Interviewing Skills Training to Unlock the True Potential of Your Organization

Interviewing skills training is important because hiring the wrong person for the job can be a very expensive mistake to make for organizations. The company loses valuable time because it takes a long time to realize that someone was wrong for the job. 

The company may spend months testing and training the employee only to realize they just wasted their investment. The financial cost is obvious – the organization is essentially paying the salary of someone who is of no use to them. 

Then, the company has to start the hiring and training process all over again, which further adds to the costs. It is bad for the person hired as well – it isn’t really their fault; it is an organization’s job to ensure that the person hired is right for the job.

Interviewing Skills Training to Find the Right Candidates

In most cases, the right interviewing skills lead to hiring people who are truly qualified and full of potential. It results in the company performing better, and the person being hired becomes a valuable asset to the company.

Interviewing skills training allows interviewers to understand what they need to probe and what questions they need to ask. It also teaches them about what to look out for and what are some warning signs that a candidate may not be the right person for the job. 

It is an essential skill for any recruitment manager; anyone who is handling recruitment for the company that does not have the right skills will end up filling the company with low-performing employees, which will spell disaster for the company.

Who Needs Interviewing Skills Training?

Any manager that handles hiring and recruitment needs the right interviewing skills training. Most major corporations ensure that all of their managers are properly trained because they know the true cost of hiring the wrong person. The problem is that most people think that they are a good judge of character.

You can easily understand the problem by looking at your personal life. We all had friendships which turned out to be toxic, and many of have made relationship mistakes which resulted in us being with the wrong person. The same is true for professional life as well.We may misread someone and think that they will be an asset of the company when in reality they turn out to be a liability.

The New Parameters of Interviews

Interviewing skills training is also important because the way interviews are conducted is changing. More interviews are being conducted online through video conferencing or on call than ever before. It becomes even harder to judge someone if they are not in the same room as you. 

However, with the right training, a manager will be able to understand and connect with people and accurately assess their real potential for the company. Companies happily pay for this training for their managers because they know that the cost of hiring the wrong person is much higher than what any training would cost.

http://lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Interviewing Skills to Hire the Right Sales Reps at the Start

If you are a high growth company ready to hire salespeople, make sure that you fine-tune your interviewing skills training first. These new hires are too important to your business success…you have to do it right from the start.

Here are some behavioral interviewing skills tips from honest-to-goodness talent acquisition experts on how they went about interviewing applicants for sales jobs…and did it well.

1. They screened resumes for the unusual.
   Believing that resumes are of dubious value in talent selection because they often overstate the candidate’s qualifications and give no real sense of a candidate’s values and working style, the interviewers looked for something that piqued their interest. Did the candidate do summer work on a fishing boat in Alaska or with engineers-without-borders in Kenya? It would be interesting to find out what they learned from the experience. Do they collect Japanese block prints or skeet shoot as a hobby? It would be more fun to talk about these topics than “work experience” and they figured they could learn a lot more about candidates’ beliefs, passions and personalities.


2. They wanted proof in phone interviews that the candidate could sell.
   While many interviewing skills training programs focus on past behavior to judge future performance, these interviewers focused less on what the candidates had done than on what they could do. Could the candidate convince the interviewer they should be hired? Have they done their homework so they know enough about the company to sell it? What can the candidate teach the interviewer? In other words, they wanted the candidates to prove that they could be confident, persuasive and provide value in the present.


3. They asked the candidate to describe what they would do if they could start a company.
   This question can highlight just how well a candidate would fit in a fast-paced and high growth culture. You can learn about how flexible and agile they can be, how innovative, how able to work in ambiguous situations, how independent, and how resourceful.


4. As the interviewers were leaning toward a no-hire decision, they gave the candidate a chance to prove them wrong.
   Here is where a candidate really has to stretch…something a real salesperson has to do often. What positive quality did the interviewer overlook? How much does the candidate really care about this particular job and this particular company? What can the candidate offer that no one else can? If they can handle this phase of the interview successfully, they have earned a second look and more complete consideration.

Yes, these are not the typical tips you learn in interviewing skills training. But high growth startup sales cultures require special traits…a willingness to take risks, a passion for the new, a commitment to educate potential buyers, and a dedication to the company even in those lean, early stages.

