Topgrading

Good grief.  The legal department of a Fortune 50 company tried to stifle the most powerful lever in topgrading — asking candidates to arrange calls with former bosses.  Legal lost, by the way, and topgrading won.

When candidates know THEY arrange calls with former bosses they are very candid and forthcoming in interviews — hench TORC (Threat of Reference Check), which is fact is no threat but a welcome promise to A player candidates, who WANT you to talk to bosses who will sing their praises.  C players can’t get their former bosses to talk (gee, I wonder why), and 90% of the time A players do.

Legal said that since almost all companies have policies prohibiting managers from accepting reference calls, it would be hypocritical for their company to require selection candidates to ask former bosses to violate company policy and talk about a former employee.

Bunk!  I told counsel that in many companies  candidates are asked to arrange “personal reference calls,” not business reference calls.  Some companies ask candidates to do “oral 360 interviews,” to help the development of the candidate if he/she joins the company.

 Turnover is high enough that if a candidate has had 4 bosses in the past 10 years, chances are good that 2 are no longer with the same company, so there is no company policy to violate.  Legal couldn’t argue with that point!

The main thing is that you, a manager of a former A player, WILL talk to a prospective employer because you will be doing a favor for that former A player and there is zero risk that you would say something so negative that you’d get sued by your former employee.  On the other hand, you’d be nuts to talk to prospective employers of C players you fired.

Legal departments hear that rationale and, so far, have backed off.   The TORC technique definitely helps you get the straight scoop from candidates.   What did Shakespear say about lawyers?