Panelists included:

• Michele Hanson, Director of Talent Acquistion, The Learning Care Group
• Allison Shifke, Project Manager, Independent Purchasing Cooperative (Subway™ Restaurants)
• Chris Reid, Director of Agency Management, Asurea Insurance Services, Inc.
• Dr. Kevin Williams, Dean of Graduate Studies, The University at Albany, State University of New York

To download the presentation wrap up, please fill out the form on the right

Another CEO has left Yahoo! under less than desirable circumstances. Not much of a shock there. But there are lessons for all of us dealing with hiring. The short tenure of Scott Thompson at Yahoo! can teach everyone that no matter what level your hiring for, the basics still apply.

Lesson #1: A Win is Not (Necessarily) a Win

Scott Thompson had only been at the struggling Yahoo! for 2 months. Prior he worked at the high growth PayPal.  These are very different companies on significantly different trajectories. What’s the lesson there? Success at one company does not necessarily equate to success at another. It becomes easy for any hiring manager to get enamored by past wins a candidate may have encountered. But a bit of analysis needs to occur. How similar was the business? Where the circumstances relevant and analogous to current times? How similar was the culture where the win occurred? Understanding past successes is important but you still need to dig a bit.

Lesson #2: Don’t Skip the Basics

As the level of a recruiting effort moves up, so should the level of due diligence. Unfortunately the opposite is often the case. Hiring Managers (in the Yahoo! case this was the Board) will begin to make assumptions in the screening process. First, it’s often assumed that someone has verified employment, education and those other mundane details. This is very common when a search firm is involved. (Heidrick and Struggles was the firm in Yahoo!’s situation.) Also, a level of trust is often applied that the candidate will have too much as stake to falsify or exaggerate (or outright lie). As the risk grows, the business case for added due diligence is even greater.

“Within the Human Resources Technology industry, I can think of no one with the same scope of experience as William Tincup,” said Greg Moran, Chairman and President of Chequed.com, Inc. “His strategic expertise and knowledge of this landscape will bring a new dimension to our Board of Directors.”

He has been named as one of the top influencers on the HR and Recruiting Industry and is one of the country’s leading thinkers on social media application for HR, an expert on HR technology adoption, and an expert marketer. A regular contributor to Fistful of Talent, TalentCulture, HRTechEurope, and HRExaminer, he also co-hosts a daily HR podcast called DriveThruHR.

Tincup commented, “I’ve worked with Chequed.com for three years and during this time, they’ve grown into a pivotal role in the industry. I’m looking forward to contributing to the company’s continued success.”

About Chequed.com

Founded in 2008 by some of the foremost experts in employee selection and development, Chequed.com is an emerging leader in the rapidly growing market for Predictive Talent Selection™ technology.

Using its revolutionary Performance Engine^TM, Chequed delivers rapid, accurate predictions of a new hire’s performance. The technology’s ability to track and measure relevant results contributes to HR organizations’ ability to better demonstrate a clear tie to business results.

Chequed.com’s experienced management team, board of directors and advisory committee have helped hundreds of startups and growing companies hire talent that made them industry leaders. Their extensive expertise has fortified the Chequed software to meet the day-to-day challenges of human resource managers facing competitive markets for human capital.

 # # #

Note to editors: Trademarks and registered trademarks referenced herein remain the property of their respective owners.

Media contact:

Jeanne Achille, The Devon Group, (732) 706-0123, ext. 11, jeanne@devonpr.com

In the interview, Trunk shares insights about the future of HR and America’s educational system, and what trends will take HR out of the flux and into the future.

Click the player below to listen to the interview. You’ll hear Trunk’s take on the things that should be keeping you up at night if you’re an HR exec, for example:

• What are the three areas that HR should be focusing on?
• How does a failing US education system impact the role of HR?
• What’s the next step for HR after its role as a service organization expires?
• How should HR change to be ready for the rise of the learning organization?

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Listen to the podcast and respond in the comment section below. Penelope promises to watch the comments and respond to keep the conversation going! You may not necessarily agree with what you hear, but like it or loathe it; it’s going to stick with you.

