SIOP Members in the News
Clif Boutelle
Generally when we think of the media, it is the major newspapers, magazines, and network radio and television that come to mind. Although they still remain important to any organization seeking to generate awareness about itself, the Internet has created a whole new vista of media outlets that should not be overlooked. In fact, more and more organizations are utilizing sites on the Internet to disseminate their news.
And a growing number of SIOP members are finding their way on to Internet sites because writers, whether mainstream media or on the Internet (often reporters are writing for both), still need credible resources. In addition, SIOP members are being asked with increasing frequency to author articles for a variety of sites, including trade journals, newsletters, and specialized publications.
So, the opportunities for media mentions are expanding, and that is good for the field of I-O psychology.
Following are some of the press mentions, including Internet sites, that have occurred in the past several months:
The fallout from the Supreme Court decision in Ricci v. DeStefano continues. The city of Chicago is thinking of scrapping its police and firefighter exams over concerns about racial diversity. Not a good idea, particularly for police, said Art Gutman of Florida Institute of Technology and Mike Aamodt of DCI Consulting Group. In a February 1 story for SHRM Online, Gutman said, “If a municipality scraps a test, it faces two liabilities: one for reverse discrimination and, if a cop harms someone, another for negligent hiring. It’s important to have a diverse police force, but Black or White, you want the people you select to be qualified.” Aamodt noted that testing companies are starting to combine cognitive exams with structured interviews and situational judgment tests. “With a structured interview, the questions are job related, all applicants are asked the same questions, and there’s a structured scoring system. They have high predictability and no adverse impact,” he said.
A February 1 story on ABC News about a new Web site called Failin.gs that lets users solicit anonymous feedback about themselves was likened by its creators to 360-degree assessment programs used in business. Frederick Morgeson of Michigan State University said they are not exactly alike. In 360-degree reviews, people select a small group of people to provide critiques, and though they are unable to match the comments to each reviewer, they know the comments came from trusted sources and are meant to assist in a person’s professional development. With Failin.gs it may be more difficult to determine how valuable the comments are. “If you can’t trust the source of the information, it’s unclear how much benefit you will derive,” he said.
R. Wendell Williams of Scientific Selection in Atlanta provided his thoughts on interviewing in a story that ran in several media outlets including the January 25 Reliable Plant magazine and The Practicing CPA. Noting that too many interviews for both jobs and promotions are sidetracked by small talk and unprepared interviewers, he said it is unlikely that interviewers will gain any good information about the candidate’s ability to perform the job “unless the hiring manager is a specially trained behavioral interviewer and has a through job analysis available.”
The January 25 issue of Conducive Chronicle included a report of a research project conducted by Timothy Judge of Florida State and graduate students Charlice Hurst and Lauren Simon. They found that physical attractiveness had a significant impact on how much people got paid, how educated they were, and their self-confidence. However, the effects of a person’s intelligence on income were stronger than those of a person’s attractiveness. The results are explained as a function of the participants’ confidence. The more confident they were, the more educated they were likely to be; therefore, the more money they made. Even when intelligence is controlled, a person’s feeling of self-worth is enhanced by how attractive they are, and this, in turn, results in higher pay.
When workers find it difficult to focus on their jobs, they may be suffering from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, according to a January 17 story in Oklahoma City's The Oklahoman. Leonard Matheson of EPICRehab LLC, a St. Charles, MO consulting firm, noted that adults with ADHD who typically made low grades in school often have unjustified low opinions of their intelligence when most have significantly above-average IQs. “It’s a tragedy because the condition is easily identified and easily treated with medications that stimulate the part of the brain that maintains attention.”
Seymour Adler was quoted in a January 11 story in the Minneapolis Star Tribune about a Conference Board study showing coworkers do not like each other as much as they used to. Adler said “the element of competitiveness in the shrinking organization erodes trust and the sense that we’re in this together.” In tough times, workers need the support of their colleagues more than ever. “The danger is…that we lack the social buffer to deal with all the anxiety and stress that is out there,” he said.
