The following is a summary of the research and practice implications from: Becker, W. J., Connolly, T., & Slaughter, J. E. (2010). The effect of job offer timing on offer acceptance, performance, and turnover. Personnel Psychology, 63, 223-241.

Speed and timeliness are important during the hiring process. Without devoting some effort to establishing an efficient applicant acceptance process, most hiring managers will continue to be challenged in their efforts to enhance their organization’s ability to compete for talent.

Interpretations of Job Offer Timing

Job offer timing, or the time between an applicant’s final interview and a job offer being made, elicits several different reactions from job applicants, dependent on whether it is faster or slower. Offer timing also impacts the applicant’s offer acceptance decision.

Extending earlier job offers:

• Signifies the hiring manager’s enthusiasm and positive assessment of the candidate.
• Eliminates the applicant’s uncertainty in their evaluation of the job/organization.
• Makes the offer more attractive to the applicant.

In contrast, later offers are more likely to violate applicant expectations and produce less favorable reactions to the offer and the organization. Receiving a later offer causes applicants to assume that the organization is not interested in them, is inefficient, and is unfair. Job applicants will be less likely to accept a job offer if they perceive the selection process or their treatment during it to be unfair.

Additionally, post interview delays in communicating with candidates can lead to negative perceptions of the organization. These views sometimes manifest into action. For instance, delays between submitting an application and being contacted for an initial interview may cause economically disadvantaged candidates to self-select out of the process.

Decision Time

Both student and experienced applicants were more likely to accept job offers that were received sooner rather than later following the final selection interview. Moreover, faster offers to student candidates led to either relatively quick acceptances or long decision times that resulted in offer rejections.

On average, experienced candidates received quicker offers, made faster decisions, and were more likely to accept offers than were student candidates. However, applicant experience did not influence the relationship between offer timing and offer acceptance.

In regards to hiring outcomes, making quicker final selection and offer decisions will not likely influence performance or turnover.

Practical Implications

Improvements in job offer efficiency could help hiring managers to significantly reduce overall hiring costs and free up resources to bolster new employee on-boarding, development, and retention programs.

In case you are still wondering, “why is this important?” Increased acceptance rates, reduced search costs, and lower vacancy times can provide substantial cost savings for the organization. Such changes would require little cost to implement, and would lead to long term savings in regards to not only costs, but also the use of time.

Additionally, for greater efficiency in the job offer/acceptance process, organizations should consider imposing applicant decision deadlines.

Interpretation by:

Kandace Waddy

DeGarmo Group

The following is a summary of the research and practice implications from: Roulin, N., Bangerter, A., & Yerly, E. (2011). The uniqueness effect in selection interviews. Journal of Personnel Psychology, 10(1), 43-47.

Job interviews are the age-old, strategy based, “survival of the fittest” in the business world. Now more than ever, people are entering the job market with university degrees, which can often make most job applicants appear to be the same. Because of this, many applicants seek to distinguish themselves by providing unique answers to interview questions.

The important question, however, is whether or not it is beneficial (or even appropriate) to “stand out from the crowd” in a job interview? Do the conventional or unconventional applicants receive job offers?

The Uniqueness Effect Defined

In selection situations, job applicants know that they are not only being judged by absolute qualities (ex. Educational background), but also by their relative qualities, such as their perceived quality in comparison to other applicants. This awareness causes many applicants to create a uniqueness effect.

In this context, the uniqueness effect is the effect of an applicant’s distinctive characteristics or answers on recruiters’ evaluations and decisions in the selection process. Similarly to the  previous rules of thumb that have told applicants to focus on differentiating their resumes from the many other resumes in the stack, in order to get the interview, that same notion is essentially used as a strategy during the interview.

The Value of Standing Out

Applicants who provide unique answers get better evaluations and are chosen more often than applicants providing common answers. When an applicant’s uniqueness is positive, such that it creates a particular social image, they are likely to receive prestige, aid, and love from others.

