Listen to this: Data and Analytics for Hiring and HR

From afar, I have to admit for some time I have been a fan of Evolv, an HR technology company that has for the last few years been been doing some really clever and interesting things in the assessment, screening and analytics space.

Essentially, Evolv helps big organizations, like Xerox for one, understand the characteristics, experiences, and skills that tend to make people successful (and not successful) in a given job, and then helps organizations test for and hopefully hire, the kinds of people that meet (or come close to) those characteristics and therefore are most likely to be successful if they are hired.

Evolv can then evaluate these data points, (and they have millions of them), compare the answers given by prospective candidates to the profile of characteristics of existing employees that indicate eventual performance success, and assess the 'match' of the candiate's answers to the characteristics of the people that time and history have proven to actually be successful on the job.

Recently the folks at NPR's Planet Money took a look at the online predictive assessment process that companies like Evolv are developing and their experience and observations make for a really interesting listen. Check out the NPR podcast here, or using the embedded player below, (email and RSS subscribers may need to click through)

Really fascinating discussion, and mostly because it gives a glimpse into what 'regular' folks, i.e. people not into HR tech or HR or tech, and rather the typical job seeker, think about this approach to employment assessment and HR technology.

The bottom line seems to be that while there might be some (initial) reservations about the relevance, accuracy, and applicability of these kinds of screening tools for employment, that the 'old' system of resumes, cover letters, interviewing polish, and 'Do you have a friend on the inside?' cronyism that are the hallmarks of the traditional job search are no better than casing your lot with an online assessment.

For what it is worth, I think the approach Evolv is taking represents the future of screening, assessment, and hiring. Wordsmithing resumes, spending hours and hours on cover letters than no one reads, and trying to decide if you should wait 24 or 48 hours to follow up with a recruiter after an interview seem incredibly nonsensical, add little value to the process, and ultimately have nothing at all inherent in them that can predict eventual success on the job.

So take a listen to the podcast (about 18 mnutes or so), and get an idea where the future of assessment and recruiting is heading. Let me know what you think.

Happy Geico Day!

REPRISE: You call it 'culture' - to the talent it might just be 'policy'

Note: The blog is taking some well-deserved rest for the next two weeks (that is code for I am pretty much out of decent ideas, and I doubt most folks are spending their holidays reading blogs anyway), and will be re-running some of best, or at least most interesting posts from 2013. Maybe you missed these the first time around or maybe you didn't really miss them, but either way they are presented for your consideration. Thanks to everyone who stopped by in 2013!

The below post hits another theme that I kind of obsessed on in 2013 - what an often amorphous concept like culture means in the workplace and how it impacts how we manage talent. The piece originally ran in February 2013.

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You call it 'culture', to the talent it might just be 'policy'

Fresh off last week's launch of The 8 Man Rotation, 2012 Season free Ebook on all things Sports and HR, I am stocking the pond for the 2013 edition with another dispatch from the sports world - but one that I promise has more broad relevance and applicability.

In baseball, and perhaps in all of North American major professional sports, the New York Yankeesare the most famous, most successful, and most storied franchise in history. Legendary players, achievements, 27 World Series championships, and the occasional bit of controversy have been the hallmarks of the team throughout its long history.

With this long history comes tradition certainly, and traditionally the Yankees have continued to reinforce elements like their uniforms, which are the same design, more or less, as they have always been, and with no player names on the back, only numbers. The Yankees shun most of the other 'entertainment' elements that have become a fixture of professional sports - they have no costumed mascots or cheerleaders. They try for the most part to project a sense of professionalism in how they play the game, and how their players, (employees really), also project themselves when they are representing the team.

For players this means (among other things), an 'appearance' code - uniform shirts buttoned and worn a certain manner, and curiously enough still in 2013, a ban for players on facial hair.  Yep, you read that correctly. If you want to play for the Yankees that means no mustaches, beards, goatees, Van Dykes or facial hair of any type.

The Yankees ownership obviously feels, and has for a long time, that the facial hair ban helps to ensure and support their company brand and culture - professionalism, attention to detail, and very 'corporate' in nature. To them surely this 'rule' really is not so much a rule or a policy, but an outward manifestation and expression of that culture.  And it is entirely up to them as an employer to feel that way.

