Tough interview questions: What makes you effective?

Jeff Altman, Big Game Hunter

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmfe9r4-swm

This question will be asked to people at the manager level and above.

Recruiters know you don’t know: Your value in the market

There is a difference between expectations for management candidates and those who take on leadership roles. As you progress through the organizational ladder, you will expect more from you as you answer this question.

So the question is: “What makes you effective?”

As a manager, you can basically monitor performance, drive a bus, and you are managing the behavior of your individual team to ensure that the tasks are performed correctly. I’m simplifying it, but it boils down to it; you’re managing a personal team to make sure you perform tasks that need to be done within the time limit established for them.

As you become a leader, drive buses more and more (that’s how I explain the management language) to choose the team of people who are inspired. I want to distinguish “inspiration” from “motivation”. I learned a good definition from Lance Secretan, one of the world’s leading executive coaches, who describes motivation as the behavior of “driving a bus.” They have to “do it for you.” They want to do it compared to inspiration. They have internal driving force, namely the internal determination to accomplish things.

So in this particular case, I turned around and said, “What makes you effective?” The answer starts by hiring a great team of people working with me, wanting to do well, and working on the organization and this particular project and team. So, No. 1, note how you pass credit to others and whether you admit that you have hired great people.

These people care about No. 2, and they want to get the job done. Before you start thinking I was just sitting at my desk and collecting a check (obviously considerate to the language here), obviously I have to look into the point of view of how my manager accomplishes things. How my directors do things to make sure if there are any friction points, they will be cleared.

From there, it’s impossible to be clear about everything, but I want to create as frictionless environment as possible because we want to have it…did you see where I’m going? I’m describing a 30,000 foot versus 3 foot job. At 3 feet you get into everything. You may be micromanaging. You may be operating more hands.

But, at 3 feet, you’re in the weed. At 30,000 feet you are looking at the level and studying the politics of the organization, trying to create less friction for the team to get them hired to get the job done, and the thing that makes you effective is to hire someone inspired to do this. Obviously, I’m simplifying things. You have expressed this. I think this is a great way to see the difference between weeds and 30,000 feet.

So if you are in the C suite, you are not in the weeds. If you are an executive in the organization. You’re not in the weeds. You have people doing things and monitor the performance of the manager, director and vice president to make sure things are done.

There is a story about former Ford President Alan Mullally who took over the organization when they failed. This was during the 2008 crisis that he proposed a very simple system designed to enable his leadership with his goal. It’s a color-coded system, and these people are trained to give everyone, including the leadership of the organization, their boss, “thumbs up”, everything goes well. However, the company lost billions of dollars.

MullallyThis is awesome! I think we’re happy to lose billions of dollars a year! ”

What he needs to do is change his communication style, not punish the truth-telling person. You can use this story in this story (I encourage you to research it yourself), but I’m sure you can also say: “I created an environment where my leaders and even some employees felt they could come and give me bad news. I’m not talking about quarrels in the organization, but about difficult information that sometimes leaders don’t hear and needs to draw their attention. I created this environment and people would come to me to tell me bad news and good news. ”

ⓒThe Big Game Hunter Company in Asheville, North Carolina 2020

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmounxkdta4

Related