Management 448 Blog (Taylor Armstrong)

Step Three:
After taking the full Enneagram test, I was categorized as a Type 3 personality (The Achiever). Overall, people with this personality type are hard-working and goal-oriented, but may have trouble making deep connections with others and may tend to seek external validation. Based on the description, it seems like “Achievers” are typically extraverted and social. They are also sometimes less agreeable and can be cold-hearted in pursuit of their goals. Next, people with this personality are very conscientious and achievement-oriented. But, they may score high in neuroticism too, as they seek external validation and are insecure about their true selves. While the description did not touch on the openness dimension of personality directly, it seems that people with a Type 3 personality might be somewhat intellectual or imaginative, depending on their goals. 

Step Four: 
Based on these results, it seems that a potential employer would see both strengths and weaknesses in me as a candidate. A potential employer looking at these results would say that the high score in conscientiousness is a green flag in terms of hiring. Conscientiousness is the strongest personality-based predictor of performance in a job context. An employer may also be pleased to see the high score in extraversion, depending on the job. Extraversion positively predicts performance in job contexts that require interaction with customers (for instance, sales). These employers would see being an extroverted person as a strength. 

On the other hand, the potential employer may see my tendency to require external validation or the related high score in neuroticism as a weakness. Neuroticism is typically negatively related to job performance. Finally, agreeableness and openness tendencies do not usually have very strong relationships with job performance, so an employer may not consider these to be glaring strengths or weaknesses. Still, agreeable people are sometimes more pleasant to interact with. For this reason, a hiring manager might be more likely to rate an agreeable person highly as a strong candidate.

Would you hire Avery (high potential, poor consistency) or Jamie (low potential, high consistency)? Why?

I would probably choose to hire Jamie if I were the business owner in this scenario. I would invest time and money into training someone reliable rather than someone who is unpredictable or might quit. If the employee were to quit, I would have to spend even more money to recruit, hire, and train another candidate. In my opinion, it is challenging to deal with unpredictability. I would not want to allocate company resources that could be better utilized elsewhere to the process of motivating high-ability, low-motivation employees like Avery. Additionally, if I needed short-term exceptional talent, I could possibly hire a contractor instead. 

Describe a type of job where it would be better to hire someone like Avery. Why?

It would be better to hire someone like Avery for a position that requires short bursts of energy or creativity. Someone like Avery is more valuable than someone like Jamie in jobs that require short bursts of performance because Avery’s short-term performance will be decidedly better than Jamie’s. As long as this level of performance does not have to be maintained constantly, Avery (and people like them) will achieve more success. While not necessarily realistic, people with high potential and poor consistency could arguably be good at “performing” jobs. For instance, pop stars have to be really good for the duration of a few hour-long shows or interviews but do not have to be consistently “on” most of the time. Famous people also often have a team to help them when they are not on stage. Similarly, while the best professional athletes are consistently good across all games, they do not in reality have to exhibit their best performance in every single practice or throughout every single day. An excellent performance for the duration of a single championship game, for instance, is enough to make the Averys more valuable than the Jamies of the world for this type of position.

Describe a type of job where it would be better to hire someone like Jaime. Why?

It is probably better to hire people like Jamie who have lower potential but higher consistency for routine, typical office jobs. Nothing spectacular is necessarily required, but the company will run more smoothly if employees can provide the same level of work every day for many hours. Most offices can run on “good enough” work for long periods. Jobs that are mostly low-pressure are best for low-potential, high-consistency employees. Some specific examples of this type of job include secretary, receptionist, and data entry clerk at most companies.