But one man's (or company's) culture is another man's policy - and in some cases this culture/policy has the effect of deterring otherwise 'top' talent from the organization. The latest example of this in action for the Yankees - check these quotes from the Tampa Bay Rays' pitcher David Price. Price is one of the best pitchers in the league, and when he becomes a free agent in a couple of years, would be precisely the kind of talent the Yankees would pursue. 

Here's what Price has to say about the Yankees and facial hair:

"If I ever did hit that free-agent market, there would be teams I wouldn't sign with simply because of the stuff that I've heard -- every rule they have."

Taking note of his beard, I told Price he'd have to shave if the Yankees traded for him.

"I wouldn't stay there very long then,” he responded. “I wouldn't sign a long-term deal there. Those rules, that's old-school baseball. I was born in '85. That's not for me. That's not something I want to be a part of."

Sure, you can get a little cynical here and tell me - 'If the Yankees offered him $10M more than any other team, he's shut up and sign the contract and shave the beard.'  That could very well be true, but that isn't really the important point to me. 

One man's 'culture' is another man's policy. Sure in this case maybe the culture/policy is having its desired effect - preventing what would possibly be a bad hire. Price, if he went to the Yankees would bristle over the facial hair ban, and probably lots of other culture/policy issues as well.

Not judging anyone here - the Yankees have been really successful for a long time doing it their way, and Price has an absolute right to his opinion and his desire to be treated as a professional.

Not judging, but just reminding that living up to and reinforcing your culture means sometimes turning away some fantastic talent that doesn't see your culture the same way you do. 

PODCAST - #HRHappyHour 173 - How Data is Changing Recruiting

HR Happy Hour 173 - How Data is Changing Recruiting

Recorded Friday November 22, 2013

This week on the HR Happy Hour Show, Steve Boese and Trish McFarlane sat down with Eric Owski, VP of Product Strategy for Bright.com, for an interesting and informative conversation about how data, Big Data really, machine learning, and really sophisticated algorithms are helping organizations better understand the fit and potential for high performance of their candidates, and increasing the chances of making better hires while reducing the time and expense to make screening and hiring decisions.

It is still a challenge for many HR and Recruiting organizations simply to manage the volume of applicants that they are seeing for many positions, and to have the ability to spend the time and resources attempting to ensure they are engaging with (and hiring) the very best people that they can. The volume can often make expediency win out over making informed decisions, and in front-line, customer-facing roles this has the potential to cause pretty significant problems for the organization. 

Bright.com offers an approach and a solution that is based on millions of data points, informed by talent and recruiting professionals' input, and validated by the companies that have used the innovative 'Bright Score' to make more consistent and correct decisions about talent and potential.

You can listen to the show on the show page here, on iTunes, (just search in the podcasts section for 'HR HappyHour'), and using the widget player below, (email and RSS subscribers will need to click through). 

More Business Podcasts at Blog Talk Radio with Steve Boese and Trish McFarlane on BlogTalkRadio

It was a really informative and forward-looking kind of conversation that sheds some light on what new ideas and technologies promise to deliver to the talent management world now and more and more in the future.

Thanks to Eric and everyone at Bright for taking the time to share his insights!

CHART OF THE DAY: The American Dream of Renting

Ok, so perhaps that title was not totally fair, as the while the below chart could be interpreted in a couple of different ways, depending on your point of view and level of relative optimism/pessimism/cynicism.

But first, the chart in question, showing the trends in American home ownership for roughly the last two decades, (my comments of course, after the jump):

The current percentage of Americans owning their homes stands at about 65%, roughly equal to the rate in 1995, prior to the last two recorded recessions, (as indicated by the gray areas on the chart).

