Megan Naude November 3, 2011 Psychology 482 Honors Option Paper #2- Selection System for Bank Tellers

Having completed a job analysis on the position of a bank teller, the necessary information has been gathered in order to design a selection system for the job. I previously concluded that the two key parts of a tellers job involve making accurate financial transactions and providing exceptional customer service. The goal of my selection system is to evaluate applicants for the position and hire the candidates that are most likely to perform well on the job. Thus, the system aims to measure candidatesability to complete financial transactions and potential to treat customers with the high quality of service that is expected. In order to measure candidates ability to quickly and accurately take care of customers financial needs, a cognitive ability test will be administered. The test will be similar to the Wonderlic test, but the questions will mainly focus on arithmetic skills. These skills are necessary for tellers who must have a basic understanding of mathematical functions in order to efficiently handle monetary transactions such as making change for customers or adding up check totals. In order to maximize the face validity of the test, the problems presented to candidates will all be related to money and will be examples of actual situations that tellers may encounter. This test will be administered to all applicants for teller positions as a paper-and-pencil assessment. A cutoff score will be determined; any applicant scoring under a certain percentage will be disqualified for the job. This is to ensure that every possible hire has at least enough understanding of mathematics to perform the job well.

A work sample will also be used to assess candidates ability to handle money. It is absolutely essential that tellers be able to quickly and accurately count bills and coins. The candidates will individually come into the branch and count money for the teller supervisor or branch manager. The administrator of the work sample will give the candidate a monetary value (Ex: $53.82), and the candidate will count out the correct amount in bills and coins. Challenges will be presented that are representative of what actual customers may request. For example, the candidate may be asked to count out $85.15 using only five and ten dollar bills and nickels or to exchange a hundred dollar bill for $10 worth of quarters with the rest of the total made up of five dollar bills. During the work sample, the candidates timing and accuracy will be taken into consideration by the supervisor or manager. Accuracy will be more important than speed, as in real life situations it is more important for a teller to give a customer the correct amount of money than to process the transaction quickly. The work sample will only be administered to candidates who have passed the cutoff score for the cognitive ability test. To assess potential for customer service abilities, candidates passing the cognitive ability test will be given a personality test. Frei and McDaniel (1998) found that high scores of agreeableness, emotional stability, and conscientiousness can predict quality customer service by employees. The personality test can be administered by computer, and candidates can take the test at home on their own time. The results from the personality test will be given to the branch manager, and the scores for these three personality traits will be taken into consideration along with the interview. Candidates who pass the cutoff score for the cognitive ability test will then be scheduled for an interview with the branch manager. This interview will be a structured, situational interview consisting of predetermined questions that aim to get an idea of how the candidate would act in

certain situations if he or she were to be hired as a teller. The goal of the questions is to assess candidates knowledge of customer service. For example, the interviewer may pose the following question: Imagine that you give a customer the incorrect amount of money from a transaction. They become extremely angered and threaten to cancel their accounts at the bank. How would you approach this situation? Additionally, the interview serves as an opportunity for the manager to assess how comfortable the candidate is with speaking to new people, a skill that a teller needs while on the job. Interviewers should have an idea of how candidates should be answering each situational question based on their knowledge of high performing tellers. Candidates responses to each question should be rated on a scale by the interviewer according to how complete and wellcommunicated the answer was in addition to whether the response reflected the correct action that a teller should take in the specific situation. The scores for each question can then be added together to give each candidate an objective total interview score. As I am using a variety of different tests in my selection system, there are many strengths and limitations. Some of the strengths include the validities of the different methods. Cognitive abilities tests have shown to have high predictability for job performance and to be especially effective at measuring core technical proficiencies such as counting money (Bertua, Anderson, & Salagado, 2005; McHenry, Hough, Toquam, Hanson, & Ashworth, 1990). Similarly, work samples have high predictive validity as well (Callinan & Robertson, 2000). Another advantage to work samples is that they have high face validities and therefore evoke more positive reactions from candidates. Additionally, they serve as a realistic job preview for candidates, giving them a chance to determine whether or not they really want to perform the job (Callinan & Robertson, 2000). Although there has been a more mixed review of personality tests, some research has shown that they serve as another fairly predictive selection tool (Rothstein & Goffin, 2006). Judge, Higgins,

