Talent Journey

One of my favorite leadership lessons from John Maxwell, guru in leadership development, is that we all have blind spots. According to Maxwell, a blind spot is “an area in the lives of people in which they continually do not see themselves or their situation realistically.” Blind spots usually refer to areas where we misinterpret our ability and are “blind” to the negative implications that has on others. All of us have blind spots…thinking that we don’t is a blind spot!

This reminds me of driving a car. You become keenly aware of blind spots when a vehicle ahead of you starts veering into your lane, unaware that your car is within inches of his back tire. On the road, we can alert a driver who is caught by a blind spot by tapping (or pressing compulsively) on the horn. Too often, though, in our careers, we do not receive this kind of immediate and auditory feedback.

One effective way to identify our leadership blind spots is to conduct a 360 Leadership Survey. This is a powerful professional development tool, designed to positively impact a leader’s growth and the organization’s overall performance. The most effective 360 degree surveys are customized to measure the leadership competencies most important to achieving your unique strategy. The best ones also allow you to choose/edit survey questions to reflect your organization’s values and priorities. A customized 360 degree survey tool is one of the most impactful and beneficial developmental gifts you can provide to your leadership team. Recipients gain insight about how others view both their strengths and their leadership gaps.

We want to share some of the benefits of conducting a 360 degree survey:

1. Identify strengths leadership effectiveness. The multi-rater report provides 360-degree feedback regarding the capability and strengths of those assessed. Participants learn what they do well and should continue doing within the organization to achieve success.

2. Identify development need. Anonymous and confidential 360 feedback provides a safe haven for management, colleagues, direct reports, and customers to provide developmental feedback. Positioned within a safe environment, feedback helps grow awareness and performance.

3. Provide anonymous and confidential feedback from those above, below and peers/customers of the leader. Often leaders are perceived well at one level of the organization, but less favorably at another. For example, the boss may evaluate a participant very well, but direct reports or customers may have a less favorable impression of the participant’s leadership ability. 360-degree information grows and develops balanced and well-rounded leadership capacity.

4. Align corporate goals and individual capacity. Individual performance drives organizational success. A well designed 360-degree survey defines the key attributes required for leadership success in your organization. When participants get accurate and honest feedback about their leadership effectiveness, they are better equipped to leverage their strengths and develop any performance gaps. A 360-degree survey alleviates blind spots and gives every team member a fair chance to thrive as a leader.

To get off to a great start in 2011, we recommend that you conduct a 360-survey with the leaders in your organization. This process is not complex or costly, but it results in a much more effective leadership team and organization.

Copywrite protected January 2011, Diane Brown, TJ Associates llc.com

There is nothing that inspires like a good classic proverb. A favorite of mine is the one that says, “Today is the first day of the rest of your life.” The substance of that proverb holds true for years as well. As we quickly approach the end of this year, we all get a guaranteed fresh start. Each new year is an opportunity to wipe the slate clean, re-evaluate our direction and set new goals. In this article, Talent Journey wants to share 7 important steps that will guide you toward intentionally navigating your upcoming year and all the potential that lies within you. We strongly recommend that you set aside some focused time to walk yourself through this year-end exercise.

Step 1: Reflect back on 2010. Acknowledge and honor both the good and the bad of the past year. Take a realistic assessment of your accomplishments/joys and disappointments/sorrows. What strengths emerged in your life? What mattered most to you? What were the top 2 -3 inhibitors or hurdles that limited you?

Step 2: Create an attitude of gratitude. Spend at least 15 minutes brainstorming all of the things you are grateful for in your life. Start with the obvious and once you get going the list quickly grows. Your list may include family, health, home, a favorite spot, freedom, etc.

Step 3: Identify your top values. Values are the rudder of life. Our life finds greatest fulfillment when it reflects the core internal values we hold important. For a comprehensive list of common values, go to http://www.thetalentjourney.com/FocusOnValues.html. What are your top 3 – 5 values in priority order?

