Read this wonderful quote by Charles Darwin “Ignorance frequently
begets confidence than Knowledge".
Let’s put this quote in the context of our daily work
situations. Organizations are faced with a number of challenges and
one among is to hire right kind of talent and make them successful. The skill
set requirements have vastly changed than how it was about 10 years ago. The advent
of Internet revolution, eCommerce ,mobile penetration have changed
the market landscape and new age companies are forced to look for different
skill sets which are still emerging and no clear cut standards.
Most companies do not have a clear idea on what to look for in a
candidate. Hence they go through a process of shortlisting of candidates
and conducting interviews. Organizations put their best forward to get right
candidates yet in at least 60% of hires (am statistically
challenged hence I am pulling out a number which is more a figment of my
imagination based on stories that I have heard) that happen there is
a mismatch between expectation and actual capabilities when the
rubber meets the road.
Although the interview process is one of the time tested ways of
selecting a candidate, why is that it fails?
In this blog I am attempting to look at one of the possible
reasons for such high failures and this thought process is based on the
concepts highlighted in the book “Invisible Gorilla" by Chris Chabris and
Dan Simons.
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| Our Competency |
In an interview, unknowingly, the one thing that we, as
recruiters, look for in candidates is their confidence. More
confident the candidate more the chances that he will be selected. The
fault lies not in the confidence but our love for confidence. Since
we are not clear on what kind of skill-sets are required we tend to
use confidence as one of the heuristics for decision making. So when we see a
candidate presenting himself confidently, our illusion of confidence
takes over automatically continues till we face
some incontrovertible evidences.
From the candidate's/employee's perspective it is very common that
when he starts learning something new while his skill level is low his
confidence is usually higher that he might sound over confident. Justin Kruger and
David Dunning in their research call it as the double curse of incompetence:
People who are unskilled are also unaware of it. And in some instances if the
leader or manager pledges his ignorance by trusting the employee to take all
the decisions hence there is high probability that he is not going to be
honest about what he knows and what he knows not. It builds up the employee’s
ego to make people believe that he knows. This struggle continues till both the
manager and employee face contradiction which exposes the employee.
What is the way out?
There are no straight forward answers. It is important to know
that anybody and everybody can fall into the trap of illusion of confidence.
Recognizing this illusion is the first step. Next step is when manager and
employee face this contradiction it is important for the manager not to
take some tough measures. Kruger and Dunning have found in
their experiment that explaining to the subject (employee) on what
went wrong and teaching them is one way of the ways to make them better judges of their
competence.
Am sure we will begin to accept that we have been victims of illusions of Confidence.. Reflect this thought and share if you have had experiences of this illusion.
3 comments:
“He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool—shun him. He who knows not and knows that he knows not is a child—teach him. He who knows and knows not that he knows is asleep—wake him. He who knows and knows that he knows is wise—follow him.”
In todays world, interviewers rarely come across type 4. All they see are types 1, 2 and 3 and they struggle to pick Mr. Right :)
Enjoyed reading this blog. I feel Organisations are still using HR function very tactically.
Companies which considers HR function seriously are the ones who are going to be successful in long run. Be it recruitment, employee engagement, training.
Loved this.
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