Great comments, yesterday, from Barb and Mukul about Reggie and his dilemma.
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"It was worse than I thought," Reggie stated flatly. "What I didn't realize when I opened up this little fracas, was that the competition started long ago. I nosed around some of my sources. It's been a dysfunctional fight for the past six months, with not only my three candidates, but two others. They are all spread across three departments, so I never saw it."

"What's been going on?" I asked.

"Mostly, it's the subtle non-cooperation of one department with another. Convenient delays, rough hand-offs, missing information. Nothing malicious or brazen, but I have five people working against each other, working against the company."

"Who's the culprit?"

Reggie's demeanor changed. He sat straight up in his chair. The nerve was struck. Chin down, looking over his glasses, furrowed brow, he finally spoke. "I'm the culprit. I thought it was a little healthy competition, but what I created was an environment where individual agendas were more important that teamwork."

"How do we fix it?"

"First, we have to start with the culprit," Reggie shrugged. "And that would be me."

"So, how did you miss this critical piece of information during the interview?" I asked. Ted was beside himself for a recent hire.

"That's the thing. I gave him some theoretical examples to find out what he would do in a couple of specific situations. He answered the questions pretty well," Ted replied.

"Then, what's the problem?"

"He answered the questions pretty well, theoretically speaking, but he had never actually performed the work himself. It is almost like he read a bunch of articles in a trade journal. He knew the buzz words and conceptually how things worked, just no real experience."

"So, what do theoretical questions do for you, as a manager conducting an interview?"

"Quite frankly," continued Ted, "it just encourages the candidate to make stuff up and lie to me."

"Indeed." -TF

"It happened again," Ted explained. "I told myself that the next time we needed to hire someone, I would be prepared for the interview."

"And?" I asked.

"Scott came down the hallway. He said the candidate had talked to four other people and everyone liked him. I didn't even know we had interviews scheduled.

"He asked if I had fifteen minutes to talk to the candidate, just to see if I liked him, too.

"Funny, I liked him, too."

"So, what's the problem?" I pursued.

"Everyone liked him, but here we are, two months down the road and I find out he doesn't have any experience in one of the most critical parts of the job. He just told me point blank that he has never done this before. Worst part, he tells me he doesn't even see that as part of his job. If we need that done, he suggests we hire an expert or a consultant to help out.

"Just what I need, to hire another consultant because someone on the inside can't do their job."

From the Ask Tom mailbag:

Question:

When is a team member ready (capable) for the next step? How do we measure capability so we can create and fill in opportunities? Which methods do you use to measure capability for the next step?

Response:

Evaluating is team member is much simpler and more precise than making a judgment about an outside candidate for a position.

Checking readiness is a matter of testing. Testing for skill and testing for Time Span.

Step One is to examine the current tasks and determine the Time Span required for each task.

Step Two is to gather three people (the Team Member, the Team Member's Manager and the Manager Once Removed) to discuss the following question. "Is this person performing below, at or above the Time Span required in the current position? It is a very simple question. You will be amazed at how quickly the three will agree.

If the three agree that the Team Member is performing above the Time Span required, the next step is to test the Team Member. Again, the test is simple. Give the Team Member tasks typical of what they would encounter at the next level, with the difficulty of those tasks measured in Time Span.

This testing process is a totally different mindset for a Manager. You no longer give an individual a promotion to see if they can handle it. You now test them with typical tasks. They don't get a promotion, they earn it. -TF

"We have been using a Team approach to hiring," Byron floated. "What do you think of having Team interviews?"

"How do you find that helpful?" I asked.

"Sometimes a single interview might miss something important. If there is another Hiring Team member in the room, they might catch it," Byron replied.

"I am all for Interview Teams. But I don't want to gang up on candidates. Here is the way I like to use Teams.

"Let's say we put three people on the Interview Team. We have a meeting to decide on what areas we intend to cover during the interview. Some areas will overlap and that's fine. These will be separate interviews and I would like to know if the candidate tells the same story to similar questions.

"And some of the areas will be different, depending on the Interview Team member. They have different areas of expertise and follow different lines of questions.

"But the most significant reason to work with an Interview Team is to put together the list of 50-60 questions that create the base line for the interview."

Byron looked a little surprised. We had talked about this number of questions before, but I couldn't tell if he was a believer. "Fifty or sixty prepared questions?"

"Yes, and that's only the beginning." -TF