avatarAna-Maria Schweitzer

Summary

The article discusses the relevance of grammar and spelling proficiency in predicting the success of healthcare professionals during employment interviews.

Abstract

The author, Ana-Maria Schweitzer, reflects on the employment interviews conducted in a healthcare organization and posits that grammar and spelling proficiency can be a predictor of a candidate's future job performance. Drawing from empirical observations and specialized literature, the article argues that these basic literacy skills are indicative of a candidate's ability to learn, adapt, and navigate the complex demands of the healthcare industry. Despite the challenges in accurately predicting job compatibility, the author suggests that even a simple test of these skills can provide valuable insights into a candidate's potential contributions to the organization and their capacity to handle the evolving nature of healthcare roles.

Opinions

  • The author believes that the ultimate test of a candidate's fit within an organization is the passage of time and their ability to adapt to the organizational culture and real-life job demands.
  • There is a recognition that the selection process is inherently uncertain and subjective, with both employers and candidates relying on assumptions and risk-taking.
  • The article emphasizes the importance of literacy, particularly in the context of functional illiteracy, which affects a significant portion of the population and can limit an individual's ability to perform effectively in a complex healthcare environment.
  • The author advocates for the inclusion of basic literacy assessments in the recruitment process, considering it a necessary step to ensure candidates can continue their education and adapt to changing job requirements.
  • Mastery of language and grammar is seen as an indicator of one's ability to internalize rules and manage complex systems, which is crucial in healthcare.
  • The article suggests that reading habits can reveal insights into a candidate's focus, adaptability, and ability to synthesize information, which are essential skills in healthcare.
  • The author points out that the healthcare sector's complexity requires professionals to synthesize information, balance unpredictability, interact with various stakeholders, and act according to guidelines and best practices.
  • The article concludes that while no candidate is perfect, assessing literacy skills can help organizations prepare for staff development and ensure that candidates can navigate the complexities of healthcare systems.

Healthcare Professionals’ Employment Interviews: Why I Ask for Grammar and Spelling Testing

Is there predictive power in assessing functional illiteracy?

Photo by Michael Dziedzic on Unsplash

During the past years, there have been dozens of candidates that underwent through employment interviews at the organization where I work, and many times I was part of the team unfolding the conversation.

Experts teach us that the selection process is not always easy to gear, and there are no bulletproof pathways to ensure the best fit between the job and the candidate. In has been my experience that the test of time will be the ultimate compatibility probe between the candidate and the organization, after the organizational culture will be absorbed (or not), and the candidate’s skills will face real-life conditions.

Yet, we need to make a prediction, starting from the short interaction with the candidate. We are making an assessment based on flawed and still subjective measures. Specialized literature abounds in recommendations of principles to help with the selection of the perfect candidate. There are no bulletproof solutions to make this prediction more accurate. As much as one tries to control the sources of error, in the end, both parties will go ahead guided by assumptions, and both parties will be acting based on guesses and risktaking.

“We must accept that uncertainty and unpredictability are inescapable. This makes life uncomfortable for managers” (K.G. Sweeney)

Looking back over how we conducted the interviews during the past decade and analyzing what happened further with the candidates after employment (whether he or she thrived or not, attained the targets of failing, stayed with the organization or left and so on), I made an empirical observation regarding the predictive power of grammar and spelling proficiency of candidates on their future success at the job, in the direction that those candidates that score low at spelling and grammar will be employees with limited contribution to the organization, to say the least.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

Why would these skills be relevant when employing professionals who will work in healthcare?

I will set the stage by mentioning two crucial concepts: literacy and functional illiteracy.

Literacy refers to “using printed and written information to function in society, to achieve one’s goals, and to develop one’s knowledge and potential.” (definition by IALS)

The above International Literacy Survey (IALS) released by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development at the end of the nineties indicated that about 25 % of the adult population in 13 industrialized countries was functionally illiterate, thus lacking:

“the minimum level of competence needed to cope adequately with the complex demands of everyday life and work”.

Our simple grammar and spelling testing is part of the more substantial measurement of functional illiteracy. While formal literacy tests exist, and they assess prose literacy, document literacy, and quantitative literacy, in the context where we operate, we are not able to do such extensive measurement. It is not cost-efficient to measure all these aspects. But being aware of literacy level has value.

For example, in an official report from Romania, the functional illiteracy rates are up to 43% among the 15-year-old, and there are worrying related assessments regarding adults’ illiteracy rates. However, a precise measurement for adults and the working population is still missing in my country. Why is this discussion relevant in today’s Romania or in other countries where the workforce is so scarce? After all, in the context of brain-drain, do we afford to be so picky?

I would argue that this screening for potential functional illiteracy is necessary since it is linked with limited abilities of candidates to continue their education, learn new things at work, and adapt to the changing requirements of their job description.

Secondly, the mastery of language and grammar, represents a good indication of one’s ability to absorb and internalize rules and pathways, especially in complex systems, such as healthcare. I am bitterly amused to hear the latest excuse following a gross language error: “I was tired, I did not realize I was unlettered”… “Well, I muse, if talking with accuracy requires effort, when supplemental job-related tasks will be added, how will this person be able to process all that information simultaneously? And how will the candidate be able to juggle around the multiple rules and targets that the healthcare job request to master?”

Lastly, if the candidate doesn’t master his or her native language (as this recent study clarifies that functional illiteracy should be assessed for the native language), that is an indication of a short lifetime reading range. Reading is an activity that tells a lot about a person’s ability to focus, connect with a different framework, and synthesize different information.

Candidates for the new healthcare environment

The way we understand and model the healthcare environment has changed dramatically during the past decades, as it became more and more complex. That translates into complex jobs, sometimes hard to correctly capture into a job description, where the professional’s day in and day out skills demand one to:

  • synthesize information to make sense of people’s experiences, symptoms, and drives
  • balance the unpredictable and unknown with the patients’ need for autonomy and involvement in the decision-making process
  • interact with multiple individuals, regulatory bodies and institutions
  • act based on guidelines, best-practices, personal experience, and availability of resources.

Systems in healthcare are described as complex adaptive systems: in short, this means there are many actors and multiple interaction pathways; thus, complexity arises due to patterns and inter-relationships. We can’t get perfect candidates; we need to prepare our organizations to orient and develop staff on one side while at the other end candidates’ skills will predict their ability to navigate through these complex systems.

In this short article, I did not even touch on the issue of digital literacy, although the digital world is here and reshaping, once again, the healthcare context. I am merely emphasizing the literacy aspect as it araised from experience in my workplace. To be honest, form many years we did not consider literacy a screening aspect, especially for candidates who graduated from a faculty. After fails and unpleasant surprises, our lesson learned is that after checking the CV and the recommendation letters, after looking at the collection of diplomas, we should not shy away from quickly assessing some literacy skills. We are now interested in asking our candidate about the most recent book he/she read, how a review of that book would look like, and how they would recommend it to a peer. A challenge like this might turn into an enlightening experience for both parties.

© Ana-Maria Schweitzer 2020

I am a Romanian health psychologist, working in philanthropy and involved in developing prevention and care programs for people with chronic conditions. As a seeker of meaning, I use writing and playing with words, as ways of uncovering both the order and disorder that reign inside and outside our minds. My most recent article is here:

Employment
Job Interview
Skills
Healthcare
Literacy
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