About Penelope Trunk

Trunk is a speaker and writer on the topics of career development, employee recruiting and retention, and entrepreneurship. The founder of three start-ups, she now lives on a farm outside Madison, Wisconsin where she homeschools her two children.

For more insights from the leading minds in Human Resources today check out The HR Thought Leaders interview series section on Chequed.com.

The standing room-only crowd got to hear real world insights about the use of behavioral assessments and automated predictive reference checking from 3 very progressive recruiting professionals—

Allison Shifke of Subway Restaurants,

Michele Hanson of The Learning Care Group and

Chris Reid of Asurea.

These panelists and Chequed.com’s Chief Science Officer, Kevin Williams provided some remarkable real world stories across a range of hiring spectrums.

If you’re interested in the slide deck from the panel you can fill out the form on the right to download the PowerPoint presentation.

“Yeah, I interviewed the guy. He was great in the interview—really nice to chat with and personable. He follows the NFL just like I do, and we went to the same college! I knew he was going to be great to work with. 

But then… something changed after we brought him on board. At first, I barely noticed the occasional, random yelps coming from his cube… but I did start noticing bizarre references he made to his ‘Mothership.’ And he tried to persuade the receptionist to come with him to wear a tin foil hat.   When he started barking like a dog at our customers, I knew we’d made a bad hire.”

If you think an interview and scan of a candidate’s resume will protect you from bat shit crazy candidates, you’re mistaken.

The problem is, we think we’re good judges of character. But we’re not. We’re human, and we’re swayed by dozens of characteristics that have nothing to do with a person’s character—or their ability to perform well in a job. We’re subject to biases and prone to snap judgments.

That’s why an interview situation is so fraught with peril. It’s less dangerous if it’s structured—if the interviewer goes into the meeting with a list of validated, job-relevant questions.  But even a structured interview, used independently of candidate assessments and reference checks, may not protect you from crazy.

Ronald E. Riggio, Ph.D., the Henry R. Kravis Professor of Leadership and Organizational Psychology at Claremont McKenna College, says if you must interview candidates, begin by realizing it’s the most flawed tool you have at your disposal.

“As we emerge out of the recession and begin hiring in full force again,” he says, “it’s important to use best hiring practices, and that may mean tossing away the interview, or at least minimizing its importance in the hiring process.”

Still not convinced? Well, here’s something else to consider: A recent study by the University of Nebraska at Lincoln shows that narcissists perform much better than non-narcissists in a job interview. Because self-centered individuals are generally better at engaging their interviewers and speaking at length, they tend to be more comfortable in an interview situation. They’re good at ingratiating behavior and, unlike non-narcissists, are natural self-promoters.

Peter Harms, assistant professor of management at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and a co-author of the study said, “We find very little evidence that narcissists are more or less effective workers. But what we do know is that they can be very disruptive and destructive when dealing with other people on a regular basis.”

In spite of what the studies and experts tell us, it’s hard give up the interview altogether, so here are a few tips for making sure you’re doing everything you can to protect yourself, your employees and your company from bat shit crazy:

1. Always use a pre-employment assessment.

A pre-assessment allows you to rely on hard data instead of gut-feelings or hunches about a candidate. Based on a scientifically validated job profile, a candidate self-assessment allows you to accurately measure competencies and predict on-the-job performance so you can focus hiring resources on sane, best-fit candidates.

2. Get as many perspectives on your candidate as possible.

One way to diminish the subjectivity of interviewing is to never use it exclusively. It’s only one perspective and the best way to hedge your bet is to view your candidate through multiple lenses. That means including reference checks of at least five people who have worked with the candidate in the past.

In fact, do this before you interview. With automated reference checking, candidates provide references as part of the application process, so pre-checking is automatic. You get the full benefit of that info before you meet the candidate in an interview situation.

3. Never go into an interview blind.

Do your homework and take the info you’ve gathered to this point (from the candidate’s own self assessment and references’ feedback) to develop a list of interview questions that is structured, systematic and specific to each candidate.

Also use behavioral questions in the interview to help you get at the things a candidate has actually done, instead of allowing him to sway you with his ability to make you feel comfortable.

When it comes to hiring, bat shit crazy is completely avoidable. Make sure your process is thorough, systematic and validated—and save the crazy for your next weekend in Vegas.