Providing unique responses was especially helpful in non-creative fields, like accounting, as opposed to creative fields, like marketing. One explanation for this could be that interviewers may have higher expectations for receiving unique answers from applicants who are seeking positions in creative fields than for those applicants who are seeking positions in non-creative fields.

Practical Implications

The benefits of providing unique answers to interview questions are clear. Job applicants who give unique answers receive both higher evaluations and a higher probability of getting the job offer, especially in non-creative jobs.

One important thing to note is that interviewers may be influenced by the uniqueness of the answers, regardless of the applicant’s true abilities. Therefore, it is important for job recruiters to assess whether or not they are prone to being swayed by the uniqueness effect, and for organizations to institute selection procedures that do account for a job applicant’s true ability, despite their uniqueness.

Interpretation by:

Kandace Waddy

DeGarmo Group

The following a summary of the research and practice implications from: Van Iddekinge, C.H., Campbell, J.P., and Putka, D.J. (2011). Reconsidering vocational interests for personnel selection: The validity of an interest-based selection test in relation to job knowledge, job performance, and continuance intentions. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(1), 13-33.

Personality assessments are often used to help identify the applicants who are likely to succeed in a perspective job.  However, they are not the only solution available to help select an applicant that will be successful in the available position. Vocational interests may also serve as strong predictors of a job applicant’s future job performance, job knowledge, and intentions to continue with an organization.

Whether it is reading books on a specific topic, attending certain sporting or musical events, or spending time doing yard work, individuals tend to have strong preferences for activities that they find interesting. Although we may not often stop to consider it, our interests have a significant influence over the approach we take towards an activity, as well as how we choose to spend our time on various tasks. This same principle, that we are motivated to do activities we find interesting, also impacts the way employees act in the workplace.

Vocational Interests Defined

Vocational Interests (“VI’s), or interests specific to the workplace, can be thought of as having three important characteristics:

• Contextually-Grounded:  VI’s are embedded in the work context, and focus on the types of activities and work-environment that an individual prefers
• Stable over time: Just like personality and work values, an employee’s VI’s remain relatively consistent over time.
• Influential over behavior: Employees are more motivated to complete tasks that they find interesting, and are more likely to seek opportunities to increase their knowledge and skill levels if they find a topic interesting.

Points to Clarify

VI assessments have not generated as much hype as personality assessments in HR literature, in part because some of the information available is not correct. A few of the questions commonly associated with VI’s include:

Are VI assessments effective predictors in employee selection?

Yes – Vocational interests have been shown to predict employees’ intentions to stay with the organization, interpersonal knowledge, technical knowledge, and other important job-related outcomes.  Like all assessment methods, these results can vary.

Why have I heard that VI assessments don’t really predict job performance?

The answer may be very obvious – Some vocational interest surveys are, in fact, poor predictors of job performance.  This is because they were designed for another purpose.   For example, the Strong Interest Inventory is designed to guide individuals in finding a career that fits their interests, not to differentiate between high and low performers within that career. To effectively use VI assessments in employee selection, you must select an instrument that is designed for that specific purpose.

I thought most job applicants only applied for jobs that they found interesting?

Although people do tend to want jobs that align with their interests, this option is not always feasible. The decision to apply for employment is based upon a multitude of factors, such as the state of the economy, compensation rates for a job, location of a job, the applicant’s education level and prior experience, present or future rewards that a job may offer, etc.  These, and other factors, may supersede an individual’s desire to match his or her interests with the sought-after job.

How are applicants’ VI scores related back to the job?

Not all VI assessments are the same, but one common way is to organize and score the applicants’ interests by grouping their ratings of the various work activities into six categories of interests, known as Holland’s RIASEC model. These six categories of interests are as follows:

• Realistic – Practical, hands-on activities (i.e. Carpenters, Electricians, Athletic Trainers)
• Investigative – Scholastic, intellectual, and/or scientific activities (i.e. Pilots, Chemists, Police Detectives)
• Artistic – Creative and expressive activities (i.e. Interior Designers, Editors, Photographers)
• Social – Teaching, caring, and helping activities (i.e. Flight Attendants, Tour Guides, Concierges)
• Enterprising – Persuasive and leadership-oriented activities (i.e. First-Line Supervisors, PR Managers, Head Chefs)
• Conventional – Routine and well-ordered activities (i.e. Bank Teller, Accountants, Pharmacists)

HR managers or employers must have an idea of the work context prior to assessing applicants, so that the correct interests are focused upon during employee selection.

