Links a go-go

Good reading for February 1, 2008:

U.S. Government launches photo screening tool to help employers verify employment eligibility

New Monster ads (seen the one with the sun coming up?)

Assessment trends for 2008

Increased use of video-sharing sites in U.S.

Attracting IT talent in 2008 (thank you HR World)

Do you know what you don't know you know?

HR academics vs. practitioners

Et tu, HR?

It's easy to give out advice. HR does it all the time.

But how well does HR practice what it preaches?

In the most recent issue of the U.S. Merit System Protection Board's (MSPB) newsletter, Issues of Merit, in an article titled "Taking our own advice", the author describes attempts by MSPB to ensure they are walking the walk when it comes to hiring procedures.

So what did they find?

1) Their job announcements weren't all that attractive. They contained jargon and too much information. Perhaps more importantly, they didn't "sell" the job.

Solutions: Job description was refined and rewritten so qualifications were easier to understand, got rid of excess information, and made easier to read. In addition, they added a job preview component that helps applicants decide if the job is a good fit.

2) They were using questionnaires as an initial screen that had low validity.

Solution: Questionnaires were replaced with an accomplishment record, which they hope (and research suggests) will better predict who will succeed in the job.

3) They were using the "rule of three" for external hires which limited their ability to consider a broad candidate group.

Solution: "Rule of three" replaced with category rating, which allows them to consider more candidates.

4) Recruitment methods weren't as broad as they could be.

Solution: MSPB worked with OPM to feature their jobs prominently through USAJOBS, the federal government's online job posting site. In addition they made greater efforts to actively seek out qualified candidates whose resumes were in USAJOBS. Finally, they used professional organizations to help advertise their opportunities.

An honest review of recruitment and assessment procedures in any organization will undoubtedly result in areas for improvement. Kudos to MSPB for following their own advice.

Wanted: Chief Magic Official

You've heard of Chief Knowledge Officer, Chief Fun Officer, and even Chief Evangelist.

But Chief Magic Official?

One guess as to who would be filling that job title.

If you guessed Disney, go to the head of the class.

Yes, Disney is out to hire it's first "CMO" who will appear periodically to grant "dreams" to guests at Disney Parks in Anaheim and Orlando this year. Disney's put together a great recruiting website that includes:

- A Magic Aptitude Test (M.A.T.) that you can take to see if you qualify--you have to take a look at it just to see the pencil you'll be using for the test (by the way, I passed and am apparently similar to Mickey Mouse)

- A great job preview video

- A creative job description and statement of qualifications

In a new twist, applications must include a video resume that will be voted on online. The top three vote getters will be invited (along with three guests) to Walt Disney World resort for further vetting.

So will this work? Probably. It is Disney, after all, who doesn't usually have too much trouble attracting candidates. And some research indicates applicants are more attracted to creative job titles.

But whatever happens, you gotta admire their creativity!

Help Wanted

Sometimes the ad writes itself

Is USAJobs enough?

Check out this article that came out recently on GovernmentExecutive.com. It's about how the federal government may need to branch out and start using other advertising venues besides USAJobs.gov, which it relies on heavily.

Some individuals quoted in the article, which happens to include a manager at CareerBuilder, point out that:

- Opportunities are not automatically posted on other career sites, like CareerBuilder, Monster, and HotJobs.

- Job openings are not "typically" searchable through search engines like Google. (Although look what happens when I search for an engineering job with the federal government).

- You can't expect people to automatically look for jobs on USAjobs.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the fed's HR shop, fires back:

- USAJobs gets 8 million hits a month. This compares to CareerBuilder's 1.2 million searches a month for government jobs.

- USAJobs is well known and marketing efforts have been ramped up (e.g., last year's television commercials, which unfortunately didn't work with my version of Firefox).

So who wins the argument? I don't think the feds need to panic just yet. But it can't hurt them to investigate other posting opportunities, particularly given how much traffic the heavy hitters like Monster and CareerBuilder get compared to USAJobs:

By the way, don't overlook the comments on that page; in some ways they are more telling than the article. Readers point out that the application process is overly complicated--to the point that one of the readers makes his/her living guiding people through the process (reminds me of a guy that does the same thing for the State of California). My bet is the application process is equally, if not more, important than how the feds are marketing their opportunities.