Benchmark Your Interviewing Process to See Where You Stand

Interviewing Skills Training for When You Want the Very Best

Would you ever hire anyone but the very best candidate? Interviewing skills training can help you sort through the good enough candidates, through the better hires  and finally identify the very best…the “A” players who will strengthen your organization and enable its success.

First, according to behavior-based interviewing skills training experts you need to know exactly who that ideal candidate would be. Work with the hiring team to design a clear profile of success in the specific job and corporate culture you are hiring for. You can easily figure out what technical capabilities they should have. But we maintain that, even more important than their technical expertise, are their attitude, working style and cultural fit. 

Over and above these “better” employees is the very best, the one who has all the competencies required, shares the same values and work ethic as the company, and exhibits a high degree of emotional intelligence or EQ. We believe that employees with this rare skill help organizations grow faster than companies without them.

Here, based upon behavior-based interviewing skills training experts, is what they can offer:

1. A highly developed people sense
   They genuinely care about people and want to understand them better… what makes them tick, what are their passions, and what are their ambitions. Their empathy makes EQ employees highly desirable for key, customer-facing jobs.
2. A natural ability to lead
   They know how to get along with all types and are people magnets. People like to be with them because they are so good at communicating, solving problems and cooperating with others. They know how to both give and receive feedback and are well respected because they respect themselves.
3. An overall perspective
   Employees with high EQ seem to be able to capture the essence of a problem easily. They can cut through the people issues to see the root cause. And then they are able to pull together differing factions to focus on common goals and solutions.
4. Strong interpersonal relationship skills
   Not only will they enhance the relationships within the company, but they also build strong external relationships. They have an innate sense of how to connect with clients and customers so that the relationship is not merely established but grows and is sustained. They help build customer loyalty. What could be more valuable to a business?

Benchmark Your Interviewing Process to See Where You Stand

Guard Against Hiring a Toxic Employee

OK, so presumably you have a more sophisticated process for interviewing and evaluating candidates than this old-fashioned egg race. But how well do you really get to know your interviewees? Are you confident that your interviewing skills training is helping you to ferret out top talent and guard against hiring a bad employee?

Have you noticed how it seems an even mildly irritating, rude person can have a stronger effect on the environment than the nice guys? It’s actually been proven. Don’t risk the organizational culture you have worked so hard to create with even one toxic personality. It will cost you dearly…not only in the negative vibes they spread but in real dollars. While “A” players add to a company’s profit in terms of productivity, a bad employee erases those gains more than two-fold. And that’s not even counting the decrease in their coworkers’ morale and the negative effect on customers.

So let’s agree that bad hires should be avoided by interviewing with the resolve to ferret out bad candidates who display toxic behaviors regardless of their skills and experience. Basic behavioral interviewing skills training can help with tips like the following:

1. Check with every employee who has come in contact with the job candidate. How, for instance, did they treat the receptionist when they were asked to wait? Or how did they interact with the janitor who could have used help opening the door as they were carrying equipment? You want an employee who is naturally courteous with everyone.


2. How does the candidate discuss former bosses and coworkers? Do they blame others for their failures? You want a candidate who, though their previous situation may have been difficult, is ready to take responsibility for their share of what went wrong and who is loyal to those who are not present.


3. Ask questions that uncover how good they are at building relationships or recognizing areas for improvement. Here are a few that can reveal weaknesses…If I talked to Sara (the candidate’s former boss), what would she say about you? What would you like to improve most about the way you interact with others? Tell me about a time when you were under a great deal of stress and how you handled it. Think of a person you found difficult to work with and tell me how you dealt with the situation.
   
   In each case, probe for further behavior-based competencies so you begin to predict how the candidate would behave in your organization.


4. Train your team to conduct behavior-based interviews effectively and get them involved. The hire should be a team decision. Establish a structured interviewing process based upon an agreed-upon job profile and see that each interviewer probes for different behaviors and competencies. Set up a common rating scale and then gather to discuss results.


5. Check references thoroughly and don’t just ask about technical expertise. Find out about the candidate’s attitude, work ethic and behavior on a team.

