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Hiring for Success: Behavioral Interviewing Techniques

Agenda: Day One

8:30-8:45 8:45-9:00 9:00-9:15 9:15-9:30 9:30-9:45 9:45-10:15 10:15-10:30 10:30-10:45 10:45-11:00 11:00-11:15 11:15-11:45 11:45-12:00 12:00-1:00 1:00-1:15 1:15-1:45 1:45-2:00 2:00-2:15 2:15-2:30 2:30-2:45 Session One: Introduction and Course Overview Icebreaker: All About Me Session Two: History of the Interviewing Process Session Three: The Recruitment and Selection Process Session Four: Factors in the Hiring Process Session Five: Cost Analysis Break Session Six: Job Analysis and Position Profiles Session Seven: Determining the Skills You Need Session Eight: Finding Candidates Session Nine: Advertising Guidelines Morning Wrap-Up Lunch Energizer: Egg, Chicken, Dinosaur Session Ten: Screening Resumes Session Eleven: Performance Assessments Break Session Twelve: Problems Recruiters Face Session Thirteen: Interviewing Barriers

2:45-3:15
3:15-3:30 3:30-4:15 4:15-4:30

Session Fourteen: Non-Verbal Communication

Session Fifteen: Types of Questions Session Sixteen: Diana Jones Day One Wrap-Up

Session One: Course Overview

Recognize the costs incurred by an organization when a wrong hiring decision is made. Develop a fair and consistent interviewing process for selecting employees. Prepare better job advertisements and use a variety of markets. Be able to develop a job analysis and position profile. Use traditional, behavioral, achievement oriented, holistic, and situational (critical incident technique) interview questions. Enhance communication skills that are essential for a skilled recruiter. Effectively interview difficult applicants. Check references more effectively. Understand the basic employment and human rights laws that can affect the hiring process.

Session Two: History of the Interviewing Process

1919: Alfred Binet World War II: Large-scale decisions had to be made about who to put where 1942: Intelligence testers were advocating using a structured set of interview questions Todays research indicates that structured interviews give organizations an accuracy rating that is far, far higher than ever before.

Session Three: The Recruitment & Selection Process

Session Three: The Recruitment & Selection Process

What can go wrong? Why do things go wrong?

What are the costs involved in hiring a new employee?

What are the costs of hiring the wrong person? What part does the recruiter play in all of this? How can such problems be prevented?

Session Four: Factors in the Hiring Process

Session Five: Cost Analysis

Lost productivity Recruiting costs Screening costs Interviewing costs Testing costs Evaluating costs Training costs + Other costs_________________ Total cost of hiring one employee

Session Six: Job Analysis and Position Profiles

Job Analysis
Takes planning and preparation; begin with: Understanding the job and what it involves Understanding the technical skills the job requires Understanding the performance skills the job requires Describing those skills in objective, behavioral terms

Session Six: Job Analysis and Position Profiles

There are three important categories in a job description.
Purpose: Not what they do, but why they are there, the reason the job was created. Key Responsibilities: What you are paying them to accomplish. Typical Activities: Those things they are expected to do in order to accomplish these responsibilities.

Session Seven: Determining the Skills You Need

Technical Skills
What specific kinds of machines will the employee use? What specific kinds of computer hardware/software will they use? Is there a certain specific and prescribed way they must manipulate tools?

Session Seven: Determining the Skills You Need

Performance Skills
Does the job involve managing other people? What level of decision making is involved with the job? Does the job involve dealing with the public? What guidelines must be followed in carrying out the job?

Session Eight: Finding Candidates

File Searches Internal Searches Placement Services Competitors Persons with Disabilities Military Retirees

Referral Programs
Third Party Recruiters Headhunters Internet Advertisements

Retired Seniors
Outplacement Firms Educational institutions Employees Companies that have announced cutbacks

Session Nine: Advertising Guidelines

Information about company Position advertised Qualifications needed Responsibilities/Challenges White space

Session Nine: Advertising Guidelines

Ten Tests for Advertising 1. Does the ad concentrate on the job? 2. Does it sort out and emphasize important details? 3. Does it highlight unique opportunities? 4. Is the ad specific? 5. Is the ad realistic? 6. Does the ad avoid clichs? 7. Does the ad speak to the reader? 8. Does the look of the ad portray the company image? The positions importance to the company? 9. Would a stranger understand the job opportunities? 10. Does the ad have sell?

Session Ten: Screening Resumes

Create your own form. Adapt it to the position. Assign points based on importance of the criteria. Set a pass/fail mark.

Session Eleven: Developing Assessments

Technical Exercises Performance-based assessments include written exercises that help to evaluate short-listed applicants before they proceed to the interview. Develop them by collecting a sample of the key duties and challenges unique to the actual job vacancy.

Session Eleven: Developing Assessments

Performance-Based Exercises In addition to technical exercises, applicants must also solve a set of workrelated problems that demonstrate their ability to perform well within the confines of a certain department or company culture.

Session Twelve: Problems Recruiters Face

The three biggest problems recruiters face:
The recruiter doesnt know applicants qualifications or specifics of the job. The recruiter makes a poor impression that gets transferred to the company. The recruiter has no plan in place for a structured interview.

