WorkPuzzle

Creativity and Walking?

I'll bet you are reading this while sitting at your desk and probably multi-tasking at the same time.

If you are, your assignment today is to go for a stroll before solving any of today's problems. Why?

Because a long suspected, but now proven, link between walking and increased creativity has been made. The below excerpt is from the NY Times Well Blog.

“Researchers at Stanford University recently decided to test that possibility, inspired, in part, by their own strolls. “My adviser and I would go for walks” to discuss thesis topics, said Marily Oppezzo, at the time a graduate student at Stanford. “And one day I thought: ‘Well, what about this? What about walking and whether it really has an effect on creativity?’”

As a result of the above discussion they structured the following research project:

They placed “volunteers" in a deliberately dull, unadorned room equipped with only a desk and (somewhat unusually) a treadmill. Dr. Oppezzo asked the students to sit and complete tests of creativity, which in psychological circles might involve tasks like rapidly coming up with alternative uses for common objects, such as a button. Then the participants walked on the treadmill, at an easy, self-selected pace that felt comfortable. The treadmill faced a blank wall. While walking, each student repeated the creativity tests, which required about eight minutes.

For almost every student, creativity increased substantially when they walked. Most were able to generate about 60 percent more uses for an object, and the ideas were both “novel and appropriate,” Dr. Oppezzo writes in her study, which was published this month in The Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition.

But how practical is it to take an entire team or business unit out for a stroll?

So Dr. Oppezzo next tested whether the effects lingered after a walk had ended. She had another group of students sit for two consecutive sessions of test-taking and subsequently walk for about eight minutes while tossing out ideas for object re-use, then sit and repeat the test.

Again, walking markedly improved people’s ability to generate creative ideas, even when they sat down after the walk. In that case, the volunteers who had walked produced significantly more and subjectively better ideas than in their pre-exercise testing period.

Finally, to examine another real-world implication of walking and creativity, Dr. Oppezzo moved portions of the experiment outdoors. “Most people would probably guess that walking outside should be much better for creativity” than pacing inside a drab office. But surprisingly, her study undermined that assumption. When volunteers strolled Stanford’s pleasant, leafy campus for about eight minutes, they generated more creative ideas than when they sat either inside or outside for the same length of time. But they were not noticeably more creative as a result of their plein-air walk than when they subsequently walked on an indoor treadmill, facing a blank wall.

“It really seems that it’s the walking that matters,” in terms of spurring creativity, Dr. Oppezzo said, and not the setting.

Just how a brief, casual stroll alters the various mental processes related to creativity remains unclear, Dr. Oppezzo added. “This is an acute effect,” she said, making it distinct from any long-term physiological changes that exercise might produce inside the human brain. “It may be that walking improves mood” as its primary effect, she said, and creativity blooms more easily within a buoyed-up mind.

Or walking may divert energy that otherwise would be devoted, intentionally or not, to damping down wild, creative thought, she said. “I think it’s possible that walking may allow the brain to break through” some of its own, hyper-rational filters, she said.

But those are only a few of many likely explanations, she said, adding that she would probably go for a walk later to help her come up with other plausible theories and inventive experiments through which to test them.

If you’re like me, I have a habit of sitting in my chair, staring off into space and thinking and...thinking some more. I always believed that this was a technique for stimulating a breakthrough of thought and creativity.

It appears based on the preceding research that I am really just wasting valuable time and this method is less than ideal.

A brief amble is what I need. The great news is I now have "permission" and a valid objective to get up from the chair, and go for a stroll.

I hope you do too. 

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Dr. David Mashburn. Dave is a Clinical and Consulting Psychologist, a Partner at Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

The Case Against Positive Thinking to Achieve Success - Part 2

Last week, I started a discussion about the prospects of positive thinking alone being a pathway to success.  When researched in an objective manner, this philosophy has been shown to produce less-than-positive results.

Don’t get me wrong—there is nothing harmful about being optimistic and having positive thoughts.  However, there seems to be a line that is crossed by some people where positive thoughts become a strategy.   Under the scrutiny of objective research, this philosophy appears to be flawed and unreliable.

As much as researchers have been critical of positive thinking success strategies, they have become excited about the concept of “grit.”  Grit is a success strategy that does withstand the rigors of research.

If you’re a long-time WorkPuzzle reader, you’ll probably remember this topic.   Dave and I have both written about it several times over the last five years.

For those of you who may be new readers, I’m going republish parts of two blogs (1, 2) Dave wrote in 2009.   Even if you’ve read these blogs already, it is a good reminder on how success is truly achieved.

Angela Lee Duckworth, PhD, has conducted a series of studies on a concept called "grit." 

Grit is another word for backbone, chutzpah, fortitude, guts, stick-to-it-iveness, etc. 

