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.

Things Don’t Fit In the Box

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I was asked to stop by and visit Patricia. Apparently, she had fallen behind in her managerial responsibilities to conduct performance reviews with her team members.

“Why the long face?” I asked.

“You were sent by the enemy,” she joked.

“Yes, and the enemy wants to know why you are resisting the performance appraisals for your team members.”

Patricia paused and slid a form across her desk. “They got this off of some website. We’re supposed to use it as the basis for these performance appraisals. Seems like a big waste of time.”

“How so?”

“Three reasons,” she replied.

  • The form doesn’t specifically apply to the task assignments my team works on.
  • It asks me to rate things on a scale from (1-5). But it leaves me in the dark as to what a (2) means. Or a (4).
  • I have to write down some comment on any rating that is not a (3). It’s easier just to rate everything a (3), but what’s the point?
  • I know if I show this to my team member, it’s just going to start an argument.
  • The instructions tell me to think about situations from the entire past year and describe them in this little box. Things don’t fit in the box.

“That’s five things,” I observed.

“Sorry, I just got carried away.”

Calibration Time

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From yesterday’s comments, some great questions.

Question:
I’ve been thinking about performance appraisals and Time Span lately because many of our front line workers are Stratum I. We have a weekly scorecard and we measure and reward every week, which fits their time span.

Our healthcare company is licensed and, as a stipulation of our license, we’re required to “review” each employee annually. Since I’ve been introduced to Time Span, I can see how these annual reviews are a waste of time for Strata I and II. So, what’s the most meaningful way to comply with our license without wasting everyone’s time?

Response:
First, if it is a requirement of your license, you are not wasting anyone’s time. If you lose your license for non-compliance, then you will be out of business. So take this very seriously. The paperwork should be completed and conform with accepted guidelines.

Now, let’s talk about making Performance Feedback meaningful. You have correctly identified that goals should be reviewed concurrently as they are achieved, meaning, if a team member is working on weekly goals, then they should be reviewed on a weekly basis. It shouldn’t take a lot of time, but a few minutes each week to acknowledge a “job well done,” will pay large dividends to the organization.

So, what would be important to talk about at least once a year? I call it calibration time. Elliott Jaques called it the “Personal Effectiveness Appraisal.” And it doesn’t have to happen ONLY once a year. Calibration should occur at least once a year or any other time the manager sees an observable change in capability (usually positive).

Here are the questions.

  • Is the team member functioning satisfactorily, given the Time Span task assignments in the role?
  • If yes, could this team member function effectively in task assignments with a longer Time Span?
  • If no, could this team member function effectively in task assignments with a shorter Time Span?

This calibration discussion has three participants, the team member, the manager and the manager-once-removed. This discussion rarely takes more than ten minutes.

The brilliance of Elliott’s discovery is that we can use the Time Span of a goal to calibrate and match task assignments to the capability of a team member. This matching is designed to keep people engaged in task assignments that are both well-suited and challenging. What happens to job satisfaction when people are challenged to their maximum level of capability? Not beyond, not below, but right at their maximum?

Because people grow and mature, this calibration should occur at least once a year or any time a manager notices a change in capability.

It’s That Time of Year

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Does your company do Annual Performance Appraisals? What is the purpose of those Performance Appraisals?

Most HR people would propose that they protect the company in the event of a termination. But here is a question to ponder. If your company is involved in litigation over a termination, which side of the table is the first to introduce your Performance Appraisals into evidence?

Gary Markle, in his book Catalytic Coaching, takes most Performance Appraisal systems to the mat. For all that we would want them to do, most often, Performance Appraisals, have the opposite effect. We think they protect us, they are used against us.

In two weeks, Working Leadership Online will tackle this subject. So I am curious, what is your experience with Performance Appraisals? Are they helpful? What is wrong with them?

The Telephone Screen

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How prepared are you to engage in the process of hiring talent?

Preparation saves time in the long run. If you post a position and receive 200 resumes in response, how can you sift through to the right candidates? The only way to efficiently and effectively do this, is through preparation. And in my years, this preparation is only haphazardly done.

