Scare applicants into applying

What if instead of convincing applicants to apply based on your brand, your benefits, etc., you scared them? That appears to be the strategy of North Carolina's Office of State Personnel.

Their latest recruiting video is called "We are here"--and no, it's not a documentary of aliens trapped on earth, although I'll forgive you for mistaking it for one.

It is, bar none, the strangest professionally made recruiting video I've ever seen. I really don't know how to describe it, so do this--go check it out and let me know what you think. It's one of those things you'll want to show your co-workers.

(by the way, I do have to give OSP kudos for their other profiled video, which describes the development of a SAS-based knowledge management system called NC WORKS).

Staffing.org's 2008 benchmark report

Staffing.org just released its 2008 Recruiting Metrics and Performance Benchmark Report. From all accounts it's a good source of data, gathered from over 1,000 organizations. It's also $400.

Fortunately, they're releasing details in dribbles through their newsletter. For example:

- Employee referrals are still the most popular recruiting source, followed closely by large job boards. Some of the less used sources include mass media and the military.

- Organizations are increasingly using combination structures--in other words, part of their staffing function is centralized, part is decentralized. The numbers vary greatly depending on industry, with transportation being much more centralized while education is much less so.

- Cost-per-hire varied wildly, from $2,000 (retailing, hospitality) to $16,000 (pharma biotech).

- Same goes with time-to-start, with retailing at 4 weeks and government at 12 weeks, with an average around 7-8 weeks.

- 11% of employers report poor performance among new hires; 20% report superior performance.

- Competition for talent and candidate quality were the two most important issues reported.

- More than 80% of respondents have adopted an ATS but few have a "talent management suite."

You can sign up for their newsletter here. It's one of the shorter, more digestible ones.

2008 IPMAAC Conference: Presentations

With memories of last week's IPMAAC conference fresh in my head (and what a great conference it was!), I thought I would mention that presentation slides have already started to appear at the website.

Here's a sample of what's already up:

Police recruiting and retention: "It's Showtime"

Implementing an assessment program for executive candidates

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Expect many more to pop up in the next few weeks.

Interested in becoming a member? Go here.

Unproctored internet testing: Safe for some tests?

One of the biggest trends in personnel assessment is the movement toward on-line testing. Many organizations are experimenting with so called unproctored Internet testing (UIT), where candidates are allowed to take the exams whenever, and wherever, they want.

Benefits? Extremely convenient for the candidate. Less administrative resources needed by the employer.

Costs? Bye-bye exam security, hello cheating opportunities. Not only is your test out for everyone to see, but you have no real way of knowing (sans biometric verification) who is taking the test.

Some organizations have decided the benefits outweigh the risks, and a new study in the June 2008 issue of the International Journal of Selection and Assessment may provide support for their position.

In it, the authors looked at over 800 applicants from nine European countries that took a test of perceptual speed in an unproctored setting, then followed this up with a proctored parallel version. Results? Not only was there no evidence of cheating, they found the opposite effect--people did better in the proctored setting.

Now before everyone throws out their proctored exams, note that this is a type of test that might be hard to cheat on--at least in one way. Because this is a perceptual speed test, there are no "right" answers that can be looked up. It also required very quick responses. So the only way to cheat would be to have someone take the test for you. Implication: it may make more sense to use certain UITs than others.

This topic is a source of much debate in the assessment community, and there is by no means consensus on the right way to go. But studies like this help!

Take a deep breath, because there's a lot more in this issue:

- The preliminary employment interview as a predictor of assessment center outcomes (fascinating look at how the AC may only make sense for mid-range interview scorers)

- A comparison of the common-item and random-groups equating designs using empirical data (for you IRT fans out there)

- The influence of external recruitment practices on job search practices across domestic labor markets: A comparison of the United States and China

- Beneath the surface: Uncovering the relationship between extraversion and organizational citizenship behavior through a facet approach (a more nuanced look at the relationship shows extraversion can predict OCBs)