Step 4: Evaluate your balance. See the Life Balance Wheel below. You can modify as you see fit. Evaluate your level of satisfaction in the areas of life that matter most to you. The scale is 1-7 with “1” indicating very low satisfaction and “7” indicating very high satisfaction. How consistent are the ratings across areas; that is, how well balanced is your wheel? If you experience lower satisfaction ratings in some areas, do you want to do anything about them in 2011?

Step 5: Write your mission statement. Your mission statement should include about 5 – 7 sentences that describe your purpose in life. It defines what you devote your life to and find worthwhile. Your mission statement will include your top values, strengths and long-term goals. A good way to begin thinking about your mission statement is to envision your 80th birthday party. What do you want people to say about you and your life?

Step 6: Choose Goals that matter. In the context of your overall mission statement, strengths, values and life balance wheel, what goals do you want to establish for yourself in 2011? A goal is specific, measurable and time bound. It is important that your goals truly matter and are compelling to you. Brainstorm all of the things you want in 2011. Avoid editing your list at this point. Write down everything that comes to mind.

• Go over your list and ask yourself, “Is this something that I really want, or is it something that I think I should want?” Take the “should’s” off your list.
• Review your list again and ask yourself, “Is this something that I can realistically accomplish in 2011.” Cross off or modify anything that is not realistically achievable in 2011.
• Prioritize your top 3 – 5 goals. Force yourself to prioritize the goals that will have the biggest impact in the coming year. Many of us live diluted lives because we try to do too many things at once.
• Review your top 3 – 5 goals to ensure they are specific and measurable. For example, “I will spend at least 2 hours of 1:1 time per week with each child and my spouse” is a better goal than “I will spend more time with the family.”
• Record and post your top 3 -5 goals in a location where you will see them frequently.
Don’t worry about getting your goals perfectly articulated. You will have all year to revise, update and clarify the goals. Start with your best understanding at this point. Be flexible to amend the goals as life changes and new opportunities arise. The goals are just a tool. Bettering your life is the end goal.

Step 7: Make it Happen. Establish accountability and track your progress. Accomplishing goals in life is like losing weight. Most often we know what we need to do (eat right and exercise), but we don’t always do what we know we should (oops, french fries and milk shake weren’t on the goal list). One of the best ways to accomplish goals is to find an accountability partner who will keep you on track. This helps direct your efforts more effectively. None of us is perfect. Please, give yourself grace along the journey.

We at Talent Journey value you as an individual and professional. We hope this 7 Step process helps you become more purposeful about what you want to be, do and become in 2011. We’re looking forward to another great year with you! May you find deep satisfaction and fulfillment as you make this… your best year ever!

Worldwide Copyright TJ Associates, LLC Diane Brown

Feedback is usually met with less enthusiasm than a bad cold. It isn’t difficult to figure out why that word gets such a bad rap on the job. I clearly remember a time early in my career when I received some unpleasant feedback, publicly. My supervisor painstakingly informed me – and all my peers – that I had sent an incorrect response to a customer. In the middle of the team’s cubicles, my supervisor held up my letter and told us that she “never wanted to see this again.” This experience, like many of yours, taught me that feedback can be spelled F-E-A-R!

Although feedback can conjure up scary memories for many of us, it can also be a gift when shared in appropriate ways and with the right intentions. Over the years, I have learned that growing and developing new skills based on feedback can be a satisfying experience. So how do we go about helping people grow without offending their spirit? Let’s review a few basic tips to making feedback helpful and positive!

First, always give constructive performance information in a private setting. That seems obvious, but many clients tell us about experiences where they felt humiliated in a public setting. Following is an example that demonstrates additional tips for giving effective feedback:

Which of these statements would be easier for you to accept?

1) When you approached Mary, you started sharing your ideas without asking her if it was a good time to talk; that was presumptuous and caused Mary to tune you out.

2) When you want to share an idea with a colleague next time, first ask if they have time to talk. This increases the chance that you will have their full attention in the discussion.

People almost universally find the second statement easier to accept and embrace. Let’s look at the positive attributes of feedback that make that the case.