Session Thirteen: Interviewing Barriers

Leniency/Stringency
Halo/Horn Effect Error of Central Tendency Stereotyping

Session Fourteen: Non-Verbal Communication

We just discussed some of the barriers to objective interviewing. Can you think of others? The words we use Miscommunication Non-verbal language Candidates language

Session Fifteen: Types of Questions

Closed questions: Respond with specific piece of data Open questions: Encourage people to talk. Probes: o Open question o Pauses o Reflective question o Paraphrasing o Summary question

Session Sixteen: Diana Jones

Have any of you ever fired somebody you hired? Did it take you a long time to arrive at that conclusion?
Please take a look at this scenario involving Diana Jones. She has just fired someone she had hired several months ago, and shes trying to figure out what went wrong. Can you help her? Find as many errors, oversights, or missing pieces of the puzzle as you can.

Agenda: Day Two

8:30-8:45 8:45-9:45 9:45-10:15 10:15-10:30 Energizer: Color Me Session Seventeen: Traditional vs. Behavior Interviews Session Eighteen: Other Types of Questions Break

10:30-10:45
10:45-11:00 11:15-11:45 11:45-12:00 12:00-1:00 1:00-1:15 1:15-1:30 1:30-1:45 1:45-2:00 2:00-2:15 2:15-2:30 2:30-2:45 2:45-4:00 4:00-4:15 4:15-4:30

Session Nineteen: The Critical Incident Technique

Session Twenty: Listening for Answers Session Twenty-One: Difficult Applicants Morning Wrap-Up Lunch Energizer: Penny Challenge Session Twenty-Two: Interview Preparation and Format Session Twenty-Three: Other Interview Techniques Session Twenty-Four: Scoring Responses Session Twenty-Five: Checking References Break Session Twenty-Six: Human Rights Session Twenty-Seven: Skill Application Session Twenty-Eight: Pre-Assignment Review Workshop Wrap-Up

Session Seventeen: Traditional vs. Behavioral Interviews

In traditional interviews, we ask questions like:
Where do you want to be in 5 years? What kind of supervisor do you like? What are your strengths? What are your weaknesses?

Session Seventeen: Traditional vs. Behavioral Interviews

In behavioral interviews, we ask questions like: Tell me about a situation where you had to solve a specific type of problem. Can you recall an instance where you had to be the leader of a team? Can you describe one decision that you regret? What did you learn from the experience?

Situation

Action

Result

Session Eighteen: Other Types of Questions

Achievement-Oriented Questions How did you increase sale in your department? How did you meet your productivity goals? Holistic Questions What are the broad responsibilities of a (job title)? What aspects of your job do you consider most crucial? In hindsight, how could you have improved your performance? How many hours a week do you need to work to get your job done? What areas of your skills do you want to improve upon in the next year?

Session Nineteen: The Critical Incident Technique

Critical incidents are stories of real events that describe effective or ineffective job behavior.
They are valuable for several reasons. Data, not opinions Can be gathered from a number of sources Lead to behavior description questions Help communicate job expectations

Session Nineteen: The Critical Incident Technique

Here is an example of an effective critical incident or situation interview question, for selecting a bookkeeper in a busy residential care facility. You are trying to do a cost analysis from all the various sections of the facility, but people are very busy and dont see the importance of this information, so they arent cooperating. What would you do?

Session Twenty: Listening for Answers

Common listening problems:
We let our attention wander. We miss the real point of what is being said. We let our emotions interfere with our judgment. We interrupt and step on the statements of the candidates being interviewed. We think ahead to what we want to say next and miss whats being said right now.

Session Twenty: Listening for Answers

Try to use the three steps of Active Listening: Non-Verbal Messages Cues or Invitations Clarification of what has been said

Session Twenty-One: Difficult Applicants

Silent Sam Betty Bluff Slippery Sue Talkative Tom

Session Twenty-Two: Interview Preparation

Do your question guide and your interview guide. Everyone who is conducting the interview should be familiar with the guides. Give yourself enough time between appointments. Have a room conducive to an informal interview. Go to get the person. Shake hands.

Session Twenty-Two: Interview Format

1. Rapport: a) The warm and fuzzy, but be careful what you say b) A little bit about the company c) A little bit about the position 2. Discussion: a) Technical b) Performance c) Fit 3. Closing 4. More about job and company 5. What happens next? 6. Permission to check references 7. Conclude and shut up

Session Twenty-Three: Other Interview Techniques

Using superlatives Moving through the questions Good note-taking Interruptions Signposts

Session Twenty-Four: Scoring Responses

Key Features of Performance-Based Rating Scales Easy to use. Allow responses to be evaluated on the degree of completeness and correctness. Can accommodate every possible applicant response from worst or completely unacceptable to the best.

Session Twenty-Five: Checking References

Don't delay. Put little value on written references handed directly to you by the applicant. Ask permission to call most former employers. Get references by phone, not by mail. When filling a key position, make a personal visit to the person giving the reference if possible. If you are unable to obtain references from the individuals an applicant has suggested, it is perfectly acceptable to ask if they have other references they might suggest you contact.

Session Twenty-Six: Human Rights

To discriminate, according to the Oxford Dictionary, means "to make a distinction, to give unfair treatment, especially because of prejudice." One of the important provisions of which many employers are not aware is that there are certain questions that an employer may not ask an applicant. Another myth is that it is okay to ask those questions if the employer adds, "You're not required to answer that if you don't want to." Remember: it is illegal to ask, period.

Session Twenty-Seven: Skill Application

Rapport Company description Position description One technical question with a probe Two performance questions, each with probes One critical incident One other question for wrap-up A brief closing that doesnt include additional information about position and company

Session Twenty-Eight: Pre-Assignment Review 3. What other advertising methods could you use? 5. What characteristics dont apply? How can you improve this? 6. What type of question is this? Can improvements be made?