Once you accept that talent and skill can’t make up for a difficult-to-work-with employee, you can refine your interviewing process to weed out the folks that won’t fit.

Benchmark Your Interviewing Process for Free

4 Sales Interviewing Best Practices to Rise Above the Rest

In our work with clients who are trying to hire top sales talent for their sales team, we find that they often make the same mistakes over and over again. These are common sales interviewing mistakes that could be overcome with some targeted interviewing skills training. And, if overcome, companies could avoid adding to the unfortunate statistic that has awarded sales the highest turnover rate of more than 20% annually in any industry. 

Come on…you can rise above the rest if you only follow these four best practices for interviewing and hiring top sales talent for your sales team:

1. Hire for attitude, not industry-specific knowledge.The true fundamental drivers of sales success are often motivation and empathy. These are the qualities that support knowing how to help clients to succeed. You can always teach a new sales rep what they need to know about your markets, products and services, but you cannot always change their attitude.
   


2. Don’t hire for their so-called book of business.It is so tempting when you are in a hurry to increase sales to bring someone aboard who promises new clients and valuable contacts with an impressive Rolodex. But rarely is their network as transferable, forthcoming or valuable as you hope. Again, hire for their ability to share in customers’ thoughts and feelings and their innate drive, preparation, dedication and training rather than for their claims of new and easy business.
   


3. Simply “liking” a candidate is not enough reason to hire.While cultural fit is certainly important, there should be some objective measure of culture fit rather than the interviewer’s biased assessment if they “like them” or not. Please. You are running a business here, not a popularity or dating contest.  You need to know that your new hire can solve problems and can get things done. Sure, they should be a fit for your sales culture, but they do not need to qualify as your new BFF.
   


4. Apply and heed the results of a proven sales assessment tool.Know what critical few sales competencies are needed for success in your specific market and environment. Then find a way to measure how strong candidates are in these few, critical behaviors. It is worth your time and investment to put each candidate through their paces. Rate them objectively so you develop a track record of what works and what doesn’t. Monitor the results and adjust as needed. This is the way to improve your sales hiring process and to hire “right” the first time.

Invest the time required to hire top talent.  And above all else, do not settle.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Interviewing – When Sales Skills and Experience Really Matter

The focus of any job interview should be on what is needed to succeed at the specific job you are hiring for. 

You should always begin with a very detailed job description that defines the intellectual, motivational and performance competencies required for success. For some jobs, skills and experience are critical; for others, they are less important. When you are hiring for a sales position for example, consider carefully what you will be asking your new hires to sell, to whom and how.

If your new sales reps will be involved in transactional sales at a rather junior level, you can probably train them in the sales skills they need and teach them what they need to know about their products, services and their customers. They can learn a viable sales approach and process and pick up the skills of how to communicate effectively and move toward success. Interviewing for this kind of selling where sales and products are relatively simple should focus on attitude more than experience. 

But if you are hiring a sales rep who will be selling more complex and solution-based offerings B2B, the vote of interviewing skills training experts weighs heavily in favor of both attitude and successful experience at selling. You cannot afford to wait until your new hires get fully trained to ramp up to speed and be productive. You need them, from the “get-go,” to know how to

• research the customer’s industry, their business and your likely competition 
• articulate your value proposition and solutions that are unique to each customer
• follow a proven sales methodology
• understand the customer’s buying process and identify key buyers
• bring value to each interaction and present persuasively
• prioritize accounts
• negotiate and close
• maintain and grow customer relationships

So how do you find all this out in your interviews? Practice behavior based interviewing. If this is new to you, your time in an interviewing skills training program will pay off quickly. You will learn how to dig beneath the “black and white” claims on the resume to the “flesh and blood” experience of the job candidate. You learn how to ask questions and probe for the truth behind the candidate’s effort to impress. 

When you can uncover what truly motivates them, their fit for your sales culture and their commitment to your company through superior interviewing skills, you are much more likely to hire someone who can help clients succeed, build a loyal customer base, and hit their sales targets. 

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

What Resumes Don’t Tell You About a Job Candidate

Even if every fact on a resume is true, most of what you learn about a candidate cannot be learned from what’s printed in black and white. You need to find a way to interview the candidate in person…to get up close and personal. 