Future-Oriented. It is easier to work toward a future goal than it is to be evaluated on a past unchangeable behavior. When the improvement suggestion is grounded in future opportunity, the person looks toward the next encounter. This generates optimism. On the other hand, when our feedback is centered on a past event, there is no opportunity to modify or improve performance. The person can only admit, defend, or deny the past. The emotion attached to a past ineffective behavior is typically unpleasant. We all prefer to operate from a more optimistic future orientation where we have a chance to perform better the next time.

Offer Suggestion(s). It is easier for people to change behavior when provided with viable alternatives to the current behavior. The suggestion in the 2nd statement, “first ask,” provides a specific example of what the person can do differently to get a better result. The less effective statement labels their motivation negatively (as presumptuous) which will likely precipitate a defensive reaction. Offering a positive suggestion for improvement demonstrates that you have that person’s best interest in mind and want them to be more successful going forward.

Point to a Reward. People will generally exchange old behaviors for new ones when they see personal reward or benefit for making the change. In our example, the receiver increases the opportunity to influence by implementing the new behavior. In the less effective statement, the person is stuck with the negative and unchangeable consequences of their past actions. Effective feedback uplifts and supports while pointing to a reward. Ineffective feedback leaves the person feeling sour about their past mistake.

In order to position the person you’re helping to both receive performance improvement information and to motivate optimism, be sure to share in a private setting and use statements that are future-oriented, provide suggestions for improvement and point to a reward. These simple tips can turn potentially difficult conversations into positive ones.

All organizations have an evaluation process that includes feedback. Challenge yourself to implement the tips described and set new standards and experiences of feedback in your organization. Feedback is a truly valuable tool for empowering employees, as well as a gift to employees in personal and professional development. Done well, it will grow you, your direct reports, and your team leading to higher levels of overall organizational effectiveness and everyone will be MUCH happier along the journey.

Copyright protected 2010, Diane Brown at TJ Associates LLC (www.thetalentjourney.com).

Over the last year Talent Journey has provided you with cutting-edge leadership tips geared toward “navigating the potential of your people” to deliver outstanding business results. When all is said and done, the people in your organization determine the success of your strategy and mission. People make the difference!

The most important decisions leaders make are people decisions. Inviting the right people to join the team may not be as simple as it sounds. In the 21st century, finding people with competence and expertise in a particular function is critically important, but it is NOT ENOUGH. 21st century organizations also need people with the ability to influence, innovate, cooperate, meet customer needs and get results (see our February 2010 article: Talent is not enough). For this reason, now more than ever, top organizations are committed to doing whatever it takes to make the BEST HIRING DECISIONS. Obviously, when you make the right hiring decisions, all the other elements of managing becomes easier.

In this article, we will discuss Structured Interviewing – an interviewing tool that has proven to improve the probability of hiring superior people. Structured Interviews help make job interviews more systematic, objective, and reliable – taking the guesswork out of hiring. The elements of a structured interview include:

1. Determine and Focus on Job Competency: Interview guides are composed on a job-by-job basis. The guides are designed to focus on the core competencies (i.e., knowledge, skill and ability) required for the job. Technical competencies include the specific technical elements required in the job, such as software, product, industry or functional expertise. Soft skill competencies include attributes such as accountability, customer-orientation, courage, decision-making, and interpersonal skills. Each interviewer is responsible for evaluating candidate’s proficiency in several of the core competency areas.

2. Behavior Based: Behavioral based questions ask candidates to describe a specific situation related to the competency being evaluated for the job. The premise is that past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior. Let’s look at an example using the core competency of accountability. The interview guide prompts the interviewer with a few questions that illustrate that competency. In this example, the question might read, “Tell me about a project you were working on that had an unreasonable deadline? Another possible question is, “Sometimes we are asked to do something that we don’t think is right, tell me about a time this happened to you.” Candidates answer questions by describing a situation/task, what action they took, and what happened as a result. Interviewers rate each response as being excellent/proficient, meets requirement, or less than acceptable/unacceptable. Behavior based interviewing enables the interviewer to “view” actual scenarios of past performance, thus predicting future proficiency.

