Hiring Challenges

Several website offer handy tips for candidates how to handle interviews, especially how to handle so-called 'tricky questions'.... For those familiar with HR or hiring processes no need to list them. In addition, some sites specialise their message to a slowly increasing group; the job-seeker over a certain age. 

Though explicitly prohibited by many legislations, to exclude older candidates from hiring, yet this practice is unfortunately rampant, even by those companies, which proudly undersign ethical values /sic/.

Interestingly enough, although any kind of valuable tip is always welcome, and perhaps in some individual cases giving the 'right answer' on the question as to 'what animal you would choose to be' or 'how do you see yourself in our company in 5 years time' should be saying more about the deplorable situation HR professionals behave rather than apparent deficiencies more experienced professionals seem to have. 

Why is it then, that instead of making candidates believe they need to give an academy award winning performance during an interview (making the candidate unnatural, uneasy, and a little less sincere), why not address the HR community to stop misperforming with nonsensical questions (where any given answer has hardly a valid unequivocal conclusion). Let's be honest; judging a professional with over 25 years of experience in his/her field by a junior - even if the interviewer has perhaps 10 years of experience,  is to say the least more than cynical. 

Human Resources - once administrating salaries, sick-days, etc - have taken over the role of judges over skills, which they seldom understand. A dedication, willingness or experience of a potential employee is never measurable by referring to favorite colours, or hypothetical cases with insufficient background information. 

Time to address the real problem. Yes, as companies profess; 'People are our biggest asset', but in practice being far from it. In the end, the economic damage for a company could be far worse than most CEOs imagine. Perhaps the training should ultimately go rather to HR staff, to raise their awareness of the erring. Because, when talking to most professionals up there, don't we all actually know what goes on?

An out-of-the-box view

For the past few months, I have been dealing with numerous discussions, which have lead to a fairly single conclusion; in order to zealously achieve a goal, we tend to forget to look around us.

Whether during presentations for professionals or less formal occasion, one cannot overlook this not too small risk factor. Professionals, perhaps driven by input from the outside world ('we deliver excellence', 'specialised', 'tailor cut', 'competitive'), base much of their solution ability to a single spot, often disregarding vital elements related to the effect of this objective.

In a recent discussion, which was preceded by a number of technical data presentations, I challenged their approach, by demonstrating a disconnect between the formal technical aspect of the solution, by asking rather for the overall understanding.

One can apply it to any given process; whether applying e.g. lean management within a company, risk management tools, ERP or even corruption fighting. Failing to raise awareness among the users, the whole exercise will become a useless quoting of formalistic but toothless 'facts'.

Specialists are indeed very knowledgeable within their field, yet a more out-of-the-box view would contribute to have implementations of new concepts be more effective in the end. And let's be fair; shouldn't this be considered to be granted for in one's strategic management?

A call for creativity... or not?

I am truly fascinated by the latest trends - perhaps call them hypes - about creative thinking, agile management and the like, which are highlighted, promoted and professed by top leaders and managers; albeit that a manager is not necessarily a leader and vice versa, but that aside.

Personally, I do profoundly believe in the fact that creativity is the only tool to increase your chance of survival. Mostly in dire needs, people often become more and more creative, which opens another question, why have we lost so much creativity.

Recently, a Dutch celebrity artist Youp van 't Hek, utterly frustrated by the incompetence - or be it the disinterest - of a mobile phone provider staff to help a customer, despite all acknowledgement that it was indeed their fault, nevertheless no solution was provided. The customer happened to be Mr van 't Hek's son, and when trying to intervene, unsuccessfully trying to contact eventually the managers above, the result was the same zero point zero. 

Upon being able to mobilise similar victims through Twitter - and the number was beyond any one's expectation - the big boss finally personally called the celebrity, fully apologising and accepting full responsibility. In other words, the lack of creativity ("the system does not allow this") has finally exposed the arrogance towards customers. And customers are, as we all know very well, the most important part of your business.

The ramification is not to be underestimated; for the sake of profits, much of the creativity is being squeezed out. When applying for a job, one must fit into a certain template, else one is not making it to the short list, resulting in a standard "thank you very much for your interest, but we have filled the position with a more suitable candidate".

True leaders do understand the need for creativity; it is unfortunately the majority of overly specialised managers, who seem not fully understanding the scope of this message. A recent experienced only highlighted this; where a finance person negatively communicated irrelevant information, resulting in a loss of talented candidates, which the company urgently needed, since they coped with a serious issue. The reason; unjustified and unverified bias.

Creativity in business is undergoing an unfortunate erosion; While being used as a fashionable hit, at the same time it is underlying bad interpretations, bad communication conventions, and poor true management skills.

Time to re-think what creativity really means, and if all candidates should be creative, why letting fairly inexperienced and incompetent HR assistants select experienced senior staff in the first place? Curbing creative and experienced people is going to damage your business in the long run. Many of my clients have finally admitted this mistake. Though, these are the few exceptions.

IT Nostalgia

Not only do we read various articles on IT solutions to keep informed on the latest development; cloud computing, handy tools to accommodate our complex project management projects - we simply function because of our hard- and software.

While typing this article on my cute and compact netbook, I often remember my first computer ever; an acorn electron, bought around 1985 I guess, that needed to be connected to a portable TV and a casette player. In order to load a programme, one needed to be patient for about 5 minutes, while the casette with the software in BASIC was slowly loaded. Every time again. By that time, there were portable wordprocessors (the size and weight of a small suitcase), but this was the first affordable home gadget. Just have a look:

The first PC followed a few years later - with a hard-disk of.... drum roll....... 20 MB! (Guess the RAM was 64 kB). Compared to our present day toys, now subject to much laughter.

