Interviewing Interviewing Skills -hiring Winners Part Two - Chandramowly

Looking beyond: How does one hire a winner? formance standards? What kind of previous experience expected? The other part is the Values template, which reflects core values of company with operative definitions for each value. Observable behaviours are stated for each value for assessment.

Values, characteristics and behaviours must be hired than merely focusing on skills, which can be taught by training. Yawar Baig’s, ‘Hiring Winners’ overtly brings out the techniques of effective interviewing says M R Chandramowly.

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t was late 60’s. Mr YB was getting ready for his first job interview with Kannan Devan Tea Company (now Tata Tea). He was called a day prior to the appointed date and as instructed, the 18 year old wore a tie, long suit and sat in the men’s bar at High Range Club where candidates were tested for social fitment. Candidates were asked what they would like to drink and when it was his turn, he said he would have a soft drink. People looked at him with different expression and smile and the barman with pity. There came a heard loud “Hello there”. YB looked up to see a florid red face in a body without neck and a large smile that said, “ So you don’t drink, eh?” YB smiled and nodded. “Tell me something young fellow,” he said, “ Do you play cricket?” YB said that he did but other people who played with him wished that he didn’t. Then he asked, “Are you a Mason?” At the time, not being aware of the Free Masons Society, YB thought it was about building walls and said “No. I’m not”. He looked at YB up and down with a funeral expression on his face and said, “You don’t drink, you don’t play cricket and you are not a Mason. Boy! You don’t have a chance” Did they select YB? Mirza Yawar Baig narrates such striking facts to bring out the qualities, characteristics, behaviours, values and beliefs that ensure to hire winners. Now we go on to our silent dialogue. Question: Yawarji, are there no links between personality factors and performance? To predict people’s behaviour, don’t we need to

Who are they?

know what motivates them and what they want out of life? Answer: Mowly, as you know, current or past behaviour is better predictor of future behaviour than any abstract trait or personality description. For example, what you want out of life does not typically relate to the competencies that are important for a particular job.

A winner is the one who measures up to both technical and values dimensions. My thanks to Mirza Yawar Baig for permitting me to reflect on this silent dialogue on “Hiring Winners”. The book also has an interview guide, which helps us to build a structured hiring process.

Key points

Asking 'Good' Questions Question: Yawar, in a hiring interview asking a ‘good’ question is important. Competency based interviews in fact requires one to prepare questions before hand. How should an interviewer learn to ask questions that will yield sufficient data for accurate assessment of a person? Answer: Interviewers must remember that they are interviewers and not investigating detectives to triple up candidates or catch them in a lie. They must first create an atmosphere of comfort and frankness where they can mutually assess for respective needs, the candidate’s as a prospective employee and interviewer’s own need as a prospective employer. Structured interviews probe in to people’s experience with right questions, which brings out what a candidate has done in the past and predict what he will do in the future. It is sufficient to understand the displayed behaviour than to understand the basic reasons for it. If one gets angry it is indicated by the tone and the body language. Interviewers need not go for a ‘psychoanalysis’ to understand what are the underlying

childhood experience for the anger. That’s true. Interviewers must be trained and made accountable for following a structured hiring process. They must be aware of the enormous cost impact of wrong hiring. Interestingly cost of wrong hiring is a hidden cost and is not calculated in most organisations. Wrong hires bleed reputation, profitability and the organisational culture. Another factor that is often ignored is that most people hire less competent people then themselves as exceptional competence of others create anxiety in many managers. Question: Sir, if managers hire people better than themselves, they would be under constant pressure and find it difficult to motivate high performers. Answer: True. But this pres-

sure is very good to have as it consistently enhances the capability of organisation. This is what I call ‘creating positive stress by building-in internal mechanisms of discontent.’ So hiring high performers is the most effective way. Question: But, how do we distinguish outstanding performers from those who are average? Answer: Hiring managers must look for the evidence where a candidate’s performance exceeds position requirements. Find out whether he or she takes initiative to transfer knowledge and trains others. Get to know if he or she takes initiative in identifying challenging goals. Discover if he or she thinks beyond immediate job and seek new business opportunities. Remember, winners attract people like themselves. Losers do

the same. Question: Yawar, they say ‘hire for values and train for skills’ and ‘it is better to hire a squirrel than training a duck to climb a tree’. In your practice of helping business leaders develop a winning culture, how do you look at what one needs to hire and what you can train-in? Answer: Mowly, we all know that values are important. Values drive behaviour and behaviour drives results. So values must be hired after ensuring its actual practice. It is important to focus on values, beliefs and attitudes since it is extremely difficult to change these by training. It is simple to screen for these and hire those who have them already. All skills and some attitudes such as customer focus or results orientation can be trained.

But the attitudes such as ‘hunger to win’ or a ‘constant self-improvement’ are difficult to train.

Hiring Template Question: Yawar, in the competency based interviewing, we recommend developing an assessment sheet which captures the needed technical and leadership competencies. In your book, you suggest to develop a specific template. Answer: Yes. The “Hiring Template.” Time spent creating a useful template eliminates a lot of wasted time in post interview aggravation. In its technical part, the template must answer factors such as: What basic skills? What technical or functional skills must be hired? What degree, diploma or certification? What are the expected per-

To summarise some key points of the guide, interviewers must be clear about the operating definitions of their organisational values. nBesides reviewing the test results if any, they must review the resume and highlight the points they need to probe. nMost important is to set out a quality time to do justice to each candidate. nBefore starting the interview, it is suggested to plan the opening statement to set the stage for mutual candor. nThe questions must be based on required competencies specified on the ‘hiring template’ and must be open-ended. nFacial expression must be neutral and friendly than overly effusive. nRelaxed posture, tone, speed of speech and accent are all-important. Yawar thus cautions, “At the end of the interview the people you did not hire should leave with a longing to work for you.”

The author is former corporate vice president - HR and currently HRD and Leadership Competency Building Consultant. E-mail: [email protected]