And the rate has been declining since about 2004, well before the American financial crisis of 2008/9, the ensuing economic slowdown, and the dramatic tightening of the availability of mortgage credit.  Combine tighter credit standards with the sharp rise in unemployment (and employment security) in the period of 2008 - 2010, then you have the basic root causes for the fall in home ownership. Even the historically low mortgage interest rates of about 2011 until, well, until now, have not been able to reverse this trend. Oh, and one more data point to consider - all cash sales of property (primarily from banks and other investors), have continued to rise - some estimates say these cash sales now constitute half of all transactions. Even if a prospective individual home buyer has a stable job, and can qualify for a home mortgage, they often find themselves losing out to a competing all cash offer from an investor or syndicate.

In the depths of the recession it was often theorized that employment mobility was becoming compromised by people's inability to sell (at a price that would be acceptable if they could sell at all), their existing homes in order to facilitate a job change or even a transfer inside their current company. In many parts of the country large numbers of homeowners were underwater on their homes, owing more to the mortgage holder than the home could expect to fetch in a sale.

In 2013 and perhaps in the future, the trends in the rate of home ownership and in the increase of all cash and investor-driven residential home sales, while seemingly not positive developments for the average employee, could be ones that end up benefiting the organization. In 2009 and 2010, organizations were probably finding it hard, (or very expensive), to facilitate employee transfers around the country or to convince that desirable candidate to relocate from one state to another when selling a home at a loss simply was too much of a financial burden to take on, no matter how fantastic the job opportunity might have been.

But with the home ownership trends heading downward, and the investor-driven all cash sales on the rise, the chances are increasing that the great candidate or that high-potential manager you'd like to send on a rotational assignment to Kentucky are going to much more able to make these kinds of moves in the future. Without the need to sell the house, well, most folks are just a few months away or a broken lease from taking the next great gig.

Of course, while not being burdened by home ownership makes someone more likely to listen to your opportunity or offer, it also makes them equally able and receptive to everyone else's offers as well.

Happy Halloween my friends.

Experience is overrated

Check out the latest in the New York Times 'Corner Office' interview series, this one with CEO of Spreecast Jeff Fluhr, (who was also the founder of StubHub), and thus probably knows a few things about finding and retaining talent).

Fluhr, in no uncertain terms, takes umbrage with the traditional, overly cautious in a CYA kind of way, approach to hiring that essentially seeks out only those candidates that have already done pretty much the same job that you want them to now do at your company, and at a company that is pretty similar (industry, size, location, etc.), to your shop.American Pop I - Mo Mullan

Basically, you want a slightly fresher, more enthusiastic, (probably younger although you won't admit it), version of the person who just left the job. Someone that can simply be plugged in to the machine without too much bother and the great ship of industry can just keep steaming along.

But Fluhr says you're wrong to try and hire in that fashion. And he explains why in the NYT piece:

What I was often doing at StubHub as the company grew was to say, “O.K., we need a V.P. of marketing and we want somebody who’s been a V.P. marketing at another consumer Internet company, and hopefully, they’ve done these certain things because that’s what we need.” But the reality is that if you get somebody who’s smart, hungry and has a can-do attitude, they can figure out how to do A, B and C, because there’s really no trick to most of these things.

One of the things I tell people is that experience is overrated. I still sometimes find myself falling into the trap of thinking, when I’m trying to fill a role, “Has the person done the work that the role requires?” That’s the wrong question. It should be, “Let’s find a person who has the right chemistry, the right intellect, the right curiosity, the right creativity.” If we plug that person into any role, they’re going to be successful.

Fluhr's reasoning and approach intuitively make sense - after all, in only the most highly skilled, technical jobs do these kind of faux-requirements, 'Must have 10 years progressive experience doing pretty much the same thing we want you to do here' actually make sense.

Admittedly, no one wants a brain surgeon or an airline pilot short on experience but possessing a 'can-do' attitude.

But for most of the rest of the roles that often fall into the dreaded 'hard-to-fill' category, ask yourself honestly if at least part of the problem is that the starting point for the definition of the ideal candidate is that they have already done the job, almost exactly the job, that you are hiring for.

Ask yourself if you are really interested in hiring the best talent you can. Or hiring just the ones that won't need much training or won't annoyingly require someone on your team to explain all the knucklehead jargon and acronyms that unique to your business and industry and are so important for your success. 

Happy Monday.