Topgrading

Topgraders frequently tell non-Topgraders that the far superior results hiring and promoting people come from the rather obvious, not-particularly creative, “common sense” Topgrading methods.  I’ve even been guilty of downplaying its revolutionary components.

At the end of a typical 2-day Topgrading workshop managers frequently say, “Yeah, Brad – it’s all common sense.”  But after decades of witnessing how managers struggle with making the changes required of Topgrading, I truly believe most of the Topgrading methods are far from “common sense” until you know they work!

IT’S NOT COMMON SENSE TO

1.  Use two interviewers, using a 4-hour chronological interview, as the major practice in hiring, promoting, and auditing talent.

After all three applications are part of a company’s culture, with up to 90% of those hired and promoted turning out to be high performers; of course such rigor seems “obvious.”  And when managers want to do a talent inventory, an audit to figure out who are their A, B, and C players, and who has the greatest potentials, it seems “obvious” to use the same technique as used for hiring and promoting!  (The only difference between hiring and promoting or auditing is that external references are checked for hiring, but the Topgrading interviewers actually talk with internal bosses, peers, and subordinates when using Topgrading for promoting or auditing.)

These methods require rigor – 90% hiring and promoting success has only been achieved when the interviewers are trained and follow the Topgrading interview guides.

2.  Measure percent high performers hired and promoted, or measure costs of mis-hires and mis-promotions.

Although business people say, “If it’s important, we have to measure it,” and “talent is our most important asset,” no company we have ever seen, surveyed, or heard of systematically measured how successful they were at hiring and promoting people.  In a meeting of Global 100 heads of HR, only Topgrading companies disclosed rigorous methods for measuring success.  And when asked, the Global 100 heads of HR admitted that 75%+ of the people they hired or promoted into managements jobs were mistakes.

3.  Expect candidates to arrange personal reference calls with former bosses (and others).

After all, most companies prohibit their people from even taking reference calls.  But the simple truth is A players do get their former associates to accept those reference calls.  Why does it work?  Former bosses of A players are not at all worried that because they might say something negative about their former A player, that A player won’t get a job and sue.  Fact:  in 30 years and hundreds of companies performing this step, 40+ Topgrading professionals have never heard of any legal issue. None!

4.  Expect managerial candidates for hire or promotion to sit through a 4-hour Topgrading Interview.

High performers love the chronological interview, the walk down memory lane in which they are asked to describe all their wonderful successes and triumphs.  In addition to the ego trip, they understand that by participating in the thorough Topgrading hiring or promoting steps, there is a very good chance they will succeed in the job (if offered, obviously), and with the huge amount of information about them their new boss will be able to coach them to a) assimilate smoothly into the job, b) perform well, and c) continue a career development process right now – within weeks of joining the company.

5.  Be able to keep in mind and rate candidates accurately on 50 competencies.

If you’re not a Topgrader, you know you wouldn’t be able to track 50 competencies, right?  But in 2-day Topgrading workshops every manager actually does it.

How can this be possible?  Because in the Topgrading Interview there are thousands of data points.  For example, when the person describes a success 10 years ago, more than a dozen competencies are revealed.  “I got the President’s award for pulling off the project,” and in explaining how she did it, she shows teamwork, intelligence, drive, dedication, analysis skills, leadership, stress management, etc., etc.

6.  Learn enough from a competed Topgrading Career History Form to screen out most weak candidates for hire and screen in only the best.

In our Topgrading workshops people analyze the completed form of a real person (names have been changed).  They then guess at how the fellow’s real boss rated him on all 50 competencies.  People amaze themselves because most are “off” only an average of 2 points on a 10-point scale and some, without even seeing the candidate, were off by only 1 point.

This fun little exercise convinces everyone that a) they can track and rate 50 competencies, and b) this Topgrading Career History Form is the best pre-selection tool on the planet.

7.  (saving the best for last)  Achieve 90% high performers hired and promoted.

About 15 years ago, thanks to the work I did with Jack Welch at GE, we proved that managers like you can be almost as good as Topgrading professionals when hiring and promoting people.

Since my profession for 3 decades had been interviewing candidates for hire or promotion, I effectively put myself out the screening business (and into the training business).

How can managers like you do almost as well as professionals with the Ph.D. and 30 years of experience?  Jack Welch asked me that, I suggested we use two interviewers who could cover for each other, he agreed, and the rest is history.  GE shot up to 90%+ success picking high performers, and since then, hundreds of companies have embraced Topgrading.

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.

