As I have gone through the interview process for awhile now, I was stuck by the
fact most of the questions I am asked are focused on past performances or duties
and not how I would use those skills or abilities address current or future
assignments. Metaphorically, hiring people using this line of reasoning is like
trying to drive your car while only looking in the rear-view mirror.
So when I saw Dr. Sullivan's process for interviewing, I asked his permission to
send this along because I thought others might find it refreshing and benefit
from what he suggests as an interview process oriented toward the future.
Note: My web address
http://home.att.net/~Choragus
__________________________________
Great Optimism,
Dutch Driver
Abilene, TX 79605
mailto:
AskChoragus@yada-yada.com
_____________________________________________________________________
Rethinking Interviews - The "Fut R View": A Better Way To Hire
By Dr. John Sullivan
Friday, November 20, 1998
_____________________________________________________________________
Most interview strategies were developed long before the "Internet" age when the
speed of change in business was
rather slow. However, if your business is in a rapidly-changing environment, you
will need new tools
that can tell you more about the future possibilities of a candidate than what
they did years ago. Does your
business require "outside-the-box" solutions that didn't exist 3-5 years ago?
Are you looking to excite applicants
and send them a message that your firm is different? If so, you might consider a
new approach to hiring called a
"Fut R View."
WHAT IS A FUT R VIEW?
A Fut R View is an advanced interview technique for IT, product development, and
other forward-looking jobs. In a
Fut R View the focus is on assessing applicants' new ideas and their
competencies in planning, forecasting, and
solving future problems your firm will face under the unique constraints of your
culture and your business
environment. Fut R Views work best for cutting edge jobs and for selecting
innovators and the "very best" in their
fields. They are not for every job. They can, however, be a supplement to
existing interviews or used as a
stand-alone tool. Fut R Views emphasize the forward-thinking whereas behavioral,
as well as most other
interviews focus on the past.
REASONS FOR USING A FUT R VIEW TO GAIN A COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE IN HIRING:
* You can't beat the competition in hiring the best candidates if you use the
same tools as the competitors to
screen your candidates.
* If you want to continually improve your selection process, you must try new
tools to change your results. A Fut R View is another approach that will give
SIGNIFICANTLY DIFFERENT ANSWERS and information than traditional interviews.
* Fut R Views excite and challenge "fast change" workers who need to be excited
in order to accept a job. These
fast-change types (as well as GenXer's) judge a company by the "WOW's" they see
in their company's recruiting and
selection process. They are often bored with resumes and standard interviews.
Fut R Views send a clear message that
our firm is different and future-focused. You can't get "the best" unless you
stand out from the competitors. Fut R
Views excite those that live for the future and conversely it can also
"unsettle" those who live in the past.
* A further advantage of Fut R Views is that after the interviews are over you
have multiple, diverse, and "fresh
eyes" forecasts and answers (sometimes you even get answers from your
competitors) to your problems. The answers alone could be priceless, even if no
one is hired. Few ever bother to document the answers to behavioral interviews,
no less use the results as valuable "data." Fut R Views give you usable answers
and new approaches to consider.
* Screening tools that give us new and different useful information allow us to
improve the quality of hire! Quality
hires might include agile, future thinkers, "envelope pushers," problem solvers,
speed learners, etc.
POSSIBLE PROBLEMS WITH TRADITIONAL APPROACHES TO INTERVIEWING INCLUDE:
* Most screening devices (behavioral interviews, resumes, references, etc.) are
"past focused." They dwell on
experiences that may be years old and reflect how a candidate acted under a set
of circumstances that are
almost certainly different than your organization will face in the future.
* Behavioral interviews ask you how you acted in the past, but they fail to ask
you how YOU WOULD HAVE ACTED if you
had the freedom to use your own approach. Applicants are not asked if the
approach they followed was their own or
if it might have been under someone else's orders. In a Fut R View, applicants
are asked to develop their own
approach. They are given the freedom to make bad decisions as well as good ones.
* Behavioral interviews ask questions about how you acted in the culture of your
old firm rather than how would you
do it in our culture (and business environment).
