Hiring for Attitude - · PDF fileHiring for Attitude ... knowledge to complete an assignment....

© 2012 LEADERSHIP IQ

Mark Murphy,

Chairman & CEO

Hiring for Attitude


Everything based on research


The Hiring Study

• 46% of newly-hired employees will fail within 18 months, while only 19% will achieve unequivocal success.

• Why do people fail?

‒ Coachability

‒ Emotional Intelligence

‒ Motivation

‒ Temperament

‒ Technical Competence

89%

11%


The need for attitude

“If you don’t have a good attitude, we don’t want you, no matter how skilled you are. We can change skill levels through training. We can’t change attitude.”

Herb Kelleher

Founder of Southwest Airlines


Finding your Brown Shorts


Finding your Brown Shorts

• Characteristics of Low Performers

‒ Whining, Negativity, Me-first, Blaming, dramatic, stir-up-trouble

• Characteristics of High Performers

‒ Don’t quit until it’s right, team player, they take risks, or they don’t take risks, sense of humor, class and poise, resilient, emotionally sensitive to others needs


How to discover Brown Shorts 1. Think of someone in the organization who really represents our culture.

This is our poster child for having the exact right attitude for our organization. Could you tell me about a time they did something that really exemplifies having the right attitude?

2. Without naming names, think of someone who works (or worked) in the organization who just did not represent the culture. This is our poster child for having the exact wrong attitude for this organization. Could you tell me about a time they did something that really exemplifies having the wrong attitude?


Case Study: Microchip In the global high-tech world, attitude is critical. But how do you discover whether someone is both technically brilliant AND a perfect fit with your culture? Moving way beyond standard hiring approaches, Hiring for Attitude has deepened our talent pool, shown us how to discover untapped talent, reduced the risk of hiring the wrong person and cut turnover substantially.

Mitch Little, Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Applications, Microchip


Microchip Negative Brown Shorts

• Condescending (e.g. ‘I’m the expert in our products, you’re not, so...’)

• Placating (e.g. ‘here, have some free software and stop complaining...’)

• Overwhelming (e.g. ‘You want technical specifications? Well, open the warehouse, because I’ve got a truckload of technical specifications...’)

• Challenging (e.g. ‘That last request you made is technically infeasible--tell me how you even arrived at those calculations...’)


Microchip Positive Brown Shorts

• Caring (e.g. ‘Even our best friends sometimes get quarrelsome and difficult, but we don’t abandon them or refuse to help. In fact, when a friend is in trouble, it usually makes us want to get in there and help even more...’)

• Persistence (e.g. ‘I ended up staying on the phone with her until almost midnight, but we finally got things figured out and working right...’)

• Objectivity (e.g. ‘When I felt myself getting defensive, I took a mental step-back to get an objective take on how the customer viewed the situation...’)


Eliminating bad questions

• Avoid superficial and easily-gamed questions:

‒ Tell me about yourself

‒ What are your strengths

‒ What are your weaknesses

‒ What would you do if… (hypothetical)

‒ You have good teamwork skills, right?

‒ If you could be any vegetable, what kind of vegetable would you be?


Brown Shorts


Brown Shorts Characteristics

Positive Brown Shorts Negative Brown Shorts

High performers are highly collaborative. They help each other out without being asked, and without any expectation of recognition or reward.

High performers are self-directed learners. If they don’t know how to do something, they’re incredibly proactive in finding the necessary information or other resources to help them gain the skills and knowledge they need.

Low performers routinely want individual recognition rather than sharing recognition with the larger team.

Low performers have a negative disposition. When faced with a new situation they regularly respond with the reasons why something will NOT work rather than trying to figure out ways to achieve success.


Differential Situations

• When faced with an opportunity for recognition…

‒ High performers demure, while low performers step on anyone they have to in order to get that notice or reward.

• When things go wrong…

‒ High performers aren’t interested in finding a source of blame. Low performers are quick to blame and eager to escape accountability.

• When asked to do something they don’t know how to do…

‒ High performers proactively acquire new skills. Low performers immediately throw up their hands, resist, and complain.


Could you tell me…

• “Tell me about a time you lacked the skills or knowledge to complete an assignment.”

• “Could you tell me about a time you lacked the skills or knowledge to complete an assignment?”


Leave it hanging


• “Could you tell me about a time you lacked the skills or knowledge to complete an assignment and how you overcame that.”


How to ruin an interview question

Problem bringers/problem solvers ‒ Tell me about a time when you had to adapt to a

difficult situation. What did you do?

‒ Tell me about a time when you had to balance competing priorities and did so successfully.

‒ Tell me about a difficult situation with a co-worker, and how you handled it.


“Could you tell me about a time you lacked the skills or knowledge to complete an assignment?”