It all started when Dr. Duckworth observed that it wasn't necessarily the smartest people who succeeded and made a lasting impact on science. She had a hunch that it was a person's personal "grit" recipe that made the difference in their level of success. 

Across six studies, Duckworth found that grit significantly contributed to successful outcomes:  Undergrads with the most grit earned higher grade point averages than their peers.  West Point Cadets with the highest levels of grit were more likely to return after the first summer.  Even "grittier" spelling bee competitors (a situation where IQ would seem the best predictor) out-spelled their less tenacious competitors.  Among older individuals, people with substantial grit had higher levels of education and made fewer career changes than less gritty peers of the same age.

Many successful people don't attribute their success to their IQ or level of talent [or positive thoughts], but rather to their tenacity.  Thomas Edison was one of those people.  Edison once said:

"Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”

Here is another prime example of grit:  Poet David Baker is Director of Creative Writing at Denison University, and author of seven books of poetry, including "Midwest Eclogue."  Mr. Baker laments:

"Unfortunately, no one comes in my window and whispers poems to me... Poets [have to] work hard.  I may work on a single poem for weeks or months and write 60 or 70 drafts—only to decide that draft 22 was the good one.”

Along these same lines, people often refer to Mozart's diaries, where he divulges that an entire symphony appeared, supposedly intact, in his head. However, Jonathan Plucker an educational psychologist at Indiana University points out:

"But no one ever quotes the next paragraph, where he talks about how he refined the work for months.”

So, if you review the research I referenced in the last blog… you’ll see that grit appears to the vital component to success.

Success comes to those who work harder and demonstrate perseverance in the face of obstacles. 

"When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn."  (Harriet Beecher Stowe)

Where does that leave the positive thinker? 

Not as far from the truth as you might imagine.  Having positive thoughts is a great start, but it must be combined with hard work, tenacity, and focus on doing whatever it takes to accomplish the goal. 

This is grit.  It’s far beyond positive thinking, and it’s what effective people do to be successful.

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Engage in the WorkPuzzle discussion by joining the TMOC private social network.  Commenting on a public blog like WorkPuzzle can be a little intimidating, so why not join the discussion inside the privacy of the TMOC discussion group?  

By joining TMOC, you'll get to see who else is in the group and your comments will only be seen by those whom you trust.   Joining TMOC is quick, easy, and free (no kidding…this takes less than 2 minutes).   To get started, click here.

Already of a member of TMOC?  If so, join the WorkPuzzle Dialog Group by clicking on the WorkPuzzle Group icon on the left side of your TMOC homepage.  Questions?   Email the WorkPuzzle editor (workpuzzle@hiringcenter.net) and we'll walk through the process.

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

The One Question You Should Ask During Every Interview

Last week, I pointed you to a helpful recruiting data site called PayScale.  PayScale is the “Zillow” of hiring —while Zillow tells you how much your house is worth, PayScale tells you how much your talents are worth in the hiring market.

Of course, people get interested in PayScale when they start to consider changing jobs.   This site passively collects data from millions of users who are in this state and uses this information to help companies and individuals better understand the job marketplace.

Follow-up With Your Candidates More Successfully.

As a real estate hiring manager, this information can be helpful.  For example, if you find out about a candidate’s work history during the interview, you can determine the individual’s earning potential if he were to remain in his existing career field.

By contrasting this information with the potential of a real estate career, you can help your candidates make better business decisions about their employment.  Initially, Most high-quality candidates will trust third party data more then your opinion on how they should proceed.

Beyond this surface data that’s useable with individual candidates,  PayScale also does research using aggregate data they collect from all their users.  This can also be helpful.

Understand Why People Change Jobs.

One of the research topics I found interesting was the motivation employees have to change jobs.  If everything is wonderful in an existing job, employees tend to stay in one spot.  Change most commonly happens when things are not going well.

PayScale recently conducted research on what causes a person to change jobs.  The research was based on survey results from more than 24,000 workers.  Here is a partial list of the top reasons that individuals start looking for a new job:

Pay.   Commonly called Total Cash Compensation (TCC), this metric combines base annual salary or hourly wage, bonuses, profit sharing, tips, commissions, and other forms of cash earnings, as applicable. It does not include equity (stock) compensation, cash value of retirement benefits, or value of other non-cash benefits (e.g., healthcare).

Stress.  This is the proportion of respondents who answered either "Fairly stressful" or "Extremely stressful" to the question, "How stressful is your job/work environment?"

Low Job Satisfaction.   This is the proportion of respondents who answered either "Dissatisfied" or "I hate my job" to the question "How satisfied are you in your job?"

