HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: The Oz Principle (book)

Competencies: self-development, problem-solving

Who benefits: all of us

Consultant Usage: almost any trainer, consultant or coach

What’s it about? I was inspired to read this updated version of a favorite book of mine by my 10-year old granddaughter.  I was helping her study for her 4th grade Spanish test.  She was struggling some and acting out, so I said to her “Well, who is responsible for the grade you are going to get on the test?”  She looked at me with that blank look that is developed by pre-teens and teens when they really want to get to you!  “I don’t know”, she said.

Don’t get me wrong.  My granddaughter is a very smart young woman.  But her denial of responsibility at that moment gave me pause for thought and a link to this week’s entry.  Dear reader, how is your sense of responsibility and accountability doing these days?  How about your organization’s?

I am also moving.  You know that involves a lot of telephone and some face-to-face contacts.  I have categorized my contacts into two groups: (1) “Hi, how may I help you?” and (2) “Sorry, but we can’t do that.”   I am doing repeat business with a moving company based upon a previous good experience.  Believe it or not, my best phone experience was with the cable company – fantastic active listening skills, empathy and a clear explanation of services.  A storage company lost my business because the customer service representative could not explain the billing procedure in a way that I could understand.  Read below to find out where these people and their organizations live in terms of this excellent book.

Which brings me to The Oz Principle, which I highly recommend to any and all of you.  Disclaimer, I have no connection to the authors or their company but someone from their company gave me the updated book after finding out I had read the earlier version.  This new version is even better.

The book is all about honesty in the areas of responsibility and accountability.  The principles apply to individuals and organization.  Behavior is seen as Above The Line – steps to accountability: See a problem, own it, solve it and do it; and Below The Line, The Blame Game: Finger Pointing, CYA, Ignore/deny, Not My Job, Oh Poor Me, or just plain Wait & See.

People operating above the line focus on, and get, results.  Those operating below the line live in a “victim cycle” with no end in sight.

The authors use the story of The Wizard of Oz as a metaphor to explain how it all works.  I especially love the chapters in Part 2 – The Power of Individual Accountability: Moving Yourself Above The Line.  Here are the chapter titles
        Chapter 4: The Lion: Mustering the Courage to See It
        Chapter 5: The Tin Woodsman: Finding the Heart to Own It
        Chapter 6: The Scarecrow: Obtaining the Wisdom to Solve It
        Chapter 7: Dorothy: Exercising the Means to Do It                                                                                                                                                                                                              Ah, if only the world worked that way.

Now there is one Below The Line issue I want to address before ending this entry.  Please don’t sit there and tell yourself, me, or anyone, that you live above the line but your organization doesn’t — Hello Enron!!!

If you can see that your organization is living below the line, have the courage to acknowledge it and the heart to get on with owning it.  The saddest part of the stories of Enron and their ilk is that so many people inside the organization know that life is being lived below the line. 

This much I know for sure, if there are problems in your organization and you aren’t trying to solve them – well eventually the Wicked Witch of West will get you…and them! 

If you have read this far, get the book and read it.  It will be your reward!  Then pass it on to the other person — you know who I mean, the one who really needs it!

Technorati Tags: the wizard of oz, the oz principle, Dorothy, the lion, the tin man, the tin woodsman, the scarecrow, emerald city, good witch glinda, wicked witch of the west, responsibility, taking responsibility, taking ownership, problem-solving, victim, victim cycle, developing responsibility, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“There’s no such things as coulda, shoulda, or woulda. If you shoulda and coulda, you woulda done it.” Pat Riley

Both talent and jobs are multidimensional.  Performance and success at work is a function of three things:

1. What talent bring (i.e., what they can do)
2. What talent are motivated to do (i.e., what they want to do)
3. What talent have previously done (i.e., past performance)

In research on effective leaders, identifying and then cultivating the right talent seems to be a critical competency for effectiveness and success.  Every mistake an organization makes in hiring and promoting the wrong talent is incredibly costly.  The cost of turnover can range from 100% to 200% of a talent’s total benefit package and every mistake can dramatically affect the morale of the team and negatively impact current customers. 

High performers are attracted to other high performers and “lovable stars.”  Each mistake you make in hiring talent means you are missing out on another qualified candidate and possibly increasing turnover with your existing high potential and high performance employees.

