You Got Game

Businesspeople who use puzzles say they're a quick, easy, inexpensive and flexible way to get information and impart training. San Francisco communications consultant Sharon Marks often asks teams of clients to solve Tangoes puzzles as part of her evaluation and training process. "Moving pieces around is similar to what people do in their work," she notes. The puzzles, which use seven angular tiles to create a variety of abstract shapes, also help her appraise communication and problem-solving skills.

One exercise calls for an employee to tell another how to build a shape with the puzzle tiles. The instructing employee can't touch the pieces or show the other employee a drawing to illustrate what he or she has in mind. All instructions have to be verbal. "Immediately, you get information about questioning styles, acknowledgment of skills and how much they check out fact vs. assumption," Marks says.

Puzzles may be useful in pre-employment assessment because they're different than the standard tests many companies use, says Bill Hendricks, president of Dallas human resource consulting firm The Hendricks Group. "Brainteasers are valuable for getting away from the typical testing devices," he says, "People can figure out how to beat those."

Puzzles are generally inexpensive. The basic Tangoes retails for $12 while the do-it-yourself training guide to using it costs $129. Custom puzzles, such as the giant jigsaw created by MDSI, cost more. Fall says he spent less than $5,000 on that puzzle, which included hiring a graphic artist to design it and a specialty advertising agency to produce it. Other puzzles, such as the word problems posed to Microsoft applicants, cost next to nothing, whether you use an existing puzzle or create a new one.

But puzzles do pose special challenges for those who use them in business. The main risk is that the skills needed to solve the puzzle won't be related to any skill needed at work, warns J.P. Whalen, president of Human Resource Development Technologies, a Wilmington, Delaware, performance development company.

"You have to make certain [the puzzle] is job-related," Whalen says. "If you're hiring a typist, give a typing test." For top-level executive applicants, Whalen often administers psychological tests designed to measure verbal, mathematical and reasoning skills. For sales jobs, he tests for motivation, whether a person is outgoing or introverted, and basic selling skills. In general, Whalen says puzzle assessments are best suited to jobs requiring logical ability, such as engineers and programmers.

Handing a job applicant a puzzle to solve may irritate some people, warns Cusumano. "I've run into some very smart people who consider it a little demeaning," he says. "But if you want to work at Microsoft, you do it."

Other people may simply be confused by the puzzle if its relevance isn't clear, says Marks. She stresses the importance of explaining in advance to those involved in a puzzle exercise the reason the puzzle is being used and how it relates to the job.

Finally, for puzzles to be effective tools for businesspeople, those administering the puzzles have to believe in their value. "If the assessment says `no,' are you willing to turn the candidate down?" asks Hendricks. "If not, then the assessment is worthless."

This article was originally published in the February 1999 print edition of Entrepreneur with the headline: You Got Game.