Strategy Briefing

							                   Competencies &
                    360° Feedback

                            Steve Olson, Ph.D.



The Center for Ethics & Corporate Responsibility
                  Reflection
1.   At this point in your career, what are the skills,
     situations, or issues that you find yourself:
     Asking others who are more experienced for guidance
     or coaching on?
     Watching others who are more experienced or skillful
     in order to adopt their effective behaviors?
     Reading up on or seeking training and education on?

2.   As you contemplate the next steps in your career, what
     skills do you anticipate you will need in order to be
     successful?
History of Competencies
Traces back to David McClelland’s 1973
article, “Testing for Competence Rather
Than for Intelligence,” which destroyed the
“IQ = vocational success” myth.
  If there almost no correlation, then what
does predict success? He suggested…

Competencies: combinations of skill,
knowledge, and attitude
       Early Research
Richard Boyatzis led research into
selection criteria for the U.S. State
Department
Had used school, school grades and IQ
Predictably, these did not predict success
Did reliably screen out women and
minorities!
What then predicted success?
Study was clear: Competencies!
What are Competencies?
Any observable and measurable attribute
(whose source may lie in skills,
knowledge, values, traits or perspectives)
that contributes to success in performing a
task or job.

We now have over 30+ years of research
on them.
      Competencies &
       Performance
Research strongly indicates that in any
given job, between 14-24 competencies
are Mission Critical to success in that role.
You cannot afford to bad at any of the
Mission Critical competencies.
Superior performers (= 1 SD above
average) are average or above average at
all Mission Critical skills, and world class
at 3-8!
              What is the Value of
             Superior Performance?

High performing                                                  Population
 individuals– 1 standard
 deviation above the mean
 generally outperform                                                                                        1 SD

 average performers by
 100-200% (148% avg.)*                                                                                              Top 15%
                                                                                                                              Superior
                                                                                             Average
                                                             Unacceptable


                                                                                         Performance




1LyleSpencer, “The Economic Value of Emotional Intelligence Competencies and EIC-based HR programs” in D. Goleman & C.
Cherniss (Eds.), The Emotionally Intelligent Workplace (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2001).
     The Goal:
 Raise everyone’s
performance 1 S. D.
                      The Key:
                       ID the
                      Learning
                        Agile
Importance of Competencies

“Good advice that is not behavioral advice
  merely compounds your problem.”
             --Chris Argyris, Harvard


 Competencies focus us on the specific
 behaviors make for success.
Importance of 360° Feedback




 “I have some good news and some bad news!
 You are honest, kind, and smart, but you are
 perceived to be sneaky, cruel, and dumb.”
Accuracy of 360°Feedback

Boss tends to be the most accurate source
of feedback regarding what it takes to
succeed in the role.
Peers tend to be the second most accurate.
Direct reports tend to be the third most
accurate, but are most accurate on
“leadership.”
Self reports are the least accurate; 0%
correlation with performance.
 How are you perceived?

While perceptions may not be the ultimate
 truth, they are what people use to make
 decisions.

               Breaking the Glass Ceiling
           Got Feedback?

     Make sure you use a research-based,
     competency-focused 360 assessment.

     Among the best are:
1. Lominger, Inc. (Korn-Ferry)
2. Development Dimensions International (DDI)
3. Personnel Decisions International (PDI)
4. Hay-McBer
Lominger Competencies

67 Competencies required to be effective
19 Stallers and Stoppers- things that
create problems, ineffective leadership
and management
Based on 30+ years of research, with
performance data (who succeeds and
fails)
   Mission Critical Skills
   Change Dramatically!
What made you successful today will likely
not make you successful tomorrow, and
might even cause you to fail!

“Career Flow” research tracks the
development of performance-driving
competencies from Individual Contributor
to Manager to Executive.
 Career Flow Research
Based on four major studies 1996-2002
140 Companies in ten industry sectors, all
functions
12,000 Self ratings
50,000 Other ratings
Performance ratings on 2,000
Promotion ratings on 1,000
Potential ratings on 500
        “Performance”
Top 22 competencies that are statistically
correlated with performance (“meets or
exceeds expectations”).
The studies showed that not all of the
competencies correlate with performance.
Only some competencies drive
performance.
“85% solution”
“Most Likely Weakness”
Competencies that are important to
performance and/or promotion that most
managers are weak at (bottom-third).
The weaker you are at these and/or the
more of these you are weak at, the less
likely you are to be successful and/or
promoted.
The stronger you are in these, the more
you will differentiate yourself from other
managers and the more likely you will be
promoted.
   “Further Promotion”
High scores bear a statistically significant
relation to who gets promoted.

Low scores bear a statistically significant
relation to who gets terminated.
        “Develop Early”
Skills required at the next level that are
moderately difficult to hardest to develop.
Research indicates that if you wait to
develop these until after you have made
the transition, you will be more likely to fail.
So, develop them early.
   “Flame Out Factors”
Significantly correlated with either
stalling/stopping (not being promoted) or
being terminated at the manager and
executive levels.
At Individual Contributor, correlated with
low performance (no non-promotion or
termination data was available).
           Flaming Out
Trouble starts early. We get assigned to
do what we already know how to do well.
Perhaps you have “little” problems or
untested areas. These get worse as time
goes by or…
Until changes– new boss, strategy, job–
and suddenly your “little” problems or
undeveloped skills matter A LOT!
Transitions to the new (boss, job, etc) kill!
    Powerful Strengths
Complete page one of the “powerful
strengths” exercise on yourself and on
another person with whom you have
worked.

When you have completed page one, turn
the page and see where those strengths
can lead.
      The Silver Bullet
Learning agility = continuously learning to
do what you don’t know how to do.

Or, learning from experience, which is
~90% of development (70% job
challenges that are new, different, and
challenges and 20% coaching and
mentoring “just-in-time”)
    Profile of Learners
Willing to look and feel stupid
Keen observers of self, others, situations
Employ conscious learning tactics
Are comparers (parallels, analogies,
history, biography, other companies,
industries)
Make sense through rules of thumb
Have measures of success & failure
Behavioral Advice: Coaching
        Handbooks
 When you’ve identified your strengths,
 you’ll want to know what you can do to
 hone them further, not overdo them (and
 turn them into weakness), and coach and
 develop them in others.
 When you’ve identified your weaknesses,
 you’ll want to know what you can do to
 improve.
 Coaching Handbooks help with both.
    E.g. 33 Listening
Unskilled
Skilled
Overused
Some Causes
Map
Remedies!