Hiring
and Interviews
An Advising
Administrator's Duty
Linda
C. Chalmers
Retention & Graduation
Analyst
University
of Texas
at San
Antonio
I
profess that the most important job duty of an advising administrator
is to hire the right people because no other function done improperly
or poorly will so quickly damage the advising operation and the
mission of providing quality advising services to students. Over
the twenty plus years that I have been an administrator/manager,
both in higher education and private industry, I have observed
that the art of hiring the right people is constantly cussed and
discussed. One must continually hone hiring skills, especially
in light of the ever-changing workforce landscape.
There
remains a constant within the forces of human-resource changes
that I always use when hiring. My mantra is "hire the attitude
and train the skill". I learned this valuable lesson early on
when I discovered that a bad attitude will poison an office staff
very quickly. Bad attitudes rarely change to good. A person's
world view comes early as decision-making patterns are developed
early in life. Just take the person who sees
the world through the "half-empty" filter and try to change them
to see it "half-full;" you soon will discover that no human power
can perform that magic!
I
have always willingly given people "the benefit of the doubt"
but early on learned the valuable lesson of listening. I will
never forget the administrative assistant I hired for a front
desk-receptionist position. During the job interview, I emphasized
that this position required that the individual be on-time and
dependable. While I heard, I did not listen to the candidate as
she responded with a saga that included living across town, childcare
issues, and her need to learn a new route to work. Unfortunately
I did see not understand this cue to her future performance. Instead
I looked at the candidates' qualifications on paper; she was the
"best qualified" of the pool so I hired her. Alas, during her
first month she was up to 30 minutes late every day (if only I
had listened!). Soon we parted amiably and I learned a valuable
lesson.
In
my twenty-plus supervisory years, I have had many positive hiring
experiences. Much of this success stems from a few solid hiring
principles and techniques:
Map
this on paper and consider the types of questions you and your
search committee will need to ask interviewees in order to yield
the best information for making a hiring decision. (Note: It is
often wise to develop these questions with the search committee
since HR laws dictate that the same questions be asked of all
interviewees.)
Recently
I was surprised to learn that, ".when surveyed, over 90% of people
(employers) indicate they hate to interview." If that is true,
then how can we expect to hire good people? It's all in the preparation.
In a recent issue of Employee Recruitment & Retention,
a report states the 10 worst hiring practices. Practice #7
is "no plans for interviewing". Interview preparation is, indeed,
important.
In
the interview, asking the right questions is critical to gaining
needed information about a candidate. Let's say that as an administrator,
you have isolated four essential job functions for the advising
position: Verbal Communication; Analytical Problem Solving; Tolerance;
and Motivation. After determining the performance measure for
each, an administrator must consider what questions will elicit
the desired information from interviewees.
- Verbal Communication - must clearly
present important information to positively influence or persuade
advisees to take action or accept consequences.
Advisees
may not be aware of or concerned about school policies, procedures,
processes, or decisions. Academic advisors often are bearers of
bad news, i.e., missing prerequisites; delay graduation, denial
of a petition, etc.
For
this skill consider asking candidates the following:
-
Being
an advisor requires a lot of time talking with advisees. Describe
a time or a job that you have had that required a lot of talking
and how you felt at the end of the day?
- Advisors
at times must deliver "bad news" about graduation or petitions,
etc. Describe a time you had to deliver bad news and how it
was received by the person.
-
Tell
me about a time that you had to influence or persuade another
person.
-
Describe
the steps you took to build a trust relationship with a friend,
co-worker or advisee.
Advisees
come from all walks of life, educational experiences, and possess
a wide range of responsibilities and stressors. The advisor, as
an objective observer and good listener, should be able to discern
the problem and assist the advisee with possible solutions.
For
this skill consider asking candidates the following:
-
Describe
a situation where you were confronted with a complex problem,
the process you used to analyze it, and the solution or solutions
you found.
-
What was your greatest success
in using logic to solve a work-related problem?
- Illustrate
a time when you helped a co-worker or friend solve a problem;
describe the steps you used to define the problem and the resulting
solutions.
-
Tolerance
(patience) - able to suppress actions or speech when important
information is unknown, manage unresolved situations and the
time it takes for resolution, positively handles frequent changes,
delays or unexpected events.
While
advisors may not always be privy to what administrators are thinking
or doing, changes may be thrust upon advisors and students and
advisors must be able to deal with these changes in a positive
manner.
For
this skill consider asking candidates the following:
-
Tell
us about a time when you had to wait for critical information
before you could act or communicate with the student/customer.
How long did you have to wait for the information? How did
you feel during the wait period?
-
In an advising job there will
be periods of time that the student traffic is minimal and
times that are very hectic, e.g., registration periods. Tell
me about the work flow patterns of your current position and
how you feel about them.
-
Sometimes the advising job is
complicated by having to sift through conflicting of ambiguous
information. What has been you experience in working under
these conditions and what impact does it make upon you?
Advising
takes a great amount of energy, especially when the advisor
load is great. Someone who generates negative energy in the
workplace will create a toxic work environment and drive off
advisees. Advisors must stay upbeat even when others are not.
For
this skill consider asking candidates the following:
-
Describe a time when your enthusiasm
helped move a team forward in completion of a goal.
-
Give me an example of a time when
your positive attitude helped a co-worker or customer or advisee
better understand the situation.
-
If you were given one tool to
create motivation in others, what would that tool be and why.
One of the
best "closing" questions (a question that I've used for years)
is "If I met your current (or former) boss on the street, what
would s/he say about you using only five adjectives?" Condensing
this into just five adjectives demonstrates the candidate's ability
to think quickly and delineates how the interviewees see themselves
through their boss' eyes. I've used this closing question for
the past few years and have weighed the answers heavily for every
hiring decision I've made. To date, each new-hire has been true
to his/her words.
In
the twenty-two years as a supervisor, the past ten years in academic
advising, I've not fired anyone. I transferred one employee to
another department, gently suggested "other options" to about
five, all of whom soon chose to depart. On the average, employees
have stayed with me for five years before moving on to promotions,
career changes, and/or transferring out of the area. More importantly,
the goals and accomplishments achieved by my teams over these
years have been astounding.
Are
administrators who use a prescribed formula ever guaranteed that
they will hire the right person? No. But administrators
who plan to succeed -- from the beginning of the process to the
end result..and then beyond - improve their odds of success. How
do we keep the good employees we've hired? That is a story for
another article in the future!
References
-
Peak
Search, (2005) Interviewing for Employers, Winning the Best
in the 21st Century, http://www.peaksearch.net/conducting-meaningful-interviews.php
-
Sennett,
Frank. (2004) "Special Report: The 10 worst hiring practices
- and how to avoid them", Employee Recruitment & Retention
, Lawrence Ragan Communications, Inc., Chicago , IL , Sample
Issue, pp 6-7
Resource
Cite
this resource using APA style as:
Chalmer,
L.C. (2005). An Advising Administrator's Duty. Retrieved -insert
today's date- from the NACADA Clearinghouse of Academic Advising
Resources Web site:
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