(a) The impression I present to potential employers — or my brand — is a professional who is hardworking, organized, collaborative, goal-oriented, versatile, adaptable, efficient, and communicative. One of my strengths is that I am a quick learner and can actively incorporate feedback into my work on a rolling basis. One of my weaknesses is that I can lack confidence at times. When I disagree with someone’s position at work I am slow to speak up in case I am wrong or have less relevant knowledge on the topic. In the future, I want to work on being more confident in expressing my views as this is a critical step in the brainstorming process and facilitates effective teamwork. Something that makes me unique is the fact that I have some knowledge in a variety of areas. At one of my previous jobs, my supervisor granted me the “Jack of all Trades” award in the office. This award recognized that regardless of the task or problem, I was willing to step in and try to solve it — even if it wasn’t related to something I specialized in. While I do not have deep knowledge of every topic, I know enough surface-level information that I can use these facts as a starting place to perform more research.

(b) If necessary, I would lean on the “Jack of all Trades” title in a situation wanted ad to pique the interest of prospective organizations. I might include a photo of myself doing various hobbies or being surrounded by various equipment (i.e. skis, books, cooking equipment, etc.). While these items may not pertain specifically to the jobs I want, they would creatively express my unique selling point. I am adventurous and willing to learn anything. I could bring a fresh perspective to any organization. I would then start to make the ad visible using social media. The growing use of online job postings leads me to believe that an online situation wanted ad might also be effective. From there, I would consider posting printed copies of the ads in places where people participate in the adventurous and wide-ranging hobbies in my ad. That way, recruiters or hiring managers might be drawn to my ad because we share a hobby. Having something in common could build rapport and encourage the manager to consider my offer further. As we gleaned from the learning materials this week, sometimes the qualifications related to a situation-wanted ad are not as important as the general attitude of the applicant. For instance, the father who stood on the side of the road looking for a job in Phoenix received many offers for his determined attitude alone.

My most recent job that involved an official job description (besides my current role) was as an SOA Fiscal and Admin Specialist for Oregon State’s Clubs and Orgs office. The job posting encouraged me to apply because I was looking for an office job style. The pay for the job was also slightly above OSU’s minimum hourly wage, which was enticing. Since I already knew I wanted to apply for an on-campus job, the job posting was not totally responsible for my decision to apply. However, certain factors included in the job description did cause me to move the position higher up on my list of preferred roles.

My experience on the job matched the job description quite well. Since the job posting is no longer available on the OSU jobs website, I cannot provide a copy of the job description. However, I did take notes on the job description to help me write my cover letter when preparing to apply. Based on these notes, I feel that the work activities and listed tasks in the job description aligned almost exactly with what I did on the job. I mainly assisted clubs with funding request submissions and maintained regular office hours to assist drop-in consultations, just as the job description indicated. In my opinion, the largest difference between the job description and my actual position was the frequency I did each task vs what the job description claimed the frequency would be. In the description, some tasks were labeled as 85% of the job’s responsibilities, while other tasks represented the remaining 15% of time on the job. I felt that I spent way more than 15% of my time on tasks that were part of the second category.

Outstanding Claims of Discrimination: Company Feelings, Support, and Potential Employment

Outstanding claims of discrimination would definitely change the way I felt about a company, particularly one that I previously maintained a very positive view of. These claims would cause me to question the company’s overall values. I would be upset that these values may prevent some customers or employees from benefitting from the company’s mission.

Perhaps more importantly, discrimination claims would push me to stop supporting a company. In other words, not only would my view of the company change, but my behavior toward the company would also change. I would want to completely stop giving money to the company if possible to avoid funding a set of values I did not agree with. If I had a habit of purchasing from that company and really liked its products/services, however, I might find it challenging to immediately boycott it entirely.

Finally, if I knew of outstanding discrimination claims against a company, this would also be enough to stop me from applying to work there in the future. First, if I did not support the company’s values and did not want to support the company financially, I certainly would not want to represent the company as an employee or link my identity closely to the organization. Furthermore, I would be afraid that if I did get hired at the company, I would not be treated fairly and could be placed in a hostile working environment. The only exception would be if a significant amount of time had passed since the claims and the company had made a concerted effort to change, had gone through a change in leadership, or there were truthfully no other job opportunities available.

