Topgrading

Another title of this article could be:  How to Say No to a Boss Who Has Very Outrageous Expectations

Of the 6,500 executives I’ve interviewed, asking 16 basic questions about every full-time job, fully one-third have failed in a job because they couldn’t say no to a demanding boss.

Meet Hal, candidate for Division General Manager, 10 years ago.  I interviewed him, labeled him an A player with CEO potentials, and he was hired.  Three months later the CEO said Hal was doing a great job turning the division around, scrapping low-profit products, consolidating plants, and Topgrading.  Great – Hal is proving to be an A player!

A year later I had a scheduled follow-up coaching session to help him tweak his Individual Development Plan, to keep him on track to become CEO of this or another billion dollar company.  “Cancel your coaching session with Hal,” the CEO said, “because he’s failed; I gave him some additional responsibilities to keep him challenged and growing, but I’ll probably have to let him go!”

“Impossible,” I said, “I’ll keep the coaching session and find out what’s gone wrong, but there’s no way Hal can be failing unless there is some personal crisis or something.”

Long story short – the CEO had tripled Hal’s job, essentially giving him three divisions to run; Hal was working 15 hours per day and failing.  I suggested that the CEO narrow Hal’s job to the original Division GM job; he did, Hal succeeded, and today Hal is successfully running a $2.5 billion company, as CEO.

Bottom line, Hal’s CEO was outrageous in expecting Hal to do three jobs, but Hal was a chicken, fearful of saying no to the CEO.  Both are responsible for Hal’s failure.

“JUST SAY NO”

Picture yourself in the room with, say, Jack Welch, who says to you, “Pete, we have a problem.  We need to send Joe to China for six months and unfortunately he has no back-up.  It’s a lot to ask, but would you be a good soldier, a team player, and do your best to hold his fort together for a few months?”

Gulp – how the heck can you say no?  “Sorry, Jack, but there is no friggin way you’ll be satisfied with my just holding Joe’s fort together – you’ll expect those three product launches to be successful.  And I have a crisis that is already taking me 12 hours per day to address.  If I say no this means I’m not a good soldier, not a team player, not an A player, so of course I have to suck it up and say yes.”  That might be the truth, but of course you can’t utter those words!

Thousands of executives, mostly A players, have described the agony of taking on more than they could do, struggling, and then failing.  The blip in their resume is usually significant, resulting in the next job being smaller.  After all, it doesn’t sound A player-like to admit one could not “take on some additional responsibilities.”

HERE’S HOW TO SAY NO

Let’s put you back in the office with Jack Welch, and you instantly KNOW that you’ll either kill yourself or fail if you say yes to him.  The challenge is to refuse the overwhelming responsibilities while retaining the respect of the demanding boss.

The thousands of executives who have successfully said no followed this 1-2-3 step process:

1.  Be positive. “Jack, I’m honored that you have the confidence in me, and no doubt I’d learn a lot.”

2.  Ask for a couple days to analyze the situation.  “But, I’ve just reorganized and have complex plans for my job, and I don’t know how complex Joe’s job is.  How about my taking just two days to analyze both situations, to be sure I can develop a plan to succeed.  The last thing you or I want is for me, a pole vaulter, to promise I can learn the high hurdles enough to medal and then fail.  I’ll get back to you Wednesday with a decision and a plan, for your approval.  Okay?”

Would Jack want a decision without a brief but thorough analysis?  How can Jack discourage a plan to succeed? That metaphor – sports – makes it common sense to try to figure out if someone can do another sport, and do it well enough to medal (succeed).  Note that you stayed positive, not using words like “possible failure,” and your attitude was that of a team player.

3.  Show confidence. “Jack. I have good news and bad news.  The good news is that with my reorg and new strategy, I believe I will turn the division around and the shareholders will benefit.  But if I take on Joe’s division, I’ll fail at both.  After looking at Joe’s division, I have a suggestion:  put Sam, head of marketing, in an Acting GM role because Sam knows a lot about product launches and that’s got to be the focus this year.  I’d be happy to help Sam with the financial analysis and Topgrading parts of the job he lacks experience in.”

You’re confident because you did the analysis of both jobs, you looked Jack in the eye and said without embarrassment that you’d fail if you took on Joe’s job, and you offered a positive solution.

ANOTHER WAY TO SAY NO

Looking through my extensive files, I was reminded of an alternative way managers have said no without sounding weak, wimpy.  Those managers create a spreadsheet to show their responsibilities and the amount of time they spend in each, monthly, and their “no” sounds like this:  “Jack, I have four major projects that are taking 60 hours per week, not just for me but for my team.  If I take on this additional project, my team will fail, so let’s prioritize and see which are the most important projects to keep.”

NO GUARANTEES

Obviously the above solutions fail to address the possibility that the boss is truly outrageous in making demands.  But if that is your situation, blame yourself for taking a job reporting to someone impossible to please.

All of the executives who experienced such a career failure swore they would a) perform due diligence on bosses in the future, by asking others what they like and dislike about the boss, and b) not accept a job offer reporting to someone with a pattern of having unrealistic expectations.

