Hope should not be a basis for hiring decisions

Hope should not be a basis for hiring decisions

I don’t think of myself as a pessimist, but perhaps I am if pessimism is the opposite of the optimism shown by some managers when hiring. They have inadequate information about the candidates’ past performance and therefore must base their hiring decisions merely on the hope that everything will turn out right. Too often, it doesn’t.

Hope is the word that came to mind as I reviewed a list of questions that were asked when interviewing to fill a vacant support staff position. What did I think of them? 

I thought they covered the right topics and I liked that they had identified criteria by which to assess the candidates’ responses. What I didn’t like was how the questions were asked—a typical office scenario was followed by,  “How would you respond?” or “How do you proceed?”

 The only questions that alluded to the candidates’ past performance were the first ones, which asked candidates to reflect on how their training and experience had prepared them for the job for which they were applying and about their familiarity with a software program used in the office.

Most of the interview script consisted of “what if?” questions which invite candidates to answer with how they hope they would respond if dropped into the scenario. If their response fits the criteria, the interviewer may hire them and hope that the new employee will behave as described during the interview.

Asked what they would do if approached by an angry customer, candidates could potentially respond with how they hope they would deal with the situation, how they hope they would be consistent with how they were trained to deal angry customers, or how they hope the interviewer would want them to respond.

But without evidence about how they have dealt with an angry customer in the past, how can the interviewer know how they will deal with a similar situation? Have they ever responded in the way they would hope to respond in the future?

A far better inquiry would ask the candidates to describe a time when they dealt with an angry customer.

Leaders should not dwell in a world of hope when hiring. Candidates (and their references) should be required to provide evidence of how they have performed in the past. Have they done the right things in the right way? 

If they have, the interviewer will have reason to be hopeful that this is the right person to hire and to be optimistic about that decision.

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During Interview Right to Hire Right workshops, participants create questions to determine if candidates have done the right things in the right way, making them the right people to hire. Contact Nelson (email: nmscott@telus.net or phone/text: 780-232-3828) to schedule an  Interview Right to Hire Right workshop for your leadership team or to learn more.

Staff Recognition Mastermind: Great Ideas Exchanged

Well, they showed me! Or I could say, they confirmed the wisdom of practitioners.

I may know something about staff recognition—enough to write a couple of books—but it’s the leaders on the front line who are the experts. They are the staff recognition practitioners. We can learn from them. They can learn from each other.

That is the premise of staff recognition mastermind groups, which I included in Thanks, Again! as a way to gather staff recognition tips, tools and techniques to fill your staff recognition tool kit.

Establish a staff recognition mastermind group by bringing together other managers and supervisors who share your commitment to recognizing staff, so you can learn from each other.

Members could be people from within your organization or leaders from outside. Meet regularly to discuss staff recognition. What are they doing? Is it working? What didn’t work? What useful staff recognition resources have they discovered recently? Establish accountability by committing to what you will do to enhance staff recognition over the next few weeks. Report your progress the next time the group meets.

On June 11, I hosted the inaugural online GREAT Staff Recognition Mastermind with five participants who came from a variety of backgrounds.

The result was a lively exchange of staff recognition practices. Participants asked each other questions about staff recognition and described what they have done to recognize staff. And everyone took notes. Lots of notes!

Despite their different backgrounds (education, small business, large corporation), everyone shared a common commitment to creating workplaces where people feel they belong and where they are valued as individuals and appreciated for how they contribute.

After an hour, I asked if joining the mastermind discussion was worthwhile and the response was overwhelmingly positive. Participants expressed interest in attending a future mastermind session, which we agreed would occur early in the fall.

“Thank you so much for an excellent mastermind group yesterday! I’m inspired to start planning our monthly recognition events for next year!” an educator wrote. “Looking forward to connecting again in the fall!”

The small business owner wrote: “Thanks for the mastermind opportunity yesterday. I really enjoyed the group and all the ideas shared.”

Another participant said, “Thank you for hosting the session this afternoon. I got some great ideas that I am going to try in the fall with the teachers in my department and even some stuff for the staff room like the Oreo cookie challenge that I am going to try before the end of the year.”