- Comparing personality test formats and warnings: Effects on criterion-related validity and test-taker reactions (another good one...personality test added predictive validity beyond ability test but no validity difference between forced-choice and Likert scales, nor between warning and no-warning conditions; forced-choice and warnings may produce negative candidate reactions)

- Applicant selection expectations: Validating a multidimensional measure in the military (describes development of a new measure of applicant perception of the selection process)

- Selecting for creativity and innovation: The relationship between the innovation potential indicator and the team selection inventory

In search of highly skilled workers

The U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) has a new study out called In Search of Highly Skilled Workers. Like all MSPB studies, it's focused on the federal government. But it has a lot of good info regardless of what sector you're in.

For example:

- MSPB recommended that departments should not rely exclusively on USAJOBS since this was not the primary way people found out about jobs--word of mouth was, through friends/relatives or their supervisor/co-workers

- More and more hires are being made from the veterans program, and this results in the most white males compared to other mechanisms; this has resulted in upper level hires trending toward white males. Interestingly, the most diverse hires were made through "direct hire", which does not require rating & ranking candidates.

- Use of the competitive exam process (e.g., need to rate & rank) is less and less frequent.

- Job security was by far the top reason new hires applied for federal jobs; other highly ranked factors included mission of organization, opportunity to serve the public/do good, benefits, and opportunity to use talents/have a better job.

- OPM's television campaign is seeing some success, with increased traffic.

- Candidates are pretty lazy and/or strapped for time. About 1/3 of hires did not apply for other jobs because they would have had to re-write their narrative description of their KSAs while about 1/4 did not because they would have to have rewritten their resume (!).

- More than ½ of upper-level hires were not aware of their application status until they called for an interview/job offer (sadly, probably not that rare).

- Many new hires indicated they would have accepted their job even with a reduction in pay because of workplace flexibilities and benefits.

- Coordination of hiring managers and HR was key: 98% of managers involved with the development of assessment tools said they got the talent they needed; only 82% of managers not involved felt that way.

- Upper level hires were willing to wait about 2 months between job application and job offer--most felt anything after that was unreasonable.

- Things the feds don't do well? According to new hires, they don't deal effectively with poor performers, their leave benefits could be better, and (not surprisingly) they weren't thrilled with the pay.

- Something else federal departments can improve on: providing clear minimum qualifications that truly are the "lowest bar", and verifying that applicants have them.

Good lessons here for employers everywhere.

Mini book review: Groundswell

Did you know that by reading this blog post you've been put into a category? Yep, at the very least you're a "spectator." In fact, you might be a "joiner", a "collector", a "critic" or even (as I am) a "creator." Where am I getting these labels? They all come from Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff's new book, Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies.

This is by no means a new subject. There have been quite a few books in recent years that cover social technologies and how they can be used productively. But these books have tended to have either a more narrow focus (e.g., by focusing on particular technologies or organizational functions such as marketing) or an extremely broad focus. In Groundswell, Li and Bernoff, both VPs and analysts at Forrester Research, describe the current slate of social technologies and provide organizations with a road map of how they should (or shouldn't) be used.

Those of you familiar with Charlene's blog will recognize much of the content of the book--in fact to be honest there aren't a lot of new concepts in the book, which is a potential drawback. The book is, to a large extent, a collection of the various concepts that the authors have already published. But there's no denying that having it all in one place is mighty handy, and the in-depth case studies serve to flush out the details. And those of you that aren't avid readers of the blog will find much in here to digest.

So what is "the groundswell"? According to the authors it's "A social trend in which people use technologies to get the things they need from each other, rather than from traditional institutions like corporations."

These technologies include all the usual suspects, including blogs, wikis, social networks, forums, review sites, tags, RSS, widgets--you get the point. They also touch on newer technologies such as Twitter (which isn't so new anymore).

The biggest strength of the book lies in its description of two concepts:

- the social technographic ladder, a graphical description of various categories of technology participation. These are the categories I mentioned at the beginning of this post and it's how the authors suggest organizations stratify their customers to figure out what social technology will work best.

