Need for change trumpeted at NICE: farm bill task force proposes actions to reserve farm-income downward spiral

Rural Cooperatives, Sept-Oct, 2001 by Dan Campbell

How co-ops rate on accumulation of knowledge, and willingness to share it, will be a key in the future. "They should look to the auto industry model of the 1950s--buy a system and run it and see what comes out the other end. If it's bad, fix it."

RELATED ARTICLE: Good interview process crucial to selecting top-notch CEO.

Of all the jobs a co-op board must perform, none are more important than selecting a CEO or manager to guide the business. Bernard Erven and Chris Bruynis of The Ohio State University led participants in a NICE management seminar through a series of exercises designed to help improve their odds for picking a winner.

"If the board makes the right decision, it will benefit the cooperative for many years," Erven said. But if the board makes a mistake and picks a weak CEO, the board won't be able to compensate for it in other ways.

"It's similar to marriage: the alter does not correct what a person was when he or she walked down the aisle," Erven said. You can't motivate a misfit into being a good CEO, nor will on-the-job training make it right, he noted. The challenge is thus to find the right person the first time. What the cooperative needs, rather than what the applicant would like to do, should guide the hiring process.

If a board lacks confidence that it can do a good job of finding the right person for the job, it should get out side help. The best candidates for the job will expect a good, thorough interview process.

Erven and Bruynis suggested following these steps:

1. Determine the co-op's labor and management needs; do a careful analysis to make sure the candidate will fit the needs of the entire organization. This will take a significant amount of the board's time.

2. Develop a written, up-to-date job description.

3. Build a pool of candidates -- the more the better. If you can't develop a pool, stop the process until you can. Internal applications should be allowed unless a formal decision is made not to. But it is advisable not to discriminate against your own employees.

4. Review the applications and select those you wish to interview.

5. Conduct the interviews. But first decide who will be on the interview team, whether it will be a formal or informal interview, what questions will be asked, how evaluations will be recorded and where the interview will be conducted.

6. Check references.

7. Make a selection.

8. Hire selected applicant.

Volunteers from the audience participated in mock interviews to demonstrate effective interview techniques. These include: asking questions that cannot be answered with a yes or no; encouraging applicants to talk about themselves and covering a variety of topics, including some "what if" situations.

"You want to determine how candidates bring their own knowledge into play, perhaps eventually leading to a situation where they must admit they don't know the answer. You are not so much looking for right answers to these questions, but to how the applicant will behave when faced with a tough situation," Erven said. "Will the person get angry if he or she feels trapped?"