Topgrading Interview – Hiring the Right Every Time
As a recruiter or an employer, you want to hire candidates who are smart, skilled and reliable. You wish every candidate you place in the organization turns out to be a perfect match. However, if you are looking to build a high-quality workforce, you need to advance your interviewing practices. One recruitment strategy you can adopt is Topgrading Interview.
Despite being a new concept, Topgrading has achieved the popularity in the world of recruitment in no time. Many big companies including General Electric, Barclays, Lincoln Financial and others are using the Topgrading methodology to recruit high-performing candidates.
If you are interested in learning more about the concept and its strategies, keep reading our article on Topgrading Interview.
Introduction
Definition
Topgrading is a corporate recruiting and interviewing strategy that is intended to identify suitable candidates for a particular position in an organization.
In Topgrading, the candidates go through an extensive 12-step process that includes numerous telephonic and personal interviews, research and interrogation, the creation of scorecards, reference checks and more. After the process, the interviewed candidates are grouped into three major categories:
- A Players
- B Players
- C Players
‘A’ Players have the most potential for high performance in their role while ‘B’ and ‘C’ Players might require more efforts to be successful.
Origin
The term ‘Topgrading’ was coined in the year 1997 by Bradford D. Smart in an article in Directors and Boards magazine. Smart formulated techniques and strategies to create a comprehensive picture of each candidate’s personality and work history. His consulting firm practiced and taught Topgrading methods to set up General Electric’s recruitment strategies in the 1980s and 90s. In 1999, Smart also released a book called Topgrading: How Leading Companies Win by Hiring, Coaching and Keeping the Best People that detailed the Topgrading process.
Methodology
Topgrading is more extensive than a normal behavioral interview which only examines a few work challenges faced by the applicant. Topgrading interview, on the other hand, is detailed and more evaluative while assessing the candidates. It accurately portrays the personality, skills, experience, and qualities of the applicants.
The main idea about Topgrading is to identify the high-performing and most skilled candidates. It can be used in both new hires and for the promotion of current employees. The method assumes that the standard interview process could be biased. Resumes are faked and manipulated often to make unqualified candidates seem suitable for the job position. Therefore, Topgrading involves an extensive interview process that puts significant stress on references of candidates to ensure his reliability. It also includes creating a detailed scorecard, scrutinizes the career history, and conducting multiple level interviews including the Topgrading interview to evaluate them based on A, B, and C categories.
Reference calls are the final aspect of the Topgrading methodology where applicants are asked to arrange calls with their past colleagues like managers, team leaders, and CEOs.
Implementing Topgrading Interview at Your Company
It’s no secret that Topgrading can help companies to hire best-performing candidates for the positions. Topgrading remarkably helps the organizations to avoid bad hiring and propel them to excellent performance. It has proven to be an effective strategy for the companies looking for top talents across the industry. Searching for the right person to fit the job position could be tough, but by using this strategy within your recruiting model, you could find them easily.
Looking for employees who fit your organization! We are here to help you with our expert talent acquisition solutions. We can make your hiring process easy and assist you in hiring the right talent from the market. Reach us to get your hiring job done with ease.
Follow our Facebook community and get the latest updates on effective hiring.