Icebergs vs Interviews - How Much Do You Really See?

One of the biggest challenges to consistently hire top performers is determining up front if they can really deliver on their perceived potential or just talk a good game.

Unfortunately, many companies use the same broken hiring process time after time, hoping that somewhere they’ll find that “special” person who will help them achieve their organizational goals. Even using some of the better interviewing techniques, such as behavioral-based interview questions, there is a lot of information about the candidate that is lost and never found until it is too late.

You probably already know that icebergs only show about 10% of their mass above the surface. If you were sailing a ship near one, you would take precautions to know in advance how the iceberg is structured beneath the surface so it doesn't cause damage to your boat. What comes to mind is sonar or some other type of underwater instrument.

Let's compare icebergs to the interviewing process:

• A Michigan State University study showed that interviews reveal only 14% accurate view of the candidate
  
  
• Yet 90% of all hiring decisions are based on the interview according to a Harvard Business Review study
  
  

In contrast, the right blend of personality assessments shows that you can see a 92% or greater view of the candidates.

> 1 assessment = 50%

  2 assessments = 84%

  3 assessments = 92%

Is this really possible? In fact, a Fortune 500 company recently conducted an internal study to show that they would have eliminated 97% of their bad hires if they had used a 3-assessment combination before they hired.

Don’t abandon interviews just yet.

In March 2013, the Aberdeen Group released a report showing that 94% of Best-In-Class companies used assessments in their pre-hiring phase. Because the organizational results were so substantial between Best-In-Class versus all others, it is crucial to look at what they did differently.

Best-In-Class companies used information from the assessments to create customized interview questions.

Applying this knowledge, assessments used in combination with interviews can produce consistently high results for hiring top performers. Armed with the best information you can learn from this combined process, it becomes easier to hire for strength and know how to, as the late Peter Drucker said, make their weaknesses irrelevant.

If the objective of hiring is to achieve organizational goals, then the imperative is to maximize the visibility of candidate competencies before hiring. Avoid iceberg hiring methods by deepening your understanding of candidates before you ever interview them and you can achieve better results.