- POST, the authors' recommendation for how to plan to engage the groundswell. This deliberate, logical approach to using social technologies is the biggest takeaway from the book. It recognizes that not all technologies are appropriate for all organizations and provides users with a rational way of planning the strategic implementation of them.

On balance, the book is an easy read and provides a great mix of big picture considerations with real-world examples. Unless you're completely new to the subject it's not likely to rock your world, but if you're interested in using social technologies but aren't sure how, this is not a bad book to have.

What would improve the book? More specifics--details--on how exactly to use the technologies. Best practices for setting up a Facebook page, for example. The different blogging platforms and their pros and cons. It's not enough to understand the concept of the technology--you need to understand the technology itself.

So what does all this have to do with recruitment and assessment? Quite a bit actually, but mostly with the former (after all, check out where people spend their time). Tapping into social technologies is a great way to spread and monitor your employment brand--i..e, why should people want to work for you? It's also a great way to identify potential candidates and spread the word about opportunities. In terms of testing, we're not there yet (and won't be until we have a secure database of individual test scores). But maybe that's okay--after all you want a job-person match, not a person-test score match.

So why did I call this a mini-review? Because I haven't read the whole book (yet). I've read most of the beginning and latter chapters, but haven't made my way through the middle, which is comprised mostly of case studies. I don't claim to have read it cover-to-cover, so take this review with that in mind.

Web 2.0 Presentation

Last week I had the pleasure of presenting at WRIPAC's April meeting in beautiful Napa, CA.

The topic was "Recruiting in the Age of Web 2.0" and I covered topics such as wikis, social networking, and blogs (which, coincidentally, I'm sure they're talking about right now just over the hills in San Francisco at the Web 2.0 Expo).

For those of you that weren't able to attend but are interested, you can view the slideshow below or here.

New York City settles discrimination case for $21M

Eliot Spitzer isn't the only one in New York that's paying for mistakes.

New York City has agreed to settle an employment discrimination case that dates back to 1999 for $21 million. This case is particularly interesting given its focus on recruiting practices.

The class action lawsuit was filed by black and Hispanic employees of the Department of Parks and Recreation who complained that the department was illegally discriminating in its promotion and assignment practices.

Specifically:
"The plaintiffs complained that they were bypassed by promotions because of a recruiting program Mr. Stern [the former Parks commissioner] had started to recruit young graduates of elite colleges — nearly all of them white — to fill positions in the agency."

Of the recruiting program, Mr. Stern said:
"The program was to get young college graduates to work long hours at low salaries. The problem was you couldn’t [get] black graduates to work for $22,000 or $25,000, either because they had loans or were offered better jobs by companies that wanted them."

What could the City have done to prevent this situation? Given the actual statistics (the article states 40 of the 179 hired were black or Hispanic), this was likely more about the fairness and perception of the process rather than hiring numbers. A different communication strategy and engagement with current employees likely would have gone a long way toward preventing the complaints.

Note that this lawsuit is separate but related from a one filed in 2002 (that was settled in 2005) which claimed that the department was illegally discriminating by favoring whites for promotion. That suit contended that:

"Time and again...the Parks Department failed to follow any objective guidelines for determining promotions and filling management positions, failed to post notices of job openings, and ‘’rarely, if ever'’ conducted the required interviews for vacancies."

As part of the current settlement agreement, the City agreed to:

"train interviewers to ensure that employees who apply for promotions are treated fairly and objectively; and to examine the process by which managers are selected in the future."

Good lessons for employers everywhere.

New MSPB study has gems

A new study out by the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), "Attracting the next generation: A look at federal entry-level new hires," while focused on the federal government, has good information for all of us. The study of recent federal hires uses data from over 1,000 survey participants as well as personnel records. Some of the insights include:

- Both those under 30 and those 30+ were most likely to find out about the job through a friend or relative. On the other hand, those 30+ were more likely to use USAJOBs and agency web sites, whereas those under 30 (not surprisingly) were more likely to discover jobs through school job fairs or placement offices. In addition, those under 30 were more likely to use "non-government job sites."

