Personnel Selection and Training

Chapter 18 in text

Selecting workers with the right skills Visual search Decision making Interpersonal skills Motivation

Poorest Method?

Interviews and References Why?

However, most common used.

Employment Laws

Require hiring choices to be justified Proven not to be

Arbitrary Discriminatory

Hence, wealth of selection methods

Selection Testing

Based on a signal detection idea HIT: hiring a person good at the job MISS: not hiring someone who would have been

good at the job FALSE ALARM: hiring someone who does a

poor job CORRECT REJECTION: not hiring someone

who would have done a poor job

Signal Detection Idea

Job

Per

form

ance

Test Score Test score cutoff

Acceptable Job Performance

HITMISS

FACR

HireDon’t Hire

Expensive!

Tests of Cognitive Ability

Verbal ability Perceptual speed Memory Spatial or mechanical ability Reasoning or analytical ability Ability to pay attention

Example: Picture Memory Test

Look at the following picture for 30s

Write down all the objects you saw

How did you do?

Mental Rotation Test

Which is the same as the object on the left, A or B?

Mental Rotation Test

Which is the same as the object on the left, A or B?

Perceptual Speed Test

Match the house in the top left with its identical match. Put up your hand when you have found the match.

Used for inspection jobs (airport screeners, xray techs etc.)

Object Displacement Test

Observe the following objects for 15s

Used for determining ability to find objects, follow maps, remember landmarks

Object Displacement Test

Which object is missing?

Used for determining ability to find objects, follow maps, remember landmarks

Which one was it?

Car Leaves Frog Horse Chair Plane Computer Snowman Truck Lion

Personality Testing

Usually looking for Neuroticism Extroversion Openness Agreeableness conscientiousness

Eysenck Personality Test

Sample questions for “extroversion” ARE YOU INCLINED TO BE SLOW AND DELIBERATE IN YOUR

ACTIONS? Y?N DO YOU OFTEN BUY THINGS ON IMPULSE? Y?N DO YOU OFTEN CHANGE YOUR INTERESTS? Y?N ARE YOU RATHER CAUTIOUS IN NOVEL SITUATIONS? Y?N

Catell 16PF Test

I am carefree. Very inaccurate 1 2 3 4 5 Very Accurate I don’t mind eating alone. Very inaccurate 1 2 3 4 5 Very Accurate I take things personally Very inaccurate 1 2 3 4 5 Very Accurate

Problems with “Personality Tests”

Want to test yourself? www.similarminds.com

Work Sample Tests

Ask candidate to do a work type problem Or watch other workers and critique their

work Usefulness depends on relevance of the

problem Fairly strong predictive validity

Example: Case Interviewing

You are called in by Pizza Hut to help them develop a strategy for entering the home delivery market in which Domino's has the dominant position. As lead consultant on this project, what would you do?"

Suggested Solutions

Identify the appropriate framework or interpretation of the problem.

Identify the key issues and state them to show you understand the problem.

Dig deeper into the key issues, ask questions, clarification, listen carefully.

Structured Interviews

Ask all candidates the same questions “Critical behaviour” interview

Built on eliciting past behaviour Tell me about a time when you had to

facilitate the operation of a team. How did you get involved? What did you do? How did it turn out?"

The MIT “STAR” method for behavioral interview answers Situation Task Action Results

Example of a STAR AnswerDescribe a time when a team member came to you for help. What was the situation? How did you respond?

Situation: I was a member of a UROP group within MIT's Media Lab where we were working on a virtual reality project. The team was comprised of one professor, three graduate students, and two undergraduates (including myself).

Task: The undergraduates were primarily responsible for a specific part of the program coding. I noticed that an undergraduate team member was having trouble with their coding and it looked like he wasn't going to be able to meet the deadline for the next day.

Action: I noticed that he was getting frustrated but I didn't want to upset him by asking if he needed help. I casually went by and began some small talk. Eventually he asked me a few questions about the project and as we talked further he felt more comfortable to ask more and more questions. I spent the rest of the afternoon coaching him through the project.

Result: He was able to submit his portion of the project on time. The professor was extremely happy with the results and he consulted with us on future coding segments of the project.

Preparing for Behavioural Interviews

Anticipate the critical behaviours Identify a few key stories from your past Identify negative and positive stories Formulate STAR answers Practice them