Using Behavioral Event Interview(BEI)effectively
The CVs for senior level positions all look and read the same. Lengthy paragraphs on academic achievements and still lengthier paragraphs on professional attainments, awards and accolades. Most CVs run well into seven or eight pages and often they are written in terse, jargonised professional language with the sole objective of impressing the reader who usually is a senior manager in the HR function of a reputed multinational organization, a large family owned company or one of the reputed PSUs. There is a thriving business around the manufacture of professionally impressive CVs which knows exactly how they should be structured and formatted, what to mention and how to mention and so on and so forth. When CVs are professionally written they are churned out with impeccable standardization. The person in the CV is completely lost behind the structure and the verbosity of language. Sifting these CVs and shortlisting them before they are pushed upwards to CEOs and MDs or even to the Chairman is quite a task for HR. This is made seemingly easier by a smart HR team member who, by seeking opinions from senior line functionaries, makes an attempt to understand the technical jargon thrown in generously in the CVs.
There are usually rounds and rounds of interviews before the incumbent is presented to the top leadership team. In these rounds an attempt is made to select at least two or three persons who can qualify to meet the top brass. These rounds of interviews are conducted by Functional Heads and Business Unit Heads as well as the senior members from the HR team. These are lengthy discussions with selection tools and techniques sporadically thrown in.
What really helps to sift the grain from the chaff is the Behavioural Event Interview (BEI). Not many people have the skills to conduct this well. However, those who possess the skills rarely make a mistake in selection of a suitable person for the role. Many times professionals who are skilled in the BEI also question documents on reference checks submitted by the so called professional agencies and when their BEI assessments differ largely from the reference check inferences, there is a general tendency to believe in the BEI outcomes more than the reference check deductions.
Professionals must be trained to conduct an effective BEI. Before training the organization must ensure the availability of well- defined behavioural competencies for senior roles. We must not make mistakes in selection as a rule. However, for senior and top roles we can’t make mistakes in selection at all as they prove expensive and significantly damaging in many respects. Well- defined competency frameworks guide us through detailed definitions required for performance at senior levels and as the definitions are specific and can be easily measured they facilitate the assessment of competencies along a scale. A thorough BEI for senior positions doesn’t take less than two hours. Many times it could take well over two hours with discussion and probing.
BEI examines and discusses actual and demonstrated behaviour. It moves forward from understanding, perceptions and explanations and picks on real examples and some critical incidents and requests the interviewee to elaborate in detail what she did and what behaviours were actually demonstrated. These behaviours could be around communication, giving instructions, thinking and decision making, analysing and working with the team members, solving a problem or handling a crisis or organising, planning or any other aspect of managing. The example is broken into detailed elements of behaviours because all skills are integrated units of behaviour which include thinking, feeling and taking action.
The BEI therefore considers and documents in detail:
1. Examples or critical incidents covering what is actually done, how and why it is done, as well as a detailed description of feelings.
2. This is compared with the competency framework and the details assist in putting the identified behaviours on the scale.
3. Those behaviours which can’t be put on a scale are qualitatively described in detail.
Case study
I conducted an assessment centre for top and senior level managers in Mumbai from a company that produced and sold cement all over India as well as overseas. This was to assess potential for top functional roles both at HO as well as at the Plant levels and Sales offices. The competencies and the potential are assessed against detailed criteria, largely guided by the competency framework which had been developed by experts and the senior internal team.
For one senior level the manager’s potential for execution capacity assessed through a relevant in — basket exercise showed that the competencies to execute and the potential for further development in execution was low. For the execution area the specific competencies included were:
a. Organising
b. Planning
c. Implementation
d. Working under pressure.
The in-basket exercise results showed that there was an average or below average value on the scale for competencies related with execution. These results came to me before I conducted the BEI. During the BEI my discussion and detailed probing showed that the person was excellent in all the competencies related to execution. I asked him to give three examples which included information on major projects that he executed and two critical incidents which he described in detail with a focus on his actual behaviours and actions that he took. I involved two other members in the content analysis of the data as well as putting the data on the metrics and the scale to obtain numerical values. The data showed high and excellent execution competencies. My BEI results and the results of the in — basket exercise were completely different and did not match on any dimension. It had taken me three hours to conduct the BEI. The expert who had assessed him through the in-basket tool did not agree with my results at all. We were in a bit of a quandary. Then I suggested that we speak with the manager’s boss, who was the CEO of the Business Unit and to whom the manager directly reported.
The CEO completely agreed with the BEI results. He said that the candidates only weak point was that his knowledge of English was very poor and very often he could not understand and interpret documents written in English, especially if there were some uncommon words. His writing skills were also very poor.
The CEO gave us three examples of how he had executed three very complex projects at the plant flawlessly and in record time and with the requisite efficiency, quality and cost parameters. His people leadership was also excellent.
It is suggested that career progression and succession processes must be guided by not only detailed role profiles but also by well — crafted competency frameworks and by an excellently conducted BEI too, especially for senior roles. Managers who have worked closely ad for fairly long with the candidates are also sound ground for providing feedback on perceived potential for further development. Checking back with them is not just right politically but critical for the process itself.
