“So, what you are saying to me,” Ellen clarified, “is that I should focus on the work, more clearly define the level of work and then interview the candidate related to the work?”

“Yes. When you embark on this witch hunt to assess the Stratum capability of the candidate, it is too easy to go astray. Your assessment might be right, might be wrong, but in any case, it’s a number, a floating number unrelated to the decision you are trying to make as the hiring manager. The decision is to determine if this candidate will be effective in completing the tasks in the role. That’s it. Everything else becomes mumbo-jumbo.” (Mumbo-jumbo is a scientific term used to describe irrelevant data).

“So, what’s really important is to define the level of work?” she concluded. “How do I do that?”