- The most common forms of assessment used were (mostly unstructured) interviews and reviews of transcripts. Narrative statements, written exams, and job simulations were (unfortunately) used much less often--despite evidence of their superior ability to predict job performance.

- Agencies also relied heavily on the "point method" for reviewing training and experience--i.e., the more training/experience you have, the higher your score. This despite evidence that the correlation between experience and performance is complex and peaks fairly quickly, while education does not generally predict performance very well. Not to mention that they make little sense when hiring for entry-level jobs.

- There were very few differences between age groups when it came to what applicants wanted in a job. For both the under 30 and 30+ groups, salary and benefits came out tops. The only significant differences came when looking at pensions (more popular among those 30+) and health insurance and tuition reimbursement (more popular among those under 30). Job security was also mentioned by both groups as a big draw to the federal government.

- Those under 30 were much less likely to predict staying with the feds for their entire career (although still an impressive 45%), and more likely to predict eventually moving to the private sector.

- "Length of the process" was by far the biggest obstacle faced by applicants in their pursuit of a federal job.


MSPB recommends federal agencies make several improvements to their recruiting and assessment efforts, including:

- Use more predictive assessment tools instead of relying on training and experience measures.

- Use a balanced set of recruitment practices to reach all the various segments of the job market. MSPB points out that conducting a proper job analysis and identifying true minimum qualifications can help cut down the number of unqualified applicants.

- Market what is important to applicants. For federal agencies this means job security, benefits, and the ability to make a difference.

- Evaluate the hiring process and remove any obstacles that are unnecessarily lengthening the process.

- Avoid stereotyping based on generational assumptions, since the data indicate substantial similarities between age groups in what they want out of a job.

Again, good information for all of us. There's a lot more information in the report.

U.S. Army recruiting challenges continue

Despite aggressive (and creative) recruiting tactics, and a $4B budget, the U.S. Army failed to meet its recruiting goal in 2007, according to a report by the National Priorities Project.

Even worse than missing the numbers, the Army continues to see a change in who is being recruited. For the third consecutive year they failed to get sufficient numbers of recruits with high school diplomas, which the Army reports is the single best predictor of successful completion of a first term of enlistment.

In addition, historically, the Army had a goal of at least 67% of recruits landing in at least the 50th percentile of the Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT, which tests word knowledge, paragraph comprehension, arithmetic reasoning, and mathematics knowledge; more details here). Since 2005 this number has fallen and in 2007 it was 60.8%.

The Army puts educational attainment and AFQT scores together for a measure of "quality." According to the report:

A ‘high quality’ recruit is one who scores at or above the 50th percentile on the AFQT, and who is tier I (has a regular high school diploma or better). The DoD strives to have all recruits be ‘high quality’ as these recruits will be more likely to complete contracted enlistment terms and perform better in training and on the job.

Unfortunately the percentage of "high quality" recruits continues to drop. In 2005 it was 56.2%. Last year it was 44.6%.

The report includes state-by-state tables as well as a discussion of what the implications of this recruiting challenge are for the Army. Worth a look.

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!

December '07 IJSA, Part 2

In a previous post I described one of the most interesting articles in the December '07 issue of IJSA (the International Journal of Selection and Assessment (IJSA)). In this post I'll go over the rest of the issue.

First up, Carless & Imber with a study of interviewer characteristics. Using a sample of 450 graduate students, they found that personal aspects of the interviewer, such as warmth, friendliness, and humor, as well as job-related aspects such as job knowledge and general competence, had effects on how attracted the person was to the job as well as their likely job choice intentions. Not only that, aspects of the interviewer impacted how anxious the interviewee was. Lesson: Much like recruiters, make sure people doing the interviewing are trained and the type of people you'd like representing your organization!

Next, LaHuis, MacLane, and Schlessman with a study of reapplication among 542 applicants to a U.S. government position. Focusing on the 9% that didn't get the job but reapplied the following year, the authors found that "opportunity to perform" played a significant role in reapplication behavior. Lesson: If you want people to reapply, give them the chance to show their strengths.