Hate Their Boss.  This is the proportion of respondents in a given category that chose "Boss" in response to the question, "If you could change one thing about your current work situation, what would it be?"

Know What Questions to Ask During an Interview.

All of these factors are important.   If possible, you should touch on each issue during a typical interview.  If you cycle through these issues with open-ended questions, you’ll strike a nerve with at least one of these topics.

If you were forced to only focus on one topic, which one of these hot-buttons tends to be most important? 

It’s questions about the candidate’s boss.

The PayScale research demonstrated that many candidates are not happy with their first-level manager.  Also, this question tends to be the one packed with the most emotion.   They don’t just dislike him—they hate him! 

As we’ve discussed in previous WorkPuzzles, finding a person’s unique pain is critical to the hiring process.   Candidates will not be open to your solution until they feel they’ve been heard, and the solutions you’re offering are customized to their situation.

This all starts with asking the right questions and letting your candidates express their pain and frustration.  Thanks to the PayScale research, you now know where you’ll most likely find this pain.

 

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Engage in the WorkPuzzle discussion by joining the TMOC private social network.  Commenting on a public blog like WorkPuzzle can be a little intimidating, so why not join the discussion inside the privacy of the TMOC discussion group?  

By joining TMOC, you'll get to see who else is in the group and your comments will only be seen by those whom you trust.   Joining TMOC is quick, easy, and free (no kidding…this takes less than 2 minutes).   To get started, click here.

Already of a member of TMOC?  If so, join the WorkPuzzle Dialog Group by clicking on the WorkPuzzle Group icon on the left side of your TMOC homepage.  Questions?   Email the WorkPuzzle editor (workpuzzle@hiringcenter.net) and we'll walk through the process.

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

Why Your Brain Loves Lists: The Psychology of Digesting Information

About four years ago, I wrote a popular blog on an obscure medical book called the Checklist Manifesto.  Since then, that book has become quite popular and the principles outlined by the author for hospitals have benefited managers and individuals in many industries.  Hopefully, you’ve used it yourself!

Since reading this book, I’ve often wondered why people are naturally drawn to the concept of a checklist. Whether I’m talking with a seasoned executive or my 7-year old, it just seems right to create and follow a list.  I never get an argument on this topic—it’s always, “…of course we’d need to create and follow a checklist, that only makes sense.”

Well, I need not wonder any more.  Best-selling author Maria Konnikova recently wrote a fascinating article in the New Yorker magazine that reveals the science behind the ubiquitous success of the list.

It’s a long and very detailed article (that surprisingly does not contain any lists), but here are a few of the points I found most interesting:

"Your mind seeks organization. “Lists tap into our preferred way of receiving and organizing information at a subconscious level; from an information-processing standpoint, they often hit our attentional sweet spot.

When we process information, we do so spatially. For instance, it’s hard to memorize through brute force the groceries we need to buy. It’s easier to remember everything if we write it down in bulleted, or numbered points.”

Your mind wants to categorize. Lists also appeal to our general tendency to categorize things—in fact, it’s hard for us not to categorize something the moment we see it—since they chunk information into short, distinct components….

Because we can process information more easily when it’s in a list than when it’s clustered and undifferentiated, like in standard paragraphs, a list feels more intuitive. In other words, lists simply feel better.”

Your mind wants to know how long this will take.  “The more we know about something—including precisely how much time it will consume—the greater the chance we will commit to it. The process is self-reinforcing: we recall with pleasure that we were able to complete the task instead of leaving it undone and that satisfaction, in turn, makes us more likely to click on lists again.

The social psychologist Robert Zajonc, who made his name studying the connection between emotion and cognition, argued that the positive feeling of completion in and of itself is enough to inform future decisions. Preferences, goes his famous coinage, need no inferences.”

Konnikova’s insight has a number of applications in the real estate industry.  Here are a few that come to mind quickly:

Recruiting.  During an interview, help the candidate categorize the dissatisfaction they feel in their current job/career by creating a list.   Prioritizing the list will help them feel and remember the dissatisfaction.

Coaching.   You have important concepts that you want your agents to understand during a coaching session.  Present the information in a list.  It will be easier to remember and refer back to later.

Training.  As the Checklist Manifesto taught us, if you want someone to consistently do something, create a checklist. This will be good for your brain and the person you’re trying to train.

Communicating with clients.  Teach your agents to use lists in their communication with clients—especially marketing pieces. As people skim information, their eyes are naturally drawn to lists.

Follow-up emails.  When you’re finished with a meeting and write a follow-up email to those who attended, use lists to summarize.  Here is what we discussed (bullet list).  Here are the action items (2^nd bullet list).

There are many more applications (another hint; done’ make your lists too long), but you get the idea. 