I would also be willing to bet that it isn't just the feds that have this issue. As more organizations implement automated application and screening programs, they risk falling in love with the technology at the expense of the user experience. I may love the look of your job, but if it takes me 2 hours to apply, well...I may just look elsewhere.

JobAdWords Update

Update on the JobAdWords Survey

In a previous post I introduced a survey I'm using to answer some questions about the words used in job advertisements. The survey can be taken here, or if that's full, here or here.

Results so far? Based on responses from a mixture of HR professionals and job seekers (I'll break them out when I have a large enough sample):

The words most often seen in job advertisements:

- Motivated
- Flexible
- Customer-focused

The words least often seen in job advertisements:

- Independent
- Smart
- Friendly

The words with the most positive emotional response:

- Conscientious
- Reliable
- Strong work ethic

The words with the least positive emotional response:

- Flexible
- High-energy
- Creative

The words associated with highest probability of applying:

- Professional
- Detail-oriented
- Reliable
- Friendly
- Conscientious

The words associated with the lowest probability or applying:

- High-energy
- Flexible

So here's an interesting question (worthy of further research): do the words in job advertisements cause a reaction because they say something about what the job would be like, or because they cause people to self-assess? Or both? For example, "strong work ethic" received a high emotional response, but was not one of the highest-rated words when it came to applying. Hmmm...

June '07 JOOP

The June 2007 Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology is out, and while it has several articles of interest, there's really only one directly related to recruitment/assessment.

In the study, Piasentin and Chapman looked at how perceptions of person-organization (P-O) fit come about--whether they stem from feeling like the organization is similar to you, complements you, or some combination of both.

Using a sample of data from 209 employees "of various occupational and organizational backgrounds", the authors found support for both the similarity and complementary effects. In addition, perceptions of fit were found to correlate (and mediate the relationship) with several other important feelings, including:

- job satisfaction
- organizational commitment
- turnover intention

So what are the implications? How people perceive the match between their own skills, values, and goals and those of the organization matter--and not just to current employees but applicants as well. Organizations have to make sure they give applicants enough information to make this judgment, however. Too often job seekers are provided with minimal, or irrelevant, information about the position and the organization, such as long lists of tasks. Yes, people want to know what the salary is and where the job is located, but they also want to know who they'll be working with, what their career growth opportunities will be, and what the organization's take on work-life balance is.

This is low-hanging fruit from a staffing perspective, and organizations that get it are providing job seekers with this rich form of information.

...speaking of fit...there's a new book out on the topic, called Perspectives on Organizational Fit edited by Ostroff and Judge. It includes recruitment and selection as topics, but also covers others, such as leadership and teamwork.

Project JobAdWords

I'll be in St. Louis at the IPMAAC conference for most of the week, then taking a little time off...In the meantime I thought I would gather a little data...

I know there's research out there that looks at applicant reactions to various aspects of a job advertisement, such as information on selection procedures, pictures, and clear descriptions of work climate. But I'm not aware of any that specifically looks at the effect of WORDS commonly contained in job ads (although there is a recent study about word frequency).

You know the ones I'm talking about:
- "motivated"
- "creative"
- "works well under pressure"
etc.

But what exactly do these words mean to a reader? What reaction do they cause?

Today I'm starting Project JobAdWords, an attempt to try to answer these questions.

I've created a very brief survey designed to shed a little light on what these words mean. I would greatly appreciate your participation in this project. Simply go to one of the following websites--if survey #1 is full, go to survey #2, if survey #2 is full, please try survey #3:

Survey 1
Survey 2
Survey 3

As soon as I have enough respondents--judged completely arbitrarily and in no way using statistical sophistication--I will post the results. If I get enough results, I may continue this project by looking at other similar issues.

Thank you! Please pass the word.

Feds host virtual career fair

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), in conjunction with the Partnership for Public Service, will host a "virtual career conference" to highlight opportunities with the federal government today, Wednesday, and Thursday. You can view the live web cast here.

The event will kick off at 11 a.m. on June 5th with an overview of federal employment by the Director of OPM, Linda Springer. Subsequent panel sessions will focus on finding and applying for jobs, insight from new federal employees, student programs, IT jobs, opportunities in medicine and public health, how to host a career fair, and several other topics.