If future performance is based on the three factors above, what types of assessments should be used to identify candidates with the greatest potential for future success and performance?

WHAT TALENT HAVE PREVIOUSLY DONE

• Resume/Work History
• Background Checks
• Structured Behavioral Interviews
• Drug Tests
• References
• Knowledge Tests

WHAT TALENT ARE MOTIVATED TO DO

• Career Interest Inventories
• Motivational Assessments
• Organizational Culture/Values Fit Assessments
• Honesty/Integrity Tests
• Signature Strengths

WHAT TALENT BRING

• Cognitive Ability/Intelligence
• Personality Assessments
• Aptitudes/Skills Assessments
• Simulations (e.g., Inbasket, role-plays)

So, know you have an evidenced based approach to talent selection. 

Which competencies actually are most predictive of success in leaders?

In a recent 2007 evaluation of 67 competencies in a financial services company by Lawrence P. Clark and Michelle Weitzman, only 6 competencies were significant predictors of individual financial performance goals:

• Drive for Results
• Decision Quality
• Hiring and Staffing
• Managing Vision and Purpose
• Developing Direct Reports
• Time Management

Certain leadership and personal competencies – including Motivating Others, Directing Others, Perseverance, Integrity/Trust, and Ethics/Values were not statistically significant in predicting success.  However, it might be argued that their absence might be highly predictive of failure. These competencies are obviously important within any corporate culture, but they did not appear to be critical for predicting high performance.

Similarly, the absence of some qualities and traits might be better at predicting failure (e.g., emotional intelligence, interpersonal competence, communication skills) but just because a leader has those does not necessarily ensure they will be a success.

Maybe now we can understand why selecting talent has often been more “art” than “science”….Be well….

Technorati Tags: pre-employment selection, assessment, interviewing, behavioral interviewing, emotional intelligence, personality inventories, work history, validation, interests, assessment centers, intelligence tests, cognitive ability measures, reference checks, peer ratings, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

“It may be your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.”

Stephen Wright

This is a repeat of my very first blog in loving memory to Elmo who taught me so much about love and life these last 11 years….

Well, I’ve learned a lot about “seeing” through some volunteer work my wife and I have been involved in for over 10 years–it’s with a wonderful organization here in Los Angeles called Guide Dogs of America (GDA). We have had the wonderful privilege of raising several guide dogs for the blind and have learned quite a bit about ourselves, others and life through our efforts.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the program you typically receive and get to name the puppies at about 8 weeks old and they live with you until they are mature (kinda like kids) which for most dogs is about 18 months. They then begin their structured training to serve their mission of literally being the “eyes” for someone who is sight impaired. When they are working they always were their “bibs” identifying as “guide dog in training.” Truthfully, our job is only to socialize the puppy and try not to make it harder for the professional trainers who will work with these dogs (so, no stupid pet tricks!).

Our community has been a wonderful supporter of the program—in fact many merchants and restaurant owners knew the names of our dogs but never our own! Good thing we have strong self-esteem. It has been wonderful to take our dogs everywhere, be recognized and have total strangers want to interact with us—gosh sounds like things all of us like about communities.

Several years ago we took our beautiful yellow lab named Elmo with us after our morning run at the beach to my wife’s favorite am coffee stop. He was working so that means no petting, no crumbs on the floor grazing or goofing off. A man approached me and told me that we couldn’t “have a pet in the store.” I know most of the morning help and didn’t recognize him—I thought maybe he might be a “newbie” that possibly possessed that “no clue gene?”

Well, I was ready for the question having been told on a number of occasions that “dogs are allowed”….these are my “educational moments” and I actually take pride in helping others understand the job Elmo is really doing. He looked at me strangely for a moment and asked, “Are you blind?” As unbelievable as it might sound, he wasn’t the first! I chuckled lightly and answered, “No.”

I wasn’t prepared for his second question which seemed to come out of nowhere—“well, is the dog blind?” “No” I replied, now beginning to dig through my mental DSM-IV flowchart of Axis II disorders. Just as quick he went into a Dennis Miller rant telling us, in a very animated fashion and loud voice, just how terrible pet owners were in our city, how they ruin property and that we want a private beach just for dogs. You could feel the tension in the room as most eyes were galvanized on this pretty intense interaction. Just as quickly, he stopped and walked away leaving me completely speechless and an awkward silence cloud among everyone watching.