RECOMMENDED RESOURCES

Wow, do we have a recommended resource for you today! It truly is the best product ever to teach the Topgrading methods that are the world’s best practices not just for hiring, but for auditing your talent and promoting with terrific success. It’s 7 1/2 hours of high definition DVDs with all the latest Topgrading methods explained by me, with great graphics. But also there is a real life case study so you learn the job scorecard for a real job, study the career history form of a real candidate named Erik, see me and Erik in split screen as I conduct a telephone screening interview with him, observe a tandem Topgrading Interview with him, watch and listen to a real reference call with Erik’s boss, and watch me coach him in a real life setting.

So, whether you are an individual manager wanting to master Topgrading, or you have a team needing thorough training, or you are interested in train-the-trainer, this is the total, total package with the DVDs, Topgrading Workbook, other books and guides, a 3-month license, on-line resources, and quarterly conference calls with Topgraders and me.

Click here to see the basic material, but you’ll want to click on where it says to learn more.

INTRODUCTION: This article helps you answer the very common question, “What is different about Topgrading?”

For years we’ve said, “Topgrading hiring is just common sense on steroids.”  That is supposed to be a cute way of saying that adopting Topgrading practices proven to hire 90% high performers is a lot easier than someone might think, and there is no magic – just applied common sense.  But lately some executives have advised, “Don’t oversimplify Topgrading hiring methods – Topgrading is revolutionary, and before embracing it, people want to know how Topgrading values, principles, and tools differ from what they are accustomed to.”

Okay, here’s what is different about Topgrading:

1.  Hire only high performers.

Companies dedicated to hiring exceptional performers tend to pay exceptional salaries, but that seems to miss the core value of Topgrading hiring: at every salary level there are high and low performers, and Topgrading strives to help you hire only the best performers – not just average candidates but the very best available.

This notion – packing teams with the “best of class” at every salary level – is highly offensive to two groups of people:  1. those devoted to equality of outcomes (“C players need jobs, too.”), and 2. C players (who realize their job will be in jeopardy with Topgrading).  Hand out an article on Topgrading and just watch these two groups coalesce to undercut Topgrading!

2.  “Topgrading” is a made-up word and concept.

In the mid-1990s, my son Geoff Smart (of ghSMART & Co.) and I collaborated on developing a more comprehensive approach to talent management than what existed at the time.  We felt it was important to come up with a word that captured the essence of the spirit and principles that make up this concept.  “Topgrading” was the name we picked.

After all, if you “upgrade” talent you might have a team of 10 C players and replace one with a B player.  Whoopee – you’ve upgraded talent and you have a poor team.  The word Topgrading struck me as capturing the essence – packing the team with all high performers, A players, stars.

“Upgrading” talent can be embraced by C players; Topgrading means no C players.

3.  (Chronological) Topgrading Interview

The idea of a thorough chronological interview, asking a few questions about every job, is not new; every executive search report is the product of such an interview.  But search reports tend to be light on disclosing mistakes, failures, and what bosses would say are weaker points.

What we call the Topgrading Interview has been fine tuned for decades and today there are 16 basic questions about every job, including every success, every failure, every mistake, every key decision, every key relationship, assessments of every boss, estimates of what bosses would say about a candidate’s strengths, weaker points, and overall performance … plus questions about leadership, talent, goals, self appraisal, etc. … plus follow up questions.  Phew!

The innovation in the Topgrading Interview is to not overlook anything.  To achieve 90%+ high performers hired, you need 1,000+ data points.

4.  Focus on 50 Competencies.

In order to achieve 90%+ hiring success, focusing on 4 or 6 “key” competencies, which is what most companies still do, is inadequate.  This partly explains why companies hire only 25% - 30% true high performers.

In hundreds of workshops we’ve trotted out our standard 50 management competencies and challenged the participants to cut the list by even one, with this criterion:  you have to keep it if you would reject a candidate who is Poor or Very Poor on that competency.  No one has been able to cut the list by even one.  Conclusion:  50+ competencies must be accurately appraised.

But isn’t it impossible for an interviewer to accurately judge 50 competencies?

Nope!  At the beginning of workshops almost all managers say they can’t possibly do it, but at the end of the workshop – they’ve done it!   They amaze themselves!

So the good news is that managers trained in Topgrading can objectively and validly rate managerial candidates on all 50 competencies.

5.  Threat of Reference Check (TORC) Technique, the “truth serum of hiring”

This technique is simple but it works, motivating candidates to be honest.  It’s this:  let candidates know at each step in the hiring process that in order to get a job offer THEY will eventually have to arrange for personal reference calls with bosses (and others).

C players drop out and A players are happy to tell the truth and to arrange those calls.

6.  Topgrading Career History Form

Problem:  Pre-screening from resumes produces a mixture of good and bad candidates, since resumes are too often incomplete and hyped.

