Leslie Pratch on Assessing and Developing Leaders

By Leslie Pratch

Base-level competencies within the Management domain include:

Planning

The ability to plan and organize own work and work of others, deciding what needs to be done, setting targets and identifying performance indicators. Effectively communicates plans, making clear what needs to be done and why and reaching agreement about how it will be achieved.

Task and Performance Management

Sets clear goals, standards of performance, and schedules. Checks and monitors the progress. Takes action by identifying which problems slow the rate of expected progress. Will adjust objectives in the face of information that indicates it is necessary to modify objectives for the task. Encourages others to assess their own performance and provides realistic and timely feedback.

Team Management

Is able to gain cooperation among a group of people, direct reports or otherwise. Seeks input of group members into problem-solving and decision-making, encourages participation, treats individual and the group as a whole fairly and equitably, keeping them informed. Picks up early signs of conflict or other issues affecting group and individual performance and finds ways of addressing these issues before they escalate. Motivates the group, builds a sense of group/team identity and provides full and comprehensive feedback on performance, celebrating success.

Productivity

Seeks the most efficient mix of time, money, and other resources when bring tasks to completion. Assesses cost/benefit payoffs, seeks ways to do things more quickly, more easily, with less waste and at lower cost. Communicates concern for efficiency to others and generates a climate conducive to productive work.

In moving from base-level to high-level management competencies we see a shift of the following nature:

High Level Competency Definitions, Interview Questions, and Behavioral Indicators

STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP

The ability to define the enterprise’s basic long term goals and objectives, and adopt courses of action and allocate the resources necessary to carry out these goals. The ability to identify conflicts among goals and the tradeoffs that need to be considered as well as strategic variables and the time horizons over which decisions can be made. Has the ability to identify how specific decisions result in specific outcomes that have major impact on the business. Leads by example and motivates others to follow.

Interview questions:

- What are the key things you want important subordinates as well as outsiders to understand in your business? How do you bring about that understanding?

- What are your staff’s key worries? What have you done about them?

- When you have to tackle a complex problem for the first time how do you approach it? Walk me through a specific example.

- Describe a situation in which you were able to solve a problem or clarify an issue that others had not been able to solve.

Behavioral indicators:

MANAGEMENT TEAM BUILDING

Attracts and develops subordinates whose talents in particular areas may be greater than one’s own and works well with them. Has a nose for great hires and will fire under-performers.

Interview questions:

- Tell me about a time you had to assemble a team to meet some corporate objective. How did you decide which individuals to include?  How did you manage tensions within the group? What did you do to keep the group focused and able to meet objectives in a timely fashion?

- Tell me about one of the toughest teams/groups you have had to manage. What made it difficult? What did you do?

- Tell me about when you had your greatest success in building team spirit. What specific results did the team  accomplish?

- Give me an example of a team decision you were involved in recently.  What did you do to help the team reach the decision?

- Tell me about a time you had to fire someone. Looking back, would you have handled it differently?

- How have you dealt with conflicting demands among team members? Imagine, for example, having a subordinate whose expertise is absolutely vital to a project but whose personality is detrimental to morale. What would you do? How would you handle it?

Behavioral indicators:

PRODUCT AND PROCESS KNOWLEDGE

Has a working knowledge of the principles and processes underlying the company’s technology or service and some proficiency in their application to the business. Communicate with the scientists who do research on the technologies and materials most relevant to the company’s business. Can relate the company’s technology or service to a wide variety of business functions, including sales, marketing, manufacturing, finance, human resources, and others. Pursues opportunities to continue own education and that of subordinates.

Interview questions:

This is an area where you should know the questions you want to ask about candidates’ technical understanding of a company’s products and/or services. In general, the kinds of questions that would elicit pertinent responses would have the following character:

- How do you keep up with developments in the field? How does your technical understanding compare with that of your peers in your functional area, such as marketing?

- Has your ability to function in marketing, finance, been hindered by a lack of technical understanding? If so, what did you do?

Behavioral indicators:

BUSINESS EFFECTIVENESS ORIENTATION

Identifies and takes action to improve business effectiveness, not necessarily by doing the same things better or more efficiently but by fundamentally reviewing the way things are done and bringing about changes that deliver better bottom line performance. This involves monitoring performance against key operational and financial metrics. Demonstrates concern for meeting for customer needs; evaluates product, processes, and services against quality and delivery standards.

