Companies can reap dividends by gaining insights into personalities of employees, customers
Every leader needs a strong team, but it’s very challenging to find people with all the right strengths and best skills to reach your desired goals. I have been leading teams for 20 years and have found a hiring tool, the McQuaig System, that helps me accelerate the process of finding candidates that best fit my company’s needs.
If employees are to fulfill the tasks you hire them to do and succeed, jobs must match their strengths. At Smart Meetings, we know that we’re hard-wired for results and need self-motivated people to perform at our desired level. We have chosen the McQuaig System to evaluate potential hires and require all job candidates to take its pre-employment test before we interview them. It gives us a leg up on understanding how our candidate is wired, and that enables us to make the best hiring decision for each job.
Finding the Right Employees
The test tells us if the person is competitive, driven, detail-oriented, social, independent and task- or people-oriented, to name a few. We know that jobs require different skills.
For instance, we know that in our company we must have a driven, self-motivated sales person to achieve the success we require. We know an editor must be detail-oriented and deadline-driven. We know a support person must be social and task-oriented to take good directions and communicate well. The McQuaig test gives us a quick insight into a candidate’s wheelhouse so that we can quickly assess if they are a good match for future success at a particular job.
Nothing is a magic bullet, yet we have found this test to be an extremely helpful tool to improve our interviewing process and ensure success for the candidates and the company. The test is also very helpful in giving us insight into how to manage people and communicate with them once they are hired.
We have found that we need to use different methods to effectively communicate with our employees. For example, we have personal conversations with new employees who are very social before we get down to business. For new hires who are very detail-oriented, we show up with data to support points we discuss with them. This approach helps not only management, but also our new employees.
Our team members do much better when they understand how management is wired. This enables them to communicate with us in the best possible way and thereby get their needs met. We find this accelerates great communication on all fronts and helps us to be more effective as we continue to create an even greater company. After all, anything great is built on clear communication and mutual understanding.
Building Relations With Customers
We also find these tools are very helpful in understanding our customers as we accelerate our sales process. You cannot require customers to take a test before a sales call, but over time a good sales person can learn how to quickly evaluate a customer’s style to create a quick and easy rapport.
For customers who have an amiable personality, we need to talk about their personal life before starting a sales process because they must like us to buy from us.
Clients who are drivers value their time, so we must make efficient presentations in order to respect their style and needs.
Customers who are analytical want to make well-informed decisions, so we provide facts and data to them.
Expressive clients need to be complimented, so we note their most significant accomplishments and present a program that makes them look great and helps them to succeed.
These are simple ways to help anyone accelerate rapport inside and out of the office and customize styles to speed up the connections we all crave from each other. Studies show that we are still animals with certain core needs that must be met as we welcome strangers into our packs.
The next time you want to present your case, whether it be to your boss or an important client with an account you want to land, look around their office and listen to the way they speak. Many clues will tell you what they value, and if you can start by understanding their needs, you and your company will attain success much more quickly.
Marin Bright is CEO and founder of Bright Business Media, LLC, which publishes Smart Meetings magazine. She was honored during Folio’s 2015 Top Women in Media Awards as a corporate visionary. Her monthly leadership column appears online and in print.