It was at that moment that I realized that one of us truly was blind—the individual who had so aggressively approached us really had no clue how he came across, the impact his style and behavior had on us and how he was perceived.

Elmo has been a wonderful metaphor for the coaching work I do and a reminder that from time to time all of us needs a “guide dog” to truly help us see the world a bit more accurately. In a sense, we are all a bit blind to how we come off and how others experience us—only when we try to open our eyes to ourselves and others can we truly grow. Elmo and the other guide dogs we have been blessed to raise have truly helped me to see myself and others in a brand new light….Be well….

Technorati Tags:  guide dogs, executive coaching, learning, envisia learning, talent management, talent development, ken nowack, nowack 

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: So You Think You’re a Good Listener (HBR Article)

Competency: listening

Who benefits: bosses

Consultant Usage: coaching 360 feedback; management trainers

What’s it about?  Got to keep today’s entry short.  The article I am recommending isn’t much longer than this entry…so go read it, darn it!

Who is Janet and why is she leaving?  Janet is an excellent employee who is leaving because her boss doesn’t listen to her.  Oh, he thinks he does.  He is sure they have open lines of communication. 

The article says that in an analysis of 4,000 360-degree feedback reports, the largest gap between managers’ self-evaluation and those who filled out the feedback forms was the manager’s receptiveness to hear bad news about difficult issues. 

Most bosses probably aren’t quite as good a listener as they think.  But try telling them! 

So here is my wicked thought for today.  Go to this Harvard Business Review site and purchase a reprint.  When it arrives, open with gloves on and shred the envelope it comes in.  When the boss is out of the office, slip in and slip it into his/her in-basket!

Oh, and if the boss comes around asking who did it this, don’t lie.  Say to the boss “Oh, it could have been any of us.” 

Or blame it on Janet, she’s leaving anyway.   

Technorati Tags: listening, listening skills, 360 feedback, executive coaching, listening training, giving feedback, communication skills, giving bad news, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

80% of success is showing up” 

Woody Allen

Gosh, it’s hard to predict (good) talent these days.  Just look at these recent studies:

1. According to RHR International, 40% to 60% of high level corporate executives brought in from outside a company will fail within 2 years based on their 2006 analysis of clients.  Those who do fail most often derail quickly sometime between 7 to 9 months in the job.
2. Last year there were 28,058 executive turnovers including board members and executives from CEO down to VP a 68% increase over 2006 according to Liberum Research analysis of North American public companies—of those 44% of the positions were filled from outside the company.
3. Failure rate for hourly jobs approach 50% or more and about 20% of hiring decisions made for professional and salaried positions end in failure (Kronos, Inc.)
4. According to Robert Hogan (Vam Kurt, Hogan & Kaiser) the failure rate of managers in corporate America is 50% (this is pretty similar to divorce rates in California)

Based on several recent surveys (e.g., Abderdeen Group and Rocket-Hire), the utilization of assessment tools for pre-employment selection and promotion is approximately 60% to 70% across all industries with some projections of increased use in the next 12 months of about 14%. Of those using pre-employment assessments across job levels, the most popular approaches continue to be evaluation of work history, candidate interviews, skill and aptitude tests, and personality inventories.

Which approach to measuring key aspects of potential talent’s knowledge, experience and competence actually do a good job of predicting future success and performance? How should you go about making them legally defensible¹.

Current research on personality², emotional intelligence³ and traditional techniques⁴ provide some answers to these questions:

RANKING OF POPULAR ASSESSMENT APPROACHES TO SELECTION (VALIDITY COEFFICIENTS)

Work Sample Tests (.33 to .54)
Cognitive Ability/Intelligence Tests (.27 to .51)
Assessment Centers (.41 to .50)
Peer/Supervisory Ratings (.41 to .49)
Work History (.24 to .35)
Emotional Intelligence (.20 to .24)
Interviews (.15 to .38)
Personality Inventories (.15 to .31)
Reference Checks (.14 to .26)
Training Ratings (.13 to .15)
Self-Ratings (.10 to .15)
Education/Grade Point Average (.00 to .10)
Interests/Values (.00 to .10)
Age (.-.01 to .00)

Anyone that has some background in statistics will immediately recognize that all of these assessment approaches account for only a small amount of variance in predicting future success but these corrleations are traditionally what is found in other areas of research such as health and medicine (e.g., the correlation between taking asprin and reduced risk of death by heart attach is .02; coronary bypass surgery for stable heart disease and survival at 5 years is .08; and psychotherapy and subsequent well-being is .32). 