3. Debrief: The process is not complete until a multi-rater debrief meeting takes place. Once all the interviews have concluded, the interview team (usually 3-7 people) gathers to compare ratings. The core competencies and each rater’s scores are summarized in a matrix. The team looks for trends in ratings. When all raters evaluated a candidate similarly within a competency, the team can be confident that rating is an accurate reflection of the candidate’s proficiency. Where significant rater differences exist, the team engages in healthy discussion until they arrive at a consensus rating for that competency. As a final step, the interview team gives the candidate an overall rating.
Structured Interviews that incorporate behavioral based questions linked to the most important job competencies and evaluated by several raters are more than ten times as effective as interviews that do not incorporate all of these elements. The structured interview builds impartiality, objectivity, accountability and verification within the hiring system. Most organizations would not purchase a $100,000 piece of equipment without doing due diligence to ensure that it meets company requirements, does what it claims to do, and has the endorsement of those that will interact with it. Structured interviews build that same diligence into your hiring process!

Talent Journey helps companies with any of these implementation steps:
1. Competency Model—We help you identify and choose the job competencies most relevant for your organization.
2. Focused Interview Questions—We help you construct interviewer guides and identify the specific questions to be asked, customized for your organization.
3. Rating Forms—Using Talent Journey’s rating format, we help design a custom rating form for your needs.
4. Manager’s Guidebook—We provide a comprehensive hiring guidebook which walks the hiring manager through the structured interview process.
5. Interview Training—We offer On-site half-day or full-day Structured Interview workshops.

Author: Diane Brown at TJ Associates LLC (Talent Journey). Copyright protected, all rights reserved worldwide.

Over the past several years, Talent Journey’s goal has been to provide insightful leadership articles pertaining to strategic and operational aspects of your business. We often focus on the management of human resources – including leaders, teams and the workforce. The broad process of managing human resources within an organization is called Talent Management. Just as your IT system organizes all the computer related technology within an organization, a comprehensive Talent Management System manages and integrates all of the human resource (talent) related components of your business. A well-designed Talent Management System provides the infrastructure used to optimize your investment in your people. It is a key component of any successful organization.

What is a Talent Management System?
A talent management system incorporates all the important aspects of building, managing and equipping your workforce to achieve your strategic mission. The important components of this talent management system include: selection, on-boarding, performance management, engaging and developing, career advancement and succession planning. In this article, we aim to demonstrate the power of an integrated talent management system to support your strategic initiatives, align your talent management initiatives and foster your employee/customer satisfaction.

First Step
The first step in creating an integrated talent management system, as highlighted in last month’s Talent Journey newsletter, is understanding and identifying core competencies that are required for each unique job. Core competencies are the skills and behaviors required to be effective in the context of that specific job and your organizational culture. They also reflect the needs driven from your business strategy. The exercise in determining core competencies is fundamental to the success of your talent management system from the point of hire through succession planning.

Once you’ve identified the core competencies required for success, the talent management system’s objective is to align, engage and develop those core competencies in your job candidates and internal team members. In this article, we will define the role of the leader in each phase of the Talent Management System.

Selection
In the stage of selecting and hiring, your role as a leader is to ensure that you have thoroughly vetted your candidates against the technical and soft skill requirements required for the role. In addition to fulfilling the requirements of the job, smart leaders analyze their team’s strengths and may choose a new hire partially based upon team gaps/composition in meeting strategic goals. Finally, it is important to incorporate the “fit” candidates have with the values and expectations of your organizational culture. Tools to guide the interviewing process and assessment instruments help identify and vet candidates.

On-Boarding
The role of a leader at this stage is to acclimate the new employee as quickly as possible into the organization or department. We cannot underestimate the importance of clearly depicting the vision, mission and culture of your organization with new employees. Each organization operates, like a family, in its own unique way. Additionally, each new employee brings a unique set of strengths and abilities, knowledge, values and experience that the organization will want to incorporate as quickly as possible in order to leverage those attributes and increase the productivity of the organization. It is critical to invest the time upfront with new employees, ensuring a successful on boarding experience for both the employee and the organization. A thorough and effective new employee orientation and using assessments to facilitate communication of the strengths and abilities of new employees are helpful tools in this stage.