Third, Carless and Wintle with a study of what attracts applicants to particular job opportunities--specifically looking at flexible career paths and who's doing the recruiting. Participants were 201 "young, inexperienced job seekers" who completed a questionnaire. Results? Flexible career paths were a big attraction (compared to traditional career paths) but recruiter background (HR or external agency) made no difference, in line with previous research that's found that recruiter personality is the key rather than things like background or demographics.

Next, Hermelin, Lievens, and Robertson conducted a meta-analysis of assessment center scores. Based on 26 studies (N=5,850) the authors found a corrected correlation of .28 between AC scores and subsequent supervisory ratings, which they hypothesize is lower than the true value due to range restriction of assessment center scores (and lower than the corrected value of .37 that Schmidt & Hunter reported). Alternate version (if the link gets fixed) here.

Heinsman, et al. provide the next study, which looks at how psychologists view the makeup and measure of competencies, still a hot topic in HR circles. Using data from over 900 applicants who participated in a 1-day selection process, they examined the relationship between competencies including Thinking, Feeling, and Power with traditional measures of cognitive ability, personality, and assessment center performance. Results? To assess Thinking, psychologists in this study relied upon measures of cognitive ability (makes sense!). To assess Feeling, they used interview simulation scores as well as personality tests scores. Finally, when analyzing Power, they relied mostly on personality scores.

Last but not least, Lievens and Anseel with a fascinating study of creating alternate versions of computerized in-baskets. The alternate version used a very similar situation that people had to respond to, but altered the context for 10 of the 20 items. Results? No significant difference in overall in-basket score between the two forms. So if you're looking to duplicate your in-baskets, check this out! Oh, and there's an alternate version of the article here.

Okay, I might as well tell you about the other two articles, because you might be interested. One is on self and peer ratings and one is on survey non-respondents (hint: it's not the star performers that aren't responding). Both have interesting results, so check 'em out!

December '07 IJSA, Part 1

The December '07 issue of the International Journal of Selection and Assessment (IJSA) has a lot of great content, so I decided to split it up between two posts. This post will be devoted to one of the studies because it's such a hot topic--web-based recruitment.

In this study, Van Hoye and Lievens gathered data from 108 applicants for head nurse positions in Belgium and looked at how they responded to two types of web-based information. The first was employee testimonials ("click here to see our happy employees talk about their jobs!"), a very common approach used by many organizations including Enterprise, Google, and the U.S. government.

The second was employer recommendations via word of mouth; in this case because it was over the web, the authors dubbed it word-of-mouse ("hey, did you hear about the opportunity at XWZ? They're a great place to work.").

Results? Well, there are several, and they all link back to source credibility.

First, word-of-mouse was a more powerful attractant than testimonials. Why? It appears the testimonials are seen as obviously controlled by the organization (and therefore possibly misleading), whereas word-of-mouse is seen as more credible. However, if you're going to use testimonials, those that focus on the individual were much more powerful than those focusing on the organization. The reverse was true for word-of-mouse: a focus on the organization was more powerful than on the employees (which underlines the importance of employer brand).

The big result is that considering all four combinations, word-of-mouse information about the organization was the clear winner in terms of attracting applicants. So efforts designed to increase the likelihood of people spreading the good word about your organization are likely to pay off. How do we do that? The authors offer some focus areas:

- image management
- campus recruitment
- building relationships with key opinion leaders (e.g., career counselors, class presidents)
- employee referral programs
- internships

I would add another: make sure your employees like what they do! Happy employees are hands down one of your most effective recruiting techniques (assuming you can't offer millions in stock options).

This is a keeper, folks, and there's a version here thanks to Dr. Lievens.

Content of the year

At the end of this, the first full year of this blog's existence, I decided to take a look back at 2007 and give you my Top 5 most popular posts of the year:

1. Jobfox plays matchmaker (there continues to be significant interest in Jobfox and their non-traditional approach to matching applicants with employers)

2. Reliability and validity--it's okay to Despair(.com). Whether it's the statistics words or Despair, I'll never know. But people sure like those little posters (and remember, you can make your own).

