Competency in an area is the result of many factors working together, which include innate characteristics (natural ability, personality) and learned characteristics (knowledge, experience and skills) as is presented in the following chart. People who have the right competencies or who have a good potential for developing these competencies will be able to do the right things (behaviors) to produce the desired results (effective outcomes).

The following report provides detailed results and judgments about how these innate characteristics may facilitate or hinder the display or development of the desired competencies and, ultimately, job effectiveness. Also provided is a competency-oriented interview protocol to use to evaluate the skills, knowledge and other learned characteristics important to this job, as well as a general model for making a good decision from all sources of information.

The following results are based on your performance on standardized ability tests. They are presented as percentile comparisons to professional norms (people who, for the most part, have an education at or beyond the college undergraduate level) and to general population norms (people who, for the most part, have a high school education).

• The Thurstone Test of Mental Alertness is a measure of her language skills and her quantitative skills. It also provides an indication of her ability to shift quickly back and forth from one problem type to another.

• The Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal is a measure of her ability to analyze complex, multifaceted written information and to draw accurate conclusions. This capacity includes the ability to evaluate information and to recognize assumptions, facts, and situations where there is not enough information to arrive at a valid conclusion.

• The Raven's Standard Progressive Matrices (Abstract Reasoning) is a measure of her ability to reason through complex, abstract, nonverbal information and to grasp new ideas. This capacity includes the ability to solve problems in new situations where one has little experience upon which to draw.

General Population Norms:   0%   100% Mental Alertness       Critical Thinking       Abstract Reasoning        Professional Norms:         Mental Alertness       Critical Thinking       Abstract Reasoning

 

Her critical thinking abilities appear to be as good as the typical professional and better than the average person. She should be able to understand most complex written problems, evaluate the relative merits of various interpretations of the information presented, and come to sound conclusions.

She should have little difficulty solving problems that involve complex, abstract information. She should also be quick to grasp new ideas and solve problems that are outside her usual experience.

Decisive Judgment Making good decisions in a timely and confident manner. Adapting To Change Adapting to changing situations and restructuring tasks and priorities as changes occur within the business and organization. Planning And Organizing Effectively organizing and planning work according to organizational needs by defining objectives and anticipating needs and priorities. Delivering Results Maintaining a high level of commitment to personally getting things done. Resilience Effectively dealing with work related problems, pressure, and stress in a professional and positive manner. Teamwork And Collaboration Effectively working and collaborating with others toward a common goal. Interpersonal Communication Communicating clearly and effectively with people inside and outside of the organization. Functional Acumen* Having the skills, knowledge and abilities necessary to be effective in the specific functional content of a job. Integrity* Upholding a high standard of fairness and ethics in everyday words and actions.

• For each personality characteristic, a distribution of possible scores (from less to more) is displayed in deciles (1-10% = 1st decile, 11-20% = 2nd decile, etc.) using ten graph blocks.

• This distribution is based on a professional norm group of approximately 40,000 respondents.

• The candidate's score on each personality characteristic is represented by the graphic character .

• Overlaid on the normative distribution, the colors and shading on the graph represent desirable and undesirable ranges on each characteristic for a particular competency.

• Ranges in which a characteristic may hinder are marked with least shading ( ).

• Ranges in which a characteristic may be a potential concern are marked in intermediate shading ( ).

• Ranges in which a characteristic may help are marked with most shading ( ).

• You will notice from the pattern of shadings that low scores are not necessarily bad and high scores are not necessarily good.

• Also notice that the Helps and Hinders ranges for a characteristic may differ by competency. For example, a higher level of assertiveness may be more desirable for one competency than another.

Making good decisions in a timely and confident manner.

Adapting to changing situations and restructuring tasks and priorities as changes occur within the business and organization.

Effectively organizing and planning work according to organizational needs by defining objectives and anticipating needs and priorities.

Maintaining a high level of commitment to personally getting things done.

Effectively dealing with work related problems, pressure, and stress in a professional and positive manner.

