Based on sterling recommendations from Laurie Ruettimann and Neil Morrison, I picked up the Omnibus edition of "Wool," a series of science fiction novellas from author Hugh Howey.

The basic premise is that the outside world has become toxic forcing humanity to live in 144-story silos, where the bottom third is dedicated to farming and mechanical upkeep, the middle third to IT, and the top third to the professional class and living quarters.

In the first novella, Wool, Holston, the sheriff, is investigating the death of his wife, and decides to resign; this means exile to the outside where he is expected to clean the sensors and windows and die.

In the second novella, Proper Gauge, Mayor Jahns and Deputy Marnes, look to find a replacement for Holston.  They engage in succession planning, a series of reference/background checks, and interviewing to make a selection among three candidates.

OMG...ITS A SERIES OF BOOKS ABOUT HR!!!

No wonder Laurie and Neil liked it.

I'm continuing on with the 3rd novella, Casting Off, but I swear if I read about the talent communities at the hydroponic farm...I'm done!!!

Are you ready for a HR gameshow?

With unemployment hovering above 7%, and millions of people looking for a new opportunity, it was inevitable that someone would create a show focusing on the job search.  Premiering on CBS on Friday, February 8 at 8/7 Central,, Mark Burnett of "Survivor" fame and Michael Davies, the Executive Producer of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" have created "The Job," which centers on five qualified applicants who compete to land their dream job.

In the first episode, five individuals with varied restaurant experience vie for the Assistant Manager position at a legendary Palm Restaurant.  With a panel of three high-ranking Palm employees observing the candidates, a number of selection exercises are employed to cull the field:

• A work sample test - At a Palm Restaurant, the candidates are asked to carry several of the tasks that an Assistant Manager would be expected to perform
• A knowledge test - candidates are quizzed by the panel of three on their knowledge of the restaurant and the type of food served (for example, "Littleneck and Cherrystone are types of what food item?")
• Co-worker familiarity - Given the Palm's emphasis on a family work environment, 7-8 employees from the Palm are brought forward and the candidates are asked to give the name of three of the employees as well as their position at the Palm
• Final Interview - the panel asks the candidates typical questions about their fit for the job

One of my favorite movies is "Night Shift," directed by Ron Howard, and starring Henry Winkler, Shelley Long, and Michael Keaton (pictured above).

Keaton has been all too absent from movies the past few years or so (just check out his imdb.com resume), so I was intrigued to see a new interview with him on Grantland.com this afternoon.

It's a nice interview, and it's good to catch up with Keaton, but it also contains one of the more intriguing questions that you'll see (it even took Keaton aback):

(2) How about the most memorable telephone call of your life?

Michael: Wow. That's a really good one. Well, there's one that's not good, I won't talk about that one. Most memorable phone call … wow, that is really good. I have to come back to that one because I'm thinking, I'm remembering a lot now. Uh, you can't say the birth of your kid because I was literally there. Nobody had to call me.

Daniel: Any one life-changing phone call?

Michael: Well, yeah, one, unfortunately, I was informed of somebody really, really close to me, you know, was extremely sick.

Daniel: That's sort of the bad part of that question, I guess.

Michael: Yeah, because that's the truth, though. I guess I'll just answer you honestly instead of trying to be funny. Unfortunately that didn't happen all that long ago. That was a life-changer, that was literally a life-changer. That was huge. But there were happy ones — a lot of happy ones.

Daniel: Sure.

Michael: Boy, was that a great question, though. Have you asked that question before?

Daniel: No.

Michael: Boy, you can hang your hat on that one. You ought to ask that one a lot, because that really makes you think. I've never been asked that. That's rare, that there's a question I've never been asked.

Daniel: Well, I'm flattered.

Michael: Hang on to that one.

An intriguing one to ask during a job interview, huh? Have you ever asked or been asked that one?

For me, the most memorable would be the news that our faculty personnel committee would be recommending to the President that I would be granted tenure.  Of course, I had been traveling that day and missed it entirely when our Associate Dean was calling to deliver the good news.  I thus learned about it on voicemail.

So, what's your answer to the question?

As mentioned in the last post, I spent last weekend in San Antonio at the Academy of Management meetings.  I left the cozy confines of my cushy desk in my ivory academic tower to enter the rough and tumble world of professor recruiting.  In one of the conference hotels, some 15 rooms were set up with an array of 12 tables in each.  Candidates waited out in the hall, as if it were some casting director's dream, and it was not uncommon to have candidates with whom you just interviewed return to the room a few minutes later to interview with another college or university.   So, after interviewing some 30 candidates, what lessons were learned over the course of three days?

1.  Interviewing is exhausting
After interviewing 12 candidates a day for two days straight with little to no break between candidates, major kudos must go to those who interview candidates regularly.   Keeping up the energy and positivity toward the end of the day took major effort (and a few sips of 5-hour energy)

2.  Fit, Fit, Fit is everything
We saw candidates ranging from full professors looking for their last destination to green PhD students working on their final sections of their dissertation.   However, we probably ended up spending more time talking about our school and its unique aspects than learning about the candidate him or herself.  Why?  Given the high number of candidates finishing up grad school, often from some top tier research institutions, we had to counter their advisor admonitions of the importance of high quality research as a criterion.   Given our emphasis on quality undergraduate education over "A"-level journal publication, our message had to be made clear, and the hope is we found a few candidates who realize the direction our school is going.

