Judging People

Who is this girl? What is she like? Would this man make a good associate? Which job assignment should we give this lady? Would you want to work for this man? Would you want him to work for you? Is this lady conscientious or is she irresponsible? Is this man trustworthy, hardworking, intelligent? Yes, we're always sizing up other people, making decisions about them. Our ability to make correct estimates of our associates, our customers, our superiors, our subordinates can often spell the difference between success or failure. Why then do we make so many mistakes? What happens when we are wrong about other people? Do our mistakes hurt us, our company, or just the other fellow? How can we improve our ability to analyze and judge the personality, intelligence, and ability of other people? To find some of the answers, let's take a look at a man whose primary occupation is making such decisions. Maybe in what he does, we will find some basic principles that can be of help to us. His name is Irwin Rodman, and he's the personnel manager of a large corporation. Today, he's been asked to select a good executive secretary for the head of the claims department, and also decide on someone to recommend for promotion to foreman in the company's new electrostatic painting operation. Who should it be? What should his decision be based on? How can he tell who will perform the best? Is it the man who's turned out more work than anyone else? The best technician? The best educated? The man who needs the job the most? The one with the highest seniority? Or the best liked? How can he judge who is the right man for the job? This is also the problem that manager Walt Alston faces when he tries to find the right rookie to plug a gap in his lineup. He knows that despite the most detailed records of past performance on the man he is considering, Willie Davis, despite years of experience making decisions about ball players almost daily, despite the best advice of the most highly qualified assistants, a certain percentage of his decisions are going to be wrong. Knowing that we can never bat a thousand, how can we improve our average in making decisions about people? To see what we're up against, let's start by looking at some of the obstacles or pitfalls that even a highly experienced personnel manager like Irwin Rodman might have to overcome. First, he knows that his judgments can never be better than his information. And there are many obstacles to getting the facts he needs, the information that is pertinent. To begin with, Rod finds that some information is just not obtainable. When he looks into the employment histories of the men available for promotion to foreman, he learns that none of them has had any supervisory experience. There is no information on their supervisory abilities to help his evaluation. But even if there were, Rod is not always able to get at it. Some things people simply won't talk about. When he asks, "How does he stand up under pressure?" I'm sure you understand, Rod, but well, uh that depends on the circumstances, doesn't it? When Rod asks, "How does he react to criticism?" He knows the operation very well, but as far as criticism goes, uh I don't think I should say one way or the other. When Rod asks, "How does he get along with his fellow workers?" I've heard rumors there's been some trouble, but I I'd prefer you check with someone else. When Rod shifts his attention to the problem of finding an executive secretary, he runs into another major obstacle in gathering information. In this case, he finds people quite willing to express themselves, to tell him what they know about Loretta De Berry, but because opinions vary so widely, he doesn't know which one to believe. Oh, yes, I've worked with her for quite a while. Well, I'd say she had her own way of doing things, but she gets as much done as any of us. Yes, I would recommend her. No, I wouldn't recommend her. A little slow, on the dull side to say the least, or kind of sloppy for my taste. I've always found her very punctual, runs a trim ship. I'd say very easy to get along with. Yes, I'd recommend her without any reservations. Each of us has a slightly different way of looking at another person, which makes getting reliable information difficult. Consciously or unconsciously, we can easily distort the facts. Manager Alston runs into a similar obstacle in gathering information on rookie Willie Davis. Here is how Willie looked to a cartoonist in his hometown paper. And here is how he looked to another cartoonist a few days later. But we can't blame it all on other people. Willie does not convey a consistent picture of himself, either. As manager Alston knows very well, if he tried to forecast Willie's performance on the basis of any one day, he probably would be way off. In one day's practice game, Willie gets a hit every time he's up. And the next day, he can't even lay his bat on the ball. So, whether the information is about a ball player, an applicant for a job, or anybody, if it's based on a single observation, a first impression, it's not reliable enough. Rod knows that a woman who has been under pressure or out of work for a long time may convey a very different picture of herself than she would under more favorable conditions. On the other hand, he can easily be deceived by an applicant who is acting her best during an interview. And he may be influenced by personality factors which have no connection with the job to be done. But, we ourselves are perhaps the most troublesome obstacle to forecasting the performance of others. One of our basic limitations is perceptual. We can't always believe what we see. If we can be fooled by a simple drawing like this, what can happen to us when we're looking at people instead of lines? And because the gray dot against the dark background looks brighter than the gray dot on the light background, doesn't mean that it is. In the same way, by comparison, a mediocre applicant can look pretty good against a poor one. Once we see a person in a certain light, it is often very hard to