Watch Briefly Noted for the date for the next GREAT Staff Recognition Mastermind meeting, tentatively scheduled for September. Join leaders who share your commitment to staff recognition to contribute what you are doing and learn how others express appreciation. You are guaranteed to leave with staff recognition tips, tools and techniques to add to your staff recognition tool kit.

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Can’t wait until September to add to your staff recognition tool kit? Maybe it’s time to buy a copy of Thanks, Again! More Simple, Inexpensive Ways for Busy Leaders to Recognize Staff. Both print and e-book versions are available. While most independent bookstores may not have the book in stock, they would be happy to order it for you. 

Hercule Poirot mystery offers insight into asking interview questions

I have something in common with one of the characters in The Fourth Man, a short story from The Witness for the Prosecution and Other Stories, by Agatha Christie.

“ ‘Very interesting,’ said Canon Parfitt. ‘Ah! Wonderful science—wonderful science.’

“And inwardly he thought to himself: ‘I can get a most interesting sermon out of that idea.’ ”

It’s been decades since I wrote a sermon and I don’t expect to deliver one any time soon, but often what I read or experience becomes the inspiration for a blog post, or even a book.

Frequently, this occurs when I read a mystery or watch a movie or TV show that portrays detectives as they solve crimes, usually beginning with the discovery of a body under suspicious circumstances. I see similarities between how fictional detectives solve murders and how managers and supervisors should conduct hiring interviews and reference checks.

You can identify the right people to hire the same way detectives decide which suspect to arrest.

Cat Among the Pigeons, the 32nd Hercule Poirot book by Agatha Christie, includes several passages that represent best practices, whether for hiring or solving a murder.

In this novel, the early investigation into the murder of a teacher at Meadowbank, a prestigious British girls boarding school, is conducted by police Inspector Kelsey, who later partners with Belgian sleuth Poirot to solve this and other murders. 

“Kelsey returned from the bypath he had been pursuing. ‘Now, Miss Johnson, let’s hear what happened.’”

This open-ended question allows the woman who discovered the body to tell the inspector what’s top of her mind before the inspector begins his usual investigative questions.

Like Miss Johnson, job candidates have thoughts they want to share right away. Opening interviews by asking the candidates to “take a couple of minutes to tell us what in your training and background has prepared you for this position,” provides an opportunity for them to deliver their essential message in response to the unasked question, “Why should we hire you?”

Both Inspector Kelsey’s and your question are short and don’t lead the witness or candidate in any direction. The responses to these questions may not produce a lot of useful information but they are a simple, stress-reducing way to get the witness or candidate talking.

Later, Agatha Christie describes a trait that makes the police officer an effective investigator.

“Inspector Kelsey was a perceptive man. He was always willing to deviate from the course of routine if a remark struck him as unusual or worth following up.”

It’s not unusual for a suspect, witness, candidate or reference to give incomplete answers. Detectives and interviewers should be prepared to probe to learn more.

When deciding what to ask candidates and references, interviewers should consider what they hope to learn about the candidate’s experience from each question. They should be prepared with followup questions if the initial responses from candidates or references is incomplete. Besides freeing interviewers from formulating followup questions on the spot, which can break your concentration on what is being said, having pre-scripted questions ensures fairness in the interview process. All candidates will be invited to describe their experiences in a similar fashion. 

It’s impossible to anticipate every circumstance that will occur during an interview and occasionally interviewers will find themselves without a prepared followup question. The interviewer may need to improvise, such as occurred when Hercule Poirot was questioning a potential witness.

“‘I see,” said Poirot. He went on, “Did you ever see at Meadowbank anyone that you’d seen out in Ramat?’

“‘In Ramat?’ Jennifer thought. ‘Oh no—at least—I don’t think so.’

“Poirot pounced on the slight expression of doubt. ‘But you are not sure, Mademoiselle Jennifer.”

Inspector Kelsey displays another technique that interviewers should add to their skill set.

“‘Anyway,’ said Kelsey, ‘you went to Miss Chadwick and woke her up. Is that right?’”

The standard advice is to avoid questions that can be answered with a single word like yes or no, because you will learn little from brief responses. But there are exceptions to this rule.

