ironic possibility that Winnicott’s concept of the T.O. itself may have served as his own T.O. or “show-and-tell” prop in whatever job interviews he may have had and as the mature expression of a childhood identity or companion he perhaps cherished.

…Winnicott-the-Pooh.