Effectively working and collaborating with others toward a common goal.

Communicating clearly and effectively with people inside and outside of the organization.

For additional, more detailed information on conducting good behavior-based interviews, please visit the ASSESS managers resource website at https://www.bigby.com/systems/assessv2/System/Reports/www.bigby.com/systems/assessv2/resources/manager.

Interview Date: __________

Before the Interview

Review the Competency Model definitions and representative behaviors.

Review the candidate's resume and be familiar with his/her background and experience.

Review the candidate's ASSESS results.

Review the interview questions and additional personality probes.

During the interview, remember to:

• Use open-ended questions
• Ask probing follow-up questions
• Focus on specific examples and behaviors
• Postpone judgment: don't rely on your first impression

  
   

Start the interview by discussing the details of the candidate's educational and work history.

Walk me through your educational background.

Listen and probe for accomplishments, grades, how he/she chose college/major, classes he/she liked or disliked, involvement in outside activities, work experience during school, etc., and probe for how they relate to the job.

Walk me through your work history.

Listen and probe for milestones, accomplishments, relationships with co-workers and supervisors, tasks he/she liked or disliked, work environments he/she liked or disliked, reasons for leaving each job, etc. and probe for how prior experience has prepared him/her for this job.

NOTES:

Decisive Judgment:  Making good decisions in a timely and confident manner.

• Describe some of the decisions you have made recently that had important effects on your business or the people involved. How did you make your decisions? How did you balance the pressures of timeliness and making the right decision? Did you change your decision after making it? Why or why not?

Additional special probes based on ASSESS results:

• Tell me about a time when you decided to use an existing solution when a new or different approach would have been better? Why did this happen? (Is there an overreliance on past solutions?)

• Tell me about a time when you made a decision quickly, and it did not go the way you expected. What factors did you miss? (Is there too much emphasis on responsiveness at the expense of a quality decision?)

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Adapting To Change:  Adapting to changing situations and restructuring tasks and priorities as changes occur within the business and organization.

• In your current and previous jobs, have your duties been relatively constant or have they changed frequently? What would you prefer? How much change would you like to have? Describe your best work environment and your worst.

Additional special probes based on ASSESS results:

• Tell me about recent changes you have experienced at work. Were they good ideas or bad? Why? (Is there a stubborn resistance to trying new things?)

• Tell me about a time when you felt frustrated by people making too many changes in your work requirements. What was the situation? How did you feel? What did you do? (Listen for an ability to adapt to change despite a strong need to be free from close control.)

• Tell me about a time when you had to completely break from your normal way of doing something because of a change. What happened and how did it affect you and your work? (Listen for a resistance to a change in routine.)

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Planning And Organizing:  Effectively organizing and planning work according to organizational needs by defining objectives and anticipating needs and priorities.

• Tell me about a successful project or initiative that you had responsibility for planning and organizing. What did you do? Why was this project successful?

• Tell me about a project where you had responsibility for planning and organizing that did not go as smoothly. What did you do? What could you have done better?

Additional special probes based on ASSESS results:

• Describe a situation that illustrates the kind of techniques that you use to stay organized and focused in your own work. (Listen for an ability to keep work organized.)

• Tell me about a time when you had to coordinate and manage several projects at once. What was challenging? How did you prioritize? How successful were you? (Listen for difficulty juggling multiple tasks at once.)

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Delivering Results:  Maintaining a high level of commitment to personally getting things done.

• Describe two recent situations in which you met an aggressive goal. What types of obstacles did you face? How did you overcome them?

• Describe a situation in which you were unable to meet an aggressive goal. Why did this happen?

Additional special probes based on ASSESS results:

• Tell me about one of your projects that had an aggressive deadline for completion. How did you get it done? (Listen for an ability to accomplish things quickly.)

• Describe two situations in which you were unable to thoroughly complete a project. What happened? Why? (Listen for an ability to follow-through on commitments.)

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Resilience:  Effectively dealing with work related problems, pressure, and stress in a professional and positive manner.

