Russell remained silent, then spoke. “So, I have been ignoring the most important skills during the interview?”

“Perhaps.” I said.

“But it almost seems silly. Am I supposed to ask if they can count?”

“Russell, you said that a critical break-down is in material counts for each day’s production. It is more than just counting. Try these questions.

“Tell me how you handled the materials staging for each day’s production. How many finished units did you produce in a typical day? What were the raw materials that went into each of the finished units? Where did you warehouse the materials? How did you move materials from the warehouse to the staging area? How long did that take in advance of production? When did you check on material availability for each day’s production? How did you handle a stock out?

“Russell, in response to these questions, what are you listening for?”

He smiled, “I’m listening for organizing behavior, working into the future, anticipating problems. It is more than just counting.” -TF

Russell was hanging with me. Turnover at the supervisor level was killing his floor crew. I spoke with some of the team members. They were capable at the production level, but none was up to the role of supervisor. We really did have to go outside. Russell had burned through two supervisors in the past nine months.

“Tell me what you are looking for in this supervisor role.” I asked.

“That’s the problem,” replied Russell. “It’s so hard to find someone with the proper experience. The best guys turn out to be great equipment operators, but they cannot handle the scheduling, cycle counts or material flow.”

“Do you interview them for that?”

Russell looked confused. “What do you mean?”

“Russell, here is what I see. You interview for technical skills, which are important. But the role of the supervisor is a completely different role than that of the technician. Your breakdowns are where the skills of the supervisor are needed most, scheduling, cycle counts and material flow. That’s a critical area to interview for.”

“You want me to interview to see how a guy fills out a schedule?”

“Absolutely. Here is how it sounds. Tell me about your scheduling process. How many people on the crew? One shift or two? Full time or part time? How far into the future? Did you have team leaders? Newbies on the crew? How did you mix them on each shift? Did the production schedule ever change? How did production schedule changes impact the work schedule? How did you handle sick outs?

“Russell, it’s more than filling out a paper schedule, it is how the candidate thinks, then behaves.” -TF

“What about the dark side?” asked Russell. We had been talking about interviewing for attitude. “I understand about interviewing for positive behaviors.” He paused. “But what about the negative stuff. It always seems that the bad attitude stays covered up. A couple of months into the job is when things begin to surface. Can we interview for that?”

“You can interview for any behavior.” I replied. “You can call it attitude, but you cannot see an attitude, you can only see a behavior. Likewise, you cannot interview for an attitude, but you can interview for a behavior. All you have to do is connect behaviors to attitudes. What negative attitude are you thinking of?”

“Arrogance,” Russell said, shaking his head.

“What behavior might be connected to an attitude of arrogance?”

“Maybe, when a supervisor is teaching someone how to operate a machine, if he is arrogant, he will be impatient, talk down to the person and criticize.”

I nodded, “So, here are the questions. Tell me about a time when you had to train someone on a piece of equipment, and they really had some difficulty learning the skill. What piece of equipment was it? What was the person’s first name? Step me through your teaching process. Where did they have difficulty? How did you respond? How many times did you have to repeat the teaching process? Was the person successful in learning the skill?

“Tell me, Russell. If you ask these questions, what are you listening for, in the response?”

Russell thought for a minute. “I guess I would be listening for behaviors. I would be listening for patience. I would be listening for tone of voice. I would be listening for critical feedback, both positive and negative.”

“Exactly. You are now listening for behaviors. These behaviors may be connected to an attitude, but the key is to look for behaviors.” -TF

Russell was waiting for me in the conference room. Our discussion about interviewing had migrated to the soft stuff, the people side of things. “So, tell me,” he asked, “how can we interview for attitude?”

“Well, let’s think about attitude. How is an attitude related to a value?”

Russell thought for a minute. “Values have more staying power. Attitudes can shift sometimes, especially based on a person’s mood. You know, how some people can be fine, then all of a sudden cop an attitude over nothing?”

I nodded. “Even so, I use the same process for discovering attitudes that I do for discovering values. Remember, I cannot see a value nor can I see an attitude. I can only observe behavior. I only interview for behavior. Here is the process.

“How would a person with this attitude behave? If I can translate the attitude into a behavior, I can interview for it.

“For example, if I am looking for a person with a can-do attitude, I ask myself, how does a person with a can-do attitude behave?”