There are so many ways to sabotage your own hiring process and end up with an employee who is far less than what you hoped for. Doesn’t everyone who engages in the interviewing game want to find the top talent, that “A” player, who will enhance the team with just the right attitude, skills and fit? And yet how often are we disappointed? 

Here are some of the reasons we make the wrong new hire choices.

1. We don’t know how to get to the candidate’s real story.
You need a proven, fair, balanced behavior-based interview process. Each interviewer should have attended a behavior based interviewing skills training that teaches how to dig beneath the surface. Sure, a candidate may be able to legitimately claim that they were part of a successful sales initiative that increased revenue by 250%. But you need to understand exactly how they were involved. Did they lead the project or were they just in charge of filing orders?

2. We are pressured to hire someone as soon as possible.
This one is very common and, admittedly, it is hard to be really discriminating when a key stakeholder is breathing down your neck to find a replacement for the critical team member who just left. Our advice? Don’t ever settle. Be patient and hang in there until you find just the right person. Otherwise you will be stuck with a mediocre hire that will drag the team down for a long time to come.

3. We rely too much on referrals and too little on our own judgment.
Employee referrals are great. They eliminate the time it takes to identify a person we want to investigate as a potential hire and typically result in people who are apt to be a higher cultural fit. But that should be as far as it goes. Don’t shorten the interview process because of an enthusiastic recommendation. Recognize the bias and follow the same procedure you would with any other candidate.

4. We focus more on skills than on attitude.
Sure, you need to begin the conversation about relevant skills, competencies and experience. After all, you want to ensure that the necessary capabilities for the desired job performance are all there. But what really matters in the end is the candidate’s attitude and cultural fit with the team and the organization. Skills can for the most part be taught. Attitudes and values, however, rarely change significantly. Be sure you hire for a candidate’s work ethic, values, change agility, motivation, enthusiasm and willingness to learn. 

After twenty years of work helping clients hire successfully, we know that the best new hires are those based on the talent you need that fits in your unique corporate culture and that supports your business strategy. That’s where effective behavior-based interviewing should lead you.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Hiring Mistake #1 – Making the Interview Process Too Difficult

Every leader knows that hiring top talent is a critical ingredient for success.  Most also know from experience that hiring talent that fits is a 50/50 proposition.  In order to “get it right,” how many interviewing tests do you expect your interviewees to endure? Certainly not the egg race in the cartoon above. 

Because we advocate the critical importance of hiring “right,” we would never recommend less than a thorough evaluation of potential candidates. But, take a close look at the interview hurdles you expect them to leap and make sure that they matter in terms of measuring how well they will do on the job and in your organizational culture. With all the competition for “A” players, you don’t want to wear out your top candidates by subjecting them to unnecessary and unproductive screening that tells you little about their ability to succeed.

The interviewing process has grown lengthier in recent years…by quite a bit. Glassdoor, the online job and recruiting site, has published a research report that says “the average overall job interview process takes 22.9 days in the U.S.” And, of course, it can take much longer according to the job level and title. Think back to the last time you interviewed for a job. It can be agonizing to wait for the decision to be made. Try to expedite the process so you don’t lose the candidate you want; and make sure that you do not antagonize the candidate you don’t intend to hire but don’t yet want to let go. 

Depending upon your organization’s interviewing process and the law, there may be screenings that are unavoidable, such as drug tests, skill tests and background checks. Then, of course, there will be a series of behavior-based interviews by phone or video and, ultimately, in person. The further down the path the candidate proceeds, the closer they get to the offer. 

Make sure that each step in the interview counts. Do this by designing and implementing interviewing skills training that teaches your hiring managers and interviewers how to focus on the behavior-based competencies and attitudes that are necessary for success. They need to know what to look for and how to dig beneath the surface to get real answers. All interviewees should, of course, be treated with respect and courtesy. Put them through paces that will inform you as to their suitability for the job, the team and your organizational culture. But don’t unnecessarily lengthen the process. Get organized with schedules. Marshall your forces and assemble your team. A well-oiled interviewing process will result in a top-notch selection and a candidate who is excited about joining your firm.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Where to Look if Your Hiring is Falling Short

It’s sad. Most companies really struggle to recruit and hire the top talent they want and need to thrive. Hiring is a process that is critical to success; yet few organizations are really good at it. 