The psychology of digesting information is key to your success as a communicator.  If you think about it, getting people around you to hear, digest, and act upon the information you’re communicating is the main part of your “job description” as a leader.   Make sure you become proficient at using this tool.

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Join the WorkPuzzle Discussion at the Tidemark Online Community (TMOC)

Engage in the WorkPuzzle discussion by joining the TMOC private social network.  Commenting on a public blog like WorkPuzzle can be a little intimidating, so why not join the discussion inside the privacy of the TMOC discussion group?  

By joining TMOC, you'll get to see who else is in the group and your comments will only be seen by those whom you trust.   Joining TMOC is quick, easy, and free (no kidding…this takes less than 2 minutes).   To get started, click here.

Already of a member of TMOC?  If so, join the WorkPuzzle Dialog Group by clicking on the WorkPuzzle Group icon on the left side of your TMOC homepage.  Questions?   Email the WorkPuzzle editor (workpuzzle@hiringcenter.net) and we'll walk through the process.

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

Are Your Job Ads Too Classified?

Did you know that 90% of the job ads posted today persist in describing the requirements of experience, skills, and education for each position as the only criteria? This would seem to be a logical system for attracting well-qualified candidates.

However, I am personally aware of several cases of individuals who have shied away from applying for those opportunities where the prerequisites are so selectively detailed. These were extremely talented candidates with many of the characteristics that would make them great employees in any field.

So why didn’t these candidates apply? Because, based on the ad content, they believed the company was more interested in experience and skill level than talent, drive and desire.

There are multiple layers behind why the “traditional” way doesn't work. You have probably heard me say that this method doesn't speak to the person. For example, “skills” do not tap a person’s curiosity, awareness or attentiveness or how they work in a group or leadership situation.

Finding more about who they are, what they are interested in, and how they view a beneficial working relationship will give you the relevant information needed to identify the successful employee. 

 Lou Adler, a widely read author in recruiting circles, recently wrote:

"Earlier this year, I saw an ad for Facebook’s VP of Human Resources. It listed a bunch of experience requirements interlaced with some generic responsibilities and hyperbole.

To me this is backwards. It’s far better to define the job before defining the person. If a person has successfully accomplished something similar, he or she has exactly the level of skills, experience and academics required.

The worked required to be done determines the skills needed, the skills needed don't define the work required.  80-90% of the people who get promoted internally into these same spots don’t have the experience, skills and academics listed as required for someone hired from the outside.

What they do have is something far better – a track record of performance that indicates they can take on a bigger role in the company.

It seems obvious that if a company wants to hire people who are both competent and motivated to do the work required, they need to start by defining the work required.

Yet somehow this basic concept is lost when a new job opens up. Instead of defining the job, managers focus on defining the person. The end result is not a job description at all, but a person description.

This limits the selection pool to a narrow group of people just like the people the company has hired in the past. By default, this precludes expanding the company’s diversity hiring program or raising the company’s overall talent level.

For The Essential Guide for Hiring & Getting Hired, I asked one of the top labor attorney’s in the country, David Goldstein from Littler Mendelson, to review the idea of using performance objectives to define the job, rather than skills. Here are a few of his comments (you’ll find his full report in the book):

 ‘A properly prepared performance profile ...and focusing on “Year 1 and Beyond” criteria may open the door to more minority, military, and disabled candidates who have a less “traditional” mix of experiences, thereby supporting affirmative action or diversity efforts.’

Hiring a more diverse and talented workforce starts by defining the work required for success, not the skills, experiences and academics needed to do the work.

This is not rocket science, just commonsense, but apparently commonsense is not one of the skills required for hiring people."

Lou’s article and book are extremely valuable tools in today’s competitive hiring environment. I am excited by the fact that most of our clients use this hiring method and apply the philosophy it evokes.

Perhaps it may be easier to practice these principles when it comes to independent contractors such as real estate agents, but it is also the right thing to do. 

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Dr. David Mashburn. Dave is a Clinical and Consulting Psychologist, a Partner at Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

Cognitive Ease—The Secret to Great Interviewing—Part 2

Earlier this week, I suggested that most people show up to an interview experiencing “cognitive strain.”  Unless you can help a person migrate to a place of cognitive ease, they’ll have a difficult time hearing and engaging most of what you’re trying to communicate.  If you didn't read the first article in this discussion, you may want to catch up before trying to digest today’s topic.

How do you get someone from a state of cognitive strain to a place of cognitive ease?  Daniel Kahneman spends several chapters in his best-selling book, Thinking, Fast and Slow, addressing this topic.

Part of the answer to the question can be summed up in this diagram:

The items listed on the right side are the feelings we want the candidate to have when they leave the interview.  These traits are the natural results of feeling cognitive ease.

