Author Archives: Tom Foster

About Tom Foster

Tom Foster spends most of his time talking with managers and business owners. The conversations are about business lives and personal lives, goals, objectives and measuring performance. In short, transforming groups of people into teams working together. Sometimes we make great strides understanding this management stuff, other times it’s measured in very short inches. But in all of this conversation, there are things that we learn. This blog is that part of the conversation I can share. Often, the names are changed to protect the guilty, but this is real life inside of real companies.

Isn’t That Too Many Questions?

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From the Ask Tom mailbag –

Question:
You suggest ten questions regarding each Key Result Area with 2 drill down questions. As an example, you suggest 150 questions would be reasonable.

How do you handle that practically. If you ask a candidate 150 questions and give two minutes per question for response, you are looking at 300 minutes for an interview (5 hours, not counting breaks).

Maybe for an executive position such a marathon interview process could be done but it seems difficult with several candidates to have interviews of such length. Is this practical or am I missing something?

Response:
You are not missing anything, you are just used to giving candidates two minutes to make up stuff, inflate their experience, exaggerate about skills and generally waste your time.

In preparation for the interview, I identify a number of Key Result Areas (KRAs).  In each KRA, I have identify tasks, activities, accountabilities and the level of work.  I need to know some very specific information about the candidate.

For example.

I am interviewing for a dispatcher role for a fleet based service company, with thirty trucks on the road.  Each afternoon, my dispatcher reviews all the leftover work and makes sure it gets on the following morning schedule.  In spite of the schedule, fifty percent of those service calls will get re-scheduled during the day.  During the day, an additional 90 service calls will get added to the mix.  Our target turnaround time for all service calls to be completed is 24 hours.

Here is a partial list of questions I might ask.

  • In your former position, as a dispatcher, how many service vehicles in your fleet?
  • What was the geographic range for your entire fleet?
  • What was the geographic range for a single vehicle?
  • How many service calls did each vehicle take per day?
  • What was the target turnaround time from the time of the customer call to the customer’s home?
  • What was the length of each service call?
  • How many service calls each day had to be re-scheduled?
  • What were the primary reasons for service calls to be rescheduled?
  • At the end of the day, how many service calls would be left over?
  • How were those left-over service calls scheduled for the following day?
  • What dispatch software did you use?
  • Step me through a customer call, how was it scheduled in the software?
  • How did you know when a call was completed?
  • Were customer satisfaction calls made after the service call?
  • Who made the customer satisfaction calls?
  • Step me through how the customer satisfaction data was recorded?
  • Step me through how the customer satisfaction data was used?
  • What changes were made to the dispatch system based on the customer satisfaction data?

Does it take two minutes to answer each question?  Do these questions give you insight into the exact experience level of the candidate?  Can you think of additional drill-down questions you might ask during the course of this small sample?

And I am only getting warmed up.

How Many Questions to Ask in an Interview

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From the Ask Tom mailbag –

Question:

Yesterday, you talked about how we could evaluate the capability of a team member related to the work.  Your focus was all about the work, calibrating the level of work in the role.  But your evaluation appears to depend on observation of actual work output.  I get it.  But how do we evaluate capability in non-employees, candidates we are interviewing for roles.  Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of observation.  We get to ask them questions.  That’s it.  How do we evaluate capability?

Response:

Interviewing candidates and gathering clues on their capability is certainly more difficult than observing team members in actual work output (applied capability).  But the platform is the same, we just have to capture our clues in a different way.

It’s all about the work.  It’s still all about the work.  With internal team members, calibrating capability requires an accurate definition of the work, an accurate definition of the stratum level of work.  In a candidate interview, the cornerstone document is still the role description.

The role description should be organized into Key Result Areas, those tasks and activities that go together, grouped together.  And those tasks and activities that don’t go together, separated from each other.  Most roles have between 5-8 Key Result Areas (KRAs).  This is where the work, the level of work gets clearly defined.

In each KRA, my discipline is to create ten written questions about the work, decisions to be made and problems to be solved in the role.  If you have five KRAs, you will have 50 written questions.  If the role contains eight KRAs, you will have 80 written questions.

And the questions are all about the work.

For every written question that you ask, I expect you to ask two drill down questions.  So, if you have 50 written questions, at the end of the interview, you will have asked 150 questions, all about the work.

In the course of your previous interviews, it is unlikely you have ever asked 150 specific questions about the work contained in the defined role.  If you had, you would have a very clear idea about the candidates capability related to the work, the candidate’s capability related to the level of work.