Although many are completely independent of each other (e.g., cognitive ability and personality) combining more than two does not seem to dramatically increase predictive validity of job performance and success.

In some cases, these assessment approaches might be stronger at predicting who is likely to fail better than who is likely to succeed….Handicap away!  Be well….

tags]pre-employment selection, assessment, interviewing, behavioral interviewing, emotional intelligence, personality inventories, work history, validation, interests, assessment centers, intelligence tests, cognitive ability measures, reference checks, peer ratings, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack[/tags]

1. Nowack, K. M. (1988). Approaches to validating assessment centers. Performance and Instruction, 27, 14-16 [↩]
2. Judge, T., Bono, J., Ilies, R., and Gerhardt, M. (2002). Personality and leadership: A qualitative and quantitative review. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87, 765-780 [↩]
3. Van Rooy, D. & Viswesvaran, C. (2004). Emotional intelligence: A meta-analytic investigation of predictive validity and nomological net. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 65, 71-95 [↩]
4. Schmidt, F. and Hunter, J. (1998). The validity and utility of selection methods in personnel: Practical and theoretical implications of 85 years of research findings. Psychological Bulletin, 124, 262-274 [↩]

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: The Grass is Greener on This Side

Competency: self-development

Who benefits: everyone

Consultant Usage: coaching, counseling

What’s it about?  I am going to deviate this week from my normal pattern of reviewing something of interest related to this site.  Instead I would like to share an “aha” moment I had this weekend.  It is most likely not an original thought.  In fact, I may have had it before.  And I will bet most you have had this same thought too.  But it is a good one to pull off the shelf every once in a while and consider.

The conception of this thought began as I was finishing up a book for a book club I belong to.  The author was writing about her experience as a caregiver.  This highly educated woman had taken a minimum wage job for a few months as a personal journey to deal with unfinished business with her deceased mother.

While the book has much to recommend it, something kept tugging at me.  Something wasn’t right.  And then near the end it came to me.  While this woman gained tremendous self-insight and self-learning about herself during her “journey”, at the end nothing changed. 

There is more to it than that, of course.  But it prompted me to think about a woman I knew several years ago when I was the interim Director of Human Resources for a small government agency.  She and I hit it off, so she would pop into my office at least twice a week to share the latest gossip and her work struggles.  (I viewed gossip as source of which way the wind is blowing – I didn’t encourage it but I did pay attention – occasionally it gave me the opportunity to prevent a real problem before it occurred.)  But it was her work struggles that intrigued me.  There was always “they” and “them” slowing her up, preventing her from doing her best.  And “they” and “them” just didn’t understand her.

What was amazing during these conversations was the amount of energy she was expending on self-improvement.  She attended seminars, read books, listened to tapes and CDs, and (privately) talked about her personal therapy.  She had great personal insight about herself.

Now before I get to my simple thought, allow me a lighter moment.  For years I played cards in a monthly poker group.  Almost everyone in the group was a psychologist and almost everyone had a Ph.D.  A brighter group you could not ask for.  I love those guys.  But it never ceased to amaze me how this very bright group of people could get hooked into the game of “If only”.  If only I had one more spade.  If only my 10 was a jack.  If only I had one more ace. 

To me, all three of these stories have a common thread.  All three stories relate to human resource development and specifically the professional evolution of emotional intelligence.  There has been such a great push to know yourself better and know how you impact others.  Self-insight, Self-knowledge, Self-learning, Tapping into the intrapersonal voice. 

But to what end is all that insight/knowledge if everything remains the same.  The author is still angry, the employee is still blaming, my poker buddies are (probably) still griping.

So what is my simple thought?  It is that the journey to self-discovery and personal knowledge is not the same as self-development.  These days there is a large “feedback industry” (360 feedback, personal coaches, etc.) out there.  And for good reason.  But how much of the feedback stops at the personal learning stage and never becomes personal change?