Also, he was featured in a January 1 Human Resource Executive Online story pointing out that the most pressing postrecession task for HR leaders will be to provide highly engaged workers able to execute new business strategies. Adler said it was important to distinguish between actively and passively disengaged workers. Actively disengaged employees are those who hate coming to work and have an overall bad attitude and should not be the focus of the bulk of engagement efforts, he said. Instead, HR should pay attention to the far greater number of workers and managers who are less obviously disengaged. He added that middle managers hold the key to both re-engaging employees and helping them implement the organization’s post-recession business strategies.
Aon Consulting’s Chad Thompson contributed to a January 6 Human Resource Executive Online story about virtual workers—those who are not physically located onsite with other workers. The benefits of virtual work “are too great to ignore” he said and include increased productivity and performance, greater engagement and less turnover. He also said that those most suited to remote work are autonomous, can deal with ambiguity well, and are highly organized.
Richard Hackman of Harvard University and Ben Dattner of Dattner Consulting in New York City were featured on the January 4 PBS program “The Emotional Life.” Hackman, who studies how groups succeed and fail while working together, noted that sometimes there are benefits to workplace conflict. Dattner counseled two aerialists and helped them improve a relationship that led to success.
Dattner and Matthew Paese of Development Dimensions International contributed to a January 20 Wall Street Journal article about the succession lessons learned from the Conan O’Brien, Jay Leno, and NBC debacle. The major NBC gaffe: promising O’Brien in 2004 that he could take over for Leno in 2009. “There’s a Goldilocks time frame for a succession,” noted Dattner. “If it’s too short, people don’t have enough time to get acclimated, and it if it’s too long, the world can change,” he said. On whether Leno can recover the success he previously enjoyed on the Tonight Show, Paese said it was important for him to address the controversy. “It would be a mistake for Leno to come back and to not acknowledge there’s been a real hitch in his career,” he said.
A study conducted by Deniz Ones of the University of Minnesota, Filip Lievens of Ghent University, and Stephan Dilchert of Baruch College showing how personality characteristics play a major role in determining medical school success appeared in several media outlets in December and January including the New York Times, United Press International, Science Daily, Medical News Today, BusinessWeek, and the Minneapolis Star Tribune. They found that certain personality traits may be excellent predictors of success in medical school, particularly during the latter years, when students are interacting with real patients.
When a Belgian–Brazilian brewer acquired Anheuser-Busch in 2008, it led to a cultural shift that had a great impact on the American company. The November 11 St. Louis Beacon carried a story about how the takeover is working and quoted Lee Konczak of Washington University and a former A-B employee. “Any acquisition leads to a big cultural change,” he said. Noting that it will take time for the new management to install its new philosophy and management style, he added, “I don’t look at the new culture as either good or bad. Five years from now, this will be a totally different company.”
Edward Lawler of the University of Southern California and Theresa Welbourne, an Ann Arbor-based consultant and research professor at USC, were quoted in a December 8 Workforce Management magazine story about restoring employee engagement to help close what they perceive as a widening gulf between employer and employee. Noting that some firms are forgoing “high- involvement” employee strategies, including providing workers with more challenging jobs, a voice in the management of their tasks, and a commitment to lower turnover and fewer layoffs, and instead using a model that means minimal investment in training and little commitment to job security. Lawler said high employee involvement is a good strategy for maintaining long-sustaining relationships with customers. “Companies are asking for more and more from their employees and not really giving anything in return,” said Welbourne, adding that “we may have to look at the employment contract again.”
A story in the December 3 issue of the Fort Collins Coloradoan featured a workforce assessment tool created by Bryan Dik and Kurt Kraiger, both faculty members at Colorado State University. The Virtual Workforce Assessment Network was developed to help match community college students with potential good-fitting career paths and, ultimately, with specific employers. They received a $482,906 U.S. Department of Education grant to test the assessment tool later this year.
