While I’m familiar with literature on hiring, particularly unstructured interviews, I think EA organizations should give serious consideration to the possibility that they can do better than average. In particular, the literature is correlational, not causal, with major selection biases, and is certainly not as broadly applicable as authors claim.
From Cowen and Gross’s book Talent, which I think captures the point I’m trying to make well: > Most importantly, many of the research studies pessimistic about interviewing focus on unstructured interviews performed by relatively unskilled interviewers for relatively uninteresting, entry-level jobs. You can do better. Even if it were true that interviews do not on average improve candidate selection, that is a statement about averages, not about what is possible. You still would have the power, if properly talented and intellectually equipped, to beat the market averages. In fact, the worse a job the world as a whole is at doing interviews, the more reason to believe there are highly talented candidates just waiting to be found by you.
The fact that EA organizations are looking for specific, unusual qualities, and the fact that EAs are generally smarter and more perceptive than the average hiring committee are both strong reasons to think that EA can beat the average results from research that tells only a partial story.
I think you are right. Like many things related to organizational behavior, I often think “in the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king.” So many organizations do such a poor job with hiring, even if we choose to merely adopt some evidence-based practices it can seem very impressive in comparison.
While I’m familiar with literature on hiring, particularly unstructured interviews, I think EA organizations should give serious consideration to the possibility that they can do better than average. In particular, the literature is correlational, not causal, with major selection biases, and is certainly not as broadly applicable as authors claim.
From Cowen and Gross’s book Talent, which I think captures the point I’m trying to make well:
> Most importantly, many of the research studies pessimistic about interviewing focus on unstructured interviews performed by relatively unskilled interviewers for relatively uninteresting, entry-level jobs. You can do better. Even if it were true that interviews do not on average improve candidate selection, that is a statement about averages, not about what is possible. You still would have the power, if properly talented and intellectually equipped, to beat the market averages. In fact, the worse a job the world as a whole is at doing interviews, the more reason to believe there are highly talented candidates just waiting to be found by you.
The fact that EA organizations are looking for specific, unusual qualities, and the fact that EAs are generally smarter and more perceptive than the average hiring committee are both strong reasons to think that EA can beat the average results from research that tells only a partial story.
I think you are right. Like many things related to organizational behavior, I often think “in the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king.” So many organizations do such a poor job with hiring, even if we choose to merely adopt some evidence-based practices it can seem very impressive in comparison.