Sources:

1. “Learn The Right Way To Interview Job Candidates” Psychology Today Blog

2. “How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways, and Also Ace That Interview”  Newswise.com

Getting the right people in the right roles may be the most vital ingredient of success at a Fortune 1000. Our newest white paper, titled Fortune 1000 Hiring Practices, will teach you what you can do to keep up and hire competitively.

Commit to a thorough hiring process

The first thing to recognize and accept about hiring is that doing it well takes time. Shortcutting the process leaves you vulnerable to bad hires, which are always costly. If you don’t have the resources to commit to a rigorous process, outsource to an employment agency you trust to conduct the search for you. Another option is to hire an intern, temp, or  consultant to cover the open position’s responsibilities until you have the right person in place. But above all, don’t hire in haste.

To read the rest of this whitepaper fill out the form on the right and download “Fortune 1000 Hiring Practices: How to Hire like the Big Boys”

Kyle’s share a few highlights with us here. You can find the full report of his findings on his Blog - BYOD or Bust: Survey Results Report

Fact: Employees Are Already Using Their Own Devices for Work

The question many business leaders are asking their HR partners is: “Do we need a formal policy for managing mobile devices?” This is not an easy question to address, as it requires perspective on what employees are doing with their mobile devices. To that end, we asked a couple of questions around usage.

The most important question when discussing BYOD, of course, is whether or not people are even using their personal devices for work-related purposes. As shown in Figure 1, the majority of employees (77%) are using their own devices to some extent–either exclusively or in addition to company-issued devices–to do work. Of course, “work-related purposes” could be something as simple as checking their email. So we wanted to gauge what else they’re doing.

According to our respondents, employees are using mobile devices at a roughly equivalent frequency for personal and business use. As shown in Figure 2 above, 67% of employees are using devices for business correspondence (email, phone calls, etc.), and 44% are using their device–company-owned or not–for professional networking.

Whenever employees are using mobile devices to access company data (48%), one would think a policy with guidelines for proper use is a must. However, another survey question revealed that only 30% of respondents’ companies had a policy for managing personal mobile devices in place. Is there a disconnect here? Survey says… Quite possibly.

Will BYOD Become a Higher Priority?

Considering the majority of employees are already using personal devices for work-related purposes, we were surprised that only 12% of organizations without a BYOD policy plan to adopt one in the near future (half of those are currently developing policies). 30% of participants without BYOD policies said that instituting one wasn’t a priority, 33% plan to modify their plans for managing use of personal mobile devices in 2012.

Security risks associated with BYOD policies continue to intimidate some–one respondent said he is “scared to death of security vulnerabilities”–but what would do more to minimize risks than to adopt an official policy? Are organizations better served by addressing issues as they arise? Or should leadership elevate mobile device policy as a priority for 2012?

For you armchair statisticians or industrial psychologists, you may have heard the term “validity coefficient.” This term refers to how predictive any element of the screening process is of future performance. Decades of research in this field suggest that education and experience are generally less predictive 0.1 coefficient area. Skill tests work well but they don’t present the whole picture. Solely basing a hiring decision on the “Can they do the Job” bucket is not very predictive. However, that is how many managers base their hiring decisions.

Add in an item from the “Will They Do the Job” bucket and the picture becomes clearer. Personality assessments and structured interviews are generally in the 0.3-0.4 coefficient range. Both are critical elements of a sound hiring process.

But you still need the “Have they” bucket. Structured reference checking (and we don’t mean the traditional, phone-based model) generally produces results in the .36 range which is as predictive as a personality assessment or structured interview.

Layer the best from each bucket and you have a high incremental predictability in your hiring. High incremental predictability equals better, more consistent hiring decisions. For today’s HR leader, that is the name of the game.

In this webinar, we will introduce you to the newest features added to our cloud-based ChequedReference software. In addition, you will learn how ChequedReference can help you:

• Reduce Turnover rates by up to 50%
• Cut hiring time by up to 90%
• Dramatically improve your quality of hire
• Achieve more desirable business results

We are pleased to announce that our spring release will boast many new and exciting features. Come check it out!

Date: Thursday, April 19 – Add to Outlook Calendar
Time: 2:00-3:00 PM EST
Location: https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/775574222