Some of the causes that produce cognitive ease are listed on the left side.  As you might suspect, if you can become proficient at influencing the items on the left (by the way, this is not a complete list—there are many more elements), candidates will start experiencing something remarkable at your interviews.

As I mentioned earlier, Kahneman spends several chapters explaining and citing research for these causes.  Not all of these would relate to interviewing (although a surprising number do apply), so we’ll just explore “related experience” today.  If you have an interest in learning more, you can delve into this topic by picking up a copy of his book.

Here is a simple question that Dr. Kahneman often asks his audiences:

“How many animals of each kind did Moses take into the ark?

The number of people who detect what was wrong with this question is so small that it has been dubbed the Moses illusion.  Moses took no animals into the ark; Noah did.

The idea of animals going into the ark sets up a biblical context, and Moses is not abnormal in that context.  You did not positively expect him, but the mention of his name is not surprising. It also helps that Moses and Noah have the same vowel sound and number of syllables.

As with triads that produce cognitive ease, you unconsciously detect associative coherence between Moses and ‘ark’ and so quickly accept the question.”

By default, the human mind wants to maintain (or get to) a state of System 1 thinking.  One of the ways it maintains this state is to look for related experiences.  When you heard just a few words (animals and ark), it quickly pulled a story from memory that allowed you to answer the question without leaving a state of cognitive ease.

The error you made (and we all make) illustrates how quickly the mind retrieves, depends upon, and desires related experiences. 

Let’s suppose I ask a different question:  How many chickens did Eric take to the marina? 

Of course, you quickly get frozen with this question.  Who’s Eric?  Why does he have chickens?  Is he taking the chickens to a boat, or is there a restaurant near the marina? And, so on.   Your mind does not even consider the first part of the question—how many chickens are there?   

In the first question, none of the background mattered because the “related experience” filled in the context.

Side note:  The relationship between related experience and cognitive ease is leveraged frequently by companies such as Geico during their marketing campaigns.  Next time you see or hear a Geico commercial, see if you can detect it.

What does this have to do with interviewing?

A “related experience” is one of the best pathways to get a candidate to a state of cognitive ease during an interview.

The point is not to deceive anyone in the interview process (we make the assumption that you’re offering the person something that will be advantageous for his or her career), but instead allow them to feel good about you and your organization and trust the things you’re communicating.

How do you find related experiences?  Here are two sources you can use immediately:

Pop culture.  How many times have you been in a meeting and someone says…"this is like the TV show Survivor.  Someone is going to get voted off the island."  This is a related experience.  Find two or three references in pop culture that would relate to the points you commonly make during and interview.

The candidate’s own experiences.  If you spend time (the first 20 to 30 minutes of the interview) drawing out and listening to the candidate’s story, you’ll have plenty of material to draw upon to find related experiences.  Restating the candidate’s own experiences and then relating it to the realities of working in your office is very powerful.

If you can master the concepts of related experience and cognitive ease, you will take your interview skills to a whole new level.   You’ll not only reap the rewards of hiring more agents, but you’ll also experience some cognitive ease for yourself!

 

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

Cognitive Ease: The Secret to Great Interviewing

Think of yourself sitting in a canoe in a swift flowing river.  You’re paddling desperately with the intention of making it 100 yards upstream. 

To get there, you’ll need to focus on the task, apply some paddling skill, and consistently exert yourself.   Because you’ll be fighting against the current, you’ll experience some frustration and probably arrive out of breath and needing to rest.

In a figurative sense, this is how most people feel when they go to an interview.  The fast-flowing current is called “cognitive strain,” and it’s a silent factor that works against you in every interview.

In the next couple of WorkPuzzles, we’ll teach you how to alleviate cognitive strain and start conducting your interviews in the calm water of “cognitive ease.”

A few weeks ago, I introduced you to Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Prize winning psychologist who recently published his best selling manifesto called Thinking, Fast and Slow.

If you didn’t catch the previous discussions on this topic, I’d recommend reading the first blog in this series.  It will give you some background for today’s WorkPuzzle.

In his book, Kahneman introduces his readers to the concept of “cognitive ease.”  In simple terms, it is the natural desire a person has to make decisions and judgments using “System 1” thinking.

As you may remember, System 1 is the fast, intuitive, and automatic way of making decisions and judgments.   System 2 is the slower way of thinking that requires more conscious judgments and critical analysis.

Dr. Kahneman defines cognitive ease in this way:

“Whenever you are conscious, and perhaps even when you are not, multiple computations are going on in your brain, which maintain and update current answers to some key questions:

Is anything new going on? Is there a threat? Are things going well? Should my attention be redirected? Is more effort needed for this task?