Interview questions:

- In very general terms, describe a situation where meeting operational timetables and deadlines meant shipping a product that your firm’s R&D staff was not happy with? Can you explain the tension? How did you resolve it?

- What have you done to make a business operate in a fundamentally different manner as opposed to improving how it currently operates?

Behavioral indicators:

________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

The base-level competencies for the Influence domain are as follows:

Communication Skills

The ability to express one’s thoughts, ideas, and concepts fluently and clearly, orally and in writing. The ability to cuts to the chase, so that key points are not drowned in a sea of words. Also, makes effective group presentations.

Interpersonal Skills

The ability to relate effectively to others by demonstrating good listening skills, showing an interest in other people, demonstrating sensitivity and tact, and by understanding of others’ views and attitudes. Recognizes others’ strengths and limitations and accurately infers the underlying reasons for their behaving as they do. Establishes rapport easily and develops and maintains networks of contacts inside and outside own organization.

Face-to-Face Influencing

Is able to persuade others to support a position or take a recommended course of action. Explains complex ideas in terms the others can understand, perhaps by using well-chosen examples, from personal experience. Anticipates how others will react and prepares counter-arguments and, where appropriate, uses information or data effectively to make a case.

Negotiating Skills

Is able to bring two or more parties together and enable them to reach agreement as to how to move forward. Demonstrates skillful use of trade-offs to build towards a final decision seen by all parties as win-win.

HIGH-LEVEL COMPETENCIES: DEFINITIONS, INTERVIEW QUESTIONS, AND INDICATORS

The following kinds of shifts occur as we move from base-level to high-level competencies:

PERSONAL IMPACT

Deliberately projects self to others—through actions, manner, posture, and attire—to create a favorable impression of personal credibility, professionalism, and integrity. Has presence. Easily adopts the style or manner that he or she anticipates will have the greatest impact on a given audience.

Interview questions:

The individual’s behavior in the interview itself will be a rich source of evidence as to this competency. The candidate’s responses to questions are more likely to demonstrate awareness of the need to project with impact and how to modify behavior accordingly rather than the actual possession of this competency. Such questions could include:

- Describe your concerns in presenting a controversial or risky proposal. How did you deal with those concerns? In what way, if any, was that different from your usual style?

- When you are working with (senior members of a different division/function in the business), what is it that most impresses them or persuades them to go along with your ideas? What do you do to give this impression?

Behavioral indicators:

NETWORKING

Readily builds collaborative and productive relationships in different areas/ divisions/functions within the organization and with others at a comparable level in external organizations. Uses and maintains those contacts in order to gain information or support on work-related issues.

Interview questions:

- On what occasion have you had to work with people where networking was important? How did that come about? Are you still in contact with them?
- What help have you had from individuals in other parts of the business? Why were they willing to help you? What have you done for them?
- How frequently do you talk with/meet people in a similar function but in other organizations?
- Describe your network of contacts inside and outside your organization. How did you build it up? How have you used it?

Behavioral indicators:

ORGANIZATIONAL INFLUENCING

Understands and manages the power relationships both within and outside the organization; knowledge of power relationships used, implicitly or explicitly, whenever initiating changes or trying to influence how the organization is structured and operates. Uses complex strategies to influence attitudes, behavior or decision-making among those over whom he or she has no direct control.

Interview questions:

- Describe your concerns and the potential blocks to changing the way your organization might operate in the future.
- If you wanted to change fundamentally the way you structure or resource your own function, how would you go about getting support for your plans? Why would you choose that approach?
- Which people have pull in your business? How well do you know them? How have you set about building those relationships?
- Tell me about a time when you had to get someone much more senior than you to support the case you were making. How did you go about doing it? What factors did you take into account when seeking that support? How successful were you?

Behavioral indicators:

CONFLICT RESOLUTION

Recognizes potential areas of conflict and intervenes quickly to defuse the situation; works with the parties concerned to reach a consensus or compromise in which no one feels as if they have lost, and does so for the benefit of the organization as a whole.

Interview questions:

- Describe a situation in which you had to bring together parties with very different perspectives to resolve the underlying conflict. How did you set about doing this? What were you trying to achieve? What happened?
- Have you ever had to defuse serious conflict? What led up to it? How did you handle it? What was the outcome?
- Have you ever inherited the conflict of someone else and had to deal with it? How did this come about? What did you do? How did you feel about the situation? What did you achieve?

