Last year, HR Zone’s, Editor’s Comment considered the merits of the TV reality show The Apprentice and picking up from hiring and firing the Sugar way is Kathy de Beer of the Centre for Team Excellence who has explored its application to graduate recruitment assessment centres.
The key focus of a recent master class talk for the Association of Graduate Recruiters summarised below, was to consider opportunities for innovation in assessment centres, using The Apprentice as the basis for an alternative assessment centre.
Assessment centres continue to be one of the best selection methods available. Nevertheless, the method has changed little over the 50 years of its growth, whilst the world of work into which we recruit people has changed enormously.
Twenty-first century work is characterised by a high degree of interdependency between individuals and teams – as evidenced by the increase of matrix management. This is combined with a relentless increase on emphasis for results, targets, key performance indicators and return on investment.
What was attractive about The Apprentice was that all of the candidate eliminations were ultimately driven by a failure to achieve results, delivered via a genuine group setting. If we compare this to the types of group exercises that are required at traditional assessment centres in which candidates are encouraged to ‘act out’ the perfect team player role and where results don’t matter, then we can see that it is unlikely that real behaviours are being witnessed.
It is, however, highly likely that real and typical behaviour was witnessed in the show. Though admittedly 12 weeks observation is a rather more luxurious timeframe than most employers will allow for the typical selection process. The potential benefits of The Apprentice assessment approach derive from the fact that candidates perform real tasks, for real results in a truly interdependent team setting.
Assessors from the line often complain that they don’t see real behaviour in assessment centres, so they may well prefer such an approach. Furthermore we know that assessors can be a weak link in the assessment process, and a task-based approach could make their evaluation simpler and more accurate. Additionally, the elimination idea could be used to provide cost savings over traditional assessment centres.
Whilst using any of the ideas from The Apprentice might be controversial, there are certainly ways in which these ideas could be applied, at varying levels of risk. Anything that helps us improve our practice is worth considering.
It is interesting to note that despite strong negative feedback from organisations such as the CBI, the programme was commended for a positive effect on diversity. The final two were not white. The runner-up was also female and from a strictly Muslim background.
Perhaps of more interest, is that though both were clearly results focused, they were team players and either could arguably be seen as a strong and positive representation of British business. Of course for those of us particularly interested in selection issues, the crux of it all is to ascertain how the winner actually performs in their new role with Sir Alan Sugar.
Did they prove to be a good hire?
Related item:
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experiential workshop approach
We facilitated the final part of a graduate assessment for a client via a 2-day outdoor experiential development workshop. This involved the group of shortlisted graduates undertaking a 48 hour leadership challenge together, as well as receiving an emotional intelligence assessment and feedback.
The process enabled the client to observe which graduates displayed the leadership capabilities they were seeking, and who were able to take a look at themselves and acknowledge their areas of personal development. There was also an integrity check as the EI questionnaire was completed prior to the assessment event where their true attitudes and behaviours were on full display.
The client was hoping to confirm their semi-made decisions. In fact, instead of recruiting their quota of 3 graduates, they decided only to recruit 2 following the workshop, knowing that they had saved themselves a dubious appointment that would have cost them further down the line.
From the graduates point of view they enjoyed a fun but challenging experience, and benefited from some personal development too.
Innovation in assessment has to be a good thing, and experiential challenges are one way to do this.
Daydreams are much better than no dreams
Anyone who has studied the research into assessment centres, and perhaps Juliette LeFevre has not, knows that there is lots of room for improvement in the traditional approach. Validity studies show typical correlations of between 0.40 and 0.45 between performance in an assessment centre and subsequent performance in the job. That’s good isn’t it? Well no not really. In fact it means that the average assessment centre is only explaining about 16% of the candidate’s job relevant behaviour (statisticians hat on for a moment).
Julliete may be complacent about not being able to understand about 84% of a candidate’s job relevant behaviour, but many of us are not. Therefore any innovation in selection has to be worth treating with an open mind!!!
The Aprentice programme made many HR people cringe: – not because the approach had no merit, but because the selection criteria for “firing” 1 of 3 people from the losing team seemed arbitary and to reflect Sir Alan’s “idosyncratic” managment style. Take Sir Alan out of the mix and you’re left with a thought provoking approach that is surely worth considering. Why? Here’s a few starters…
1) More time with good candiates, less time with weak candidates.
2) Strong work sample exercises where performance matters.
3) True team dynamics because all members know that if their team mates let them down their chance of employment could be at risk. (When did you last see real conflict in a group exercise!)
Juliet says that she does not hire on likelihoods – that is just simply wrong. All selection is based on stacking the probabilities in your favour. It is all about likelihood, many of them unsubstantiated.
If you do a little thinking, instead of complaining that ideas are not spelled out, I think you’ll find some real merit in this article.
On the other hand you could rely on banal “reality checks” and never try to improve selection.
Cheers
Doug
Daydreaming
>>>there are certainly ways in which these ideas could be applied, at varying levels of risk>>>>
So why not specify them???
>>>It is, however, highly likely that real and typical behaviour was witnessed>>>
I dont recuit on likelihoods especially unsubstantiated ones. Its also likely that untypical and ‘acting up’ behaviour was witnessd. Obviously the degree of ‘likelihood’ is critical.
>>>the elimination idea could be used to provide cost savings over traditional assessment centres.>>>
This statement doesnt tally financially with…
>>>12 weeks observation is a rather more luxurious timeframe than most employers will allow for >>>
Can we have a reality check here please? 1. Its not practical to have risk based assessments using company money or products 2. Its too time consuming 3. The CBI spoke against it…need I go on?
Is this a serious article or simply a collection of daydreams???