According to the news release, videos of all twelve panels will be available through both OPM and the Partnership for Public Service for the remainder of the year. The event is specifically targeted at the 600 colleges and universities around the U.S. who participate in the Call to Serve initiative.

Kudos to these organizations for being creative about highlighting opportunities in the public sector and taking advantage of technology to get the word out.

Must-reads on OFCCP compliance

John Sumser has written two excellent posts about OFCCP compliance, job posting in light of the sunset of America's Job Bank, and the final rules for the Jobs for Veterans Act.

First post here.

Second post here.

(Bolded date may indicate 2006 but these are 2007 posts)

Highly recommended for employers covered by OFCCP laws/regulations.

2007 SIOP Conference: Highlights, Part 3

This is the fourth in a series of posts about the 2007 SIOP Conference. In Part 1 I talked about some of the new products out there and in Part 2 and Part 3 I reviewed some of the research that was presented. This post continues that review...


Employment interview structure and discrimination litigation verdicts: A quantitative review

Pool, McEntee, and Gomez analyzed 31 federal court cases from 1990 to 2005 (27 claims of disparate treatment, 7 of adverse impact) to see if there was a relationship between the amount of interview structure and verdicts in employment discrimination cases. Most cases (73%) were brought under Title VII and involved promotional decisions (65%). Race discrimination was the most common allegation (47%) and the vast majority of cases (84%) involved a single plaintiff. For both types of claims, the strongest factors associated with a victory for the defendant (employer side) was having interviewers that were familiar with job requirements and having a guide for conducting the interview. In disparate treatment claims, defendants were more likely to prevail if they also had standardized questions and identical interviews for each applicant. In disparate impact cases, defendants fared better when they had evidence of validity (which makes sense given the burden shifting in these cases). Similar results to Williamson et al.’s 1997 study, but good data to have—see, we’re not just saying standardize those interviews because we’re sadistic HR folks.

Recruiting through the stages: Which recruiting practices predict when?

This meta-analysis by Uggerslev and Fassina of 101 studies looked at the impact that various “recruitment predictors” (e.g., job-person fit, job/organizational attraction) had on various outcome criteria (e.g., job pursuit intention, acceptance intentions). Results depended somewhat on the criterion, but perceived fit between the individual and the job/organization was across-the-board the strongest predictor. The only criterion that matched perceived fit was job characteristics, which tied for predicting acceptance intentions. The strength of the correlations varied, from a low of .15 between perceived fit and job choice to .47 between perceived fit and recommendation intentions. So how do we use this? The authors suggest efforts to increase the appearance of a good fit between the values of goals of applicants and those of the organization may pay off (I'm thinking, say, by focusing on aesthetics and message customization or clearly indicating what you’re looking for).

Meta-analysis on the relationship between Big Five and academic success

Okay, so it's not directly about recruitment or assessment, but it's still interesting. The title pretty much says it all--the presenters (Trapmann, Hell, Hirn, and Schuler) were looking here at the relationship between Big Five personality traits and academic success. Results? As you might expect, it depends what you mean by "success." Neuroticism was related to academic satisfaction (hey, that's why they're neurotic, right?) while Conscientiousness correlated with grades and retention. The other three factors (Extraversion, Openness, and Agreeableness) were not related to success.

That's probably the end of my review of 2007 SIOP presentations, unless I manage to obtain more presentations. Stay tuned for reviews from the upcoming IPMAAC conference!

Targeted job board: I/O Careers

Do you have a job opening in the field of Industrial/Organizational (I/O) Psychology, which ranges from individual assessment to organizational analysis? Then you might want to look at posting on I/O Careers, which now has over 650 members from 40 schools.

Membership is limited to "individuals who are serious about the field of I/O Psychology" but during the beta of the site, posting jobs is FREE. (After that it's $250 a pop).

Check it out.

Recruiting Trends Survey from DirectEmployers Association

The results from the 2007 Recruiting Trends survey sponsored by the DirectEmployers Association are out.

Data gathered from 47 companies indicated:

- 55% of hires were made from online sources (+8% from last year).