Self-development is when you put your insights into actions and change yourself in relation to those people around you or situations you find yourself in. 

So go out there and learn something about yourself…and then ask yourself how you can effectively use that information.  Or in poker parlance, learn to play with the hand you are dealt.  When one is able to do that, the grass is greener on this side!

Technorati Tags: self-development, self-improvement, 360 feedback, intrapersonal knowledge, personal change, self-knowledge, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“Vacation is what you take when you can’t take what you’ve been taking any longer.”

Unknown

Have you ever gone to work when you were feeling less than 100 percent?  Well, we have a new name for that–it is called “presenteeism” and is defined as showing up and not being at your peak ability to perform your job due to physical, emotional or cognitive challenges.

Have you ever not gone to work when you were feeling 100 percent?  There is an old word for that–it is called “playing hooky” (”Hooky, also spelled “hookey”apparently developed from the phrase “hooky-crooky” common in the early 19th century, which meant “dishonest or underhanded”).

Employers have been rather clueless about the magnitude of their absenteeism problems although they realize whether someone is at work feeling “under the weather” or staying at home neither are adding much to the “corporate bottom line.”

The firm CCH in their 2007 Unscheduled Absence Survey discovered that only 34% of employees who call in sick do so because of true physical health problems. The other 66% are most likely dealing with child care, eldercare, or other family problems that require us to skip out of work for all or part of the day.

Unscheduled absenteeism has climbed to its highest level since 1999 and these absences cost some large employers more than $1 million a year, according to the CCH survey of 323 human-resources executives conducted last year. The survey found that unscheduled absenteeism cost employers $660 per employee per year on average last year, up from $610 the prior year. 

What employers do know is that individuals who don’t practice healthy lifestyle behaviors are more likely to be a greater cost liability.  For example:

• According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, smokers cost the American business nearly $94 billion annually in lost productivity
• Overweight employees are absent, on average, 13 days more than healthy weight workers
• The National Business Group on Health reports that obese people have 30% to 50% more chronic medical problems than those who smoke or drink heavily

So employers today readily acknowledge that workers with lousy health habits are more likely to be out of the office.  What they don’t seem to know is how many employees actually take a day off without really being physically ill.

To fight back, companies are now doing everything they can to make sure that you don’t play hooky.  In a recent Marsh/Mercer Health and Benefits Survey, 20% of companies are limiting the actual number of days you can take for ACCEPTABLE absences; 39% are experimenting with paid-time off “banks” for employees to use when they need to; and 56% are now tracking unscheduled absences and using them in some capacity in an employee’s overall performance appraisal.

If you work at Wal-Mart, you now have to call a 1-800 phone number the day you want to play hooky or are legitimately sick instead of notifying their manager directly.  Hopefully, Wal-Mart isn’t paying for each 1-800 call that comes in each day.

Using the most recently available data, the United Nations International Labor Organization (ILO) has determined that the average Canadian, Australian, Japanese or Mexican worker works roughly 100 hours less than the average employee in the US does in a year (about 2.5 weeks less). Brazilians and British employees worked some 250 hours, or more than 5 weeks less than Americans. Germans worked roughly 500 hours, or 12.5 weeks less than their US counterparts.

All of us deserve a day to play “hooky” to energize our “battery” and step off the “big wheel of life” before we get flung off it….When is the last time you really played guilt-free “hooky” and went to bed with a great big smile on your face knowing you were able to spend one day doing some things that really excite your passions? Um-mm, me either….Be well…

Technorati Tags: absenteeism, employee wellness, obesity, health promotion, stress, engagement, productivity, job burnout, vacations, work-life balance, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack, Envisia, Envisia Learning

“Through reflection, he (the practitioner) can surface and criticize the tacit understandings that have grown up around the repetitive experiences of a specialized practice, and can make new sense of the situations of uncertainty or uniqueness which he may allow himself to experience”

                                                                                            Donald Schön
 

Learning about ourselves and about our execution in practice requires an internal and external process. It requires both our own critical reflection  (use of reflection) and feedback from and discussion with others on what we do, how it works against some standard or vision of what’s desired, learning from mistakes and re-calibrating our principles and frames to incorporate new learning (use of social interaction).

