Aspiring Minds

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Learning from data

What behaviors makes people succeed?

Varun Aggarwal

What is the right answer?

a) Clearly define daily tasks for the team members, evaluate what they have done at the end of the day and establish deliverables for the next day.

b) Design and clearly communicate a process for implementing fines and other monetary disincentives for not meeting the agreed timelines.

c) Motivate the team to work harder and meet their deadlines by assuring them a monetary incentive at the end of the peak season.

d) Rotate the work responsibilities amongst the team members, and assign them tasks other than what they have been doing so far. The freshness of work would motivate them.

You are working as an Operations Manager in an air conditioners manufacturing firm. Since it is a seasonal business, the work pressure is high in the months December to June and negligible from July to November. Now the peak season is starting again and you notice that your team members are not very motivated, working at a very slow pace and not meeting deadlines. What will you do?

Ask: What is the wrong answer?!

a) Clearly define daily tasks for the team members, evaluate what they have done at the end of the day and establish deliverables for the next day.

b) Design and clearly communicate a process for implementing fines and other monetary disincentives for not meeting the agreed timelines.

c) Motivate the team to work harder and meet their deadlines by assuring them a monetary incentive at the end of the peak season.

d) Rotate the work responsibilities amongst the team members, and assign them tasks other than what they have been doing so far. The freshness of work would motivate them.

You are working as an Operations Manager in an air conditioners manufacturing firm. Since it is a seasonal business, the work pressure is high in the months December to June and negligible from July to November. Now the peak season is starting again and you notice that your team members are not very motivated, working at a very slow pace and not meeting deadlines. What will you do?

Scoring different answers

• Ask the candidate for the best strategy and worst strategy

• Tag one option as the wrong strategy: say wa

• If candidate endorses ws = wa, provide +1 (wa score)

• If candidate endorses bs = wa, provide -1 (ba score)

• Do not tag/care for a best answer (ba)

People who can’t identify wrong answer consistently fail…

Job Profile Tests Performance criteria Result

Direct Sales Sales SJT Percentage of each individual’s sales target achieved

rwa = 0.35 (0.08)rba= 0.25 (0.15)

Insurance SalesLogical Ability,

Personality, Insurance readinessSales SJT

Performance ratings provided to individuals by their supervisors

rwa = 0.26 (0.02)rba= 0.14 (0.00)

Goes to 11% from 5% with SJT scores.

Manager

English,Logical Ability,Quant Ability,

Personality Managerial SJT

Performance ratings provided to individuals by their supervisors

rwa = 0.39 (0.10)rba= 0.36 (0.10)

Goes to 34% from 20% with ‘worst score’

Regression: 0.47wa: 1.00ba: 1.80

* Work done with Steve Stemler, Wesleyan University

Learnings

• Answer choices selected by candidates reflect their thinking process.

• Responses predict real-time situational judgement and on-job reactionary decisions.