- Employee referrals were the largest single source (21% of hires), followed closely by the organization's website and general job boards.

- Employee referrals also generated the highest quality candidates (82% rated favorable), but niche job boards and search firms tied for second, with campus recruiting a very close third. General job boards were rated favorable by only 22% of respondents.

- The largest percentage, by far, of recruitment/advertising budget went to general job boards (34%). Referrals, the source of the highest quality candidates, received 6% of the budget.

- Putting these numbers together, the source value (cost/hire) was highest, by a large margin, for referrals, followed by the organization's web site and, perhaps surprisingly, social networking technology.

Comments and follow-up conversations indicated a growing frustration with general job boards (especially for IT jobs) as well as a growing reliance on sources of passive candidates, such as social networks, blogs, and search engine optimization.

Read the full report for a much more detailed analysis and insights. Thanks to Rocket-Hire for making this available.

Job ads of the future?

Curious about the direction job postings are going?

Looking for ways to snazz up your postings?

Then read this post over at jobs2web. Check out the graphic.

How close are your postings and/or career portals to this? Are they even in the same ballpark?

How hard would it be to add things like:

- links to a webinar/job preview video

- RSS feed

- subscribe to similar jobs

Answer: not hard. Let's hurry up and get there!

2007 SIOP Conference: Highlights, Part 2

This is the third in a series of posts about the 2007 SIOP Conference. In Part 1 I talked about some of the new products out there and in Part 2 I went over some of the research that was presented. In this post I'll point out some more research that you may find interesting...

Legal risks and defensibility factors for employee selection procedures

Posthuma, Roehling, and Campion analyzed nearly 600 federal district court cases and came up with some very interesting results:

- Employers are most likely to win (by far) when defending tests of math or mechanical ability. Employers also fare well when defending assessments of employment history and interviews.

- Employers did worst when defending physical ability tests and medical examinations. Tests of verbal ability and job knowledge were also more likely to result in a plaintiff win.

Predicting Internet job search behavior and turnover

Using a sample of 110 nurses in Texas, Posthuma et al. found using longitudinal survey data that (among other things) Internet job search behavior was related to turnover--folks weren't just surfing for fun. This suggests that organizations need to pay close attention to job searching behavior among employees; not necessarily to curtail it but instead to figure out why high performers want to leave.

Gender differences in career choice influences

After analyzing survey data from nearly 1,400 fourth-year medical students from two U.S. schools, Behrend et al. found a gender difference in preferred career: specifically, female medical students valued "opportunities to provide comprehensive care" when choosing a specialty much more than men. This is consistent with other work that has showed women to be more "relationship-oriented" than men when it comes to choosing a career.

Portraying an organization's culture through properties of a recruitment website

In this study of 278 undergraduate students, Kroustalis and Meade found that inclusion of pictures on a website that were intended to portray a certain organizational culture did so--but only for certain cultural characteristics. Specifically, pictures that implied a culture of either innovation or diversity had the intended effect--but pictures representing a team orientation did not. Interestingly, "employee testimonials" designed to emphasize these cultural aspects failed to do so for any of the three aspects studied. Finally, individuals who perceived a greater fit between themselves and the organization (in terms of the three cultural aspects) reported being more attracted to the organization.

Recruiting solutions for adverse impact: Race differences in organizational attraction

Last but definitely not least, Lyon and Newman gathered data from nearly 600 university students on their reactions to 40 hypothetical job postings...and came away with some very interesting results. For example:

- Conscientious individuals were more likely to apply to postings that explicitly stated a preference for conscientious applicants.

- Conscientious individuals were more likely to apply to postings that described the company as results-oriented.

- Black applicants with higher cognitive ability were more likely to respond to ads seeking conscientious individuals while White applicants with higher cognitive ability were less likely to do so.

- When a company was described as innovative, Black applicants high on conscientiousness were more likely to apply; this was not the case for White applicants.

2007 SIOP Conference Part 2: Highlights Vol. 1

In a previous post I talked about some of the products showcased in the program for the 2007 SIOP Conference.

In this post I'd like to highlight some of the more interesting (to me--and to you too, I hope!) presentations being made. Because there are so many interesting presentations, I'll use several posts to cover a number of them.