Practical Applications of VI Assessments

Vocational Interests should not be thought of as a reason to throw away personality assessments in selection.  Instead, they should be viewed as an option that offers you something unique to consider in the selection process. Unlike predictors such as cognitive ability, the validity of using VI scores in selection depends on the extent to which interests are reflected in the performance requirements of a job.  In jobs where this relationship is strong, VI assessments can help HR managers to select candidates that will actually enjoy their work and perform it well, have motivation to learn about their job, and stay with the company.

Interpretation by:

Kelly Whalen

DeGarmo Group

DeGarmo Group recently published a whitepaper relating to talent acquisition in the healthcare industry.

“Leveraging Work Value Alignment to Drive Patient Satisfaction in Healthcare” is a report on the use of talent acquisition strategies to identify top-tier candidates for positions in healtcare settings.

To request a copy of the paper, please click here.

DeGarmo Group also will be hosting an informative webcast session on this topic on Tuesday, November 15th at 11am CT. To register for this session, simply follow this link:

https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/438797449

The following is a summary of the research and practice implications from: Podsakoff, N.P., Whiting, S.W., Podsakoff, P.M., & Mishra, P. (2011). Effects of organizational citizenship behaviors on selection decisions in employment interviews. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(2), 310-326.

Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) is thought to be one of the many factors that influence managers as they make selection decisions based upon job interviews. OCB is the behavior of an employee which may not be a part of the job role, but supports the work environment at large by supporting fellow employees and the organization as a whole. Applicants who display OCB during job interviews are less likely to voluntarily quit, are likely to be more productive, and are likely to be more efficient than their coworkers.  Questions that attempt to gauge OCB can be included in the job interview to help with selection decisions.

Types of OCB

The interview situation gives managers an opportunity to ask questions that tap into the applicant’s potential for future OCB while on the job; however, they should be aware that certain behaviors during the interview may influence their decision process.  Specifically, three aspects of OCB are influential in selection decisions and will be discussed further: helping behavior, voice behavior, and organizational loyalty behavior.

• Helping behavior.  This involves voluntarily helping others with work-related problems or helping to prevent them.
• Voice behavior.  This involves expression of constructive challenge intended to improve a situation within an organization.
• Organizational loyalty behavior. This involves the manifestation and evidence of employee commitment.

OCB and Interviewer Perceptions

Manager’s and interviewer’s expectations of a possible future employee (including perceptions of competence, overall evaluations, and salary recommendations) can be influenced by each of these three factors.  The more helping behavior, voice behavior, and organizational loyalty behavior an interviewee displays during an interview, the higher the perceptions of competence, overall evaluations, and salary recommendations will be.

Practical Implications

Those who make the selection decisions after an interview should not hesitate to look for these displays of OCB during the interview, because, as noted above, they can predict many positive outcomes for the organization.  Interviewers should be aware that the information gathered on OBCs in the interview should be taken cautiously though.  This is because not all OCBs are behaviors that affect the organization’s bottom line.  If the behaviors do not benefit the organization, but the interviewer allows this display to influence his or her decision, it may not lead to the best decision for the organization.

The aspects of OCB that are going to be relevant for an organization and be important to performance differ across organizations and jobs because every organization and job has different needs when it comes to this type of supportive behaviors.  Interviewers should be trained in advance so that they know what behavior it is that the organization is looking for.  Specifically, which OCBs are important to the bottom line and which are not.  Useful information can be obtained from the display of OCBs as long as the interviewer knows what to look for.