You can think of a cockpit, with a set of dials that indicate the current values of each of these essential variables. The assessments are carried out automatically by System 1 and one of their functions is to determine whether extra effort is required from System 2.

One of the dials measures cognitive ease, and its range is between “easy” and “strained.” 

Easy is a sign that things are going well—no threats, no major news, no need to redirect attention or mobilize effort. 

Strained indicates that a problem exists, which will require increased mobilization of System 2.

When you are in a state of cognitive ease, you are probably in a good mood, like what you see, believe what you hear, trust your intuitions, and feel that the current situation is comfortably familiar. 

When you feel cognitive strain, you are more likely to be more vigilant and suspicious, invest more effort in what you are doing, feel less comfortable, and make few errors, but you also are less intuitive and less creative than usual.”

With these definitions as a background, would you rather have someone be experiencing “cognitive ease” or “cognitive strain” during an interview?

Obviously, you’d want the person to be experiencing cognitive ease.  If candidates are suspicious, uncomfortable, and lacking the creativity to imagine themselves in a new career, your interviews are not going to come to life.  It's very difficult to build a relationship with individuals who remain in this state.

Here’s something you may not have considered:  Every candidate you interview (especially if the person is a “new to real estate” candidate) is experiencing cognitive strain when they arrive at your office.

There are very few exceptions to this rule.  Interviews are stressful.  Being in a new environment, meeting new people, receiving a bunch of new information, and having the perception you’re being evaluated puts people squarely in System 2 thinking. 

One of the secrets of successful interviewing is helping a person migrate from a state of cognitive strain to a place of cognitive ease during the 45 minutes you spend with the candidate. If the candidate remains in a state of cognitive strain (and most people do), the person will not have the ability to truly hear and engage most of what you’re trying to communicate.

How do you do this?  Daniel Kahneman has some great insight on this topic based on the research that he and others of have done.  It’s fascinating stuff, and we’ll cover it during our next WorkPuzzle discussion.  

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

When Recruiting--Should You Trust Your Gut?

In his best selling book, Daniel Kahneman creates the framework for his insights by defining the two “systems” of human reasoning that are employed to make decisions and judgments:

System 1 is sometimes referred to as intuition.  It is fast and automatic and is usually associated with strong emotional bonds.  It is based on formed habits and is very difficult to change or manipulate.

System 2 is sometimes referred to as reasoning.  It is slower and much more volatile, being subject to conscious judgments and attitudes. 

These framework definitions are a simple way of explaining how a judgments can occur in two different ways.  In psychology, this is called a duel process theory.  Obviously, I’m grossly over-simplifying these concepts.  There is much to read on this topic if you care to learn more.

For our discussion, the following chart may be helpful in understanding the concept of System 1 and System 2:

So, here’s a question:

When it comes to making judgments in the recruiting process, is System 1 or System 2 more reliable? 

Before you put too much thought into this question, I’ll share a quick story that contributed to some of Kahneman’s research.  Early in his career, Kahneman and his research partner, Amos Tversky, discovered they both had identical silly ideas about the future professions of several toddlers they both knew.

“We could identify the argumentative three-year-old lawyer, the nerdy professor, the empathetic and mildly intrusive psychotherapist.  Or course, these predictions were absurd, but we still found them appealing. 

It was also clear that our intuitions were governed by the resemblance of each child to the cultural stereotype of a profession.  The amusing exercise helped us develop a theory that was emerging in our minds at the time, about the role of resemblance in predictions.  We went on to test and elaborate that theory in dozens of experiments.”

In simple terms, these gentlemen were employing System 1 to draw conclusions about a person’s fit for a particular profession.  If a human’s mind is susceptible to quickly draw conclusions under these ridiculous circumstances, could it also draw wrong conclusions during a more traditional recruiting encounter? 

Here is another example to consider.  Let’s assume that Steve is selected at random from a representative sample:

“An individual has been described by a neighbor as follows:  ‘Steve is very shy and withdrawn, invariably helpful but with little interest in people or in the world of reality.  A meek and tidy soul, he has a need for order and structure and a passion for detail.’

Is Steve more likely a librarian or a farmer? 

The resemblance of Steve’s personality to that of a stereotypical librarian strikes everyone immediately, but equally relevant statistical considerations are almost always ignored. 

Did it occur to you that there are more than 20 male farmers for each male librarian in the United States?   Because there are so many more farmers, it almost certain that more ‘meek and tidy’ souls will be found on tractors than at library information desks.”

During multiple research studies, Kahneman found that participants ignored the relevant statistical facts and relied exclusively on resemblance.  More specifically, the experiments demonstrated that humans tend to use resemblance to construct mental “rules of thumb.”  Once developed, they rely on these mental rules to make difficult judgments—even to the point where it defies reason and causes predictable biases (systematic errors) in their predictions.