Reflection is a key to learning. Unexamined action can just be reaction without consciousness and intention and lead to habit and routine without confirming effectiveness or clarifying impact. Reflection that incorporates critical thinking and challenges what we think we know allows us to open learning space. 

Critical reflection engages double-loop learning¹ in which not only actions and outcomes are considered, but also the underlying assumptions, organizing schema and operating values are questioned to explore new alternatives (learning). It involves challenging theories-in-use² to better understand what, how and why; and expand one’s repertoire of and accessibility to knowledge and actions.

One’s openness to useful feedback and critical reflection provides the platform for learning from the observations, feedback and motivation offered by more experienced mentors (which provide added incentive and idealized visions of what’s possible) and colleagues in social networks. Social interaction thus plays an important role in the learning (whether in a paired mentor relationship or small group). The social interaction process helps, (1) as the vehicle for feedback and sharing alternative meaning systems, (2) because discourse and language provide the platform in which we crystallize “what we know” (or now believe we know) and (3) because influence is a social dynamic. The great Donald Schön popularized the idea that learning was inherently active, social and connected to the situation and that knowledge is created through reflection-in-action³. Raelin further develops many of these ideas in his discussion of work-based learning⁴.
.
Social interaction provides dialogue and exchange of language conveys different meanings and deepens understanding. In this way, learning becomes internalized and available for future use.  Through this process, we resolve tension between theory and practice and create a more personalized, workable fit. Over time, this process results in what I like to call “practice theories”.

This concludes, for now, my exploration into learning masterful practice. There is so much more to dig into and try out in making this more commonplace in education and training for professional helping roles in human systems.

Technorati Tags: Dave Jamieson, masterful practice, self-awareness, learning, critical reflection, social interaction, practice theories, double-loop learning, work-based learning, Don Schon, Joe Raelin, Chris Argyris, envisia learning

1. Argyris, C. and Schön, D. (1978). Organizational Learning: A Theory of Action Perspective. Reading, MA.: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company [↩]
2. Schön, D. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner. New York: Basic Books [↩]
3. Schön, D. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner. New York: Basic Books [↩]
4. Raelin, J. A. (2008). Work-Based Learning: Bridging Knowledge and Action in the Workplace. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, Inc [↩]

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: Brain Agility (Book)

Competencies: stress management, cognitive hardiness, eating/nutrition, psychological well-being, exercise/physical activity

Who benefits: individuals interested in maintaining brain health, especially those who are or nearing retirement age

Consultant Usage: psychologists, nutritionists, some trainers and employee coaches, doctors and nurses

What’s it about? I had my annual physical (okay, bi-annual) on Monday.  The doctor asked me what I was doing for my body.  Was I exercising regularly?  Eating right?  Getting enough sleep? 

Interestingly, he never asked me if I was properly exercising my brain. 

Yet in the workplace, brain wellness is number one on the individual health scorecard.  One could argue that this is also true for those of us nearing or in the retirement stage of our life.

In one of those wonderful serendipitous moments where two separate events cross paths at just the right time, I came across a short, easy to read book called Brain Agility.  After just a glance at the table of contents I wished that every doctor who gives physical check-ups would give this book to her/his patients.

The book is about brain fitness.  Brain fitness is a growing industry.  Sales in brain fitness software alone are estimated at $225 million a year. 

What I like most about this book is its holistic approach to taking care of the brain…and why it ties in so well with the annual (or bi-annual) physical check up.  The book is divided into two sections.  The first section explains how the brain works, and especially how it ages.  It describes the relationship between aging and nutrition, stress, and physical exercise.  The intent is to give the reader knowledge about how to forestall or slow the normal age-related cognitive decline.

The second section, and the bulk of the book, is filled with a wide variety of daily mental workouts to improve brain fitness. 

If you are interested in the topic or want more specific information on the various mental workouts, you can go to the author’s website: http://brainagility.com/.

I would tell you more about the book myself, but it is time for me to begin my new daily brain regime.    Have a healthy day!