Behavioral indicators:

________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

The base-level competencies associated with the Judgment domain are as follows:

Analytical Skills

The ability to assess and analyze problems and come up with workable solutions, based on logical analysis, the identification of inconsistencies and discrepancies, generating alternative solutions, and evaluating their impact and consequences. Is willing to change mind when presented with contradictory data.

Use of Concepts

Uses concepts or models, rules of thumb, or accepted theories to understand and describe issues or situations. Identifies key differences between old and new situations. Identifies trends or patterns in events or behaviors, as well as inconsistencies or discrepancies that are not obvious to others.

Business Awareness

Demonstrates a broad understanding (beyond a narrow functional perspective) of the way businesses function and succeed, and how external factors (i.e., the marketplace, legislative, technological, etc.) and internal factors (i.e., business strategy, resources, budgets, systems and processes, etc.) interact to influence performance.

Decision Making

The ability to make a decision based upon judgment of the options available. Ensures decisions are consistent and in line with decisions previously made, and that they are made in time for appropriate action to be carried out. Balances intuition with logic and is prepared to make decisions in uncertain situations or where information is limited.

Ability to Learn

Takes full responsibility for own learning. Recognizes and acknowledges own strengths and limitations, seeking assistance or avoiding situations in which one’s own limitations would be a serious hindrance to performance. Learns from own experience and mistakes and those of others. Seeks out opportunity to gain new skills or broaden understanding, anticipating the changing competence requirements of current job or future job opportunities.

The following kinds of shifts occur as we move from base-level to high-level competencies:

High-Level Competencies: Definitions, Interview Questions, and Indicators

PATTERN RECOGNITION

The ability to synthesize information from disparate sources and formulate a clear pattern. Sees connections among different ideas, organizes and integrates them, and is able to identify and express the key issues in a complex situation.

Interview questions:

The individual’s manner of describing specific business issues will provide good evidence for this competency. Otherwise the interviewer could ask:

- Describe a complex business problem with which you have had to struggle. What were the key factors? The difficulties? How valid, how accurate was the information? What reservations did you have? What opportunity did you discern?

- What kinds of problems do you most/least enjoy dealing with? Why?

Behavioral indicators:

INTUITIVE DECISION-MAKING

Makes inferential leaps so as to reach a solution despite incomplete or ambiguous information–knowing that one has made the “right” decision, frequently based on mental modeling (e.g., what would it take to come to a particular conclusion that I have in mind) or rehearsal of events (in contrast to a logical, step-by-step process of working one’s way to a conclusion). Also demonstrated in the individual’s ability to make quick decisions, despite the complexity of the issues or the pressures involved.

Interview questions:

The individual’s description of his approach to new or complex business issues will provide good evidence of this competency. Otherwise the interviewer could ask:

- Have you ever led the thinking on a new business venture?

- Describe what you did and how you reached your conclusions.

- Describe a situation you have faced where none of the old ways of doing things appeared likely to work. How did you make the final decision on how to act? What were the consequences of your decision?

Behavioral indicators:

APPLIED STRATEGIC VISION

Stands apart from day-to-day activities, views things from different perspectives in order to discern alternative big-picture scenarios and develop a vision of the future for the business, its strategies and priorities.

Interview questions:

Presumably, you will have given the matter of a company’s strategic vision considerable thought and know how to ask questions related to it. In the event you need some help, here are some questions:

- Describe the three most important trends in your business/market?

- Give me an example of a competitor in this market making a poor strategic move and why; what would you have done differently?

- What could you do (have you done) to help grow the market?

- How could your market share be increased? Have you increased your market share?

- What long-term opportunities exist for your function/business?

- What will your business look like in five years?

- Where will you be (in your career) in three years’ time?

Behavioral indicators:

OPENNESS TO CHANGE

A readiness to do things differently in the business or function, seeing the organization as dynamic and changing, and able to contribute constructively to the change process; prepared to make personal changes as well as expecting changes in others.

Interview questions:

- Describe any change project with which you have been involved.

- If you were suddenly promoted to your boss’s position, what would you do differently? How would you bring these changes about?

- In what ways is the business falling behind the times or behind the competition? What would you do about it? What have you done about it?

-Describe a recent corporate initiative that had a significant impact on your part of the business. Tell me about your role in its implementation. What did you have to do differently? How did you change?

Behavioral indicators:

________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

The dictionary of competencies that follows was developed for use with clients of Pratch & Company. As detailed as they are, they will likely evolve and sharpen up through usage and feedback from those who apply them.