Yesterday’s comments drew fire related to Stupid Hiring Questions. Both responses centered around efficiencies in the process, to quickly eliminate unqualified candidates in the interview.

By the time I get to the face-to-face interview, I should only be dealing with the highest probability candidates. But getting to the highest probability candidates still requires hard work.

  • Resume Review
  • Telephone Screening
  • Telephone Interview

Most managers miss the telephone screen. The telephone screen is based around five central questions related to the critical role requirements. It is based on an agreement with the candidate that this phone call has a short time commitment of five minutes or less to answer only a few basic questions. In most cases the telephone screen will last three minutes or less. It is highly efficient in qualifying candidates, allowing us to spend more time with only the best candidates.

A Counterproductive Gift

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If you are interviewing candidates for a position, buyer beware. Here is what you are up against.

While you and your management team are flipping a coin to see who is going to handle the interview, your candidate is in a seminar with a professional coach with the sole purpose to beat you. The stakes are high. The candidate has nothing to lose, everything to gain. And they WILL beat you. This comment posted by a professional coach to demonstrate how the candidate takes advantage of STUPID INTERVIEW QUESTIONS by unprepared managers.

Janet Palmer – Communication Excellence Institute comments, “From the interviewee’s perspective, ‘Tell me about yourself’ is a great question! It allows the candidate to talk about his or her background and capabilities, and how they link to the job description and needs of the hiring organization. For over 20 years, our firm has successfully coached high-level candidates to take full advantage of the wonderful opening question–“Tell me about yourself” or “Tell us why you are interested in this position,” which are essentially the same question–and to respond clearly and directly to the match between the candidate and the position for 3 to 4 minutes, the time during which serious first impressions are made. Our logic (proven by positive results) is that if the candidate can dominate the first critical 3.5 minutes of the interview (as suggested by research), then he or she has the greatest ability to make a favorable impression that is likely to last. I frankly hope interviewers never stop asking that opening question! It’s a gift to the smart candidate.”

And yes, one of the most STUPID INTERVIEW QUESTIONS is “Tell me about yourself.” But not as STUPID as “Tell me where you would like to be in five years.”

Both of these questions allow the candidate to talk in non-specific, inflated, exaggerated drivel. Which is exactly what they are coached to do. One of the Big Five Mistakes made by managers is –

  • The manager loses control of the interview.

Most managers lose control because they are not prepared to ask the real questions that would be helpful in making a sound decision. And if the manager is not prepared, the candidate is trained to take over. Janet is right. It is a GIFT to the candidate.

Unproductive Nonsense

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The third Big Mistake managers make in the hiring process.

  • Manager allows bias and stereotypes to influence the process.

Why?

It’s not that bias and stereotypes are bad. Bias and stereotypes are normal. We all have them. The problem, in the hiring process, is that we make selection decisions based on this bias.

Look, we can’t help having those impressions. They exist. And in the mind of the interviewer, they are formed and connected within seconds of the candidate entering the room. But that’s not the problem either.

The problem is that we allow those bias to make our decisions for us.

The problem, for most managers, is they arrive in the interview without preparation, perhaps 3-4 written questions to ask the candidate. From there, the interview crumbles into unproductive nonsense. Silly hypothetical questions are followed by a plant tour. In the end, the manager has insufficient data to make a decision, so the only criteria left are those impressions formed in the first few seconds of the interview. Back to bias and stereotypes.

Solid preparation is the antidote.

Hiring Threat

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Some of you may have missed this comment posted last week by Michael Cardus on the five Big Mistakes in hiring.

Comment
One area that is not mentioned is the manager allowing fear and concern for their own position to sneak in. I was talking with a friend of mine who is a program director. She said “I am interviewing people for entry level positions who are more qualified than me.”

Listening to her say this, I could hear the concern for her own job. The thought of hiring someone smarter, I may lose my job to the person I hired, or worse, that person, I hired, may get a promotion and become MY BOSS! YIKES.

As the job market is pushing over-qualified people to find work at a rate that they would not have accepted 3 years ago, managers have to work on their self-esteem to learn how to get their egos out of the way.