Technorati Tags: , stress, employee wellness, stress management, nutrition, aging, brain, brain exercises, brain agility, physical exercise, cognitive decline, visual-spatial orientation, word fluency, logic, resilience, hardiness, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“The number of years of experience in a domain is a poor predictor of attained performance”

Anders Ericcson

Would you rather go to a doctor with 20 years of experience in a specialty area working at one of the most prestigious institutions or be treated by someone fresh out of medical school?

How long does it take to become truly proficient in one’s area of expertise and profession?  And if one truly is more experienced, does it ensure they are actually better?

• Evidence shows that in the USA the highest skilled drivers (registered race and rally car drivers) have a much higher crash rate than the average driver (Naatanen and Summala, 1976).
• Chess grand masters who can recall almost entire layouts from their games are no better than novices at recalling 6 or more randomly placed pieces
• Actors who have been in the profession a long time truly are better at recalling their lines than those new to the profession but don’t have superior memories on any other subjects
• Those who select stocks for others for a living are barely better than the rest of us (Ericcson et al., 2006).

There is, in fact, a big difference between “experts” and those “who are expert” in what they do.

In a recent book co-edited by Anders Ericcson called “The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance“, the authors conclude that great performance comes mostly from two things:

1. Regularly obtaining concrete and constructive feedback

2. Deliberate practice

Two authors in the Cambridge Handbook (Janie Deaking and Stephen Cobley) cite prior research in which they analyzed diaries of 24 elite figure skaters to determine what might explain some of their performance success.  They found that the best skaters spent 68% of their practice doing really hard jumps and routines compared to those who were less successful (they spent about 48% of their time doing the same difficult things).

Having raw talent is wonderful but it’s what you do with it that really seems to matter.  “Only dead fish go with the stream” is an old saying–if you don’t work to get better it just doesn’t happen naturally.  Ericsson and other use the word “deliberate practice” to mean focused, structured, serious and detailed attempts to get better.  That means it has to be challenging and difficult (i.e., practicing the most difficult tasks).

From questionnaire responses of best and worst performers (Crews and Landers, 1991) it appears that deliberate practice seems to help automatic processing (i.e., the “let it  happen” versus “try to make it happen”).  Just think of the last time your truly tuned in to how hard to press your foot down on the brake of your car or pressure to put on the steering wheel to move it when you last drove your car.  Since you have driven for years, little cognitive processing is consumed with the “how” giving you more opportunity to engage in other activities (some of which actually impair your effectiveness in driving safely).

As it turns out, expert performance requires about ten years, or ten to twenty thousand hours of deliberate practice. Little evidence exists for expert performance before ten years of deliberate practice in any field¹.

Truly, “past performance is the best predictor of future success.”  The requirement of deliberate practice to truly become a higher performer gives us some clues as to why the traditional techniques and methods to select talent are only modest at helping us to identify high performers in the future².

RANKING OF ASSESSMENT APPROACHES TO SELECTION (VALIDITY COEFFICIENTS)

Work Sample Tests (.33 to .54)
Cognitive Ability/Intelligence Tests (.27 to .51)
Assessment Centers (.41 to .50)
Peer/Supervisory Ratings (.41 to .49)
Work History (.24 to .35)
Emotional Intelligence (.20 to .24)
Unstructured Interviews (.15 to .38)
Personality Inventories (.15 to .31)
Reference Checks (.14 to .26)
Training Ratings (.13 to .15)
Self-Ratings (.10 to .15)
Education/Grade Point Average (.00 to .10)
Interests/Values (.00 to .10)
Age (.-.01 to .00)

So, no wonder I have been so unsuccessful in most of my executive coaching assignments–not only is it challenging to get executives I work with to put any new behavior into practice but I can’t seem to get them to do it for any length of time!  I guess old dogs are indeed hard to teach new tricks unless they are willing to practice it correctly over and over again….Be well….

Technorati Tags: selecting talent, talent development, executive coaching, performance, mastery, expertise, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack, envisia, deliberate practice

1. K. Anders Ericsson, ed., The Road to Excellence: The Acquisition of Expert Performance in the Arts and Sciences, Sports and Games. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1996, pp.10-11 [↩]
2. Schmidt, F. & Hunter, J. (1998). The validity and utility of selection methods in personnel: Practical and theoretical implications of 85 years of research findings.  Psychological Bulletin, 124, 262-274 [↩]