The dictionary defines base- and high-level competencies across the four domains (Judgment, Influence, Management, and Personality). I assume that candidates for senior management already possess base level competencies across these domains. The dictionary emphasizes the high-level competencies. It defines the competencies succinctly, illustrates them through positive and negative indicators of competent behavior, and supports interviewing with range of possible interview questions designed to enable interviewers to evaluate candidates’ strengths in each competence.

The differences between the base- and high-level competencies within each dimension reflect factors whose complexity, ambiguity, and difficulty increase with increasing senior positions in an organization. In going from base-level to high-level competencies, there is often a shift from:

- Analytical, to more intuitive thinking, based on extensive experience

- Personal success, to team, departmental, and business unit success

- Simple problems and tasks, to complex and ambiguous ones

- Concrete issues, to abstract ones

- Direct involvement and influence, to indirect involvement and influence

- Short-term perspectives, to longer-term perspectives

- Tactical to strategic views and responses

- Task and project completion measures, to budgetary, marketing, and bottom-line measures of success

- Personal ambition and commitment to success, to team and group leadership for business success

- Building and maintaining internal relationships to developing high-level internal and external relationships

- Overt, to covert agendas

When applying these definitions, it is important to have an understanding of the clues and pointers to the competencies required to meet and deal with the challenges of a particular job, including: the degree and extent of challenge in the job; the major factors that add to complexity, ambiguity, or difficulty; the hurdles to be overcome; and the inherent risks of the job. Rarely will any job require all of the high-level competencies. Some may focus entirely in one area while others combine competencies from several of the four dimensions.

You need an understanding of the ideal experience and background required of the job. You also need to understand the critical competencies required. By doing both you will ensure that you have caught the essence of the job, are able to target recruiters’ efforts, and select the best person for the job with efficiency and effectiveness.
________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

Together with reference checks, the interview is the main tool that lay people have for assessing candidates. Interviews structured to elicit evidence of competencies associated with outstanding performance have a much greater predictive validity than unstructured interviews.

Candidates bring us a lifetime of decisions and results achieved, which we examine and value in the context of the requirements of the job we are seeking to fill. It is necessary to know not only what the candidate has achieved but also the thinking process used to achieve it.

We need to identify the early mentors and environmental influences. We need to understand the decision-making process and factors considered in each major career transition. This means understanding why one choice was made and another was rejected. We need to identify those motivations that are common to each major career move (e.g., more money, recognition, authority, collegiality, challenge). We want to understand in granular detail the job experiences that are directly relevant to the position for which we are recruiting. We should learn about performance in academics, sports, theater and other competitive activities in middle school, high school and college. We want to understand what energizes the candidate, what motivates him or her.

We need to evaluate what combination of personal characteristics, skills, knowledge, experience and attitudes the candidate used in achieving results. These factors should then be considered against those that have been previously identified as key selection criteria.

During the interview, interviewers should have the key selection criteria at hand and have established in advance the areas they will probe in the candidate’s past performance. For instance, if negotiating skills are identified as key to successful performance, then the interviewer should ask the candidate to recount an occasion when these skills were brought to bear either successfully or unsuccessfully. Indeed, probing areas of poor performance and lack of success is important.

Interviewing tips:  (1) Get candidates to define the event they are going to describe before entering into the narrative detail. (2) Ensure that candidates identify their own role clearly rather than referring to a collective “we.” (3) Seek evidence of the thought processes and rationale behind the various actions. The skill with using this technique is to formulate questions, which will elicit evidence of the behavioral indicators linked to the key competencies in the selection criteria. Interviewers may use the suggested definitions linked to the competency definitions to compile a format for the interview.
________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

The Competency Framework offers a classification of a broad range of behavioral dimensions that make up successful management. How you rank and evaluate how well a candidate exhibits these behavioral dimensions is a matter of interpretation. The dimensions, therefore, should be used as a guide to prompt your own thinking. Individuals are much more complicated than the language we have to describe them; the competency descriptions are at best approximations. Nevertheless, the framework may serve as a useful guide, pointing to features that individuals who have been successful in comparable management positions have exhibited.

The competency framework is split into two tiers. The lower-tier definitions relate to the basic competencies that we assume candidates possess once they have reached middle management and appear on our radar screens. Higher-level definitions relate to senior management positions. One should be evaluating the evidence that candidates display in this area, or at least their potential to develop. The breakdown of the competency domains is shown in the figure below, including sections covering ideal experience and cultural fit. These are defined in greater detail in the Dictionary of Competencies, which follows.