Conclusion:  I think we'd all agree--systematic errors in hiring are a bad thing.  Relying on intuition causes us to hire people we shouldn’t and overlook potential high performers.  According to Kahneman, System 1 reigns supreme when making hiring decisions.  By the way--if you think you’re exempt from this type of reasoning, you’re mistaken.  It affects everyone who evaluates candidates and conducts interviews.*

How do you keep from getting stuck in an endless cycle of systematic errors? 

First, recognize what is happening and make a conscious attempt to resist being controlled by your mind’s System 1.  Second, learn how to employ System 2. 

In our company, we use assessment tools to help us overcome the System 1 dominance.  These tools do help, but it is also important to structure interviews so that you’re collecting data and not just allowing your System 2 to lazily disengage. 

This means asking lots of open-ended questions, formulating thoughtful follow-up questions, listening, taking notes, drawing trial conclusions from your candidate’s answers, asking the candidate to defend their positions, etc. 

We’ll cover more on this topic in future discussions, but for now, work to stay mentally sharp and engaged during your interviews.  It will take more effort, but you’ll make better hires. 

*Note:  After evaluating the financials of many real estate companies over the last seven years, I’ve noticed that most companies have 40% to 60% “D” performers in their ranks at any point in time.  Considering that many “D” performers leave the organization soon after they’re hired, most companies have a very poor track record at selecting high performers.

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By joining TMOC, you'll get to see who else is in the group and your comments will only be seen by those whom you trust.   Joining TMOC is quick, easy, and free (no kidding…this takes less than 2 minutes).   To get started, click here.

Already of a member of TMOC?  If so, join the WorkPuzzle Dialog Group by clicking on the WorkPuzzle Group icon on the left side of your TMOC homepage.  Questions?   Email the WorkPuzzle editor (workpuzzle@hiringcenter.net) and we'll walk through the process.

 

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

Making Decisions and Forming Judgments: An Introduction to Daniel Kahneman

A few weeks ago, I started reading a fascinating book called Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. 

I usually move through business books quickly and zero in on the few ideas that seem applicable.  I suspect most business books are intentionally designed to be consumed in this manner.  They’re “sugary” and easy to digest knowing the attention span of the readers (me included) is relatively short.

So it took some courage for Kahneman to write a 500-page book full of substantive content that is fairly difficult to understand.  I’ve been reading for a couple of weeks and I’m only 20% finished!  I recently picked up a couple other books to read in parallel because this one is going to take while, and I don’t want to rush through it.  If I did race through it, I feel like I’d miss a bunch of great insights.

To provide some background, Kahneman won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2002.  Since Kahneman is a psychologist (not an economist), it was unusual for him to win this prize.   In fact, he was the first non-economist (by profession) to win this award.  He won the prize for developing Prospect Theory-- a behavioral economic theory that describes the way people chose between alternatives that involve risk.

Studying Prospect Theory would be beneficial for anyone in the real estate profession (I can’t think of a Nobel-prize-winning topic more applicable to the day-to-day work of a real estate agent), but the topics we’ll be discussing in future WorkPuzzles will focus more on the psychology of making decisions and forming judgments.  Here is quick summary of what we’ll hope to learn:

In his best selling book, Daniel Kahneman will take us on a groundbreaking tour of the mind and explains the two systems that drive the way we think.  System 1 is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical.

The impact of overconfidence on corporate strategies, the difficulties of predicting what will make us happy in the future, the profound effect of cognitive biases on everything from recruiting your next agent to diagnosing what causes some of your agents to consistently make the wrong choices—each of these can be better understood by knowing how the two systems shape our judgments and decisions.

Kahneman reveals where we can and cannot trust our intuitions and how we can tap into the benefits of slow thinking. He offers practical and enlightening insights into how choices are made in both our business and our personal lives—and how we can use different techniques to guard against the mental glitches that often get us (and those we manage) into trouble.

Tomorrow, I’ll share some specific insights concerning some of Kahneman's ideas and how they apply to recruiting.  In the future, I'll occasionally revisit this topic with new insights and ideas that apply not only to recruiting, but also coaching and personal performance as well. 

If you want to read the book on your own, the Kindle version in a great bargain (only $4.99 on Amazon) right now.   Also, there are several summaries of this book available if you’re more of the “cliff-notes” type of person. 

Regardless, I believe there is a lot learn from Daniel Kahneman’s manifesto.  Writing from a near 80-year-old’s perspective, he has much wisdom to share.

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Already of a member of TMOC?  If so, join the WorkPuzzle Dialog Group by clicking on the WorkPuzzle Group icon on the left side of your TMOC homepage.  Questions?   Email the WorkPuzzle editor (workpuzzle@hiringcenter.net) and we'll walk through the process.