Does Topgrading “translate” well into other cultures?  You bet!  During the past 6 months I’ve spent most of my professional time working with global rollouts of companies such as Barclays, DTZ (global commercial real estate management), Argo (insurance), and several other companies in Russia, Europe, South America, and Asia.  Following are key conclusions, insights, and advice:

1.  USE TOPGRADING METHODS NOT JUST FOR HIRING BUT FOR PROMOTING PEOPLE AND FOR AUDITING YOUR PEOPLE TO SEE WHO REALLY ARE THE A, B, AND C PLAYERS.

Companies usually begin using Topgrading methods to hire the best people, but soon realize that those same methods, with a simple tweak, can dramatically improve their success promoting people.

A survey of Global 100 heads of HR showed only 25% of the people they promote into management turn out to be high performers, except for the Topgraders in the room who reported 75%+ success.  My first project with GE was improving their promoting methods and GE soon achieved 90%+ promoting success.

How?  Simple – trained Topgrading interviewers do the same chronological interview they use for hiring, but instead of conducting external reference checks they interview internal people – bosses, peers, and subordinates.

Global companies struggle to understand who are their A, B, and C players in other locations.  A terrific use of Topgrading methods is to parachute in trained Topgrading interviewers who conduct the interview and just as in promoting, interview internal bosses, peers, and subordinates.

Bottom line:  use all 3 applications of Topgrading globally – hiring, promoting, and auditing talent.

2.  ROLLING OUT TOPGRADING IS NO MORE DIFFICULT THAN ANY OTHER GLOBAL CHANGE.

The good news is that global companies find it quite easy to make tweaks to accommodate Topgrading other cultures.

Recently I was in Shanghai, training managers from several parts of China, Singapore, Australia, and Europe, and did not even need a translator.  English truly is the global language of business.

If translations are necessary, the key ones are PowerPoint (slides for workshops), the Topgrading Workbook (with all 12 Topgrading hiring steps plus the latest Topgrading forms and guides), and the 50-page eBook, Avoid Costly Mis-Hires. (My permission for translations and edits is required, but I almost always give it.)

Cautions: Do a double translation – into the language, and from the language back into English.  There will be some weird translations, but this step surfaces them.  For example, there is no Russian word for the most important of 50 management competencies – resourcefulness – so we had to create a paragraph translation, and that took some, uh, resourcefulness.

Also, when using a translator in workshops, slow down 30% and simplify content at least that amount.

3.  TOPGRADING IS LEGAL EVERYWHERE WE KNOW OF.

Chapter 12 (Legalities of Topgrading) of my big book, Topgrading, was written by the largest employment law firm in the US, Seyfarth Shaw, and they vetted all Topgrading methods not only in the US but a lot of other countries (through their partners).

4.  “TWEAK” THE TOPGRADING CAREER HISTORY FORM FOR EACH COUNTRY.

Even if a translation is not required, a few sections – different education systems, currencies, and military requirements – require different terms for each country.  Our British friends will say that indeed a translation is required so the form uses English, not American.

We believe the Topgrading Career History Form is the best pre-selection instrument on the planet.  The TORC Technique is now in the Instructions (”At an appropriate time, near a job offer, you will be asked to arrange personal reference calls with supervisors and others you have worked with in the past decade”).  The form now has supervisor ratings, true reasons for leaving, and ratings on key competencies - all of which are quite accurate because of the TORC Technique.

Companies that do not use the Topgrading Career History Form have a problem – they screen from deceptive resumes, so they waste a lot of time in phone screens, and worst of all, they end up interviewing too many C players.  The Topgrading Career History Form saves a lot of time and, more importantly, assures that only the best candidates will come in for interviews, so it’s important to make those few modifications for each country.

5.  THE WORDING IN THE TOPGRADING INTERVIEW GUIDE SHOULD BE MODIFIED FOR DIFFERENT CULTURES.

In some cultures the wording of some questions is too direct.  For example, asking, “We all make mistakes – what mistakes did you make in that job?” might be changed to, “What are some ways you might have achieved even more?”  Or, in cultures that favor teamwork and downplay individual contributions, instead of asking, “What were your successes, your accomplishments,” you might ask, “In what ways might your efforts have contributed to the team successes?”

6.  TOPGRADING INTERVIEWS SHOULD BE CONDUCTED WITH A TANDEM PARTNER, A LOCAL A PLAYER TRAINED IN TOPGRADING METHODS.

Locals can “read between the lines” with respect to words used and body language.   For example, Americans expect interviewees to look them in the eye but not stare, and can leap to the wrong conclusion when interviewing someone from a culture in which eye contact is considered hostile.

Caution: Become a student of the culture – ask lots and lots of questions about body language, values, history, attire, etc.

