Desk audits require careful preparation, professional demeanor, and the right tools to gather accurate job information. Avoiding common pitfalls during interviews and choosing appropriate methods such as direct observation or questionnaires can lead to a more accurate and respectful evaluation process.
Key Insights
- Avoid common mistakes during desk audits, such as poor scheduling, lack of privacy, and failure to prepare or communicate clearly with the employee.
- Maintain professionalism by refraining from belittling language, rushed conclusions, or discussing unrelated issues outside the audit's scope.
- Use supplementary tools like group interviews, direct observation, and questionnaires to gather comprehensive and reliable job performance data.
This lesson is a preview from our Intermediate Position Classification Course. Enroll in a course for detailed lessons, live instructor support, and project-based training.
As we continue with Module 7 and desk audits, there are some things that we need you to understand. We want to give you a list of helpful hints, a list of helpful hints for desk audits, things to avoid. And so, before the interview, failing to keep appointments that look good, timing interviews badly, having lunchtime at the end of the day, during a busy time of the day, and failing to prepare beforehand.
You want to be able to go into a desk audit prepared with confidence, knowing that you will get through this desk audit. Giving the employee no time to prepare. When you schedule a desk audit, you must give the employee time to prepare so that they can gather their thoughts, their notes, and you don't want to rush that process.
Duplicating information obtained elsewhere. Failing to arrange privacy. That's important.
You must be in a quiet space where there is not a lot of heavy traffic back and forth, where you and the employee can have an interview that is free from distractions, and where there will be some privacy for both of you. During the interview, you don't want to ask poor or leading questions. Failing to give proof of material.
Failing to prove important parts. During most of the talking, you want to be able to make sure that you allow the employee time to talk. Using belittling language.
Being discourteous. Failing to provide an introduction and a purpose. Failing to break the ice.
Getting too friendly or too chummy with the employee. Assuming a menial or servile attitude. Arousing fears.
When closing the interview, buffering or faking knowledge. You don't want to talk about things that you can't talk about intelligently. Failing to express appreciation.
Failing to tap her off the interview properly. Jumping to conclusions. Advising on other problems not within the classifier's authority.
Harrying through the closing interview. Passing the buck off onto someone else. Arousing hope, implying, or making promises.
And so these are the helpful hints of the things that you want to avoid when conducting a desk audit interview. And so let's look at some additional tools for desk audits. These tools can be used to analyze jobs and to assist in the position review.
And so group interviews. Sometimes group interviews are needed. They are often effective and have given additional means for gathering job information.
This can happen when more than one employee performs the work of a particular position or when multiple employees are covered by the same standardized position description. Similar to the interview approach for individuals, the group method should result in an overall description of the nature of the job, a comprehensive description of the tasks performed by all employees, the percentages of time devoted to the task, and any differences in duties between positions in question. Direct observation.
For jobs consisting primarily of observational physical activity, observable physical activity, direct observation is the most appropriate method for job analysis. Many federal wage system jobs may lend themselves to such an observation. This method can be approached in two ways.
One, observe the employee performing a completed work cycle before asking any questions. Take notes of all the job activities observed, including those not fully understood. After accumulating the necessary information, talk with the worker to clarify the process and any points not fully understood.
And, observe and interview simultaneously, discussing your observations with the employee while he or she is performing the work. The last additional tool is questionnaires. Many agencies use questionnaires either in place of a desk audit or as a source to gather additional information before determining whether a position review is necessary.
The questionnaire should be based on the factors of the applicable classification system, use, and include questions similar to those we've discussed in this module. While employees should complete the questionnaires independently, the supervisor may be asked to provide minor assistance and to verify the responses given. Once completed, both the employee and the supervisor should sign the questionnaire to indicate that all of the responses are accurate.