3.  Two heads are better than one
It was considerably easier to have two representatives from our institution doing the interview than a lone individual.  Not only was it helpful to keep one fresh, and fill in gaps about the job/organization that the other person might have failed to bring up or forgotten, but it also demonstrated the collegiality and camaraderie that we share at our place at work...which leads to....

4.  As always, you are the face of the organization
Given the importance that we place on collegial service that we stress not only in our mission, but in our tenure and promotion processes as well, this notion cannot be captured by a single one-on-one interview.   I believe the "chemistry" (for lack of a better word) that my colleague and I conveyed certainly left a much more positive view of our school (which was probably unfamiliar to those outside of Wisconsin or the Midwest) with those who interviewed with us, than those candidates who met with a single representative from another school.  Further, I believe we were the only table where laughter was heard on a regular basis.   Even if some candidates were looking at us as the equivalent of a "safety school," they have much more positive regard for us than before they entered the interview.   However, this was not necessarily the case for other schools, which leads to....

5.  Social Comparison Theory is alive and well....
Several cohorts of candidates participated and bonded in doctoral consortiums prior to the interviews taking place, so it was not uncommon to see them out in the hall huddled together discussing their interview experiences.  We had an opportunity to ask some of them about how the process was going for them, and they were more than willing to share some of their horror stories, including one common thread about one school where the interviewer was consistently demeaning the quality of her/his employer and engaging in epic acts of self-promotion.   The candidates were almost of the point of waiting outside that room just to hear from other candidates what outrageous things were said in that particular round.  Talk about bad brand management (and I hypothesize that when that school is unable to find any suitable candidates to hire, they will blame the low "quality" of the applicants).

6. ....but is competition?
One of the better parts of the process was hearing candidates talk up their fellow colleagues from the same school or group.  More than once we heard a candidate say that if you do not choose me, you should choose candidate X.  Very refreshing.

So, it is off to review the applications and on to the meet with the committee to determine second interviews.

As a fan of all things “The Sports Guy,” I recently picked up Bill Simmons new book, “The Book of Basketball” which details his fascination with the NBA. One of the early chapters focuses on “The Secret” of basketball, which Simmons learned from Isiah Thomas at a topless pool in Vegas.

What is "the Secret?"

According to Isiah, “The secret of basketball is that it’s not about basketball.”

Isiah details the impact of creating the right team in The Franchise by Cameron Stauth:

“It’s not about physical skills. Goes far beyond that. When I first came here, McCloskey took a lot of heat for drafting a small guy. But he knew that the only way our team would rise to the top would be by mental skills, not size or talent. He knew the only way we would acquire those skills was by watching the Celtics and Lakers, because those were the teams winning year in and year out. I also looked at Seattle, who won one year, and Houston, who got to the Finals one year. They both self-destructed the net year. So how come? I read Pat Riley’s book Show Time and he talks about “the disease of more.” A team wins it one year and the next year every player wants more minutes, more money, more shots. And it kills them. Our team has been up at the Championship level four years now. We could have easily self-destructed. So I read what Riley was saying, and I learned. I didn’t want what happened to Seattle and Houston to happen to us. But it’s hard not to be selfish. The art if winning is complicated by statistics, which for us becomes money. Well, you gotta fight that, find a way around it. And, I think we have. If we win this, we’ll be the first team in history to win it without a single player averaging 20 points. First team. Ever. We got 12 guys who are totally committed to winning. Every night we found a different person to win it for us.”

For years, the Detroit Pistons struggled to beat the Celtics and Lakers until Jack McCloskey, Pistons GM, made a controversial in-season trade of Adrian Dantley for Mark Aguirre. Simmons writes “Maybe Dantley was a better player than Aguirre, but Aguirre was a better fit for the 1989 Pistons. If they didn’t make that deal, they wouldn’t have won the championship. It was a people trade, not a basketball trade.”

Simmons identified three characteristics about successful teams that went beyond talent:

1. They won because they liked each other, knew their roles, ignored statistics, and valued winning over everything else.
2. They won because their players sacrificed to make everyone else happy
3. They won as long as everyone remained on the same page

Team Chemistry

Clearly, Simmons feels chemistry is crucial to the success of the team.

A recent SHRM poll “Interviewing Do’s and Don’ts for Job Seekers,” finds that a majority of HR professionals use chemistry as a major determinant in the hiring decision.

“A closer look shows that 15 percent of HR professionals polled say “chemistry” is 75 percent of the final hire decision while 39 percent of those polled report chemistry is 50 percent of the final decision.”

The Questions

How does one determine that chemistry? Can one easily find those willing to know their role and value team success over their own self-serving interests, particularly in a job interview?