Performance Management, Engaging and Developing
The role of a leader at these stages is to ensure that the natural strengths and abilities of each person are leveraged to the highest potential. A leader’s skill in maximizing talent, both individually and within the team, predicts success in retention, performance, and organizational momentum. The leader must have the tools and wisdom to actively identify, utilize and develop the talents of their people. The core competencies identified in the first step of an integrated talent management system are used in these later phases to evaluate (performance management) and develop (skills and career) employees on the team. Properly designed performance management evaluations, 360° feedback instruments, and an organizational training program rooted in the pre-determined core competencies are helpful tools at this stage.

Career Advancement and Succession Planning
Finally, the role of a leader in career advancement and succession planning is to align the potential of individuals with future opportunities that exist within the organization. Most organizations today are concerned about their leadership bench. The economic downfall, reduction of the workforce and other high-priority initiatives have stifled leadership development over the last few years. Organizations are feeling the squeeze in this area and know they need to bridge the gap. A first step is to assess the leadership competencies necessary for future strategic success against the existing talent potential within the organization. Organizations now need to allocate resources to develop high potential internal candidates or put aside dollars to recruit outside the organization where internal gaps exist. Workforce planning tools, assessment tools and high potential programs will be helpful at this stage.

In summary, high performance organizations are founded upon an integrated and well-managed talent management system. This system is powered by the core competencies that will fuel achievement of the strategic mission. Like a thread through fine fabric, a talent management system weaves crucial core competencies through your selection, on-boarding, performance management, engagement and development, career advancement and succession planning processes. Invested in appropriately and used consistently, this integrated system clothes your organization with human resource efficiencies, effectiveness and productivity. The successful implementation of strategy depends upon an organization’s ability to deploy their Talent Management System effectively. It is the people that bring strategy to life!

Worldwide Copyright TJ Associates, LLC Diane Brown

Over the years, we have included articles specific to each one of these components – we invite you to visit our website at www.thetalentjourney.com/newsletter to view any of these in full:
Selection: April 2010; August 2010
On boarding: November 2009
Performance management: October 2009; February 2010
Engage and Develop: January 2010; July 2010
Career advancement and succession planning: March 2010

It is no secret that organizations today are looking for ways to make better decisions about the people they hire and promote. Most leaders understand that soft skills are just as important as technical skills in determining who will be their strongest contributors. In fact, according to the Center for Creative Learning, soft-skill deficiencies account for seventy-five percent (75%) of career “derailers.” Some example career limiters include conflict resolution, interpersonal and influencing skills. The ability to successfully determine and evaluate your candidates’ skill proficiencies against the critical skill requirements of your jobs is key to good hiring and promotional decision-making. In this article, we bullet-point four simple strategies that enhance success in selection of talent.

1. Identify the Job Skill profile: Not all jobs in your organization require the same set of skills to be successful. A sales job requires a much different set of skills than a quality assurance engineer. Before you begin the hiring process, you want to identify the key skills most important for success in your unique job. We call this the JOB PROFILE. Creation of the job profile should also include consideration of technical and soft skills important to your team and organization’s overall success. Keep in mind that not all organizations function in the same way and with the same set of values. A candidate that has been successful in another organization does not guarantee success within yours. Success is determined when there is a match between your unique job profile and the skill proficiency of a candidate.

2. Create Behavioral Questions for the Candidate: After you have identified the job profile, you create a set of behavioral based questions that will measure your candidate’s proficiency against those key skills. The best interview questions ask candidates to describe a situation where they actually used the skills in your job profile. For example, if you identify “influence” as a critical skill, you might formulate your questions like this: “Tell me about a time that you had an idea that you wanted to implement. How did you go about influencing your decision-makers and what happened as a result?” Creating strong technical and soft skill behavioral questions lays a strong foundation for success in the hiring process.