Of course, your hiring team should be well versed in interviewing skills training so they have a consistent process to follow and an effective rating system that focuses on the specific behavior-based competencies needed for the specific job and your organizational culture. But beyond preparing your interviewers well, how good are you at the other important components in the hiring process from sourcing to screening to making the offer? Do you know? If not, you should. You should have a system in place so you can evaluate where your hiring process is successful and where it needs bolstering. 

Here are ways some recruiting experts suggest you assess your success:

1. Take a close look at your overall hiring process.
Define the key stages from attracting to hiring. Make sure that you have a good idea about how many candidates on average you will need to source, screen and interview to hit your hiring forecast.  Then plan and allocate resources accordingly.  And please be smart about how many interviews you subject a candidate to.  Our research tells us that you only need four people to interview a candidate to understand if they have the behavioral competencies needed to succeed.  Anyone else you add to the mix is for team buy-in.   Unfortunately, some companies have 10 or more interviews and turn off great candidates before they can get them on board.

2. Take a close look at your candidate sourcing channels. 
You want to ensure that you have an active and robust pipeline of potential employees who may fit. Know where your best candidates come from and keep in touch. 

Referrals are probably the most favored route because they come with recommendations from people who know them and who know the company. Be sure you actively promote referrals by asking employees frequently to review their network for likely talent and by rewarding them when a referral hire is made. Other helpful sourcing channels include social media, internet job marketplaces, and hiring agencies (especially good for identifying qualified candidates for senior positions).  Just make sure your job descriptions are accurate, compelling and reflect your true corporate culture.  You do not want to fill your candidate pipeline with unqualified talent.

3. Take a good look at your candidate screening process. 
Capture all the information you can about each candidate so you can track them at each point in the hiring process. Use validated assessment tools and time-tested behavioral interviewing techniques to qualify potential new hires.

Remember that, with each candidate interaction, you have a chance to learn more about their potential fit while selling the benefits of the job and leaving a good impression. Regardless of whether or not the candidate is hired, be sure that you represent your organization professionally. Who knows where the candidate will end up and who they will talk to next?

4. Take a close look at the final interview stage. 
Make sure your interviewing team is fully prepared to effectively and accurately assess the behavioral competencies that the job demands.  Ensure that you can rate short- and long-term fit in terms of the job, the team, their potential new boss and the overall corporate culture.

Breaking the hiring and interviewing process down into key stages allows you to evaluate each step and improve where you may be falling short. 

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

3 Serious and Avoidable Interviewing Mistakes

Don’t you wish you could examine each job candidate as carefully as the man above with a magnifying glass? Those of us who are in the business of interviewing skills training understand all too well the importance of attracting and hiring high performing talent. The consequences of bad hires haunt a company and their hiring managers for months afterward. Either the poor hire stays and poisons others on the team or they leave and the vacuum is costly in terms of lost productivity and the time needed to re-fill and train for the open slot. 

Interviewing well is challenging but it is critical. Here are 3 mistakes that you can avoid with just a bit of discipline:

1. Rushing it.
Resist pressure from the anxious hiring manager who is struggling to reach targets and meet deadlines without a key worker or from the CEO who is naturally impatient and doesn’t fully appreciate how long the hiring process can take. If you are ultimately responsible for the hire, you could pay the price for hiring too quickly and making a bad choice. Stick to your guns; do it right; and cite, for those in a hurry, a few instances of poor hires and the misery they caused.

2. Not following a structured interviewing process.
Make sure that everyone on the hiring team takes the time to prepare and knows what they are to look for. For each job, identify the key performance indicators for success. Divvy up behavioral, motivational and intellectual competencies so the individuals on the team know which areas they should focus on. Each should be well schooled in behavioral interviewing so they can dig beneath the surface to better predict actual on-the-job behavior.