Question 1: Why do Organizations Allocate More Resources to Aspects Besides Employee Recruitment?

Organizations might decide to allocate more resources to marketing or product design than successful employee recruitment and selection strategies because fundamentally, without a product, there is no business. Additionally, without high-quality marketing, there will be no interest in the product. Both of these components are clearly essential for generating revenue. Knowing the importance of these two components, managers may overlook the merits of employee selection as they relate to overall profitability.

Question 2: What are the Strengths and Weaknesses of Not Prioritizing Recruitment and Selection?

One strength of not prioritizing recruitment and selection is that this approach allows the organization to allocate more of it’s resources to other business functions (such as product design, as mentioned above). Primarily, companies have a fixed amount of time and money to allocate to different aspects of their business and must choose between them carefully. Additionally, allocating resources to systems in place for employees once they have already joined the company may have a powerful impact on company performance. For instance, providing learning opportunities for current employees to gain additional skills and providing mental health programs to help employees avoid burnout could be a valuable use of a company’s focus and increase the effectiveness of existing personnel.

A glaring weakness of not prioritizing recruitment and selection in an organization is the exceptionally high cost of making the wrong hiring decisions. When a mistake is made, not only must organizations repeat the hiring process and find a new potential candidate, but customers may also become frustrated with the unsuccessful hire’s work, and other colleagues may become discouraged. Second, as discussed in the mini lecture, prioritizing recruitment and selection can give organizations a competitive advantage. Companies that have successful employees also prevent their competitors from leveraging those same employees. Good employees can be hard to find and will gain irreplaceable company-specific knowledge after working at a company for several years.

Question 1: Experiences as an Applicant

The last job I applied for was a job here at Oregon State and is the part-time role I am currently still working in. This year, I am a teaching assistant (TA) for the Intermediate Accounting Series (ACTG 317, 318, and 319 or External Reporting I, II, and III). Last year, I worked in a different role on campus. However, over the summer, the professor who teaches External Reporting II contacted me via email, asking me to apply for the TA position.

At first, I hesitated to submit an application given the position I already had from the previous year. However, after further consideration, I decided that this potential job was more related to my future career goal (CPA and auditor at a public accounting firm) than my current position. I knew I might not get the job anyway, but it was worth a shot. I submitted my resume and cover letter to the official job posting on the OSU jobs website.

Shortly afterward, I received another email stating that I was selected for a virtual interview. The interview was conducted over Zoom with two Accounting professors and involved many job-specific scenario questions. I received a third email about a week after my interview, letting me know that I got the job and that I should expect further communication closer to the beginning of the next school year.

Overall, I felt that the application process for this job moved along fairly quickly and without incident. My only concern was that I did not receive specifics about scheduling or training until right before I began working (a fair amount of time after I got hired).

Question 2: Impressions of the Job and Desire to Work There

The questions asked of me during my interview were very job-oriented and unique to the type of job I was applying for. This gave me the impression that the job would be relatively practical without busy work or unrealistic expectations. While I was worried about not having a schedule until closer to my start date, my bosses worked hard to accommodate my class schedule and overall availability. For this reason, I got the impression that the job would be flexible and student-friendly. Finally, when I asked about training during my interview, I learned there would be no formal training for the job. This gave me the impression that my employers would value independence and creative problem-solving skills.

These three experiences and lasting impressions during my application and new hire process increased my desire to work as a teaching assistant. I knew I would have a busy schedule with many other commitments (such as VP of Media and Technology for Beta Alpha Psi, participating in sorority events for my chapter, intramural sports teams, and a heavy course load) so I valued the job’s flexibility. Additionally, I am practical and efficient, which is one of the reasons I love accounting so much. I dislike time-wasting busy work and was pleased to learn that there seemed to be a minimal amount in this position. Similarly, I am generally internally motivated and prefer to work at my own pace. Therefore, I dislike being micromanaged and felt that the independence this job provided was a good match for my work style.

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