see that person differently. When we look at this drawing, some of us may see the young girl in it first. If so, it may take us a long time before we see that it is also a drawing of an old woman. Based on appearances alone, who could say which one of these men would make the best supervisor? And what if one of them were an old school friend? Would we tend to put a halo on him? Would we magnify his virtues and overlook his faults? Or because this man is poorly dressed, would we do just the opposite? Is this sufficient reason to feel he would make a poor supervisor? While most of us know the dangers of judging a person primarily on the basis of his appearance, many of us let a stereotype about his group influence our judgment of the individual. We all have a tendency to over simplify. We type people, generalize, and classify them, and quickly come to a conclusion as we might do here, that all advertising men wear gray flannel suits, carry briefcases, and wear thick horn-rimmed glasses. When we see a drawing like this, we have a tendency to fill in the spaces and complete the circle. Because we have reliable reports that Willie is a good hitter and fielder, should we excuse him from base running tests? Is there any reason to fill in or assume we know everything about him? The problem becomes even more difficult when we introduce the emotional factor. Sometimes we see only what we want to see. What happens to our judgment when we are under the pressure of an urgent deadline to select a foreman by tomorrow, for example? The strong opinions of our friends and co-workers can influence our judgment and sometimes lower our batting average. With all these obstacles to overcome, is it any wonder that we sometimes feel that deciding whom to hire, promote, or train takes almost a superhuman talent? Is it any wonder we sometimes have so much trouble understanding our associates, knowing with whom to do business, sizing up our customers, making job assignments, rating our subordinates, or predicting what our boss will want next? There is, fortunately, a more practical, more scientific approach to judging people. Since our baseball manager has an unusually high degree of success in picking the best men, we may find in his methods some practical ways of improving the quality of our own evaluations of people and what they can do. To many people, these ball players look very much alike. They all throw the ball, catch it, and hit it. But to the experts, they perform very differently. It is often these small differences which matter most, which make a difference on the scoreboard. Whether it is choosing a starting pitcher, juggling a lineup, or selecting a rookie to plug a gap in the outfield, the more specifically we can spell out our needs, the clearer picture we will have of the job to be done. This is what manager Alston wants in his rookie center field. First and foremost, he wants speed. A man fast enough to cover all of that big center field, who can really pick those balls off the fence, who is like lightning on the bases. He wants someone with an eye for the ball, someone he can depend on when the chips are down, to let the bad ones go by. Get a hit in a clinch. Or turn a single into a double. Yes, manager Alston knows exactly what he wants. This is a high-level conference of a baseball team manager and his coaches. It could easily be a meeting of executives in a big corporation or department managers in a factory. The first thing we find is that these men who really know their business are sticklers for detail. They know the more valid differences they can identify, the more they concentrate on detail, the better appraisals and forecasts they will be able to make. They are well aware it is most important to know what they want, what they don't want, and particularly what doesn't matter. In making decisions about people, they recognize the difference between the desirable and the essential. In the same way, personnel manager Rodman knows that he must be specific and detailed about his job requirements and priorities. And when, as in the case of the foreman, he is not familiar with the electrostatic painting operation, he relies to a great extent on the opinions of a superintendent in the organization who knows this area well. With his requirements arranged in order of priority, Rod begins by interviewing each prospective foreman. He starts with a few questions he calls knockout items. For example, if it is important that a foreman have specific health requirements as a matter of company policy, he gets these out of the way early in the interview. Beyond these knockout items, Rod prefers more general questions which require a person to think on the spot and to do most of the talking. Rod listens carefully. In fact, he listens more than he talks, giving himself more time to observe and judge. He encourages each man to talk freely about himself and his work. His questions are designed to get information in specific areas. Since Pete has never been a foreman before, Rod asks, "What do you respect or admire most in a boss or supervisor you've worked under?" In his answer, Pete may reveal some of his own attitudes that will come forward when authority is placed in his hands. Rod probes further by asking, "How do you think you've changed in the past few years?" Pete's answers can help pinpoint areas where he still may be having trouble today. Rod likes to know something about a man's goals, his ambitions, so he asks, "What do you look forward to in the next three or four years so far as working with this company is concerned?" Pete's answer is likely to reveal whether or not his goals are realistic. Is he trying to achieve too much, too soon? Whether he is looking for a foreman for the paint shop or an executive secretary, his interviewing techniques are generally the same. By structuring his questions in various ways, Rod can get much valuable information about a person out of a face-to-face conversation. He asks Loretta, "What are some of the things she looks for in a job?" To learn which situations and