It’s all about the work.

How to Evaluate Capability in a Candidate

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From the Ask Tom mailbag –

Question:

How can I test to see if a person has Stratum II or Stratum III capability?

Response:

If you are looking for a paper and pencil test, there is none.  There is no test with a set of answers that you shove into a computer that divines a person’s capability.  Elliott chuckled when this question was posed.  Most psychometric instruments, he observed, have, at best, a .66 correlation with reality.  Most are based on personality, or behavior, or behavior connected to temperament.  While those tests, or profiles have statistical significance for repeatability and in most cases, a stunningly accurate description of a person’s tendencies or behaviors, their evidence of predictability, a specific profile for a specific role has significance barely above flipping a coin (.5 correlation).

Elliott conjectured, if there were a paper and pencil test for capability, its likelihood to stand the same test would likely yield no more than the same .66 correlation with reality.

But your question is still valid and there is a method to satisfy the high curiosity we have about a person’s capability related to the level of work.  There is no trick, no special technique, no psychological requirement that we climb inside the head of our candidate and play amateur psychologist.

Moreover, the validity of this method reveals between .89 and .97 inter-rater reliability.

It’s all about the work.  Focus on the work.  As you define the role, its task and activities, goals and objectives, what is the level of work?  Does the role contain Stratum II level of work or Stratum III level of work?  Examine the decisions that have to be made and the problems that have to be solved.  Examine the time-span of the goals and objectives in the role.  What is the longest time-span task in the role?

The biggest mistake most companies make is underestimating the level of work required in the role.  A defect in the definition of the level of work in the role will most assuredly result in hiring the wrong person.

Examine your role description.  What are the tasks and activities?  What are the decisions that have to be made?  What are the problems that have to be solved?  What is the time-span of the longest task assignment in the role?

Based on that definition of the role, does the candidate provide evidence of effective task completion?  It’s all about the work.

When we spend the time to accurately define the work, and accurately calibrate the level of work in the role, the questions become very simple.  Does this person work as effectively as someone in the top half of the role or the bottom half of the role?  And, in that half, does this person operate as effectively as someone in the top, middle or bottom.

When you ask the team member to do a self-assessment, ask the manager and ask the manager-once-removed (MOR) about effectiveness, the inter-rater agreement approaches .97 (.89-.97).  With this practical evaluation system, why would you want to resort to other methods that might only have a .66 correlation with reality?

It’s all about the work.

Hanging Out the Target

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“So, if morale suddenly improved as the speed of the line improved, what do you think changed? What changed inside their heads?” I asked. Emily and I were talking about her production line’s sudden improvement in both speed and attitude. She mulled the question over.

“Remember, before, we were talking about competence and incompetence,” she was thinking out loud. “I didn’t believe you when you said the problem was incompetence. But now, I see such an improvement, I think you were right.”

“So, what changed inside their heads?” I asked again.

“Before, they didn’t know the daily target number. That single number became a tool for them to get better. They became more competent.”

“They are on their way to mastery,” I said. That word mastery hung out there like a full moon. Inescapable.

“I never thought of it that way.”

“Put the two together.”

“Competence and mastery,” she said.

“Why do people perform at a high level?” I asked.

“Because they can,” she replied. “Give them the tools to become competent and you will see progress.” Emily smiled. It was beginning to sink in.

“At least, that is half the story,” I announced.

“There’s more?” Emily asked.

Wishing for More Productivity

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“They just don’t get it,” protested Kyle. “Why are they so stupid?”

“Why are they so stupid? Or why are you so stupid for expecting them to understand?” I asked.

Kyle did not expect my response and I could see him stiffen in the chair. He didn’t know how to react to the challenge, so he countered with a question.

“What do you mean?” he said, stalling for time. I was quiet. The seconds ticked by. Kyle finally broke the silence. “Okay, they are not stupid. I just wish they could be more productive, and solve problems better, work smarter.”

“You have exactly the kind of team you have designed,” I said. Kyle’s face lightened a bit.

“You know, you are probably right,” he replied. “So, how do I make it better? How can I improve the design?”

I waited. “It’s not a matter of improving the design. It’s a matter of improving the designer.”

Can I Afford to Fill the Role?