3. Personality testing basics (Part 2). As you can see from the sidebar survey, folks continue to be very interested in personality testing.

4. Wonderlic revises their cognitive ability test. Wonderlic, one of the oldest and most famous testing companies, continues to generate interest.

5. Checkster and SkillSurvey automate reference checking. There's further development to be had, but I do believe these tools could be a boon to HR and supervisors alike.

Okay, so enough about me. What about what everyone else is writing about? Here are my nominations for content of the year:

1. Morgeson et al. fired a shot across the bow of personality testing with their piece in Personnel Psychology that resulted in multiple, shall we say, not so thrilled responses. I don't know where this debate is going (although I suspect alternate measurement methods will play a part) but it sure is fun to watch!

2. There were some great books I came across this year. Particular props for Understanding statistics, Evidence-based management, and Personality and the fate of organizations. Yes, they were all published in 2006...are you saying I'm behind?

3. Dineen et al.'s great little piece of research on P-O fit and website design in the March issue of J.A.P. that I wrote about here. Take a look at your career website with these results in mind.

4. The Talent Unconference was a big success, and I'm very thankful that many of the presentations were videotaped; I put up links to some of them here

5. McDaniel et al.'s meta-analysis of situational judgment test instructions. Not only is this a great piece of research, it's (still) free!

So what about my New Years wish from last year? I'm still waiting. Although if people search databases like Spock eventually get up enough steam...perhaps I'll get my wish?

Here's to hoping 2008 is filled with interesting and useful things!

November '07 Issue of J.A.P.

The November 2007 issue of the Journal of Applied Psychology is full of interesting articles, including several relating to recruiting and assessment. Let's take a look:

First, a field study by Hebl et al. on pregnancy discrimination. Female confederates posed as job applicants or customers at retail stores, sometimes wearing a pregnancy prosthesis. As "pregnant" customers, they received more "benevolent" behavior (e.g., touching and over-friendliness), but as job applicants they received more hostile behavior (e.g., rudeness). The latter effect was particularly noticeable when confederates applied for stereotypically male jobs. This isn't a form of discrimination that gets as much play as others, but may be much more common than we think. My guess is a lot of people associate pregnancy with impending time off and don't focus as much on the competencies these women bring to the job.

Second, a study on faking. But wait, not faking on personality tests, faking during interviews. Levashina and Campion developed an interview faking behavior scale and then tested it with actual interviews. Guess what? Scores on the scale correlated with getting a second interview. (Looks like those classes you took on answering vaguely are going to pay off!) But wait, there's more. The authors also found that behavioral questions were more resistant to faking than situational questions (another reason to use 'em!), and follow-up questions INCREASED faking (another reason NOT to 'use em!). Other goodies in this article: over 90% of undergraduate job candidates fake during employment interviews (I assume that's just this sample), BUT, the percentage that were actually lying, or close to it, was less (28-75%).

Third, Brockner et al. provide research results that underline how important procedural fairness (justice) is. Three empirical studies demonstrated that employees judge organizations as being more responsible for negative outcomes when they experienced low procedural fairness. So when applicants or employees get bad news, they'll blame the organization even more if they feel the process used was unfair. Why do we care? Because perceptions of procedural fairness impact all kinds of things, including recruiting (e.g., how someone reacts to not getting a job) and the likelihood of filing a lawsuit (for, say, discrimination).

Fourth, Lievens, Reeve and Heggestad with a look at the impact of people re-taking cognitive ability tests. Using a sample of 941 candidates for medical school that took an admissions exam with a cognitive component, the authors found that retesting introduced both measurement and predictive bias: the retest scores appeared to be measuring memory rather than g, and predictive validity (of GPA) was eliminated. More evidence that re-testing effects are non-trivial. Pre-publication version here.