3. Letting bias fool you. 
Use an agreed-upon interviewing score card so you have a quantifiable measure of the criteria, either met or not met, that you set out at the beginning. Bias can creep in so easily. It’s just human nature to hire someone just like you or to make a snap judgment that determines your vote. And beyond the human tendency for bias, you need to make sure your interviews are strictly legal. Any hint of unfair hiring practices could put your company at legal risk.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

What Does It Take to Interview and Find Just the Right New Hire?

The hiring process can be tedious, time consuming and ineffective…both for the candidates and for the interviewers. But hiring right is well worth your investment. Just consider the wasted time and resources when you hire poorly and you’re faced with recruiting, interviewing, onboarding and training all over again!

The objective of interviewing should be to make job offers only to candidates who are a strong match for the open job, the potential career path and the corporate culture.

Follow these basic steps from proven interviewing skills training, one-by-one, to be sure you hire the best talent for your business strategy and the best attitude for your organizational culture.

Here is our recommended hiring and interviewing process based upon over two decades of experience:

1. Define the ideal candidate in terms of behavioral competencies, personality and potential.
2. Screen applicant resumes and sift through for only those candidates who fit the profile on paper.
3. Interview those candidates on the phone (and 80 to 90% will likely be crossed off your list).
4. Put the remaining 10 to 20% through assessments for the specific must-have skills that matter most.
5. Spend a full half-day with the top 5% who survive in interviews with a representative mix of co-workers, managers and executives depending upon their potential role.
6. Compare notes from the various interviewing groups to find out what they liked and what concerns remain.

Not done yet.

1. Schedule follow-up interviews with each candidate by two company employees (one of whom focuses on body language only for non-verbal clues to their true attitudes).
2. Conduct exhaustive reference checks.
3. Schedule the few who make it this far to come to work for an onsite “scenario test” day.

If they pass this last hurdle, they get the prize…a job offer.

If this seems like too lengthy of an interview process, think about some recent research from Glassdoor by Dr. Andrew Chamberlain and Ayal Chen-Zion in the U.S., UK, Canada, Australia, Germany and France.  They found that more challenging job interviews correlate to higher employee satisfaction across all six countries.  According to their data, the optimal interview difficulty to achieve the highest employee satisfaction is 4 out of 5 on a five-point scale.

So, before you remove rigor from your interviewing process, make sure that the process is difficult enough to adequately determine the level of “employee/employer match” without going overboard.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

A Better Way to Select Talent that Fits the Job and Your Unique Organizational Culture

Does it sometimes seem as if the hiring committee is just throwing darts at a board to make their final selection? A stab in the dark is just that…a gamble that you have chosen someone who will fit the job and fit the culture. But hiring mistakes can be costly indeed. Take off the blindfolds and take a far closer and more discriminating look at your job candidates. 

One tip that comes directly from interviewing skills training is to consider the current top talent at your organization. Think of the highest performers at all levels of the company from the mail room to the executive suite and then find answers to these key questions:

• What vital few traits matter most?  Define the three or four distinguishing traits that all your superstars share. This tells you what traits you want more of because people with those differentiated characteristics thrive.  To challenge which qualities are most important, reflect to see if anyone with all of those competencies has ever failed to succeed.  This will help you understand what matters most and perhaps identify other traits that are critical for success. 

• Do you consistently recognize and reward those traits?  If you do – great.  That means you have strong alignment between the values that work and the values you reward.   If you do not, you need to understand why.  Perhaps you are missing an opportunity to encourage the behaviors you want.  Maybe you are fooling yourself about what really matters most.  For example, some companies say they believe that “people are their greatest asset,” but they really care about making as much profit as possible on the backs of their employees.  

High performing companies hire talent that aligns with what makes their best people successful and go out of their way to reward the behaviors that matter most.  Do the same and the odds are in your favor that you will hire well and for the long-term.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Interviewing Skills - 3 Questions to Help You Look Beyond the Resume

When you are interviewing for a new manager, you need to learn not as much about a candidate’s technical skills as you do about their people skills. However, their ability to understand, support, communicate with, and manage people is not clear or obvious from a typical listing of what roles they played when and where.

Here are 3 questions that can help you dig beneath the facts of a resume to unearth answers that will give solid clues as to how your candidate might behave as a new manager on the job.

