Behavioral Interviewing: Getting Bang for Your Interview Buck Michelle Martinez

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Ever run into hiring managers that don't want to take the time up front to prepare for interviews with job candidates? Or what about managers who go with their "gut feeling" when selecting candidates, instead of job-related information garnered from actual interviews? It might be time to change the interview process.

Anyone who has been on either side of a job interview have heard or asked questions similar to these:

• Tell me about a time you identified a problem and came up with the solution? What did you do?
• Describe a project that required a high amount of energy over an extended period of time. What did you do to keep enthusiasm up?
• Tell me about a job or project where you had to gather information from many different sources and then create something from the information?
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• What's been the most difficult obstacle you have ever overcome?

What's common about the four questions is that all focus on behavior.

"People understand the notion that past behavior can predict future behavior," says Bill Byham, chairman and CEO of Development Dimension International, a global testing and assessment firm. "The problem is getting behavior."

For example, you ask a sales position candidate, "In your current job, how well are you doing as a salesperson in your unit?" The question relates to behavior, but isn't specific enough to gather the needed information. "We don't know if the candidate is the only person in the sales unit," Byham explains. "We didn't pin down the real behavior, so the next question has to probe."

But the basics for behavioral interviewing aren't just about interview questions. "The biggest problem is when questions don't really relate to the job," explains Wendell Williams, managing director of ScientificSelection.com, which specializes in hiring and skills measurement systems that minimize turnover, reduce training expenses and maximize productivity. "Or, when interviewers are trained in behavioral interviewing questions, but have no answer key to determine how the answers fit the job to be filled. A lot of practitioners work very hard at mastering the probing technique, but the magic is in the answers."

According to Williams, the correct execution of behavioral interviewing has several key phases:

• Candidates are asked behavior-based questions.
• Interviewers have a clear idea of the job domain.
• Interviewers are trained in probing techniques.
• Job requirements are known because a job analysis was conducted and that data was translated into competencies that can be accurately measured during the interview process.
• An answer key is available because a job analysis was completed.

Cost of Bad Interviews

Doing the legwork that prepares us for an interview is time-consuming, but a lifesaver when you think about how the quality of a candidate selected affects your organization. "The bell curve can be divided into roughly four groups," Williams explains. "People in the top 16 percent who produce the most, people between 84 percent and 51 percent who produce more than average; people between 50 percent and 17 percent who produce less than average; and people in the bottom 16 percent."

If you translate productivity into dollars, the need to do the upfront work becomes even more real. Williams explains: "Financial differences in personal productivity are astonishingly high. They are estimated to be 19 percent of average salary for semi-skilled workers; 32 percent for skilled workers; and 48 percent for managers and professionals. Translating these percentages into dollars looks like this: If you have 20 $60,000-a-year managers, a 48 percent productivity difference would amount to $576,000 per year; 20 skilled workers paid an average of $40,000 would be $152,000; and 20 semi-skilled workers at $50,000 would be $320,000 annually."

Genentech's Experience

Two years ago, San Francisco-based Genentech, a company that employs 5,000, started using behavioral interviews for selecting new hires. According to Shannon MacGregor, senior recruiter for the company, the process has been well worth the time, and the money spent "is pennies when you consider the outcomes," she says.

"Eighty percent of hires are from the college level so we started there," she says. "But, it has expanded to other areas of the company, such as finance, sales, marketing and medical affairs."

Genentech's initial step was to train every employee who conducts candidate interviews in behavioral-based techniques. Working with B.T. Innovations, the human resources and recruiting staff selected software that would help with analyzing jobs, then determining what skills—from most important to least important—need to be discussed.

The initial feedback from managers was along the lines of, 'Gosh, it takes more time, but it is worth it.' They like the feeling of being well prepared, consistent with interviews, and not scrambling around putting questions together at the last minute," MacGregor says.

A web-based program by B.T. Innovations helps Genentech conduct job profiles. "A hiring manager, someone who has done the job, and someone who is currently in the job are the people involved in the job profiling," says MacGregor. "This team goes through a list of 168 task statements that will determine what skills (at what level) are needed for job success. Questions for the interviews, broken down by the number of interviewers involved, are also generated."

Genentech's hiring process is divided into two (sometime three) rounds. The first round assesses essential performance skills such as leadership, communication, motivation, etc. The second-round interviews-involving three to five interviewers-ask questions focused on the top five to eight skills needed on the job. "Questions about each skill are asked by two interviewers," MacGregor says. "But, the questions are different. By doing it this way, we get a comparative analysis of how candidates answered."

Behavioral-Based Techniques Take Many Forms

Another method of behavioral-based interviews made popular by Lou Adler, veteran recruiter, founder of CJA Executive Search, and author of Power Hiring is performance-based interviewing.

According to Adler, performance-based interviewing cuts down on some of the legwork.

"When you know the performance needs of the job, you just need to get examples of comparable past performance," he says. "This way you don't need to even define the requisite behavior. If you find people with the ability to meet performance needs of the job, I guarantee they'll have the correct mix of behaviors."

In Adler's opinion, by putting performance first, "you very quickly find some excellent candidates who have achieved similar results using a different mix of skills, behaviors and competencies. By starting off looking for skills, behaviors and competencies, you minimize your pool of top performers and inadvertently eliminate great people who bring new ideas and fresh thinking."

The performance-first approach has other benefits, he says, for the recruiter, hiring manager and candidate:

• The recruiter and hiring manager are on the same page with respect to real job needs.
• Recruiters play a more dominant role in the hiring process.
• Managers quickly become better interviewers.
• Recruiters and other nonfunctional experts, become more insightful about real job needs without having to become technical experts.
• Candidates clearly know what is expected of them before starting the job.

But, the bottom line is this: No matter which way you approach behavioral interviewing, know the ins and outs of the job your hiring for. If you don't have what Williams' calls "the answer key," you're doomed for some degree of failure, which will show up in areas such as retention, productivity, hiring costs and more.

Michelle Martinez is a Leesburg, Va.-based writer specializing in recruitment, human resources and workplace management issues.