 

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle. 

Conscientiousness: A Trait Every One of Your Future Hires Should Possess

If you’re looking for a new blog to add to your daily reading, I’d like to suggest Eric Barker’s, Barking Up the Wrong Tree. Besides being listed on both the New York Times and Wall Street Journal blog roles, he has 45,000 email subscribers (it is very difficult to get to this subscription level) and his columns regularly appear in Wired magazine.

In addition to being a great writer, Eric collects and presents research-based content in a way that is easy to digest. He generally does this by picking a topic of interest and then summarizing the research on the issue with short, pithy paragraphs that make the case for his point of view. 

He recently published a blog on the character trait of conscientiousness that I found both interesting and compelling. Upon reading his insight, I immediately copied the content and sent it to all four of my teenage sons! I challenged them to start asking themselves, “How conscientious am I being as I do __________?”

While this information was helpful to my children, it is also a key trait that should be part of every hiring decision you make. Why? Because conscientiousness is highly correlated to success in all parts of life. Eric explains:

"Conscientiousness is the fundamental personality trait most closely tied to self control and it tracks with nearly every type of success across your lifespan.

It’s pretty crazy really:

Money and job satisfaction? - Check.

“Measured concurrently, emotionally stable and conscientious participants reported higher incomes and job satisfaction.“

Finding a job? - Check.

“…the personality traits Conscientiousness and Neuroticism have a strong impact on the instantaneous probability of finding a job, where the former has a positive effect and the latter has a negative effect.”

Long marriage? - Check.

“…our findings suggest that conscientiousness is the trait most broadly associated with marital satisfaction in this sample of long-wed couples.”

Healthier life? - Check.

“Among adults over age 45 (n = 2,419), Neuroticism and low Agreeableness were associated with metabolic syndrome, whereas high Conscientiousness was protective. Individuals who scored in the top 10% on Conscientiousness were approximately 40% less likely to have metabolic syndrome…“

Long life? - Check.

“Conscientiousness, which was the best predictor of longevity when measured in childhood, also turned out to be the best personality predictor of long life when measured in adulthood.“

And let’s not forget good grades and staying out of jail.

Via How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character:

…conscientiousness was the trait that best predicted workplace success. What intrigues Roberts about conscientiousness is that it predicts so many outcomes that go far beyond the workplace. People high in conscientiousness get better grades in school and college; they commit fewer crimes; and they stay married longer. They live longer – and not just because they smoke and drink less. They have fewer strokes, lower blood pressure, and a lower incidence of Alzheimer’s disease."

So, since conscientiousness is such an important trait, it might be helpful to know what it is! Here is the definition I sent my kids:

Conscientiousness is the trait that denotes being thorough, careful, or vigilant; it implies a desire to do a task well. It is manifested in characteristic behaviors such as being efficient, organized, neat, and systematic, also including such elements as self-discipline, carefulness, thoroughness, self-organization, deliberation (the tendency to think carefully before acting), and need for achievement. Conscientious individuals are generally hard working and reliable.

With this research as a backdrop, it only makse sense that you'd want to hire conscientious people. In fact, if you were to rank the importance of other traits, this may be the most important characteristic that leads to successful hiring outcomes.

Here is a quick application for this information: Ask some open-ended questions about conscientiousness during your upcoming interviews. For example:

Was your manager in your last job a conscientious person? How did that make you feel?

In your previous position, were your co-workers conscientious in accomplishment of their work?

Are there situations in the past where you were rewarded for your being conscientious?

These questions should spur some discussion and hopefully give you some insight into your candidate’s perspective on this important character trait. In our next WorkPuzzle, we’ll discuss the capacity a person has for improving his/her level of conscientiousness. I know I could use some improvement!

 

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Join the WorkPuzzle Discussion at the Tidemark Online Community (TMOC)

Engage in the WorkPuzzle discussion by joining the TMOC private social network.  Commenting on a public blog like WorkPuzzle can be a little intimidating, so why not join the discussion inside the privacy of the TMOC discussion group?  

By joining TMOC, you'll get to see who else is in the group and your comments will only be seen by those whom you trust.   Joining TMOC is quick, easy, and free (no kidding…this takes less than 2 minutes).   To get started, click here.

Already of a member of TMOC?  If so, join the WorkPuzzle Dialog Group by clicking on the WorkPuzzle Group icon on the left side of your TMOC homepage.  Questions?   Email the WorkPuzzle editor (workpuzzle@hiringcenter.net) and we'll walk through the process.

 

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Editor's Note: This article was written by Ben Hess. Ben is the Founding Partner and Managing Director of Tidemark, Inc. and a regular contributor to WorkPuzzle.