Gender and letters of recommendation: Agentic and communal differences (249-8)

Here's a study that should make you think twice about those letters of recommendation you review (if you don't already). After analyzing nearly 700 letters of recommendation for psychology faculty positions, the researcher found that women in these letters tended to be described as more affectionate, warm, and kind, while men were described as more ambitious, dominant, and self-confident. In addition, letters for women contained more references to their physical appearance (insert shudder here).

Data trends in open mode, online, unsupervised cognitive ability testing (61-28)
Personality testing online (unsupervised) and paper and pencil (supervised) (103-21)
Retest effects on an unproctored Internet-based GMA test (205-29)
DFIT analysis of web-based and paper-based versions of the WPT (261-21)

These four studies all looked at online testing in some way or another. The first three provide some support for online testing; they suggest that online general mental ability (GMA) test scores are relatively stable over time and the psychometric qualities of a personality test were consistent regardless of whether the test was taken online & unproctored or in person & proctored. Before we get too excited, however, the last study found that the paper-and-pencil and online versions of the WPT were not completely identical. It also found that WPT-Q scores differed between proctored and unproctored settings. So overall, mixed support for online testing. Chances are other factors (e.g., physical environment, Internet self-efficacy) play major roles.

Fancy job titles: Effects on recruitment success (261-25)

Chief Fun Officer. Brand Evangelist. Some organizations are coming up with creative job titles in an attempt to lure candidates who may find "Marketing Executive" a tad dull. But does it work? In this study, Dr. Klaus Templer presented nearly 400 marketing students with four hypothetical job ads using various titles, including fancy (e.g., Global Brand Insights Manager) as well as traditional (e.g., Marketing Officer). Results? Attitude toward the job was significantly higher with the fancier title, as was the extent to which the job was recommended to a friend. Why? Templer hypothesizes that fancier job titles lend the job more prestige, making it more attractive. Interesting follow-up question I have: Does the response vary between high-potentials and low-potentials? Also, we should keep in mind that surveys suggest job titles may have less of an impact on retention.

More conference goodness in upcoming posts!

Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 92, #2: Web Recruitment

March journal madness ends(?) with the latest issue of the Journal of Applied Psychology.

I'll post separately about all the recruitment/assessment goodness in this issue, but today's post is specific to one article: "Aesthetic properties and message customization: Navigating the dark side of Web recruitment" by Dineen, Ling, Ash, and DelVecchio.

Why treat this one special? For starters, it's a great little piece of research. And, it's something that I think many of my readers will be interested in--a way to increase the quality of candidates responding to Web-based recruitment methods and simultaneously cut down on the flood of unqualified applicants.

How do we do such a thing? By paying a lot of attention to two things, say the authors:

1) The aesthetics of your web page/job advertisement content. This refers to things like the fonts you use, graphics, colors, and Web page design. Seems like a no-brainer, but how many specific job postings had you thinking, "Now that's an attractive ad"?

2) The customization of your content. This refers to the extent that information presented to job seekers is tailored to their particular needs, interests, and competencies.

This particular study analyzed responses from 240 upper level undergraduate students enrolled in business courses (93% were business majors). The researchers first had the students fill out a Web-based questionnaire to gather information about their needs, abilities and values. The students then came back about 4 weeks later and viewed an actual Monster.com job advertisement tweaked for the study (the article includes a great example of the actual "ad" that was presented to study participants). Each participant was in one of four conditions:

Condition one: Good aesthetics (job posting with color, pictures, multiple fonts, patterned background) and customized feedback regarding the fit between their needs, abilities, and values, and aspects of the position/organization (e.g., "It appears that your preferences for a company culture are INCONSISTENT with what you would find at [this company]")

Condition two: Good aesthetics and no feedback.

Condition three: Poor aesthetics (black-and-white, no pictures, backgrounds, or varying fonts), and customized feedback.

Condition four: Poor aesthetics and no customized feedback.

The researchers then measured the amount of time spent viewing the posting, information recall, and attraction.

Results? Depends what yer lookin' at:

Viewing time: Highest in condition one (mean of 202 seconds). Including customized information had a big impact on viewing time, but aesthetics mattered only when customized information was present--when there was no customized information, aesthetics mattered much less and overall viewing time was much lower.