• Tell me about two situations in which you experienced pressure and stress at work. What were the circumstances? How did you react? How would someone else know you were under stress?

• Tell me about two work situations in which you were rejected, turned down, or had some other frustrating setback. What happened? How did you react? How long did it take for you to recover?

Additional special probes based on ASSESS results:

• Describe several situations in which you were criticized unfairly. What was said, by whom? What impact did it have on you? (Can the candidate accept criticism constructively rather than react defensively?)

• In your past jobs, tell me about situations when you became angry or upset with another person. What upset you? How did you respond? What was the result? (Listen for the self-discipline to avoid saying or doing things the candidate would later regret.)

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Teamwork And Collaboration:  Effectively working and collaborating with others toward a common goal.

• Describe the last assignment in which you were part of a team. What was your role? What aspects of working as part of a team did you do well? With what aspects were you less successful? Why?

• In what types of situations do you prefer to work independently and in what types of situations do you prefer to work as part of a team? Why?

Additional special probes based on ASSESS results:

• In your previous jobs, have other people done their share of the work? Did you get fair credit for your efforts? (Listen for a tendency to be critical of others, or expect others to not perform.)

• We all have conflict or disagreements when working closely with others. Tell me about two situations in the past where you had a conflict with a co-worker or team member. How did the conflict affect your relationships and your work effectiveness? (Listen for a tendency to be disagreeable versus cooperative.)

• Give me several recent examples of work situations in which you asked others for assistance and situations in which you could have asked for assistance but did not. In each case, why or why not? (Does the candidate avoid collaboration?)

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Interpersonal Communication:  Communicating clearly and effectively with people inside and outside of the organization.

• Tell me what you have done in your past jobs to ensure that others are informed or have the information that they need.

• Tell me about a time when there was a miscommunication between you and a co-worker. What happened?

• Tell me about any training you have taken to develop your communication skills.

• (Use the interview as sample of the candidate's ability to listen, respond appropriately, articulate thoughts clearly, close the communication loop and otherwise communicate effectively in a one-on-one situation. Was the candidate effective?)

Additional special probes based on ASSESS results:

• Tell me what you have done in the past to make sure the ideas and opinions of others' are heard in a meeting. Are there times when you should have listened more? Explain. (Listen for a tendency to be overbearing at the expense of receiving input from others.)

• We all say or do things we later regret. Tell me about times when this happened to you. Have you hurt other people's feelings? Said things you should not have said? Explain. (Listen for the impact the candidate's spontaneity may have on his/her ability to communicate effectively.)

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Functional Acumen*:  Having the skills, knowledge and abilities necessary to be effective in the specific functional content of a job.

• Please describe for me how your education and training have prepared you for this job. What courses have you taken and how do they apply to this job?

• Please describe your previous job experience and how it prepares you for the technical requirements of this job. Try to give specific examples of what you have learned and how you learned it.

• What are you doing on an on-going basis to maintain and improve your technical skills and abilities?

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Integrity*:  Upholding a high standard of fairness and ethics in everyday words and actions.

• Describe for me an ethical business dilemma that you have faced. What were the circumstances? What did you do? Why?

• Tell me about two situations in which you have seen others be unfair or dishonest. What happened? What would you have done differently? Why?

NOTES:  (details of the situation, actions by the candidate, and the resulting outcomes)

Your goal is to bring the interview smoothly to a close.

Ensure that the candidate feels that he/she has been able to give you a complete and accurate picture of him/herself.

Explain the next steps in the process and timeframe as appropriate.

Thank the candidate for his/her time and close the interview.

Good selection decisions require careful consideration of all the available information (education, training, experience, skills, abilities, personality, etc.) from as many different credible sources as possible (interviews, reference checks, background checks, ASSESS results, etc.) against a clear specification of what is needed or desired in the job.

Use the following chart to evaluate the candidate on each of the competencies of the Model. Carefully consider each competency before making your overall judgement.