3. Rank the Candidate Responses and Get Consensus: During the interview process, interviewers rank the candidate responses (using a rating scale such as ineffective, effective or superior) against the requirements identified in the job profile. Next, the team gathers together to share those ratings. Candidates that gave answers demonstrating the highest level of proficiency across the skill set outlined in the job profile become the final candidates for the job. Regardless of whether or not the interview team is able to reach consensus on the top few candidates quickly or after some significant discussion, the time invested is well worth the reward. The leader is responsible for keeping the consensus meetings focused on how well the candidate demonstrated proficiency in the key skills areas.

4. Finalists Participate in an objective Assessment tool: Before making a final selection decision, ask your top candidates to take an objective assessment. (Please read this month’s article on “Assessment & Evaluation” for documented evidence of assessment value in the hiring process.) Remember, an assessment should measure your candidate’s skill against the job profile. When that happens, the tool greatly improves hiring and promotional success rates. According to an Aberdeen Group study (Talent Assessment Strategies: A Decision Guide for Organizational Performance: March 2010), organizations using assessments achieved the following results:

• 75% greater year over year improvement in hiring satisfaction
• 75% year over year decrease in hiring costs
• 2.5 times greater year-over year increase in profit per full time equivalent

Obviously, these types of results magnify the importance of imbedding assessments within your hiring process. The assessment can also be used throughout the career of the hired employee. It should be incorporated into all stages of the integrated talent process — including on-boarding, performance management, career development, and succession planning.

Creating a rigorous hiring process following this 4 step process guarantees better quality hiring decisions. We utilize this approach in our own organization and help our clients implement it as well. As the research indicates, the investment pays for itself. When you get the right talent and put them in the right job, the rest of leadership becomes much easier. Star performers thrive when they can use their best skills to get results.

Author: Diane Brown at TJ Associates LLC (Talent Journey). Copyright protected, all rights reserved worldwide.

In August 2005, Business week printed an article that called out an important 21st century paradigm shift occurring in business today. They labeled it the “Creativity economy.” They asserted that just as Frederick Taylor’s scientific management concept revolutionized the 20th century, creativity and innovation will be the impetus to success in the 21st century! A 2010 survey conducted by the Bloomberg/Business Week/Boston Consulting Group (BCG) confirmed Business Week’s contention. They found that 72% of today’s corporate leaders place innovation as a “top three” strategic priority.

So, what is creativity and how is it different from innovation? Creativity is simply the ability to generate something new. Innovation, on the other hand, is the ability to create something new that fits the strategic initiative of an organization. Innovation applies creativity to a real business/customer desire and produces positive ROI.

We believe there are two core types of innovation. The first type is evolutionary. Many of the leaders in Jim Collins’ book “Good to Great” described innovation in this way. As organizations incrementally leverage one small idea upon another, breakthrough mushrooms forth. Evolutionary innovation is often nearly transparent to the internal company; ideas are consistently implemented until a tipping point occurs which sparks recognition of the breakthrough. The second type of innovation is revolutionary. It is best described by Frans Johansson in the “Medici Effect: Breakthrough Insights at the Intersection of Ideas, Concepts, and Cultures.” Medici is the last name of the family largely responsible for birthing the Renaissance in fifteenth century Italy by assembled talented people across many disciples and cultures together in one location. This cross-pollination unearthed novel and unique breakthrough concepts. Johansson argues that work environments that provoke collaboration across career vocations, departmental functions and diverse cultures are poised to unleash similar breakthrough innovation. While the second type of innovation can be more dramatic than the first, both are necessary and lead to successful and important innovative outcomes.

In order to compete in the 21st century, we believe leaders must encourage, inspire, and champion both types of innovation. This will be a challenge as many organizations are still immersed in cost cutting efforts, which produce lean staffs with too much to do. Nonetheless, resourceful and creative organizations will overcome these limitations. 21st century organization MUST cultivate and inspire new ideas, processes and products/services in order to survive and thrive. Those that fail to do so will end up smothered and choked out by those that do. Too much is happening too quickly to allow your organization to stagnate in the ruins of economic constriction. As is true in all victories, winners find ways to step up and break-through in the midst of challenge. We want to encourage, inspire and provoke you to that end!