* Behavioral interviewing questions (and answer outlines) are widely available,
making preparation and "practicing"
relatively easy.
* In behavioral interviewing you would ask a veteran general how he/she fought
their last war, while Fut R
Viewing would ask them both, how they would do it today, and ask for their plan
for forecasting and winning a
future war.
* If competencies are measured in a behavioral interview they are probably
"dated" and based on "what competencies
'resulted in success' in the past." You may be able to avoid this "past bias" by
identifying the competencies a
firm will need in the future and assessing these new competencies in a Fut R
View.
* The two different types of interviews would get different answers because the
past is not always a predictor of the
future, and the way we did it "then" might not be the way we would do it
tomorrow. If you assume a rapid rate of
change (like in high tech firms) what you did as little as one year ago may
already be ancient history!
PREPARATION FOR THE FUT R VIEW
* Interview/survey your top performers in the targeted jobs to identify what
your best employees see as the most
difficult current and future issues, problems and opportunities facing the
job/firm. They would also be asked
to contribute an outline of the best, average, and unacceptable answers that
would be used as guidelines for
assessing the candidates. For a Fut R View to be most successful, you must make
sure the problems given to the
applicants are ones that the best applicants can solve and the "average" can
not. You should also "pre-test" your
problems and solutions with your best technical performers to make sure you know
for sure that the best will ace it
and the worst will fail it.
* Prior to a Fut R View you have two options.
1. Under the first option you notify the candidates in advance of the Fut R View
that they are expected to research the company (and it's environment) and to be
prepared to outline how they would forecast/solve our problems (or take
advantage of our opportunities).
2. Under the second option (for positions where research and forecasting skills
are less important) you supply all
candidates with a brief 1-page summary describing our culture and our problems/
opportunities.
STEPS IN A FUT R VIEW:
Note: Be prepared to video/audio tape (with permission) the session or to take
good notes in order to "capture" their
answers
1. At the beginning of the Fut R View, you welcome the candidate and outline the
goals and steps of the process.
Answer any questions they have.
2. Next the candidate is generally asked to identify the potential problems they
would anticipate during their first
month on the job (if they get them wrong you can identify the actual problems
for them). You then ask them to walk
you through the steps (and the why's) for solving these first month problems.
3. The next step (optional) involves giving them an outline/process map for some
of the key processes/ systems
they would be responsible for managing or using. They would then be asked
questions on (1) How they would improve /
modify the systems, (2) What are the critical success factors for a world class
system, and (3) What are the
common problems/errors with these systems.
4. The Final step of a Fut R View involves asking the candidate to forecast the
next 1-2 years for (1) the job,
(2) the needs of the business, and (3) the critical success factors for your
industry.
5. Other possible options include:
* Asking them to outline their self-development and learning plan for the first
year
* Asking them for their ideas on how, through their job, we can help us gain a
competitive advantage over our
competitors
* Asking them to critique our firms latest solution/ideas
* Asking them to forecast functional and industry essential competencies for the
next 2 years and show which ones they
have
* As a substitute to Fut R Views try "Simuviews" (interviews where the applicant
is put through several verbal
simulations about how to solve the current problems to be faced in the job at
our company)
6. Rate the applicants on the ability to accurately forecast,
solve short- and long-term problems and on their overall view of the future as
it relates to our vision and needs. Compare them to other candidates. Also
compare Fut R View scores with the scores on their traditional interviews to see
the superiority of the tool. Allow others who couldn't make the Fut R View
session to "view the tape" and evaluate the candidate.
7. Remember with Fut R Views you get the ideas/plans of all of the interviewees.
This intelligence has a value of it's
own, regardless of who you hire.
______________________________________________________________________
Dr John Sullivan is head of the Human Resource Management Program at San
Francisco State University. He is a well-known international speaker, author and
advisor to Fortune 500 and Silicon Valley firms. He is also head of
the HR Strategic Forecasting Project, whose goal is to forecast and anticipate
HR issues. (E-mail questions or
comments to mailto:
JohnS@sfsu.edu)
______________________________________________________________________
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