Talent Journey

In business there is almost a universal understanding that emotional intelligence and IQ are both important attributes of strong performers. Yet to ensure we are all on the same page, let’s define “emotional intelligence.” According to John D. Mayer and Peter Salovey, two of the leading researchers in this area, “Emotional intelligence refers to an ability to recognize the meanings of emotion and their relationships and to reason and problem-solve on the basis of them. Emotional intelligence is involved in the capacity to perceive emotions, assimilate emotion-related feelings, understand the information of those emotions, and manage them.” In short, emotional intelligence is the set of skills that defines how effectively people perceive, understand, reason with and manage their own and others’ feelings.

Daniel Goleman in his 1995 book “Emotional Intelligence – Why It Can Matter More Than IQ” said, ‘there is intelligence in the emotions (and) intelligence can be brought to emotions.’ To be successful in business, people must be smart about their emotions and those of others. Most of us would probably have to admit that there have been times our emotions have gotten the better of us, leading to an in-the-moment decision that we later regretted. On the other hand, we also know people who communicate by facts alone and never engage the emotional buy-in for decisions. Either extreme leaves business interactions flat and less successful than they could be.

To that point, Mr. Goleman found that “Of the competencies required for excellence in performance, 67 percent are emotional competencies.” Fast company agrees: “Companies can continue to give top priority to financial performance – but many now also realize that technical and intellectual skills are only part of the equation for success. A growing number of organizations are now convinced that people’s ability to understand themselves and manage their emotions improves their performance, their collaboration with colleagues, and their interaction with customers.”

EQ is more important today than ever before. More and more of our work is being done in teams, across functions, and globally. Thus, EQ skills such as team problem solving, diversity awareness, flexibility, and influence are emerging as key pre-requisites for success. All of us can enhance our ability to recognize and understand our emotions and the emotions of others. People who are self aware and can read the emotional responses of others are more effective, productive and successful in the 21st century workforce.

So, how can we increase emotional intelligence (EQ)? First, we must increase our self-awareness. We need to identify and understand our emotional responses. Second, we need to improve our self-management by choosing our response, rather than being hijacked by our emotions. Third, we must increase our social awareness by reading body language and meaning behind the words of others. Active listening and empathy are key skills. Finally, we must improve our relationship management. This calls for openness, transparency, and curiosity. It entails seeing things from another person’s perspective.

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

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.

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.

Many NFL sports fans (especially those in San Diego) predicted that the Chargers would play in the Superbowl this month. They were, by all accounts, an extremely talented group, arguably among the most proficient in the NFL. Yet, their season ended prematurely in heart-wrenching defeat. Why?

LaDainian Tomlinson may have provided rich insight into one possible answer. He said that he didn’t feel “connected, as far as the team, the unity, the togetherness, family” this past season, and said many players were more about “me” than “faith, family, football.” Whether Tomlinson is expressing sour grapes or reality, his comments hit upon a potent point: talent ALONE is not enough to win the big game.

What is true in sport is also true in business. Although technical expertise, knowledge, and experience are critically important to organizational success, those things alone cannot sustain market share and customer loyalty. In today’s global and competitive economy, the “players” of an organization must be aligned around a core mission, set of values, and principles of behavior. This alignment is what Tomlinson was referring to in his comments about connectedness. Alignment, along with technical competency, composes the complete ingredients for success.

Each organization shapes its own alignment factors. In today’s workplace, prudent leaders carefully scrutinize a candidate’s ability to “fit” these unique alignment factors. Employers are at an advantage right now since many very skilled people are seeking employment. It is a prime time to ensure you make right selection decisions regarding both technical competency and the soft-skills alignment factors.
Increasingly organizations are turning to assessment tools to help predict performance success. Such tools provide organizations with objective and comprehensive information about hidden soft skill potential as it relates to job requirements.

Some of the information these assessments can provide include:
• Communication and problem solving style
• Reactions to conflict and stress
• Ability to manage problems and emotions
• Ability to influence
• Intensity of accountability and results orientation
• Motivational style, including preference for recognition and rewards
• Strengths in interpersonal, operational and strategic thinking

Studies indicate that a comprehensive and validated assessment tool increases your organization’s ability to predict “fit.” In fact, when a comprehensive assessment (including personality, motivation and competency) was compared to an unstructured interview alone: the assessment predicted performance 25 times better! (Scott Lighthouse in Industry and Organizational Psychology 1, 2008, pages 333-342.)