Rebecca Schalm of RHR International (Calgary) authored an article explaining the differences between coaching and executive integration in the December issue of Talent Management magazine. Executive coaching focuses on the development of the individual whereas executive integration engages a person within a system and addresses common transition problems, and accomplishes this by establishing a series of activities and interventions, she wrote.
She also wrote a November 16 article for the Calgary Beacon citing the need for capable managers and pointing out how managers differ from leaders. Leaders can provide inspiration and goals, but it is an adept manager who brings those goals to fruition, she wrote. “It’s doing the hard work without getting the spotlight.” She outlined three key aspects of good management, including the ability to plan, which is the “how-to” in reaching a goal; following through; and inspiring team members to keep on track as they work towards established goals.
Schalm also contributed to a November 10 Human Resource Executive article about the pros and cons of hiring inside or outside talent. Noting that external hires have to adapt to an organization’s culture, she said, “They have to figure out how to get things done, how to influence people when they don’t necessarily know who the people are they should be influencing. It can take longer to really figure things out and get traction.” On the other hand, she said that internally promoted employees “are potentially colored by ‘this is how we’ve always done things here.’ It may be tougher to have them really bring a different lens to the situation.” She also noted that studies have found that between 40% and 60% of external hires are unsuccessful compared to about 25% of inside hires.
Defining leadership by who is at the top is the wrong approach and doesn’t necessarily identify those who have the right qualities to make good decisions in tough circumstances, said Robert Hogan of Hogan Assessment Systems in Tulsa, OK, in the November issue of CEO Magazine. In fact, as much as 65% of the top people within organizations fail because of the way people assess leadership. Key qualities of a strong leader include integrity, competence, and breadth of understanding, he said. “Leadership is about getting a group to work, so it means empowering employees, not alienating them,” he said.
Donald Hantula of Temple University was quoted in the November issue of Philadelphia Magazine for a story about volunteering for charitable projects being run by civic organizations. “Volunteers often feel a large sense of pride, even more so if you compare them to people doing the same job for pay,” he said.
William C. Byham of Development Dimensions International Inc. authored an article for the November–December issue of China Business Review on developing the next generation of Chinese business leaders. He outlined strategies for building leadership pipelines to groom future leaders.
He also wrote a piece for the November issue of Leadership Excellence magazine entitled “The Clogged Career Pipeline.” He discussed how delayed retirements of baby boomers will create long-term problems for organizations trying to nurture future talent.
Research conducted by Ellen Ernst Kossek of Michigan State University and Leslie Hammer of Portland State University was the subject of a November 21 story in the Seattle Times. Their study of 12 grocery chains in Ohio and Michigan showed that training supervisors to be supportive of employees’ family and personal lives led to higher job satisfaction and better physical health and that it made workers more productive. A similar story also appeared on a November 17 posting of News Blaze, an Internet news service.
Paul Harvey of the University of New Hampshire was interviewed for a November 17 Foster’s Daily Democrat story about how extensive news coverage and government warnings about the H1N1 flu outbreak could cause some workers to skip work. “It’s an easy situation to take advantage of and people justify taking off from work as a way to avoid the flu.”
When the Bank of America was looking for a new CEO last fall, Randall Cheloha of Cheloha Consulting Group in Wynnewood, PA contributed to a story on CEO succession that was used in several media outlets including the United Press International, Philadelphia Inquirer, and News Blaze. He said succession planning should be an ongoing process for boards of directors, not a periodic activity. “It is critical for boards to get first-hand knowledge about prospective CEO successors and top executives and get to know and work with them. Calling it one of the most important functions a board can do, he said. “I am surprised at how many companies are still not fully prepared to replace their CEOs.”
Please let us know if you, or a SIOP colleague, have contributed to a news story. We would like to include that mention in SIOP Members in the News.
Send copies of the article to SIOP at siop@siop.org or fax to 419-352-2645 or mail to SIOP at 440 E. Poe Rd., Suite 101, Bowling Green, OH 43402.