Author: Diane Brown at TJ Associates LLC (Talent Journey). Copyright protected, all rights reserved worldwide.

Many of us feel pressure in our workplace roles because of the downsizing of resources and upsizing of expectations in today’s marketplace. Resourceful and effective leaders strive to utilize all available assets, especially the most cost-effective ones. A very accessible, yet often overlooked asset is untapped talent among the staff within organizations!
Most of us have experienced a season in our career when our best talents were not utilized. We felt the disappointment, disillusionment, and apathy that surfaces when we are stuck punching a time clock rather than contributing in meaningful and fulfilling ways. Obviously, most leaders try to bring out the best in each team member. However, people are multi-faceted and complex. Understanding what makes people tick can be difficult to discern without tools and it takes some additional effort and time.

The secret to engaging people is finding that perfect fit between what attributes a job requires and a person’s natural strengths. To help with this, many organizations are now turning to objective and validated assessment tools to help ascertain people’s strengths. The tool provides additional insight about candidates BEFORE a job offer, project assignment, or promotion is extended. Not only do assessments provide rich and often concealed information about candidates, they also unveil information that allows you to quickly know and understand the person you are assimilating into the team.

Well designed assessments predict performance success by evaluating three important attributes:
1. Personality style: “HOW” employees will operate within your organization.
2. Motivational drivers: “WHY” employees engage and contribute.
3. Skills/Talents: “WHAT” natural soft skills and talents employees possess

Simply understanding the unique “how”, “why”, and “what” of each employee helps leaders to leverage existing and future assets. It also enables leaders to optimize the whole team’s talents.

Utilization of structured interviews, along with personality and cognitive assessments increased performance predictability by 35 times.
- Industrial and Organizational Psychology (2008)

Try a Complimentary Assessment. If you are not utilizing an assessment tool, we invite you to try Talent Journey’s complimentary assessment. We use the most validated assessments in the world, and are a global leader in assessment-based solutions for selection, on-boarding, retention, team building, leadership, sales, customer service and more. Try it without obligation or risk and experience the rich benefits. Please contact our office, (760) 471-2703.

In today’s economy, we’d all agree that identifying ways to save billions of dollars might be worth a “listen”. According to Dr. Lyman Steil, every American worker commits at least one $10 listening mistake a year, collectively costing our nation more than one billion dollars a year!

What is a listening mistake? It is when active and accurate listening are not practiced and communication breaks down. The good news is that with a little practice and desire, everyone reading this article can become a more excellent listener.

Think about a time you were having a conversation with someone and they seemed disinterested, uncaring or simply incompetent. Did you walk away feeling you had wasted your time and would probably have to repeat yourself again? This happens to me too often when calling my utility companies, credit card organization, and more recently my mortgage lender. After repeating my request several times (to several people), the heat begins to rise and I find myself frustrated with someone who may be hearing my request for the first time.

Effective leaders and service-oriented employees strive to minimize these feeling when working with customer, internal or external. It is critical to hear and translate what someone is saying in to meaning resolution. Some easy ways to practice your active listening skills are:

• Ask questions
• Listen wholly and then respond –Check your emotions – control them
• Stay open (not defensive) See from their perspective, not your own
• Stay engaged with a mindset to resolve the issue
• Identify their desired outcome (what do they want?)
• What is their hurt? Identify their pain or hurt
• Figure out how you can help?

In the absence of active and accurate listening, we often times find ourselves attempting to resolve issues or problems that are not really what the other person cares about. When we listen well, the resolution to a problem is often times much simpler than we anticipated. When we diffuse emotion and ask the right questions, the other person can often times help us find an acceptable positive outcome. Without effective listening, we’re often left feeling confused about issues, concerns, and needs. Organizations lose a lot of emotional energy and operational productivity simply because of poor listening skills.

I recall an example of when I was a liaison for staff at a university and we decided to have a suggestion box put in the break room. We got some wild requests but we addressed every item mentioned. Although we were not able to implement all the requests, we were able to help staff feel they had a voice. Our workroom and break room were a large room with no way to designate one from the other. One of the requests was to put up a room divider so that those braking or having lunch were not disturbed. It was amazing how many more people used the break room and were grateful for the privacy this simple solution provided.