Last but definitely not least, one of my favorite topics--web-based recruitment. Allen, Mahto, & Otondo present results from 814 students searching real websites. When controlling for a student's image of the employer, job and organizational information correlated with their intention to pursue employment. When controlling for information search, a student's image of the employer was related to the intention to pursue employment, but familiarity with the employer was not. Finally, attitudes about recruitment source influenced attraction and partially mediated the effects of organizational information. What does all this mean? Don't throw your eggs into one basket--organizational image is important, but so is the specific information you have on your website about your organization and the specific job.

There's a lot of other good stuff in this volume, including articles on the financial impact of specific HRM practices, a meta-analysis of telecommuting impacts, engaging older workers, and daily mood.

Jobfox members look upward

Jobfox is a job site I've posted about before that is making an attempt to more accurately match candidates with employers. The idea is to allow candidates to describe themselves in detail, including their work preferences, then have employers seek them (hence their motto, "be the hunted.")

Speaking of work preferences, one of the features the Jobfox offers is the ability for candidates to select up to five features of a job that they value the most--things like 401k matching, unstructured environment, and work/life balance.

Since Jobfox has all this information on people, they recently posted an analysis of results of over 6,000 registered job seekers. The press release focuses on the dearth of "green" factors people are looking for (e.g., looking for a company that is ecologically friendly), but to me the take home is about career advancement. Take a look at the top six desired job qualities:

Advancement opportunity (55%)
More leadership responsibility (41%)
Work/life balance (38%)
Leadership that's respected/admired (36%)
Sense of accomplishment (36%)
Higher salary (28%)

Notice that half of these, including the two most popular, are related to moving up in an organization.

The other result of note has to do with another kind of green (in the U.S. at least). Look at where salary is--down at #6. This suggests (and smart organizations know) there are ways of attracting and retaining talented folks simply by offering ways for people to take on increased responsibility and leadership opportunities, or restructuring the job (which might also help with that sense of accomplishment).

Looking far and wide

When it comes to finding talented individuals, how far and wide do you look? Are you as creative as you could be?

In a recent article James E. Challenger, of the outsourcing firm Challenger, Gray, and Christmas, described the results of a new study in which half of the 100 HR executives polled stated their companies work informally with former employees; 23% considered stay-at-home parents to be valuable recruiting targets. The goal? Finding folks that are experienced and easy to train.

What does your organization do when people leave? Does it go beyond getting a forwarding address? How about following a structured approach to keep track of talented individuals in case their next job fizzles?

Challenger cites Lehman Brothers as a leader in this area with its Encore program, which according to the website is "designed to facilitate networking and professional development opportunities for individuals interested in resuming their careers in the financial services industry. Ideal candidates are women and men, preferably with industry-related experience at a vice-president level or above, who have voluntarily left the workforce for a year or more."

Does your organization actively recruit people that have been out of the workforce for a year or more? Or are these people seen as "stale"?

The article also includes "resources for returning parents", including:

UCEAdirectory.org (searchable database of continuing education courses)

Meetup.com (real-world social networking)

Modernmom.com (advice on activities and work-life balance)

Showmomthemoney.com (money tips, degree links, and more)

Ladies Who Launch (networking and entrepreneurial advice)

Has your organization considered recruiting efforts that target these types of groups? Or is it hoping that qualified applicants find you?

Some things to think about as we all work on being more creative with reaching out to all qualified candidates. I bet there are a lot of folks out there that would love to see a list of employers willing to hire returning workers (as well those that are open to part-time arrangements).

Links a go-go for October 1, 2007

Good reading for October 1, 2007

The new affirmative action (about schools, but lessons for employers)

2007 ILG National Conference Highlights

Don't automatically dismiss people that been fired

Court rules EEOC may proceed with discrimination case against L.A. Weight Loss

Visa and using credit scores in the hiring process

Hiring supervisors and leaders (the #1 problem of most organizations, IMHO)

Deloitte demonstrates just how creative recruiting can be

How many names does it take to get to a hire?

Who does The Gap think it is? Monster?

