By BLR Founder and CEO Bob Brady
The best way to deal with difficult employees is to avoid hiring them, advises attorney Dan Forman. BLR® founder and CEO Bob Brady says that while Forman is half-joking, he makes the serious point that difficult employees usually start out that way. They do not become different people after they get their ID badges and company e-mail addresses. Their “difficult” traits are usually there for all to see—if only we want to look.
Forman, a partner with the San Francisco law firm, Carlton DiSante & Freudenberger LLP, spoke about techniques for screening out potentially difficult employees during his presentation at the California Employment Law Update held earlier this month in San Francisco. The event was sponsored by the Employer Resource Institute, a BLR subsidiary.
Forman asked members of the audience to talk about the techniques they use to screen out unsuitable applicants. The audience enthusiastically offered numerous suggestions, some of which are highlighted here.
Questions
- One participant suggested asking, “Have you ever worked for a difficult supervisor?” and listening for clues about how they would behave in your workplace. If they say, for example, “Yes, I had to be at work at exactly 8 o’clock,” you are alerted to a big potential problem. “If they think that having to be at work on time constitutes a difficult supervisor, we probably don’t want them.”
- Another member of the audience, citing the difficulty of predicting whether well-spoken applicants will be successful in the sales positions for which they are applying, suggests asking them about what sales awards they won in prior jobs. “And don’t just take their word for it,” she added. “Ask to see the awards.” She observed that sales people are proud of their awards and the good ones will eagerly bring them in.
- Try to get managers of supervisors who interview applicants to reflect on their general impressions of applicants, “and really listen,” suggested another. He looks for subtle clues that managers may have missed but that could indicate mismatches. Recently, a supervisor noted in passing that an applicant “talked a lot.” Reflecting on it, they agreed that this was a warning signal that should not have been ignored. After discussing it, they realized that this was a very bad sign.
- Ask about problems they’ve had at other jobs. If it’s always someone else who is creating the problem, they may be displaying an unwillingness to take personal responsibility that will probably carry over to your workplace.
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- How do they deal with the forms that have to be filled out during the application process? If they get things wrong, or make mountains out of molehills, don’t expect them to magically transform once you’ve hired them.
- Replicate the conditions of the workplace during the interview. One participant said that his organization starts work at 6 a.m., so they interview early, too. “If you get pushback on the phone, they’re not going to be on time.”
- Another member of the audience said she has a manager who “always hired problem employees.” Her colleagues sympathized. They suggested extra interviewing help for the manager, and also making that failure a big part of the manager’s performance appraisal.
Behavior
Forman observed—and I certainly agree 100 percent—that one of the interesting (but not new or novel) things about these comments is the way they center on behavior rather than job skills. If it has been said once, it’s been said a billion times: When a new hire doesn’t work out, more often than not it is a life skill failure, not inability to do the “real work.” Despite the fact that we can test and evaluate for job skills pretty well, most interviewers concentrate on them, ignoring equally important behavioral traits.
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HR’s Role
How can HR help? Obviously, by applying these tips (and others) in their own interviews and educating managers and supervisors to do the same. Even more so, as suggested by the attendee who really listened, HR can help interviewers “replay” the interview, looking for clues they may have overlooked. Interviews are stressful, and not just for the applicants.
What do you do?
Do you have a favorite interviewing question of selection technique you’d like to share with colleagues? E-mail it to me at Rbrady@blr.com and I’ll put them together and publish them in the near future.
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Read this article and the followup this week with interest.
1. My experience has been that folks come into and exit an organization basically for the same general reasons, at the margin. For example, I could work at two companies as a life insurance actuary and one has an office with a door and free coffee, while the other is a great cubicle, and you pay a modest fee for the coffee. Both have great people and the interview questions were what they were and the commute/locations were ‘equal’…you go for the free coffee and private office. 3 years later, the office location changes, you’re in a cube and the coffee is now 10 cents. You start looking and now the ‘bar’ is different. Who changed and how? If this sounds simplistic, let’s see a study/analysis that totally refutes it, or better yet, find out tomorrow why your best employees chose your company – at least that way, you’ll know what some of the downsides might be when you need to make changes (that to “management” might seem practical and innocuous!).
2. Similarly, the questions you ask must relate to the position AND the culture. Without making a value judgment, some of the more “whimsical” questions about “manhole covers” might be appropriate for an organization that values “curiosity” as a primary “shared value”, but may not be all that useful if I simply need you to follow very specific directions without spending too much time on the “why”. Yet, if after I hire the “follower”, I now want to develop a culture of “innovation” across all employee groups, did I hire the wrong employee or did I change the terms of the “employment contract”?
I am pushing back against the idea that I/we should have “known” better than to hire a employee who was the “wrong fit” for the organization.
3. I find it a tad ironic that many, many US manhole covers are made at East Jordan Iron Works in East Jordan, Michigan which is an absolutely beautiful area with great people. Many of the Iron Works’ employees require stamina, brawn, patience, and common sense, but innovation, curiosity about the business, and continuous learning about iron casting isn’t necessarily their all consuming passion. What they care about most is a decent wage for a solid day’s work, some health and retirement security, and a bit of time and resources to enjoy some of the area’s natural amenities generally with their families.
If you want to ask the right interview questions to make the best hires for your organization, you have to really, really know each “job”, its contribution to the organization, AND your own culture or cultures, since complex organizations and structures can have alot of ‘diversity’! When you’ve got that down, your interviews can be easily scripted, performed and evaluated. This is how you develop “great interview questions”, and subsequently hire great employees and partners.