We want to challenge all of our leaders to practice active and accurate listening this week. Where can you help diffuse an emotional situation by listening for the underlying needs and desires of another person? Where can you engage another person in resolving their concern by asking the right question (s)? How can you set aside your own perspective and see life completely through the eyes of another person? Listening with this type of purpose and generosity is a precious gift to give someone else. Try it and see what happens as a result!

Author: Alane Taylor at The Talent Journey. Copyright protected, all rights reserved worldwide.

Most companies follow a common hiring process when soliciting candidates for an open position. That process probably includes creating a job advertisement, posting the position in the newspaper or a job board, sifting through resumes, and identifying the candidates to interview.

Although accepted as common practice we have found that many gaps exist in hiring that can be bridged with some minimal additional efforts at the front-end. By identifying core job success attributes, also know as the “job benchmark”, the entire hiring process flows more smoothly and has greater success.

Here a just a couple of our job benchmarking successes:
* Success Story – 50% of a company’s new hires were lost during the training program. After benchmarking the job, they were able to hire the right people and increase retention to
80%.

* Success Story – An organization had a 74% turnover in their sales force. After benchmarking and debriefing, they retained 100% of the sales force for the last 18 months.

The job benchmarking process is successful because it helps avoid some of the more common hiring pitfalls many organizations face. A few good examples of this include:

• The risk that the person screening the interviews may not be familiar enough with the job requirements to differentiate great from good or poor resumes.
• Leaders may not ask the right questions to determine whether or not the candidate possesses all the right attributes to be successful in a job. (In fact, most interviewers focus on the technical requirements of jobs. However, research indicates that 3/4 of hiring failures are actually due to soft skill deficiencies — such as poor interpersonal, influence, and conflict resolution skills.)
• Leaders may rely strongly on testimonies of prior colleagues or trusted friends of a candidate in making hiring decisions. Although it can be great to have that type of insight, other aspects of the organization including size, leadership style, and organizational culture may influence the potential success of that candidate. Not all candidates perform equally well in all environments.

How do you avoid these hiring pitfalls?

We recommend first analyzing the job to determine which attributes are most critical for success. Job benchmarking is simply analyzing the success factors for a job BEFORE taking any other hiring steps. This analysis includes determining which competencies (technical and soft skills), behaviors, and motivators will most effectively deliver the key accountabilities for this position. Once you’ve “let the job talk” by clearly articulating the technical and soft skill requirements of the job, the rest of the hiring process flows more effectively. Obviously, the best candidates will possess the attributes that fit the specific requirements of your unique job, team and organizational culture. Our performance fit model provides a pictorial of this concept:

The next step is to measure the candidates against that job benchmark. This approach minimizes the gaps mentioned in the common hiring process. None-the-less, interviewers must be well trained in structuring and objectively assessing candidates against the job benchmark within the interview process. We recommend composing some targeted and objective interview questions that ask candidates to provide specific examples of those job success attributes. For example, if conflict management is a key success factor, you might ask the candidates to share an example of a recent tough conflict that they encountered at work and describe how they handled it and what happened as a result.

As a final check, we recommend inserting a validated assessment tool at the end of the hiring process. Before extending a final offer, an assessment provides an objective measure of your candidate’s FIT with the benchmarked job attributes. Here is how that works:

Once you’ve narrowed your field of potential job candidates to the top 3-5, candidates are asked to take a three part assessment. A good assessment measures three things: the behaviors, motivations and competencies (soft skills) of the candidate compared to the job benchmark profile. The objective assessment provides a check on the interview process and can effectively raise red flags about the candidate that may not have been revealed during the interview process. In the end, investing a little extra effort in the objective assessment provides peace of mind, reduced hiring errors, and significant improvement in choosing star performers.

~ © Copyright protected, all rights reserved worldwide. Co-authored by Diane Brown and Gary Sorrell.