Response
This is a solid fear that runs through the mind of the manager. It creates a bias in the mind of the manager and there is no escaping it. Working on self-esteem doesn’t help and it is impossible to get your ego out of the way. This is self-preservation and skews the hiring decision.

Elliott Jaques observed this in his research with organizations. Those organizations that handled this, created a role for the Manager Once Removed (the Hiring Manager’s Manager). He describes this role specifically, as a member of the hiring team, to bring perspective and to qualify the candidate pool. Because of this fear, the Hiring Manager might hire too low in capability. The role of the Manager Once Removed (MOR) is to make sure all considered candidates have the Time Span capability for what is required in the role.

This is the current subject area in our Working Leadership series. We have closed our scholarships, but you can still register for this single session – Time Span and Hiring Talent.

Misintrepreting Responses

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Second on the list of the top five mistakes managers make in the hiring process:

  • Manager misinterprets responses in the interview.

Why does this happen? One simple reason. Managers misinterpret responses because they try to interpret responses. Stop trying and you will improve your batting average.

In our Time Span Workshops, I ask how many have taken a psychology course. Lots of hands get raised. Then I ask who has degrees in psychology, very few hands go up. Advanced degrees? No hands go up.

“So, no one in this room is certified by the state to practice psychotherapy or psychoanalysis?” All eyes avoid the question.

Managers misinterpret responses during the selection interview, because they try to play amateur psychologist. Don’t play amateur psychologist. You will improve your decisions in hiring talent.

Manager Misses Important Information

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Yesterday, we talked about the scrutiny, vetting and due diligence we give to a capital budget item like an expensive machine, yet the approach to hiring is less formal, often missing pieces of due diligence. This casual approach is the beginning of a process that spells mismatch, underperformance, compromise and grief.

In a comment yesterday from Michael Cardus, he ends with this statement. “As people we can pass judgment on a machines value, a dis-comfort comes from judging a persons value.”

And yet that is the task in the hiring process, to render a managerial judgment about a person’s potential value to the organization. Why is this so uncomfortable?

Here are the top five mistakes managers make in the hiring process.

  • Manager misses important information during the interview.
  • Manager misinterprets responses.
  • Manager allows bias and stereotypes to influence the process.
  • Manager makes the decision too quickly.
  • Manager loses control of the interview.

Time Span and Hiring Talent is the next Subject Area in Working Leadership Online. We have a couple of scholarships left for that series (starts next Monday, Oct 4), but we are going to close those out today. If you would like one, please reply to Ask Tom.

Effective at Hiring Talent

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From the Ask Tom mailbag:

Question:
If the first managerial authority (according to Elliott Jaques) is Team Member Selection, and we are evaluating a manager’s effectiveness in this area, how will we know?

Response:
Indeed. Can you spot positive managerial behavior? Negative managerial behavior? What’s the difference when it comes to hiring talent?

I believe hiring a person for a role is much like purchasing a piece of capital equipment. Most often, we do a better job of buying the machine, than we do hiring the person. Could we at least pay as much attention when we are hiring?

If we were going to spend $50,000 on a piece of equipment, what kinds of things would we do?

  • Complete current flow chart of production system.
  • Modified flow chart of production system including new piece of equipment.
  • Create a purchase committee to assist in the elements of the capital purchase.
  • Complete needs analysis for new machine in the production system (specifications, capacity, throughput).
  • Investigation of possible vendors for the new machine.
  • Comparison of machine candidates.
  • Research in user experience using machines of this type.
  • Creation of specific selection criteria.
  • Ranking of selection criteria, absolute criteria, desirable criteria.
  • Ranking of machines against selection criteria.
  • Reference checking with former and current machine users.
  • Machine and vendor selection.
  • Negotiation with vendor for purchase price and terms of delivery, installation and warranty.

Do we spend more time and care? Are we more effective at buying a machine than we are at hiring talent?

Working Leadership Online
Our next Subject Area, Time Span and Hiring Talent will be released on Monday, Oct 5. We have ten slots available for scholarships. Participants will gain access to a powerful diagnostic interview to gauge Time Span. There is a short Field Work assignment and then a feedback session. If you would like to participate, please reply to Ask Tom.