Interpretation by:

Ashley Niemczyk

DeGarmo Group

 DeGarmo Group announced today that Anthony Adorno will be facilitating an HR.com webcast titled “Reducing Employee Turnover in Front-Line Jobs“. The session will be held on October 20th, 2011 from 1:00 – 2:00 pm ET. Provided below is a description of the session, as well as registration information.

 Session Overview

Ever hire an employee with all the right skills for the job, only to watch that person walk out the door for good three weeks later? Where did you go wrong? What did you miss?

Most organizations often overlook the importance of measuring an applicant’s work tolerance as part of the talent acquisition process. Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter if the applicant has the skills to do the work if they can’t tolerate the demands of the job!

During this session we’ll discuss the concept of work tolerance as applied to jobs in several settings including retail sales and customer service. We’ll talk about the process of analyzing jobs to discover their underlying work tolerance demands, as well as approaches for using work tolerance information to improve the talent acquisition process to reduce employee turnover, and increase levels of job satisfaction.

Finally, we’ll share the results of research using work tolerance measures in several organizations representing industries such as telecommunications and financial services, but the concepts learned during this session can apply to any job, in every organization.

What will participants learn?
1) The difference between the work tolerance and skill demands of jobs
2) How to analyze jobs to determine their underlying work tolerance demands
3) Methods for using work tolerance demands for improving talent acquisition
4) The impact of work tolerance characteristics for reducing employee turnover in front-line jobs

Who should attend?
1) Recruiters, Managers, Directors, VPs, etc., responsible for HR, Staffing, and Talent Acquisition.
2) Those interested in learning about the impact of work tolerance on organizational success.
3) Business leaders

Registration Information

To register for the event, please visit: http://www.hr.com/stories/1317068692478

The following is a summary of the research and practice implications from: Barrick, M. R., & Zimmerman, R. D. (2009). Hiring for retention and performance. Human Resource Management, 48(2), 183-206.

As the poor economy and the associated decrease in employee raises and bonuses make it more difficult to retain high-performing employees, organizations need to make pre-hire determinations of which candidates are most likely to stay with the organization. Finding indicators for both performance and turnover enables organizations to use fewer resources when selecting applicants. But, based on the idea that past behavior is the best indicator of future behavior, what are the most useful predictors for high performance and low turnover?

Pre-hire Predictors

Are pre-hire predictors of turnover also effective indicators of work performance?

Several indicators, such as biodata (biographical data) and pre-hire attitudes, have been explored for the purpose of answering that very question. In particular, three types of information are especially strong indicators of job performance and turnover.

• Biodata- predictors that represent pre-hire embeddedness in the organization (employee referral; number of friends and family) and habitual commitment (tenure in prior job; number of jobs in last five years)
• Pre-hire attitudes- includes the applicant’s self-confidence and confidence with decisions, as well as the applicant’s desire for a job and pre-hire intent to quit
• Personality traits- Conscientiousness (being dependable and reliable) and Emotional Stability (ex. Individuals who have low emotional stability tend to have negative perceptions of themselves and their environment.)

Turnover Decisions and Job Performance

Some notable indicators of which employees are likely to remain working for a company six months after hire include: pre-hire embeddedness, habitual commitment, personal confidence, motivation for employment, conscientiousness, and emotional stability. Further, beyond the period of six months post hire, up to two years later, the remaining two indicators for voluntary, avoidable turnover are conscientiousness and emotional stability.

The number of jobs held over the previous five years was a better indicator of early turnover, whereas tenure on the most recent job was more predictive of early job performance.

The good news is that most turnover decisions are “functional,” meaning that those employees who tend to stay in an organization tend to be the better performers.

Practical Implications

Learning how to do the job (conscientiousness), meeting the “right” people from whom to learn about the organization (embeddeness), and figuring out the power structure of the firm and the organization’s goals and values are important to employee success and lead to lower turnover during the early stages of an employee’s adjustment to an organization.

While so many of the factors listed above serve as suitable indicators for high performance and low voluntary, avoidable turnover, hiring managers should mainly consider them when hiring for a short-term or seasonal position, due to the fact that most of the indicators are useful for six months post-hire.