1. To determine if they know how to give feedback and handle difficult situations, ask them to describe a time when an employee’s performance was below par and how they responded. Follow up to ask if they would handle the problem differently in retrospect and how long the performance was below par and why.
   
2. To determine if they truly care about an employee’s development, ask if they would share a few examples of how they supported former team members in achieving career goals. Then follow up to ask if they would refer you to one of these employees so you could learn first-hand about their experience. 
   
3. To determine if they know how to show their appreciation for a job well done, ask about how they have rewarded employees in the past. You want to learn not only that they value individual contributions but also that they know their team members well enough to give rewards that are personally meaningful.  Then follow up to ask if they would refer you to one of these employees so you could learn first-hand about their experience.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Hiring? What to Look For in a New Leader

What sets a leader apart from the rest of the population? This is what you must determine if you are in charge of finding one. 

Interviewing skills training will tell you that your first step in the process of hiring for any position you are trying to fill is to be clear about what specific qualities, attitudes, and skills are needed for success for your unique strategy, organizational culture and job. The only difference in selecting a leader is that the stakes are higher. A poor selection could lead an entire organization in the wrong direction.

Here, from our two decades of experience in working with leaders in various industries and companies large and small, is our short list of behavior-based competencies you should look for:

• Excellent communication skills to both marshal and inspire the troops
• A positive outlook and the ability to remain calm and focused when the going gets tough
• A presence and self-confidence that commands attention and respect
• An understanding of what it takes to work on and with a team
• A big picture, strategic approach
• A willingness to accept feedback, pro or con, with the goal of continuous learning and improvement

Your task is difficult but there are leaders out there…you just need to find them.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Three Behaviors That Will Give You the Employees Most Likely To Succeed

When it is time to hire, how ready are you to hire the right talent?  Do you know what it will take to find candidates with the relevant skills that will fit in your unique organizational culture?

To succeed, sharpen your interviewing skills training so you have a proven process for new hire identification and selection. And then look, in general, for these three behaviors that will give you the employees most likely to succeed.

Desirable employees generally:

• Display genuine curiosity. You want employees who are eager to learn, ask good questions and do not pretend to have all the answers.
• Focus on others rather than on themselves. You want employees who know how to work with and communicate with others and are able set their egos aside in order to accomplish the common goals of the team.
• Can deal with ambiguity and flex to the situation. The path to a goal is not always clear. You want employees who can accept the discomfort of not knowing right away how to proceed but can dig in and find a solution to the problem.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Two Tips for Significantly Boosting the Right Candidate Pool

All the interviewing skills training in the world cannot help if you don’t get the right candidates on the interview list to begin with. If you are seriously interested in attracting top talent, here are two tips that can significantly boost the level of the candidates you draw and their inclination to join your organization.

1. Recruit in the right places.
   If you only advertise your opening in places for the currently unemployed, you miss an entire pool of potential applicants. Many “A” players have jobs but are not fully satisfied. Use your network to spread the word that you are in the market for the best and the brightest. Be active online, not just on job boards, to expand your contact base. Go to events where you can meet people who are likely candidates. Let them know you are interested in getting to know them better and, if they are not ready to move, ask them to help you by sharing the job opening info within their network of friends and colleagues.
   
   
2. Be sure you show how attractive your company can be.
   Especially if you are interviewing top talent, you need to demonstrate that your organization has a culture that would fit them best, that there are opportunities for future growth, and that their contribution will be fully appreciated and rewarded. Be forthcoming about what they would be doing and who they would be working for.
   

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Three Answers You Must Have Ready as an Interviewer to Help Your Candidate to Say “Yes!”

At some point during the job interview, your potential new hire will have an opportunity to ask some good questions to learn more about the job, the corporate culture and the company.

After completing an effective interviewing skills training program, you should be prepared to have good answers to the following three questions to increase your chances of landing candidates who fit:

1. How will the company support my professional development and career growth?
   Candidates want to know how the company will offer targeted and relevant learning and development opportunities. Be prepared to discuss how much the company cares about and invests in improving and reinforcing the key skills necessary for success and advancement.
   