Pratch & Company Competency Model

Experience base includes functional skills, career flow and quality of training/employers, relevant sector experience, level of management responsibility and previous performance achievement.

In subsequent posts, I will lay out each of these domains, the competencies within them, and behavioral indicators–what to look at in how the candidate performs in an interview.
________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

As noted in my previous entry, the competencies encompass four significant domains of individual capability:

1. Judgment
2. Influence
3. Management
4. Personality

1) Within the JUDGMENT domain lie all of the technical, professional/intellectual and creative competencies that enable individuals to make sense of the world around them–to see the forest for the trees; analyze complex data; break problems down into their component parts; reach logical conclusions; and generate alternative and new solutions so that they can understand, assess and determine what needs to be done in their jobs.

This area has been traditionally assessed by looking at academic and professional qualifications, career track record and psychometric tests. In this domain lie pattern recognition, intuitive decision-making, applied strategic vision, and openness to change.

2) Within the INFLUENCE domain lie all the communications, interpersonal, persuasion and political competencies that enable individuals to work effectively with and relate to clients and colleagues: to explain, persuade, sell, cajole, network, negotiate and lobby so that they can successfully influence others and gain their support to get things done in their jobs. This area has to do with influencing and gaining support in non-hierarchical circumstances. In this domain lie personal impact, networking skills, organizational influencing and conflict resolution.

3) Within the MANAGEMENT domain lie tasks of project management and people management: planning, organizing, scheduling, monitoring, and controlling work; developing, counseling, and directing people; building teams and resolving conflicts so as to ensure services are delivered, results are produced, and projects are completed on time.

These are the competencies needed to produce results through other people. High-level competencies include strategic leadership, management team building, business effectiveness orientation, and product and process knowledge.

4) Within the PERSONALITY domain lie personal traits and tendencies such as drive, self-confidence, decisiveness, tenacity, flexibility and resilience. All of these enable individuals to meet and overcome the stresses, challenges, conflicts, and obstacles that may affect performance in the other three domains.

It is important when analyzing a position in terms of competencies to think through the actual requirements of the job. Intellectual requirements of the job are often overrated and personality factors underrated.
________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

Companies undergoing a search to fill a key management role will have developed a template for a position prior to talking to recruiters. The following is what the individuals assessing candidates (i.e., recruiters, board members, existing members of senior management who will work with the executive) need to know to do their jobs:

1. Business Context

What is the strategy and what is the business model. See examples.

2. Critical Business Imperatives

This section aims to cover the priority activities needed to realize the strategy/objectives, including:

(a) The nature of the team that the person would join. What type of person would best complement the existing team? How should the team evolve?

(b) Any pertinent, salient activities the company needs to do to realize the strategy (e.g., closing a major account, developing a major OEM partnership, completing a critical product development stage or conducting a launch of a new product, building the organization).

(c) The culture of the organization. What are the organization’s values? Management style, communications, training and development of people.

3. The Job

(a) Job title and purpose.

(b) Dimensions of the position:  budgets, people, materials, capital investment and key result areas.

(c) Nature and scope:  basically, the difficulties and challenges inherent in doing the job well.

(d) Key relationships, both internal and external.

(e) Principal accountabilities: this covers two or three key objectives and the job’s expected contribution to the organization, critical business imperatives, what is most important to the organization from this position.

(f) Performance measures related to the critical business objectives.

(g) Time span horizon of the role (see Stratified Systems Theory to learn how to measure the role and the person).

4. The Person

This section covers characteristics that define the ideal candidate. These characteristics include functional/technical/professional skills, work experience, career flow and prior level of performance desired. Here, the competencies also come into play as a means of defining key selection criteria.

The ideal candidate characteristics are rooted in the two-three principal accountabilities/ tasks that the jobholder needs to perform in order to be considered successful. For example, what sort of behaviors, actions, and contributions would a high-performing jobholder make in carrying out these tasks (i.e., the behavioral indicators)? Finally, what are the competencies associated with these successful behaviors, actions, and contributions?

This analysis must be specific to the organization in question and anchored to behavioral indicators. Although the ideal candidate specification should be as complete as possible, it should not degenerate into a laundry list. What are the competencies that will make the difference? It is important to consider trade offs and what is essential and what is less essential. Included in this section is a description of experience desired.