The Corporate Leavers Survey

This just in from the Level Playing Field Institute: a new study, sponsored by Korn/Ferry, that finds that corporate unfairness, in the form of "every-day inappropriate behaviors such as stereotyping, public humiliation and promoting based upon personal characteristics" costs U.S. employers $64 billion annually.

This sum, based on survey responses from 1,700 professionals and managers, is an estimate of "the cost of losing and replacing professionals and managers who leave their employers solely due to workplace unfairness. By adding in those for whom unfairness was a major contributor to their decision to leave, the figure is substantially greater."

Examples of the type of behavior they're talking about:

- the Arab telecommunications professional who, upon returning from visiting family in Iraq, is asked by a manager if he participated in any terrorism

- the African-American lawyer who is mistaken THREE TIMES for a different black lawyer by a partner at that firm

- the lesbian professional who is told that the organization offers pet insurance for rats, pigs, and snakes, but does not offer domestic partner benefits

What does this have to do with recruiting? Aside from the obvious (turnover-->need to backfill), check this out:

One of the top four behaviors most likely to prompt someone to quit: being asked to attend extra recruiting or community related events because of one's race, gender, religion or sexual orientation.

Not only that, but 27% of respondents who experience unfairness at work in the last year said this experience "strongly discouraged them" from recommending their employer to other potential applicants.

What can employers do to prevent this? Aside from the tried and true methods (good and regular training for all supervisors, prompt and thorough investigations), the report offers other suggestions, which vary depending on the group (e.g., more/better benefits for gay and lesbian respondents, better managers for people of color).

Definitely some things to ponder.

Summary here

More games

I've posted before (here and here) about how Google and other companies are literally using boardgames as part of their applicant screening process, and how I'm not a big fan of this technique.

The September, 2007 issue of Business 2.0 has an article titled "Job Interview Brainteasers" that highlights another type of game employers play--this time, it's asking "creative" questions during the interview.

Let's take a look at some interview questions from the article and who's asked them:

How much does a 747 weigh? (Microsoft)

Why are manhole covers round and not, say, square? (Microsoft)

How many gas stations are there in the United States? (Amazon.com)

How much would you charge for washing all the windows in Seattle? (Amazon.com)

You have 5 pirates, ranked from 5 to 1 in descending order. The top pirate has the right to propose how 100 gold coins should be divided among them. But the others get to vote on his plan, and if fewer than half agree with him, he gets killed. How should he allocate the gold in order to maximize his share but live to enjoy it? (eBay, and, similarly, Pirate Master)

You are shrunk to the height of a nickel and your mass is proportionally reduced so as to maintain your original density. You are then thrown into an empty glass blender. The blades will start moving in 60 seconds. What do you do? (Google)

These questions have been around for quite a while and are used to measure things like creativity and estimation ability. The question is: Are they any better than board games? Probably. But they're still a bad idea.

Why do I say that? Well, first of all, a lot of people find these questions plain silly. And this says something about your organization. Sure, some people think they're fun or different. But many more will scratch their head and wonder what you're thinking. And then they'll wonder if they really want to work with you. Particularly folks with a lot of experience who aren't into playing games--they want to have a serious conversation.

Second, there are simply better ways of assessing people. If you want to know how creative someone is, ask them a question that actually mirrors the job they're applying for.

Want to know how they would tackle a programming question? Ask them. In fact, you can combine assessment with recruitment, as Spock recently did.

Want them to estimate something? Think about what they'll actually be estimating on the job and ask them that question. And so on...

Another advantage of these types of questions? The answers give you information you can actually use. (Hey, you've got them in front of you, why not use their brains)

If you don't really care about the assessment side of things, and in reality are just using these questions as a way to communicate "we're cool and different" (as I suspect many of these companies are doing) there are better ways of doing this. Like communicating in interesting and personal ways (e.g., having the CEO/Director call the person). Like talking about exciting projects on the horizon. Like asking candidates what THEY think of the recruitment and assessment process (gasp!).

My advice? Treat candidates with respect and try your darnedest to make the entire recruitment and assessment process easy, informative, and as painless as possible. Now THAT'S cool and different.