job duties she feels most capable of handling. He asks, "What annoys her most about bosses she has known?" To try to determine some of her attitudes toward taking orders. Rod frequently tries to get additional reactions by having multiple interviews. These can help offset any personality factors that might have unduly influenced him. Since Loretta may be working for this department head, Rod arranges an interview to see how well they think they can work together. When Rod checks on her references, he wants to find out more than would they recommend her or not. He carefully designs questions to help bring out the information he needs. What duties was she carrying out at the time she left her last job? What responsibilities did she fulfill the most effectively? In what areas was she least competent? How did she get along with her superiors? With her co-workers? And when Rod shifts his attention to getting recommendations or advice from other people in the plant on his prospective foreman, he tries to establish the relationship, the point of view, or the bias of the person he is talking to. He's getting a little too lazy for me. There was a day when I could recommend him very highly, but he's lacking off quite a bit lately. Even though we are all very close here, I think everyone would agree that he's the best man for the job. Yes, he learned the trade in my department. I taught him everything he knows and now he's looking out for himself. As his information accumulates, Rod watches for patterns of behavior. For example, whenever the record shows a man is repeatedly late, or when he appears to be making more and more mistakes, it is usually significant. Under similar circumstances, the past is probably the best single indication of future behavior. But no matter how good the recommendations, Rod prefers to rely more heavily on what he can observe himself. And so he gets samples of work whenever he can. He gives tests in typing, shorthand, and has Loretta fill out a typical form. But frequently, he wants more information, deeper information than work samples can give. In such cases, he turns to standardized intelligence, personality, and aptitude tests. A great variety are available, each designed for a specific purpose. While some information which people may hesitate to give in an interview will show up on these tests, their main purpose is to show how each person compares with a specific group of people who have taken the same test. Many of these tests have already demonstrated their value in selecting better workers. When Roddy evaluates test results, however, he is careful to keep them in their proper perspective. They are only part of the total picture, but as he learns more, an increasingly significant part. Basic to evaluating others is the fact that in each of us, in different degrees, are all things human. If we understand ourselves, we can be our most useful tool in understanding others. Once we are aware of our own weaknesses, once we are aware that our senses are imperfect, that our eyes deceive us, that our attitudes and opinions do not change readily, that we have a strong tendency to generalize, to stereotype, rather than judge the individual. Once we are aware of these natural tendencies, we can guard against them. We can stop magnifying a man's good points because he is a friend, or minimizing them because he has some characteristic we don't like. We can prevent ourselves from filling in. We can avoid oversimplifying or judging on the basis of one or two traits and neglecting the complexity of the human personality. We can ask ourselves, does this person look better because we've been disappointed with others? Before we reach decisions about other people, have we stopped to examine our own purposes? Do we know what we are looking for? What we want? What we don't want? And what doesn't matter? How detailed, how specific are our expectations and requirements? Have we arranged them in an order of priority? How penetrating are our listening skills? What can we learn for ourselves? And what can we get from other people? To counteract our personal bias and give us more and possibly different reactions, have we arranged for the person we are judging to meet other people whose opinions we value? And when we depend partly on the opinions of these people, are we aware of their bias, of their relationship to the person we are judging? Have we wandered too far afield of our own background? If so, will expert advice help us? Have we separated the important differences from those that do not count? Are we aware that our expectations may be for the ideal person and that he probably hasn't been born yet? Are there good points which compensate for weaker ones? If we are not willing to accept a person's weaknesses, have we considered the alternatives? Have we made a decision before we know the reasons for it? If so, shouldn't we challenge it rather than try to confirm it? If our information warrants, are we willing to change our opinions? Our success, we well know, depends on the accuracy of our decisions. So, if there is time, it may be best to let a decision incubate. But, we are aware that waiting too long may be as bad as not waiting long enough. We will never be completely certain. And after checking back on ourselves, it is essential to take a chance. Making decisions which require us to evaluate the ability and forecast the performance of someone else takes experience. But, it also builds experience. The more of it we do, the better we are likely to become. No matter what our role, the success or failure of our predictions about people depends to a great extent on our use of these tools. Though we may not always have the opportunity to use all of them, when used properly, they can reduce the risks and take much of the guesswork out of the process of sizing up people. Used properly, they can increase the accuracy of our evaluations of people and our ability to forecast their performance. And they can bring greater efficiency, higher profits, and more genuine satisfaction to everyone. Mhm.