For example, one venture capital firm specified in the context of a search for a software company a successful vice president of sales would have to build a repeatable sales process. In terms of ideal experience, a successful candidate was viewed as needing to have:

(a) Deep sales management experience targeting Tier One carriers

(b) Experience managing a sales organization of at minimum of 25 people

(c) Career flow spanning five years minimum in sales or sales management, showing progression starting as engineer to sales manager to regional manager to directing a significant number of sales people

(d) Experience having worked with quality organizations and with strong mentors

(e) Experience having built high performance sales teams in the past

In terms of technical and professional skills, the candidate needed to have:

(a) Strong knowledge of carrier operations and procurement

(b) Strategic selling sense – a proven success model/process for penetrating Tier One accounts (e.g., hire technically competent sales force and implement a rigorous sales management process built on understanding customers’ needs and on tracking sales force activities)

(c) Focus on performance metrics and process orientation; detailed but scaleable approach

In terms of personal characteristics, the candidate needed to have:

(a) Business achievement orientation, indicated by a track record of achievement.

5. The Competency Framework

The competencies encompass four significant domains of individual capability:

1. 1. Judgment
2. 2. Influence
3. 3. Management
4. 4. Personality

The next entry will flesh out these four domains.
________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

This series provides a handbook on how to conduct a solid behavioral interview based on a competency framework I have developed and published © Leslie Pratch 2003. At Pratch & Company we use this framework to relate insights from a psychological assessment to the requirements of a particular managerial role. You can use it too. Identifying skilled managers can differentiate a firm from its competitors in the industry. Anyone involved in making key hiring decisions can and should conduct systematic, efficient, and rigorous behavioral interviews of candidates. To that end, I have prepared this handbook to guide judgments about the individuals you are contemplating hiring.

Overview

Opportunities for management team building occur in three kinds of circumstances. One, management team members depart and need to be replaced. Two, senior management teams occasionally need upgrading. Three, a company’s growth or restructuring plans can reveal management roles that should be filled.

Management team building is a systematic process that begins with identifying a need and ends with the hiring of a successful candidate. What follows is a flexible framework containing guidelines and interview prompts to back up your professional judgment. It is intended to enhance the selection process by focusing your thinking on the fit between the job and the candidate. This framework covers the specification of need, the specification of the ideal candidate, interview, and report/recommendations. It draws on an understanding of business strategy and includes a diagnosis of the business context, a rigorous definition of the person, and a job specification. These elements, taken as a whole, result in selection criteria that will enable you to assess candidates systematically.

Matching individuals with jobs involves judgments that can never be made with absolute precision. We can minimize the risk, however, by systematically gathering evidence before making a decision. Our starting point is to understand the objectives of the company, the contribution expected of the particular job (and job holder), and the organizational culture in which the job will be performed.

From this analysis we can obtain a profile of the individual skills, personal characteristics, attitudes and experience necessary for high performance in that particular role. Candidates can then be assessed against this profile in order to drive board and management consensus.
________________________________________________________________________
Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.

By Leslie Pratch

If you are a board member or chairman it’s important to know what kind of person you have in the CEO slot. Would you like to have the perfect individual who never lies, is totally competent, is a masterful strategist? Of course you would, but I have never met one of those people.

Understanding who or what your senior management is tells you how to deal with the interpersonal equation. It’s very valuable at the board level to know how senior managers (and fellow board members) will lean over the long haul:  “I think the CEO will do X, two board members will lean with him, and two could be bought off.” Knowing what you have in your critical positions or on your board of directors is very important when you get into situations that test integrity or which test the direction of your company.

Knowing what what makes executives tick is one of the benefits of a clinical approach to assessments. Assuming the executive is competent for the position and has the right quotient of integrity, over the long term, knowing what makes that person tick will give board members and senior management a winning equation.

Conventional interview-based assessments (see, for example, the Category on this blog called “Interviewing: Theory and Practice”) will screen out the bozos but won’t give an understanding of the real problems and how to fix them.

Just focusing on behaviors (which is what Marshall Goldsmith advocates) will not change the dynamics of the management team. It will not improve the performance of the team. Understanding the team dynamics is important for changing them. Just “improving” an individual executive’s behavior will not foster better organizational performance. A clinical assessment, especially if complemented by a 360-degree assessments, gets at the team and finds out what the issues are for that team. If an individual has well-camouflaged weaknesses, it will get at those too.
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Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com.