Ultimately, personality (conscientiousness and emotional stability) is a useful indicator of voluntary, avoidable turnover up to two years after hire. Further, a personality assessment enhances the usefulness of biodata when the two are used together. Hiring managers should note that with the exception of personality, the importance of all other predictors weakens over time.

Interpretation by:

Kandace Waddy

DeGarmo Group

The following is a summary of the research and practice implications from: Barrick, M.R., Swider, B.W., & Stewart, G.L. (2010). Initial evaluations in the interview: Relationships with subsequent interviewer evaluations and employment offers. Journal of Applied Psychology, 95(6), 1163-1172.

Structured interviews have long been considered valuable tools for gathering information about job applicants. Although they are comprised of structured questions, these interviews also include an initial rapport-building stage, during which the interviewer briefly engages in small-talk with the applicant.

Three types of information are intuitively gathered by the interviewer in this initial rapport-building stage:

• Competence – How competent does the applicant appear to be initially?
• Affect – How likable is the applicant?
• Similarity – How similar is the applicant to the interviewer?

Each of these three types of information impact subsequent interview scores and outcomes (e.g., job offers). Initial impressions of affect and similarity are irrelevant to job performance and may have a biasing effect on interview scores. However, initial impressions of competence formed during the rapport-building stage may contain job-relevant information.

Rapport-Building Findings

The interviewer’s initial impressions of affect and similarity did impact interview scores and the likeliness of a job offer. Furthermore, initial impressions of the applicant’s competence influenced interview scores and the likelihood of receiving a job offer above and beyond initial impressions of affect and similarity. Overall, better initial impression ratings led to higher interview scores and greater likelihood of receiving a job offer.

Practical Implications

Initial competence ratings may be useful pieces of information when made early in the selection process, such as during career fair recruiting or during a screening interview. These intuitive impressions of the applicant’s competence are more suitable as a “select-out”, rather than a “select-in”, decision aid.

Secondly, initial competence ratings may prove useful for jobs that require a lot of brief, meet-and-greet interactions with a variety of people. In this case, the applicant’s ability to interact effectively during the rapport-building stage of the interview may lend credit to the applicant’s social competence at handling similar social interactions on the job. As a way to capitalize on initial competence ratings, the DeGarmo Group would suggest implementing a structured scoring system that will guide interviewers in rating this interpersonal skill.

Finally, organizations should be cautious about eliminating the initial rapport-building stage altogether from the structured interview for two reasons:

• Interviewers tend to naturally form initial impressions of applicants no matter what.
• The initial rapport-building stage can increase the applicant’s satisfaction with the interview and can function as an opportunity to further recruit the applicant.

Interpretation by:

Mackenzi Harmon

DeGarmo Group

The following article is a summary of the research and practice implications from: De Pater, I., Van Vianen, A., Bechtoldt, M., & Klehe, U. (2009). Employees’ challenging job experiences and supervisors’ evaluations of promotability. Personnel Psychology, 62 (2). 297-325.

Understanding why certain employees are promoted is critical at both an individual and organizational level. At the individual level, it is important to understand what factors affect career advancement. At an organizational level, a thorough understanding of what factors lead to employee success in a higher position is imperative for succession planning and managing employees. Therefore, a comprehensive understanding of the various factors that contribute to promotion can be beneficial at both the individual and organizational level.

What Makes an Employee “Promotable”?

Many factors influence whether or not an employee will be promoted in an organization including:

• Job performance – Promotion decisions are often made based on job performance. That is, if employees are successfully completing tasks outlined as part of their current position, it is assumed that they will also have the skills necessary to successfully complete tasks in the next position “up the ladder”.
• Challenging experiences – The type of task that is completed is often another important consideration in promotion decisions. As employees engage in more challenging and complex tasks, their likelihood of success in higher positions increases.
• Promotability evaluations – Many organizations conduct promotability evaluations in order to determine if a supervisor believes an individual could adequately perform at a higher level in the organization. These evaluations can include supervisors’ perceptions of current job performance and work experience.