But when we imagine what we are used to now, we've gone a long way. Even to the point, ... what happens when your internet connection is down, your laptop doesn't want to boot properly, you lost your excel sheet....

Just to add a bit of nostalgia to the cucumber season ;-)

Customers and Communication

A few days ago, I wrote an article on some observations how it feels being a restaurant visitor. Not that it was from a culinary point of view, but describing patterns how staff was dealing with customers - including myself. It is not my intention to repeat summing up deficiencies in the service - ignoring guests, poor communication, minimal willingness. The feeling, in short, was far from positive. 

What does this have to do with management if it is not a kind of Michelin restaurant guide? Well, the subject is not too far remote, as any business is constantly dealing with clients in its every day performance. The same way, as I can feel frustrated because the waiter/waitress gives me a look as if I am disrupting his/her peace or waiting in vain to get another order, a customer can feel in the event a company does not adequately respond to the customer needs. 

Moreover, I stumbled over another interesting article "People Prefer Incompetence to Rudeness". It illustrates a similar angle on the issue, how you are treated as a customer. The bottom line is, that basically customers like to have a pleasant feeling when dealing with a provider - even in the event, when the requested service or goods cannot be delivered. Better than getting what you want wrapped in rudeness.

It is therefore necessary to keep in mind when you offer services, not to hide behind SOPs or excuses of "too many mails" or blaming a sick colleague; moreover, if the excuse is in fact inexcusable being therefore a blunt lie. That's not what a customer wants to hear. Not providing the proper feedback - or in other words; not fulfilling your promise or expected response - is a big sin in communication. And radiating this image will in the end damage your reputation of the business.

Therefore, put communication high on your priority list. When promising to get back - even if the solution is not (yet) at hand - do get back. Not only is it polite, it is the customer's right - i.e. your obligation.

Change Management...

Not only have I contributed to change management, also at many occasions I had the chance to exchange experiences with fellow managers. You probably know the standard change stories; where staff gets uneasy - up to even hositle - against the announced changes and the process seems like a dragging agonising suffering towards a 'forcefully ' imposed result.

If this is indeed the case, then obviously something has been applied the wrong way. Many mechanisms in every day business life are subject to a real time response requirement: If you see your stocks plummet on the market, you are expected to get rid of them as soon as possible, else you face a big loss - unless you are a gambler-type, relying on a full bounce-back. Or if demand is high and commodity scarce we know that prices go up... 

Yet in other areas, which should equally respond more dynamically to market changes, this assumption seems almost non existent. Only after a decade or so, a department realises, it is applying inefficient or over outdated processes. Why does management - and it happens often enough - underestimate needs for changes, such that when it becomes unbearable a thorough turnaround becomes imperative - and is unnecessarily adding up to the distress?

Understanding, that e.g. on the technology side, one is to a degree limited by a status of hardware implementation for a set life-span. Nevertheless, many changes are a sign of reacting too late.

Businesses should understand that a business process or a philosophy may be just a temporary desirable state, needing adjustment the moment the external factors shift. Darwin's theory would also easlily apply here; not the strongest survives, but the fittest - the one, who knows immediately to react adequately to a change. Keeping this in mind as one of the business objectives can prevent much pain and agony from costly and too complex change management exercises. Better to regularly visit your doctor and take his advice to heart, rather than waiting too long, where perhaps in the worst case even the doctor would no longer be able to help the patient. 

Workable partnerships

As an interim manager, one has the opportunity to see and compare a number of clients - either simultaneously or at least within relatively short time-intervals. It provides a person with many valuable insights and experiences on how management ticks; different styles in different situations, for different branches of industries, and the like. No schoolbook is able to provide such a rich baggage to a professional.

When getting better acquainted with a new business, one always discovers the overall functioning of the place. In fact, the role of the interim manager implies that (s)he blends in as smoothly as can be - and not only with regard to the designated portfolio. The (short-term) duties and responsibilities require a very pragmatic but most of all a very critical point of view, which should avoid falling into hidden trap that could lead to a grave problem.

The expectation nowadays in general is that candidates are team-players, and taken from experience, this is usually dangerously misinterpreted as a jolly get-along-well conformist attitude. It reminds me sometimes of a teen-age couple, who fully infatuated dream of days of wine and roses. When two business partners get together, like in private life, one should be equally accepting the fact, that even the most "beloved" partner will have a flaw, and maybe especially the apparently less ideal types will turn out to be the most loyal and contributing most to the business. 

In real life, businesses will always have weak links, and this is a reality, which we all need to accept. These weaknesses, are not exclusive for any level; they do occur even at the top. Therefore, assuming that the 'perfect' stereotype profile exists in a candidate; when looking around, I sometimes wonder about the congruency of a company's expectation and the existing culture inside. And yet, this rich variety of profiles is more efficient in the long run than the opposite, as it makes the business more flexible and able to yield external threats. Yet, why do so many managers require the latter instead? Though I know the answer, I leave it as a purely rhetorical question for now.

Understanding (and accepting!) each other's position, input and skills is very important. A team member (down or up), not getting sufficient room - to expand either skills or talents - will soon become a drop-out risk, which is always a drain for the company. Business only succeeds, when both company and a team-member/candidate find a workable partnership A workable partnership is based on mutual acceptance, and especially accepting the enriching variety. Sadly enough, we focus too much on too many irrelevant details, and are no longer able to see the overall strategic objective. Learning to re-gain this ability is the only way towards a win-win situation. And believe me; happy people make happy bosses.