There may be points during an interview or investigation when it’s desirable to confirm your understanding of what was said. You want to be certain that your conclusions are based on the facts, just as the facts should lead to identifying the murderer. 

A variation of this technique can be used to rein in particularly verbose candidates. Interrupt a long-winded response to summarize what you hear and ask, “Is that right?” 

Then pray that the candidate’s answer is yes. 

In addition to confirming what you believe the candidate said, this is also a way to keep your interview on schedule.

The shared goal of interviewers and detectives is to get it right. The best tool you have at your disposal is the set of questions you ask. The better your interviewing skills, the better the quality of information that will be available to you when deciding the right person to hire (or arrest).

No detective wants an investigation to end with a courtroom acquittal. And you don’t want to fill a vacancy with the wrong person.

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Want to learn more about questions to ask during interviews? Schedule an Interview Right to Hire Right workshop for your leadership team. Contact Nelson (email nmscott@telus.net or text/phone 780-232-3828) to set a date for your workshop or to learn more.

Planning a conference or convention? Nelson’s How Would Sherlock Hire? program may be just the breakout session you are looking for.

Building a stronger message of gratitude

In a previous article, I used the concept of a simple jigsaw puzzle to illustrate how the ingredients of staff recognition fit together. In the centre of the puzzle is the essential component of meaningful staff recognition—Genuine appreciation for what the recipient did.

This uniquely shaped piece touches all the other pieces, all of which are identical in shape and size. None are as important as the Genuine piece or more significant than any of the other pieces.

As is true of all puzzles, the more pieces that are laid in place, the clearer the picture—in this case, it’s a picture of appreciation for how an individual or team contributed, or for what they achieved.

A message of appreciation becomes stronger with the addition of other ingredients that combine to make recognition GREAT (Genuine, Relevant, Explicit, Appropriate and Timely). But what does that mean? How does adding ingredients strengthen the message?

Let’s watch how it happens as I add ingredients to a simple message from a supervisor:

“I appreciated how you assisted your colleague just now.”

Whether delivered in person, written on a sticky note, or included in a text message, this recognition was Timely because it was delivered soon after the boss saw behaviour that they value.

The supervisor knows why the behaviour deserves recognition, but is the reason as evident to the individual being recognized?

To ensure it is, make the recognition Explicit:

“I appreciated how you assisted your colleague just now. You stepped in to offer to assist with the inventory when you saw that she was busy and trying to manage several tasks.”

The supervisor can add that the staff member’s actions were Relevant to what the organization believes is important:

“What you did is a great example of teamwork, which is one of our values as an organization. Working as a team is key to our success.”

Deciding how to deliver recognition requires that the supervisor knows staff members well enough as individuals to recognize them in Appropriate ways.

The right way may be with a thank-you note, recognition in front of the team, a gift card from their favourite coffee shop, or the opportunity to extend a break. 

Jigsaw devotees understand that not all pieces need to be in place before they begin to envision how the completed picture will look. The same is true when recognizing staff.

Not all the ingredients need to be part of the message for recipients to feel that their contributions are appreciated.

In our example, recipients will understand that what they did  was valued by the boss even if the message of appreciation ends with the first statement.

The supervisor could skip the Explicit description of what the recipient did because the reason for the recognition is as obvious to the recipient as it is to the person providing the recognition. It’s not always necessary to explain why the behaviour is Relevant to the organization’s values, goals or mission statement. 

While Appropriate is always preferred, any recognition is better than none. 

Even when not Timely, recognition is still worth doing. There is no statute of limitation on staff recognition. Even recognition delayed will be valued by recipients.

Nevertheless, recognition has its greatest impact on recipients when all five ingredients are part of the message—just as we would not abandon a puzzle with a few pieces still in the box.

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During Staff Recognition: One Piece at a Timeworkshops, participants focus on fitting all the ingredients together to deliver recognition that is GREAT—Genuine, Relevant, Explicit, Appropriate and Timely. Contact Nelson (nmscott@telus.net or phone/text 780-232-3828) to schedule a Staff Recognition: One Piece at a Time workshop for your team or to learn more about this or other staff recognition programs.