Utilization of assessments in the hiring process is without a doubt a prudent strategic decision. The important question becomes, “which one do you choose?” Before you can determine which assessment tool will meet your organizational needs, it is important to clearly define your objectives and implementation strategy. We have put together a few critical questions to consider when selecting an assessment tool:

1. What is the purpose of the assessment process? If you are using an assessment to improve performance predictability in hiring, make sure the instrument has been validated for selection.
2. What are you attempting to measure? If you are hiring for a lower level position, matching the right personality and motivational driver to the job might be sufficient. However, if you are selecting a technical expert and/or leader, you will also want to assess the candidate’s abilities against the soft-skill competencies required for that job. Compare the attributes being measured by the assessment against those required for the job and your critical alignment factors (mission, values, and principles of behavior).
3. What ongoing support will you receive? You want to look for vendors that will provide active ongoing support and will not simply administer the assessment and deliver the results. Although these both hold value, a trained professional in the assessment brings it all together and provides insight that comes from experience. So, once you have identified the best assessment tool, also choose a reliable and personable business partner.
4. How is the system priced? It is important to clearly understand the fee schedule as it relates to the manner in which you plan to use the test. Ask vendors to outline up-front fees for system design and configuration, as well as ongoing usage fees. Remember, the assessment tool is an investment that enables you to choose the absolute best candidate for your job, team and organization. It is similar to investing in maintenance of machinery or website optimization. Investments return increased productivity and profitability.

We see incredible opportunity for organizations to build teams and increase success this year. As the applicant pool is deep and rich, take time to search for candidates with strong organizational “fit”. Don’t settle for candidates based solely upon technical talent. Pursue those that also are emotionally intelligent, work collaboratively, and contribute innovative and creative ideas. Your organization deserves workers that are aligned and committed to your mission and culture. Utilizing a comprehensive assessment within your hiring process enhances your ability to make an objective and informed decision about candidate “fit” within your unique organization.

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

WorkLife balance is a hot topic among many workers today. It is just as it sounds – a balance between work and life. The individualization of this balance drives the need for looking further in to what this means for employees within your organization. In some cases, the WorkLife balance signifies maintaining a fulfilling life in and outside of work. In other individuals, it indicates the real necessity of balancing work with home responsibilities. For others, this topic conjures up negative feelings and implies a lack of commitment to one side of the equation or the other; for example, a boss may see WorkLife balance as too little commitment to work and a family member might sense too little commitment to home. If one of these descriptions resonates best with you, it probably provides a clue into your current attitude about WorkLife. In this article we assist you in looking more broadly at the different dynamics of WorkLife balance

Balance vs. Effectiveness

In the context of work and life, the word “balance” is somewhat esoteric. As a metaphorical image, we might picture a balanced two-sided scale with 12 hours of work balanced by 12 hours of “the rest of life.”

But, in reality we all know this is unrealistic. Thus, at Talent Journey, we prefer to help organizations and people work towards WorkLife effectiveness.

• WorkLife is the decision making process that each person goes through in managing their personal priorities.
• Effectiveness results when energy spent on work priorities and energy spent on other domains of life arrive at a comfortable and satisfying resting place of equilibrium that reflect the individual’s preferences while also meeting business needs.

Reflects values

Personal values are a critical component in determining WorkLife effectiveness. Overwhelmingly, research shows that generations actually share common values that influence WorkLife effectiveness choices.

Some simple examples include the similarity found among workers born during and pre-WWI. In this group, values tend to include work, sacrifice, duty, conformity, perfectionism, personal achievement and team orientation. On the contrary, in looking at the post-WWII generation, they tend to value globalization, technology, fun, self-reliance, diversity and social causes. Like many comparisons, the varying sets of values are different (one not more right or noble than the other).

Given the diversity of values, it is evident that organizations aligning themselves for success have some work cut out for them. It will be critical for our nation’s multigenerational workforce to navigate and explore the conflicting values amongst their staff. To optimize success, the generations must begin to understand each other and embrace this diversity.

Reflects circumstantial needs

In addition to values, life circumstances also play a substantial role in determining WorkLife effectiveness. Here are some examples.

• Bargaining power – Strongly competent workers and those with specialized skills have more choice regarding where and how they work.
• Demographics – Families with more disposable income can afford options, making WorkLife effectiveness more achievable.
• Caregivers– People caring for children, elders, or sick/aging relatives have fewer choices regarding how to spend “free time.”
• Corporate culture – some companies support flexibility and others are more rigid.
• Type of job – a sales rep has more flexibility than a production worker in terms of how, when, and where work is done.

As you can see, values and needs individualize this concept of WorkLife effectiveness. Every person has different values or needs that make them unique. In an organization poised to retain and acquire top talent, recognizing this will be a first step. Let’s face it, as our economy improves, opportunities will present themselves and employees will once again find themselves in a position to navigate choice. It is going to be important for leaders to enable employees to work towards their place of WorkLife effectiveness. Employers will need to gain greater sensitivity to differing values and needs. Flexibility in how and where work is accomplished might make the difference between attracting or losing top talent.

At Talent Journey, we are proponents of finding win/win solutions for both workers and the corporate business. The awareness and willingness to help employees create balance opportunities will benefit both parties. Efforts such as flexible schedules, part-time work, and telecommuting can be just the thing your business needs to both generate better productivity AND satisfy WorkLife effectiveness needs. It is evident this ideal has been obtained when both business needs and employee preferences are met simultaneously.

One additional fact to note: WorkLife effectiveness is dynamic. Naturally, as people progress through their careers, values and circumstantial needs shift. All good employers want to find ways to attract and retain top talent for the entirety of the journey, through all stages of the worker’s life cycle.

Worldwide Copyright TJ Associates, LLC Diane Brown