• “Happened all the time; that’s why I’m interviewing with you guys.”

• “I told them to find somebody else.”

• “That’s why we have customer service; let them figure it out.”

• “I wasn’t afraid to admit that I lacked the skills I needed and was easily able to find a peer who caught me up to speed.”

• “I enlisted the help of someone from corporate who was familiar with the tool I did not know how to use. I didn’t have to solve the problem from scratch, and it sure felt good to share the credit for a job well done.”


Brown Shorts Questions Proactive (they don’t wait to be told to take action)

• “Could you tell me about a time when you had to make a really important decision at work?”

• “Could you tell me about a time you saw a coworker struggling to complete something?”

Adventurous (they’re willing to step outside their standard role)


• “Could you tell me about a time when you had to think outside the box?


Brown Shorts Questions Resilient (they bounce back quickly when things go wrong)

• “Could you tell me about a time when you were given an assignment that you were sure wasn’t going to succeed?”

• “Could you tell me about the most difficult customer you’ve dealt with?

Optimistic (they believe that there’s always a solution to every problem)

• Could you tell me about a time you couldn’t find a solution to a problem?

• “Could you tell me about a time an error occurred on a project to which you were assigned?”


You need an answer key


Developing Answer Guidelines

“Could you tell me about a time you lacked the skills or knowledge to complete an assignment?” WARNING SIGNS

• I just gave up • Did not ask for help or assistance • I took it straight to my manager for her to deal with. It is not in

my job description to fix that • I am never wrong or it is always the other person’s fault.


Answer Guidelines: Warning Signs • “When you don’t know how to do something you just placate

the requestor and obfuscate the issue until hopefully it starts to go away. I’ve found it to be pretty common for a customer or boss who gets all hot and bothered over an issue to completely forget it within 72 hours.”

• “I had one boss who was terrible at communication, and a lot of times it negatively affected the procedures and workflow in our department. I know it really impacted my work and made my life pretty miserable. There were a lot of times when I didn’t find out about process changes until after the fact. This slowed me up a lot, and I spent a lot of days just frozen, unable to do anything, because I literally didn’t know what to do.”


Developing Answer Guidelines “Could you tell me about a time you lacked the skills or knowledge to complete an assignment?” POSITIVE SIGNALS • Did not give up • Learned from the experience • A willingness to be flexible. • Listening to ideas other than their own. • Detailed explanation of why the improvement didn't work, what

exactly was done when the fix didn't work, the thought process around the original recommended fix, and why the chosen final course resolved the situation


Answer Guidelines: Positive Signals • “I initiated a ‘forum’ of really talented people from all over the

organization at my last job. I set it up so we met once a week to discuss our challenges and problems. It was a great way to get feedback and advice, especially when I wasn’t sure how to do something.”

• “I was honest with the customer and explained that I wasn’t familiar with what they were looking for, but that I would connect them with the person in our company who was the expert on this. I made this connection within the 24 hour window I had promised to the customer, and I kept in touch with both the customer and our expert throughout the process. Then I went and learned as much about the issue as I could so next time I would be prepared.”


Textual Analysis

• First Person Pronouns: The high performer answers (the ones in the Positive Signal category) contain roughly 60% more first-person pronouns (e.g. I, me, we) than answers given by the low performer answers (the ones in the Warning Signs category).

• Second Person Pronouns: Low performer answers contain about 400% more second person pronouns (e.g. you, your) than high performer answers.

• Third Person Pronouns: Low performer answers use about 90% more third person pronouns (e.g. he, she, they) than high performer answers.


Textual Analysis

• Past Tense: Answers from high performers use 40% more past tense than answers from low performers.

• Present Tense: Answers from low performers use 120% more present tense than answers from high performers.

• Future Tense: Answers from low performers use 70% more future tense than answers from high performers.


Textual Analysis

• Adverbs: Answers in the low performer category contain 40% more adverbs (think of words ending in -ly, like quickly, totally, thoroughly, etc.) than the high performer answers.

• Negation: Low performer answers use 130% more negation (no, neither, etc.) than high performer answers.

• Absolutes: Low performers use 100% more absolutes (always, never) than high performers.


Evaluation


How many questions?

• 60 minute interview

‒ 10 minutes rapport building

‒ 10 Minutes close

‒ 40 minutes of content

How many minutes in an answer does it take to get past the canned stuff?


The (Universal) Coachability Question

1. What was your boss’s name? Please spell their full name for me.

2. Tell me about NAME as a boss.

3. What’s something that you could have done (or done differently) to enhance your working relationship with NAME?

4. When I talk to NAME, what will he/she tell me your strengths are?

5. Now everyone has areas where they can improve, so when I talk to NAME, what will he/she tell me your weaknesses are?


Everything based on research


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