Individual Blog Week 6

This week the reading posed a good question, "do the organizations have the best people?" The text explored various theories, and half-truths. I personally found the research done on how organizations can spot the best talent in advance to be interesting and at the same time controversial. There was significant research done by Schmidt and Hunter that examined 19 methods that organizations used to select employees. They found the best predictor of job performance was general mental ability with IQ tests. Sample tests, job tryouts, structured job interviews and conscientiousness were strong predictors as well (Pfeffer, 2006). I am not surprised by these findings however, there are arguments about whether IQ tests are fair, measure a range of abilities and if they are a strong or weak indictor of performance. This fights the findings of Schmidt and Hunter. I personally believe that other facts can affect ones job performance. I think social skills, as well as personality and emotional intelligence can affect job performance just as much as IQ. For instance, if you were a salesperson, had a high IQ, yet had very weak social skills, would you be successful at your job? You would not feel comfortable or be able to communicate with those in which you are selling to. I think it is very important to know how employers are evaluating you, and you should be prepared. I also think that managers need to consider some of the other abilities and skills that I previously listed.  It is important to point out, that managers can use evidence-based decisions about who to hire.

I found the article "Do you Need to Lighten Up or Toughen Up," to be an interesting take on performance research, because it goes straight to the employees. If you are a manager this is an article that you really should read and understand. 2,500 people took this survey and found that 52% believed negative feedback helped to improve their performance, and 47% believed that positive feedback helped them more. This creates a difficult situation for managers to be in, because the results are split, and it is very difficult for managers to tend to two completely different kinds of people. There was common ground, and that was that 96% said if delivered appropriately, negative feedback would be effective at improving performance. There also seemed to be an age gap that played a role in the responses. This being that 64% under the age of 30, liked the negative feedback, and 60% of those 50 and older preferred positive feedback. As a manager knowing how your employees receive information is very important. This is information that all managers should look at when developing performance reviews. Knowing this about your employees can improve perfomance. I personally have been given both positive and negative feedback, and I find that I need the negative in order to improve, and that correlates to the research since I am under 30. Positive is always nice to hear, but it doesn't allow you to grow and improve. What feedback benefits you more? Does your manager, or you as a manager vary feedback depending on person? What is your opinion on this matter?

The article, "In Hiring, Algorithms Beat Instinct" from the Harvard Business Review, refers to studies done to show that a simple equation is a better metric is make a decision, than human instinct. In 17 studies of applicants it was shown that the equation outperforms human decision by at least 25%. There was research conducted by Brian S. Connelly of the University of Toronto found that people making the call were highly familiar with the organization and had more information about the applicants that what was in the equation. However, it was found that people are easily distracted by this information and they use the information inconsistently. People can be swayed by comments of remarks on arbitrary topics which can lead to an inadequate choice. Surveys suggest that 85%-97% of professionals rely to some degree on intuition or mental synthesis of information. This evidence-based suggestion for hiring, I think makes sense. I can see how managers could be easily influenced to hire someone or dismiss them by comments made, or appearance, yet equations in my opinion can not measure socials or emotional intelligence.

Human Resource departments never get enough credit. They are constantly being asked to do more and more, and rarely get the credit that they deserve. There are many cases on how to be an evidence-based HR practitioner, and I feel that more and more  departments might begin to use this technique. I will take with me many of the finding from the research in order to benefit my employees, and improve their work performance, and the overall success of the organization.