Read Sidu's Avoiding hell at work by spotting Dilbertian job descriptions.

Sidu's on target. That's why I suggest you do a real job analysis, and write the ad and/or job description with other technical people. People who are not in the industry dumb down the descriptions and ads, and make them worthless for people to filter themselves in or out for your job.

Labels: job analysis, job description

posted by Johanna Rothman at at 7:22 AM | link |

A behavioral audition is one where youw ant to see some specific candidate behaviors. Management auditions typically fall into this category. But especially if you're hiring for an agile team, you might want to see how a candidate exhibits behaviors, such as coaching, feedback, how the person participates in a standup meeting or in a retrospective.

If you want to see some specific behaviors, first, return to your job analysis. What are those essential technical and non-technical skills? Can you make a behavioral audition around those skills?

You might want to see if the candidate will be a smooth addition to a team or a disruptive addition. In that case, you ask the candidate to do some work with one or more members of the team. You'll ask the candidate how that work went, and you'll need to debrief the members of your team (with open-ended questions) about what it was like to work with the candidate.

Try a focused conversation for the debrief:

1. What stood out for you?
2. Where were you challenged?
3. What insights do you have about this candidate?
4. What do you recommend we do with this candidate?

Behavioral auditions are the most difficult to design. In my experience, you can see the behaviors if you use a technical audition, you are likely to see the behaviors you want to see. But to know what you want to see, you've got to do a job analysis.

Labels: audition, job analysis

posted by Johanna Rothman at at 8:50 AM | link |

Jason Yip's Hire squirrels instead of turkeys has a link to a discussion of Harvard's hiring of Faust as the new president. Looks like Harvard got smart and thought about cultural fit, and those critical influencing and negotiation skills. (See my other post A Perfect Example of Insufficient Cultural Fit.)

On the other hand, read Seth Godin's Sheepwalking, where he describes people putting in time at their jobs, instead of being creative and solving problems.

The first part of a smart hiring decision is to know what non-technical qualities, preferences, and skills you need. That's why you need to think about the deliverables and activities the employee will perform on the job. (That's why I put so much emphasis on the job analysis.) Technical skills are easy to train. Finding people who can solve problems and do the hard work you need them to do--that's hard. And that's what's necessary for a smart hiring decision.

Labels: hiring decision, job analysis

posted by Johanna Rothman at at 7:38 AM | link |