Each of these factors must be examined simultaneously in order to determine if an employee is ready for a promotion. Job performance alone is not a good indicator, as many times one’s current performance will not be predictive of their success in a more complex position.

Therefore, examining current performance in conjunction with how current tasks overlap (or don’t) with those of the higher position is imperative.  This is because tasks required for a higher position are often more challenging and complex and employees who volunteer for those complex tasks may be more qualified and motivated to take on the tasks that would be required by a higher position.

Ultimately, the decision is based upon the individual’s knowledge, skills, and abilities, to determine whether he or she has the potential to succeed in a more complex position.

Practical Implications

In today’s competitive and ever-changing business environment promotion decisions are important not only to organizations for succession planning, but also essential to individuals interested in career development and advancement. Therefore, several considerations should be taken to ensure success.

• Organizations – To ensure employees are ready for promotion, it is important to evaluate not only the level of current individual performance, but also the types of tasks the individuals are partaking in to determine if they qualify for a higher position.
• Individuals – Individuals wishing to advance their career should be encouraged to take on complex tasks that are a good fit for their current skills and abilities.  During this time, staying connected to the organization and working closely with a supervisor will help to avoid any negative effects (i.e. reduced quality of work, decreased productivity, etc.), as the employee works to increase overall contribution and performance.

Ultimately, the decision for promotion will be up to the supervisor. Many times this decision is important for both the individual and the organization as a whole. Therefore, various factors should be taken into consideration before a final verdict is reached.

Interpretation by:

Elizabeth Allen

The DeGarmo Group

Bloomington, IL – DeGarmo Group (www.degarmogroup.com), is  proud to report that US Cellular (www.uscellular.com) was recognized as a J.D. Power 2011 Customer Service Champion—one of only 40 companies to have earned this distinction this year.

US Cellular uses DeGarmo Group’s talent acquisition systems to select employees who work in their front-line, customer-facing roles such as Customer Service Representatives and Retail Sales Associates, among others.

“We’re happy to see US Cellular recognized with such a prestigious award. We’ve worked very closely with their Talent Acquisition team over the years to ensure that our assessment solutions help to select the best people to fill those critical front-line positions” stated Anthony Adorno, Chief Operating Officer for DeGarmo Group.

To qualify for inclusion on this elite list, companies must not only excel within their own industries, but also must stand out among leading brands in 20 major industries evaluated by J.D. Power. Five key customer “touch points” measured included people, presentation, process, product and price.

To identify the J.D. Power 2011 Customer Service Champions, J.D. Power evaluated more than 800 brands. Companies were identified based on customer feedback, opinions, and perceptions gathered primarily from J.D. Power’s syndicated research as well as additional, supplemental research. This group of 40 represents the highest-performing companies that deliver service excellence to U.S. customers—both within their respective industries and across all industries measured.

According to Alan D. Ferber, executive vice president of operations for U.S. Cellular, “We are especially honored to be named a Customer Service Champion because it’s based on the opinion of our customers. They deserve excellent customer service, and we will continue to work hard to deliver it.”

About DeGarmo Group

DeGarmo Group is a leading provider of web-based assessment and training services to support talent acquisition and employee development processes. We employ a staff with expertise in Industrial and Organizational psychology that regularly contributes to, and draws upon, the latest scientific research to deliver innovative and compelling solutions for our clients.

About U.S. Cellular

U.S. Cellular is committed to fixing wireless one project at a time and recently unveiled The Belief Project, an array of industry-leading innovations designed to elevate the customer experience. The Chicago-based carrier provides the best cell phone service in the country according to survey results released by Consumer Reports, which found that wireless customers are more satisfied with U.S. Cellular than every other major wireless company. U.S. Cellular has the highest call quality and network satisfaction of any national carrier and was also named one of Forbes Magazine’s 2010 “Most Trustworthy Companies.” The Belief Project complements U.S. Cellular’s growing catalog of cutting-edge phones that are all backed by its high-speed nationwide network.