   
2. Would you describe the team I would join?
   Interviewees want to know not only about the individuals who would become colleagues but also about the performance and team culture of the group. They want to assess how comfortable they would be with the way their potential new team does business. Be ready with authentic answers and clear examples that outline the way people think, behave and work.
   
   
3. How will my success in this position be measured?
   Every new hire deserves to know what metrics will be used to gauge their success or failure in the job. Be ready with a clear description of the critical two to three metrics that will be used to measure their success and how they align with the overall success of the business.
   

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Growing Fast - Where to Find Your Most Likely Leaders?

Sure, the duck that is on the curb above the rest is positioned to lead. But does that mean the others do not have what it takes?

Seldom is this mentioned in interviewing skills training but it should be…it’s worthwhile to look beyond the obvious “stand-outs” when you are searching for potential leaders. For example, a good friend and I went to pick up new puppies for our family. One alpha puppy was ecstatic to see use, climbed all over us and won our hearts immediately. The other puppies were more submissive. My friend took the alpha. I reluctantly selected one of his brothers. My friend’s dog ended up being a nightmare to train and difficult to have around kids. Our dog has been a family treasure. I learned two things that day:

1. Sticking out in a crowd is not a prerequisite to success – for dogs or for leaders.
   
   
2. When selecting talent, know what attributes matter most.
   

We both fell for the “lovable alpha dog.” We were not smart or experienced enough to know that the ability to be trained and be with kids were critical. I got lucky and my friend did not. 

When hiring top talent, do not count on getting lucky. Until you really investigate (which neither of us did in selecting our first dogs), how do you know what talents rest in the group just on the level below? And don’t restrict your leader candidates by their current role in the organization. What you should care most about are leading and lagging leadership skills that would be valuable in various functions over time. For example, a customer service team leader may have just the relationship-building skills that could be developed for a sales leadership role. Or someone in operations may have the detail-orientation that could be applied well as a project leader or in finance.

The lesson? 

Leaders – especially more self-proclaimed introverted leaders like Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer and Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffet - may not always be the most visible or obvious candidates.

Where are potential leaders lurking? You don’t know until you identify and look for the leadership attributes that matter most for your business strategy and unique corporate culture.

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

Should You move from “Job Fit” to “Cultural Fit?”

The interviewer rejecting the job candidate in the cartoon above might well have added, “We don’t like how you do it.”

Because indeed, we are seeing the trend in interviewing skills training from hiring simply for job fit to hiring more for cultural fit over the long-term. The “how” one behaves on the job matters more than we ever knew or appreciated. It’s the round peg in the square hole syndrome…if a candidate’s motivations, working style and attitudes are at odds with the desired or actual work environment, the match-up will not last.

The first step in interviewing with cultural fit in mind is to have a very clear picture of the performance culture the new employee would join. We define culture as how things truly get done in an organization - the way people think, behave and work. Though most savvy organizations understand that cultural fit is critical to hiring well, it is surprising how few companies have taken this basic step. Only once you clearly define your corporate culture, you ready to zero in on the job candidates that will thrive in your unique performance environment.

Are you hiring for cultural fit?

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/

5 Big Interviewing No-No’s for Managers

Hiring well may be the most difficult and yet most important job of managers as they build their teams. Your interviewing skills training will have taught how some interviewers rely on a hit-or-miss process as they assess who to hire. But you can do far better.

Here are five interviewing no-no’s that will help keep you on track:

1. Don’t talk too much.
   This is your opportunity to learn about the candidate, not dominate the conversation.
   
   
2. Don’t be overly swayed by your first impression.
   Stay objective throughout the interview even if, at first, the candidate did not impress by manner and dress.
   
   
3. Avoid leading questions.
   Don’t broadcast what you want to hear from the job seeker by asking questions like, “You have experience dealing with difficult customers, don’t you?” or “Give me an example when…”
   
   
4. Don’t ask personal questions.
   Stay on legal ground. No questions about family, ethnic background, age, etc.
   
   
5. Don’t neglect the tough questions out of empathy for a nervous interviewee.
   Ask the same questions of every candidate. This will give you an objective, not skewed, perspective on a candidate’s attitude and ability.
   

Learn more at: http://www.lsaglobal.com/behavior-based-interviewing-training/