7.  BEST PRACTICES IN COACHING ARE UNIVERSAL.

Coaching is part of Topgrading and best practices that are routine in the US, such as using email 360 surveys to track a manager’s progress changing his leadership style, are not commonplace in other cultures.  No problem – just introduce these tools.  Ditto for asking individuals to compose their Individual Development Plan with What they are going to do, Why, When, and How the results will be measured.

“But we’ve never done anything like this” can be true, but when the methods and benefits are stated, and the people in authority express confidence in those methods, people in all cultures comply.  At the risk of being redundant – be sure to modify language for the culture!

As CEO of General Electric, Jack Welch was the first CEO to rollout Topgrading methods globally. The first version was for assessing and coaching candidates for promotion. So, overnight managers around the world learned to create job scorecards with measurable accountabilities; hundreds of managers were trained in the tandem Topgrading Interview, and used the Topgrading Interview Guide.

8.  THE CEO MUST DRIVE GLOBALIZATION OF TOPGRADING.

As with any meaningful change, Topgrading must be driven by the CEO.  Sure, Human Resources is key, but managers can “game” Topgrading if the CEO is not a Topgrader.

9.  IMPLEMENT TOPGRADING FIRST IN THE HOME COUNTRY, TO WORK OUT THE DETAILS.

Then roll it out globally.  There is an exception:  A CEO who has previously Topgraded an organization can implement it globally all at once, confident that the tweaks will be minor and that the company will have a lot more A players, faster, with the global rollout all at once.

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.

A recent study done by the Human Capital Institute et. al. validated several points that we have been talking (or preaching) about for years with mainly anecdotal data as backup.

Here are the highlights: Read more »

Topgrading “sounds good” to every manager, but we frequently hear from Topgraders , “There are doubters who say that doubling and tripling hiring success sounds too good to be true, so what can I tell them?”

You can drop names of well known companies that Topgraded, expecting to impress the doubter.  And you can say,  “Read Chapter 5 of Topgrading – it’s loaded with case studies of leading companies whose CEOs swear to the truth in the stats, typically 25% - 90% A players hired.”  People rationally believe this but people want to feel the results … somehow … to be really convinced Topgrading saves a lot of money.

This Topgrading Tips article walks you through two short exercises to give any doubters that “feel.”  We’ve used these exercises in workshops for years – exercises in which doubters  “run the numbers” with their own conservative assumptions.

To get to a bottom line, in workshops the average attendee concludes, “Wow, every time I hire someone, including bad hires and good hires, using Topgrading methods I’ll probably put an average of $250,000 on the bottom line and I’ll perform better and get faster promotions.”

Exercise #1:  Estimate the percent high performers you’ve hired in recent years.

This exercise takes less than a minute.  Just think – what percent of the people I’ve hired turned out to be high performers, A players, starts, what I expected … with the only other category MIS-hire.

Our research over the years shows the average rate of good hires to be 25%.  Of course, if you include disappointing but adequate performers, your hiring “success” is probably closer to 80%.  But Topgraders set the bar high, and if you are disappointed or worse with 75% of your hires, you’re typical … and you have a 25% success rate.

Now show the doubter Chapter 5 of Topgrading, and they will be impressed that leading companies took their success rate from 25% to 90%.

Exercise #2: Estimate the costs of a typical mis-hire.  Use this form:

This is the most widely referenced cost of mis-hire form, and in only 15 or 20 minutes your doubter will be amazed at how COSTLY a typical mis-hire is.  In our Topgrading books we show the costs to range, for various jobs, from 5 to 27 times base salary.  And your doubter will be amazed at how time consuming it is to sweep up after a typical mis-hire (200 hours, typically).

The combination of doing those two short exercises, followed by reading Chapter 5 in Topgrading, will go along way toward convincing your doubter that Topgrading hiring indeed can pack their team with high performers.

RECOMMENDED RESOURCE: Consider attending our June 23 - 24 Topgrading Workshop to learn the 12 Topgrading Steps and get personalized coaching from Brad Smart and other Topgrading professionals.  Click here for information.

This question, or some variation of it, is one of the most frequent questions Topgrading Professionals get asked. People tend to understand the benefits of a thorough selection process for managers and executives, but often balk at driving Topgrading processes down through the organization. The answer is YES, OF COURSE!

Our clients have opened our eyes on this. For about 25 years Brad assessed candidates for top executive positions and when companies wanted training, the focus was on what Brad knew best - upper level managers. But clients took Topgrading lower, lower, and now to entry level jobs, telling us that Topgrading methods, simplified, are BY FAR the best hiring methods for 100% of employees. Read more »