Russell piped up. “So, a person with a can-do attitude would go the extra mile.”

I smiled, “And my question will be, think of a time when you worked on a difficult project that required extra effort? Tell me about the project? What was it that required extra effort? When you discovered it would take extra effort, what did you do? Did you work alone or involve other people? What were the discussions like with others working on the project?”

When all is said and done, what I really care about is the behavior that springs from the attitude. -TF

“We always hire people for their technical skills, but we fire them for who they are.” Russell and I were having a conversation about how to create hiring questions.

“Tell me more. What do you mean you fire them for who they are?” I asked.

“Well, they may have the right experience, know how to handle the technical part of the job, but their attitude is a little out of whack. In the beginning, it doesn’t show up, but after a couple of months, little things appear. After six months, this strange behavior actually begins to flourish and it’s downhill from there.”

“What do mean, strange behavior?” I was getting curious.

“Sometimes, it’s just people skills. They are a little gruff at first, then a couple of people get on their bad side. Pretty soon, they become downright rude. They publicly dress people down in meetings. No one can disagree with them without a huge public confrontation.”

“Do you interview to discover this type of behavior?”

“No, usually the person is pretty well coached by a headhunter on how to handle the interview, so we don’t find out until later.” Russell stopped, his brow furrowed. “You mean you can interview for a bad attitude?”

“Yes, you can. Bring me your job description for that open position. Tomorrow, we will talk about interviewing for both the technical side of things and the soft “people side of things.” -TF

“It’s a matter of business intelligence. It’s a matter of thinking differently about recruiting.” Marcy and I had been talking about sourcing candidates to fill two open positions in her company. “Marcy, how do your salespeople keep up with all the customers and prospective customers in their world?”

“Well, the sales department uses a CRM program. You know, Customer Relationship Management. It’s a database that they can use to keep track of contact information, conversations, likes and dislikes, birthdays, all kinds of stuff.”

“Marcy, have you ever thought about using a low-end off-the-shelf CRM software to keep track of prospective job candidates? Listen, when your sales people go out to meetings, conferences, mixers, do they meet people, collect business cards and find out important information related to customer needs? I just want you to do the same thing. Always be recruiting, always be gathering information, always be collecting business intelligence. You should have the best rolodex in the business, only these days, your rolodex needs to be on steroids, using CRM software. Find out who the players are in your community. Always be sending them information, enticing them toward your company. Invite them to events, send them a card on their birthday. Get aggressive about recruiting.” -TF

Since Marcy was still listening, I continued to talk about the specific things that need to be done to source more candidates in the recruiting effort. “You started by creating the Wanted Poster, like in the old West. Paint a picture of the person you want and get it on paper.

“This does two things for you. First, it creates a picture in your own mind. Many candidates may slip through your fingers because you don’t know who you are looking for. Did you ever decide to buy a car, a specific car, and once you knew what you wanted, you suddenly noticed how many other people were driving that car. You were able to distinguish this year’s model from last year’s model. And they were everywhere.

“Second, you now have something to talk to other people about. You can firmly place the image of this person in the minds of other people, business associates, friends and family. You need to get a posse together to go find these candidates.

“Marcy, you will never get what you want, you will only get what you focus on.” -TF

“I am just not getting quality candidates from the referral agency,” complained Marcy. We were talking about two positions she needed to fill. “I call them and explain what kind of person we need, but they take two weeks to get back to me. And the people they send are just not qualified.”

“Marcy, how do you source other candidates besides the referral agency?” I asked.

“Well, we really don’t have time. We’re just so busy around here. It’s really hard to get good people these days.”

“Marcy, here is my observation. You are not seeing quality candidates because you are not focusing your efforts. If your referral agency is not doing the job, then your company has to take responsibility and source your own candidates. You need to be actively recruiting and networking all the time. You are in the business. You should have a better rolodex than the referral agency. You don’t, because you see recruiting as a distraction. Your expense last year for head hunters was $45,000. And what do you have to show for it. Three positions filled, but two didn’t work out, so you are waiting for the replacement guarantee.”

Marcy didn’t like what she heard, but she was still listening. Is your company having difficulty sourcing candidates? What are you doing about it? What ideas have you used to get more and better people into the interview room? -TF