and Cable (2000) suggest that a major strength of interviews is that they allow both the candidate and the interviewer to get an idea of the potential person-organization fit of each candidate. Furthermore, interviews give candidates the opportunity to ask the interviewer about the organizational culture and find out more about the position. The major strength of my selection system is that I have put together a battery of tests and tools that can measure several different aspects and potentials of each candidate. Using batteries of tests has been shown to increase the predictive validity of the individual tests (Outtz, 2002). There are also several limitations to each of my selection tools. Work samples are not as relevant to applicants that do not have any job experience (Callinan & Robertson, 2000). Most teller positions do not require previous experience with handling money, but they do prefer candidates who have had this experience. Those with experience would have a large advantage over those without. Additionally, work samples are extremely time-consuming since they must be administered on an individual basis in the workplace, and they only measure one factor of the job in this case counting money (Callinan & Robertson, 2000). Morgeson et al. (2007) suggest that the validity of personality tests is generally low. Additionally, a major limitation of personality tests is that when candidates fake their responses, the criterion-related validity is dramatically decreased. Consequently, when selection ratios are high, a high number of fakers can end up being hired, reducing the selection validity of this tool (Mueller-Hanson, Heggestad, & Thornton, 2003). Although interviews have a high predictive validity, the validity of the interviewer is a limitation. Many interviews are subjective and can therefore be biased; training interviewers on how to conduct an un-biased interview can sometimes help resolve this issue (Judge et al., 2000). See Appendix A for a flow chart of the selection system.

In order to study the validity of this new selection system, I would have the newest round of applicants complete all of the tests but not take their scores into consideration when selecting them. I would have them complete the cognitive ability test but not determine any cutoff score. They would then complete the personality test, work sample, and interview. All of their results would be recorded, but the manager would select the new employees based on their previous selection system. After a few months on the job, the new hires would be evaluated and their performance ratings would be compared with their selection test scores. I would then look at these comparisons to see if my tests are predictive of high performance. If high scorers are performing well and low scorers are performing poorly, this would confirm the validity of the system. If I saw many potential wrong hires or rejections, I would have to take this into consideration and adjust my system accordingly. There are several legal concerns regarding this selection system. Cognitive ability tests have historically had high levels of adverse impact favoring Caucasian candidates over African American candidates (Outtz, 2002). Additionally, there has been mixed research about Equal Employment Opportunity issues when it comes to interviews, some stating that certain minority groups are at a disadvantage (Judge et al., 2000). Personality tests, however, have been shown to have very infrequent adverse impact (Baydoun, Rose, & Emperado, 2001). Outtz (2000) suggests that the adverse impact of different selection tools can be reduced by using the combination of tests and tools together, as I plan to do in my selection system. The selection system that I have designed brings together a variety of tests and tools to evaluate potential hires for teller positions. Each tool is specifically designed to measure a certain ability that a teller would need in order to perform the job well. When implemented together, the different aspects of my system should ensure that the most qualified candidates are selected for the

job and that the company does not waste any time or money on people that will not turn out to be high performers.

Works Cited Baydoun, R., Rose, D., & Emperado, T. (2001). Measuring customer service orientation: An examination of the validity of the customer service profile. Journal of Business and Psychology, 15(4), 605-620. Bertua, C., Anderson, N., & Salgado, J. (2005). The predictive validity of cognitive ability tests: A UK meta-analysis. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 78, 387-409. Callinan, M. & Robertson, I. (2000). Work sample testing. International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 8(4), 248-260. Frei, R. L. & McDaniel, M. A. (1998). Validity of customer service measures in personnel selection: A review of criterion and construct evidence. Human Performance, 11(1), 1-27. Judge, T. A., Higgins, C. A., & Cable, D. M. (2000). The employment interview: A review of recent research and recommendations for future research. Human Resource Management Review, 10(4), 383-406. McHenry, J. J., Hough, L. M., Toquam, J. L., Hanson, M. A., & Ashworth, S. (1990). Project A validity results: The relationship between predictor and criterion domains. Personnel Psychology, 43(2), 335-354. Morgeson, F. P., Campion, M. A., Dipboye, R. L., Hollenbeck, J. R., Murphy, K., & Schmitt, N. (2007). Are we getting fooled again? Coming to terms with limitations in the use of personality tests for personnel selection. Personnel Psychology, 60(4), 1029-1049.

Mueller-Hanson, R., Heggestad, E. D., & Thornton, G. C. (2003). Faking and selection: Considering the use of personality from select-in and select-out perspectives. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(2), 348-355. Outtz, J. L. (2002). The role of cognitive ability tests in employment selection. Human Performance, 15(1/2), 161-171. Rothstein, M. G. & Goffin, R. D. (2006). The use of personality measures in personnel selection: What does current research support? Human Resource Management Review, 16(2), 155180.

Appendix A Steps in Selection System

All applicants are given cognitive ability test

Cutoff score is determined for cognitive ability test- applicants scoring above cutoff score move on to next steps in selection system

Applicants are given personality test on computer- agreeableness, emotional stability, and conscientiousness scores are recorded

Applicants complete work sample (counting money)- timing and accuracy considered

Applicants are interviewed by branch manager- scored on each response

Scores from all selection tools are added together and selection decisions are made