Information recall: Pretty much the same thing, except providing customized information helped only if there were good aesthetics.

Attraction: Aesthetics didn't seem to make a difference, but providing customized information resulted in the highest attraction levels.

Why is this happening? The authors suggest it's a result of the amount of cognitive elaboration--the more customized and appealing the information, the "deeper" the processing, meaning better memory of the ad, etc.

But here's probably the best part...when looking at the job-person fit and the above factors, only under condition one did the "low fit" applicants report being less attracted to the job and the "high fit" applicants report being more attracted to the job. What does this mean? That paying attention to the attractiveness of your career website and job opportunities AND helping people understand if they fit with the job and your organization helps folks "select in" and "select out."

The authors say it best: "These strong effects suggest that the combination of good aesthetics and customized information allows job seekers to better recognize when they are a low fit, leading to far less attraction among the lowest fitting individuals."

Bottom line

Allowing potential applicants to self-screen out based on realistic job information has HUGE advantages, both to the individual and the organization. The potential applicant doesn't waste their time going through the (sometimes laborious) process of applying only to later find out the job wasn't what they wanted. The organization doesn't have to spend time and money selecting out these people. The payoff from a little invested upfront, whether it's working on the attractiveness of the web page, providing customized results, or some type of job preview video, pays huge dividends, and is in effect the most effective and efficient form of selection.

By the way, if this type of research is something you're interested in, take a gander at this (thank you, Dr. Lievens), this, and this.

BBB Warns of Online Job Scams

Yesterday the Better Business Bureau serving Alaska, Oregon, and Western Washington issued a warning to job seekers to watch out for misleading online job postings designed to steal identity information or money.

The BBB has received dozens of complaints about a variety of job boards, including Monster, CareerBuilder, and Yahoo! HotJobs.

Tip-offs that the posting may be fraudulent include an unwillingness on the part of the employer to meet prospective applicants, the BBB reports.

In addition, the BBB advises "To further guard against identity theft, the BBB advises job hunters to refrain from including their Social Security Numbers, birth dates, or college graduation dates in resumes that are posted online. Consider posting your resume anonymously and providing an e-mail address as your primary contact rather than your home address or phone number."

They advise applicants to check out businesses on BBB's webpage to make sure they are legitimate.

If this becomes a big problem, it will have serious implications for gathering information from applicants and the ability to contact them. Another sad development in the evolving world of identity theft and online scams.

Podcasting and jobs

Podcasts are one of the technology tools de jour. Whether it will stick around for the long haul is up for debate, but for right now there are a number of ways they can be used effectively.

Advertise your opportunities

One way is to use podcasts as another way to get the word out about your organization and career opportunities. One firm that facilitates this is jobsinpods. Check out this example of how this content is already becoming popular in Google searches.

Gather job information

Another way to use them is to gather information about positions, say as part of a job analysis. Take a listen to this example, "Life as an Escalation Engineer" with Microsoft. I think you'll find it's a rich source of information about typical tasks and job requirements.

Can you think of other ways to podcast?

The Conference Board reports online job ad statistics

The Conference Board has released an analysis of U.S. online job advertising trends for January of 2007 and it's got some really juicy numbers for us.

Highlights:

- There were 3,141,800 vacancies posted online, a drop of 6% from December of 2006 (primarily seasonal). This includes nearly 2 million jobs that were not posted in the previous month.

- California had the largest drop by far in posted vacancies--not surprising given that it is the state with the largest labor market and the highest overall number of job postings (532,000 in January).

- Over the entire year there was an increase of 12% in the number of postings.

- Maine and Oklahoma outpaced other states with the largest increase in posted vacancies over the last year (+68% and +50%, respectively).

-Four states -- Hawaii, Virginia, Delaware, and Utah -- had more advertisements than job seekers (!). Top cities in this category include Washington DC, Salt Lake City, and San Jose.

- Occupations in the highest demand were Management, Business and finance, Office and admin support, Computer and mathematical, and Healthcare. With the exception of Office jobs, these are also some of the highest paid jobs available.

- New York and Los Angeles had the highest number of posted vacancies.

This is just the tip of the iceberg--the report includes voluminous information breaking these numbers down. Good stuff.