Workplace Assessments

January 2007 - Security Recruiter Workplace Assessments

All articles written by John Howard, Ph.D., except where noted.

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If the Shoe Fits: The Story of Sava Senior Care
From Jim Sirbasku’s Desk

Finding the right person to fit in a particular job can be like trying to find the right foot to fit the glass slipper. For Danette Manzi, senior vice president of Sava Senior Care Administrative Services, the ProfileXTTM is like a magic shoehorn.

Manzi, who had experience with the assessment tool, brought the ProfileXT™ to Sava Senior Care last July. She found that it is key to finding sales associates who fit the positions she needs to fill.

“The ProfileXT™ got the right people into the right jobs,” says Manzi, who has more than 20 years of experience in selecting long-term care professionals. “We review results with our employees, candidly discussing how their thinking and behaviors matched our benchmark for high-performing employees. People understood that they might not match the position, but they could move into other positions and be successful.”

Headquartered in Atlanta with 184 locations in 18 states, Sava Senior Care provides long-term care to nursing home residents. The company has used the ProfileXT in a couple of ways. First, all 269 full-time employees in sales and marketing took the assessment. “We correlated the results to our performance,” Manzi says. “From that point, we developed a plan for performance improvement as well as training programs in the are employees and candidates,” she adds. “When I used due diligence again to find the right tool for Sava, this one met our needs. It’s much more comprehensive than others we researched.”

Years later when the opportunity arose to deploy assessments at her new organization, she retained SmartMoves, Inc., in San Rafael, Calif., owned by Barbara Spector, to obtain the assessment tools she needed for Sava Senior Care.

“Barbara has been instrumental in bringing a different aspect of working with the assessment tools to us by using the instrument to match traits between the manager and his or her employee. We have also worked on team dynamics by matching the manager profile with the team’s profiles and performance. So we moved from impacting individual results to impacting team performance.”

Spector and Manzi collaborated to build a team spread with characteristics the people on Manzi’s teams had in common. “Ms. Manzi was then able to do coaching and help the manager of the department work with people where there was a big difference in styles. This enabled the teams to work together more harmoniously without as much misunderstanding, stress and conflict.”

Spector’s SmartMoves, Inc., has been a Profiles strategic partner for 10 years, and her business has doubled almost every year since, in terms of profitability and number of clients. Using Profiles’ assessments is a no-brainer for executives like Manzi.

“Why change something that isn’t broken?”

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Technical Corner: Assessment Tools Must Be Fair to All Groups

This month we examine the third Department of Labor guideline for occupational assessments. This rule says that assessment instruments should be unbiased and treat all groups with fairness.

Fairness in hiring, training and promoting employees is not only required by law, but it also benefits the company to hire the person with the most relevant abilities, skills and job knowledge.

However, selecting the right employee often presents managers with a challenge. Job interviews must be wide-ranging, designed to elicit the best information and conducted within the law.

Asking the wrong question can cause big legal issues for a manager and the company if a job candidate believes there has been bias. At the same time, the necessary questions must be asked to ensure the hiring manager has the information to make a good decision.

Profiles International’s Step One Survey II™ can help in this area. Used properly, it helps managers stay “inside the lines” while getting information from candidates. As one of our clients says, SOSII helps managers follow through in a uniform manner in interviews. “The questions are provided in a specific format that means we don’t have to worry about overstepping any lines of what can or cannot be asked.”

The client adds, “We have also found it is a much better judge of honesty or integrity than when our managers relied on gut instinct.”

Honesty and integrity are important to every company, but the threat of lawsuits has made it difficult to have confidence in asking the questions that help determine an applicant’s integrity. If you call the candidate’s previous employer for a reference, you might get no information – or a carefully worded statement that confirms dates of employment.

If you are suspicious about a candidate and decline to hire him or her because you cannot get the information you seek, will you be able to show that you used fair and unbiased information?

Profiles’ SOSII enables employers to objectively obtain accurate information, identify the best candidates and conduct better interviews. All of Profiles’ assessments meet or exceed Department of Labor guidelines, and we work diligently with our clients to help them understand our tools and use them correctly.

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HR Corner: What Does Good Leadership Look Like?

People who reflect on the subject of leadership do not always agree on what makes a good leader. Most of them focus on leadership instead. Here are 10 different traits used to describe effective leaders:

• They have a clear vision of where to go and how to get there.

• They favor action over inertia.

• They take responsibility for their actions.

• Their values are reflected in their actions.

• They recognize that they need other people and build relationships.

• They are confident enough to consider opinions different from their own.

• They provide the training and tools employees need to complete required tasks.

• They often work alongside their people.

• They are honest about their own weaknesses and hire people who will shore them up. They are both teachers and pupils of their employees.

• They work hard but take time for themselves.

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Product Focus: Step One Survey II™ Saves Consulting Company from Costly Hiring Mistakes

Jean, human resources director for a large consulting company, stared at the resume on her desk. A few years ago, she would have wasted precious time trying to read between the lines.

The applicant, Robert, was applying to work in the accounting department. His credentials appeared impeccable. He had received excellent training, and his experience matched the company’s requirements for the job. But what did she really know about him?

Thanks to the Step One Survey II™, Jean knew everything she needed to and used the few minutes remaining before her interview to mentally review her questions. Her company had been using the SOSII for several years, after a huge hiring mistake resulted in large financial losses. Jean and her colleagues began searching for assessments that would work for them. They found the SOSII, which had saved them countless times from making more hiring mistakes.

The scientifically designed assessment told Jean exactly what she needed to know about applicants before she ever conducted an interview. She no longer pored over resumes, trying to read between the lines.

Her first step was to identify, through scientific methods instead of “gut reaction,” the best candidates to interview. Jean and her employees in HR routinely use the Step One Survey II™ to evaluate applicants for integrity, substance abuse, reliability and work ethic, with the reports provided in an objective manner.

The SOSII also allows them to conduct uniform interviews that elicit highquality information.

The reports supplied by SOSII gave them Quick Check, which included a candidate's employment status, availability to start, most recent salary, and supervisory experience; Employment Profile, an employment history plus supporting interview questions; an integrity report, which summarized admissions regarding theft of money, property, data and time; a substance abuse report, which showed admissions regarding the personal use and/or distribution of illegal and/or regulated substances; a criminal convictions report, which revealed admissions regarding criminal convictions; and an attitude report, which showed feelings regarding integrity, substance abuse, reliability and work ethic.

With a final review of the structured questions that she would ask Robert related to key issues identified in his responses, Jean felt well-prepared and confident. She was ready to welcome him into her office.

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