At a glance the Topgrading Career History form looks like an application form, but it’s much more. It requests all the information NOT included in resumes or application forms but you wish you had – complete salary history, boss ratings, likes and dislikes in jobs, true reasons for leaving an employer, and the “truth serum” – the TORC Technique (#5 above).

The Topgrading Career History Form gets only the best candidates in for face-to-face interviews.

7.  Research Base for Topgrading

There are now about 40 Topgrading professionals who have conducted tens of thousands of in-depth Topgrading Interviews on pre-screened candidates for executive positions.  Literally hundreds of thousands of times we’ve asked interviewees the talent question – what did you inherit, what did you end up with, and what did you do in terms of hiring, coaching, firing?

The point:  we’ve heard about every hiring method under the sun and never stop improving Topgrading methods.

8.  The Most Credible Case Studies

My son’s company and mine publish unusual case studies in our books and articles:  CEOs of NAMED leading companies state that their companies as a whole are doing better because of Topgrading.

9.  Managers (like you if you are an A player) can achieve 90% high performers hired.

Thanks to Jack Welch (GE Chairman at the time) approving Topgrading methods including two interviewers, the Tandem Topgrading Interview, many companies wanted to copy GE.  It’s now proven – trained A player managers can achieve 80% - 90% HIGH performers hired.

10.  Important Measures of Hiring Success

The HR world has been measuring hiring success in questionable ways – “cost to hire” people and “time to fill” jobs.  Trouble is, hiring goals are achieved if there are poor performers who are hired quickly and cheaply. Topgraders systematically measure percent HIGH performers hired.

The Topgrading Cost of Mis-Hires document is an original tool to quickly measure those costs; in only 15 minutes hiring managers become aghast at the high costs of their mis-hire, and that motivates them to learn the best hiring practices.

11. Ongoing Refinement of Interviewer Skills

Topgrading interviewers go through the Topgrading Interviewer Feedback Form, a checklist of a couple dozen good interviewer techniques, and simply give each other brief feedback and a couple of suggestions for how to do better next time.

12.  Candidates Arrange Personal Reference Calls with Former Bosses.

This is the follow through part of the TORC Technique (#5 above), and it’s simple:  after the Tandem Topgrading Interview, if the candidate and the interviewers want to proceed, the interviewers ask the candidate to do the work of arranging calls with the people the interviewers choose to talk with – usually 4 bosses, 2 peers, and 2 subordinates.  Conducting these phone interviews assures that the “truth serum” worked.

13.  Coaching New Hires Right Away

Candidates are promised coaching soon after they join, “to smooth your onboarding, assure you are productive quickly, and to begin a long-term development process right away.”  Bingo – A players love it!

CONCLUSION: Topgrading is an organic set of hiring best practices, most of which destroy what had been common hiring myths.

RECOMMENDED RESOURCE: We’ve released a brand new Topgrading Workbook, the same workbook we use in our workshops.  It has a clear explanation of each of the 12 Topgrading hiring steps, the same exercises to teach each step, and lots of new tools and methods.  Click here for more information or to order.

FREE DOWNLOADS: 1) 50-page eBook, an overview of Topgrading – click here, 2) Cost of Mis-Hires Form – click here,  3) Topgrading Vision, listing the 12 problems Topgrading solves, the skills necessary to learn, and results – click here.

The New Topgrading Workbook!

Hi Topgraders,

You have asked for a simple, straightforward Topgrading Workbook, with all the latest Topgrading tools, and here it is!

The Topgrading Workbook is THE manual we use in our Topgrading Workshops.  It clearly explains all 12 Topgrading hiring steps and then there are the same fun, practical exercises we use in workshops.

To purchase the Topgrading Workbook, click now to get a tool that will be your personal tutor or the only handout you’ll need for your internal Topgrading workshops.

It is possible to hone your skills as a Topgrading interviewer and still not achieve the level of success in hiring and promoting you expect. “How could that possibly be?” you ask. If you do not spend some time early on in the selection process defining what A player performance is, you will still have a high probability of putting the wrong person into that job even if you do a fantastic job in the Topgrading interview.

Most managers jump into the selection process without ever clearly defining what an A player “looks like” for a given position. If you do not know exactly who you’re looking for, it is pretty difficult to know when you have found them. It is no wonder that most managers experience a dismal hiring and promoting success rate.

You can significantly increase your chances of hiring a high performer by spending an hour or two at the beginning of the selection process to specifically define the accountabilities for a given position and the mission-critical competencies an A player candidate will exhibit. You can think of it this way: the accountabilities are the results you expect the candidate to exhibit in the first 12 months on the job and the mission-critical competencies describe the manner in which you expect the results to be delivered.

For example, increasing revenue by 12.5% within 12 months may be an accountabilty for a sales manager. A few mission-critical competencies for that sales manager candidate may be resourcefulness, tenacity, redeploying B/C players, and customer focus.

Thinking about what results an A player needs to achieve and the behaviors you would like that person to exhibit will get you to your goal of having all high performers on your team quicker than you can imagine!