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From the Ask Tom mailbag:

Question:
Let’s say I buy into Elliott Jaques model of Requisite Organization. But I have a small company. As you describe the layers in the organization, it is clear that I am missing some key roles. But in this recovery (are we still in recession), I have to stick to my personnel budget. I cannot afford to hire the people necessary to fill all the roles.

Response:
If you were thinking about purchasing a machine, a major expensive machine, for your operations, and you were concerned about budget, how would you make that decision?

Actually, it doesn’t matter whether you are concerned about budget, the answer is still the same. You would purchase the machine only if it were necessary for the operation. I don’t know of a single business owner or manager who would put something in place unless it was necessary.

I use necessity as a driver for many decisions. Is that machine necessary? Is that role necessary? If your business model requires a role, yet your budget will not allow the hire, then you have to modify your business model.  Or you might have to stretch a person across two roles.  And that person might be you.

Rather than questioning the validity of organizational roles and layers, let Elliott’s model help you understand what is missing and what modifications you might have to make until your company gets back in the zone of profitability and growth. You will get there faster.

How to Miss Something Important in a Candidate Interview

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Kirklin was shaking his head.  “I don’t know how we missed it,” he muttered.

“Missed what?” I asked.

“We hired this guy about a month ago, to be a supervisor in one of our technical areas.  Six guys on his team.  How hard could it be?”

“I don’t know, how hard could it be?” I probed.

“Apparently, pretty hard.  His team’s production is behind and his team members are coming up to me privately and complaining.”

“What are they complaining about?”

Kirklin thought for a moment.  “Just general stuff, doesn’t really matter.  Bottom line, this new supervisor has never supervised a team before.”

“Then, why did you pick him for the job?” I wanted to know.

“Well, he was a supervisor at his old job.  I mean, he had a supervisor title.  Today, I asked him how many people he had on his team.  Turns out, he didn’t have a team.  He supervised a machine.”

“How did you miss that in the interview?”

“I guess I never really asked THAT question,” Kirklin replied.

How to Anticipate the Unpredictable

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Brent wasn’t sure he heard me right. I know he was expecting some sympathy for all of his long hours.

“Your long hours are not because you are working hard,” I said. “Your long hours are because you didn’t budget your time.”

He tried the puppy dog look. “But I don’t know exactly how much work there is to do until it piles up on me,” he protested.

“That’s BS,” I responded. “If you would sit down and think about your week coming up, you would find that 95 percent of it is totally predictable.”

“But customers call with questions about their bids, or they want to add something to the project that we quoted for them.  I can’t just tell them that I will get to it next week, they will give the job to one of our competitors,” he defended.

“So, how often does this happen?” I pressed.

“Well, it happens all the time.”

“I thought you said it wasn’t predictable?”

The Just Reward for Hard Work

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I had a hot tip to stop by and visit with Brent. As I entered his office, I noticed his eyes were sunk in. It was Friday, but he didn’t look like he was ready for the weekend.

“You look like crap,” I observed. “When did you get here this morning?”

Brent sat up, a bit startled. “Oh, man,” he said. “I rolled in around 5:00a. I just had to get some stuff done.”

“And when did you leave last night?”

“Well, I got out of here about 9:45p. I don’t know what it is. This has been going on for the past three weeks. On Monday, things don’t look so bad, but come Thursday and Friday, the work just seems to pile up. I have worked the last three Saturdays and last week, had to come in on Sunday. Missed the football game.”

“So, this is not some special project. Just your regular work,” I inquired.

“Yeah, in fact, if I had known about it ahead of time, I could delegate some of it out and it would already be done. But I don’t know about some of this stuff until it’s too late, or don’t realize how long it is really going to take. All of sudden, the pile is stacked up and everyone has gone home. The work’s gotta get done.”

“Brent, what if?” I started. “Brent, what if I don’t believe you.”

How Not to Appear as a Control Freak

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“I am taking over a new department,” explained Ellen. “It’s not a promotion, just a new department. I heard through the grapevine that some people are off-balance wondering what life is going to be like under my direction. Two people said they might quit. How do I let them know that I am not going to be some micro-managing monster?”

“You could wear a sign,” I suggested.

Ellen laughed. “Be serious. I want to let them know that I am not some control freak boss.”

“It sounds backward,” I started, “but instead of telling them about you, why don’t you find out about them?”

Ellen looked puzzled.

“Look, you may be under the microscope. If you become genuinely interested in each of your team members, you will accomplish two things. First, the focus will immediately shift away from you. Second, asking questions about them will speak volumes about you.”