9-Box Decision Matrix
Project Goal and Stakeholders
Summer Institute (SI) is the last stage in the application process of Teach for the Philippines. The Admissions team, alongside the Coaching and Training team work together to decide which candidates will be inducted to the organization's Fellowship program after several weeks of intensive training. In 2020, I spearheaded the selection process for this stage, and I had to work around the fact that our SI was happening during the time the effects of the pandemic were being felt by the entire world. This meant I needed to devise a system for decision-making that was not only effective in consolidating performance data about candidates but simple enough for the Admissions, Training and Coaching teams to understand, and execute virtually.
Approach and Methodology
PROJECT INITIATION AND PLANNING
The project began with a series of consultations with members of the Admissions team, Coaching and Training team. Through these conversations, we were able to accomplish the following:
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Establish role expectations and accountabilities in terms of overseeing selection decisions during Summer Institute.
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Identify what the non-negotiable behavioral indicators we needed to select for.
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Align on feedback from the previous year's SI that can be integrated into an updated Selection design.
Once these were completed, I finalized the entire selection design for our Summer Institute building on the best practices that we had established in years prior. One of the most effective tools for decision-making that I sought to incorporate was the team's use of a 9-Box matrix, which measured both potential and performance. While the original use of the matrix was more for performance management, we made tweaks to it such that it could be used to help guide selection decisions on which candidates should be inducted or not based on the indicators we set for both potential and performance. This would be the cornerstone of our entire decision-making process in Summer Institute.
Inspired the 9-box matrix for talent management, a similar matrix was developed and used specifically for making selection decisions during SI
DASHBOARD DESIGN AND AUTOMATION
Visually, the 9-Box was intuitive and easy for anyone to understand. However, some of the challenges we had in the past using it were the following:
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It was tedious to fill up given the numerous candidates we were assessing. Users needed to not only identify which indicators were present or absent when evaluating candidates, they also had to pick and choose which box a candidate would be sorted under.
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There was no ranking system based on overall performance. While you can easily a hierarchy from comparing candidates from different boxes, there was no way to tell if a candidates in the same box were performing better or worse compared to each other. Ranking was particularly important for us at the time given we had limited slots in the program.
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There was always the possibility of Human Error. Since the 9-box required manual intervention to fill out, there was always a chance that individuals would fill out the 9-box incorrectly if ever they misinterpreted indicators or instructions.
As a result of this, when I designed the Selection Dashboard we used for Summer Institute using excel, I made it a point to integrate automation into the tool so that we could easily resolve the challenges we previously had with using the 9-box matrix. To make this possible, I needed to identify a working model for quantifying performance and potential based on the presence and absence of behavioral indicators. Using a variety of different excel formulas, such as IF, VLOOKUP, SUM, RANK, among others, I then set up the dashboard in such a way that depending on how users fill out inputs for candidate assessments, the 9-box will automatically fill up to reflect their performance either real-time or at any previous selection period in our Summer Institute.
A sample section of our evaluation sheet where assessments of candidates are summarized. Depending on how indicators are filled up,
scores for potential and performance would be automated accordingly.
This 9-box matrix was the main visual used in our evaluations and deliberations. The automated placement of specific candidates in particular boxes would inform the kind of deliberation discussions the team would have on their standing.
TEAM ONBOARDING
Since a new system of tools to aid in the team's decision-making was being introduced, I sought to comprehensively onboard the different members of our Admissions, Coaching and Training team on the use of the tools and ensure that any feedback was taken into account before it was launched and used during Summer Institute. Additionally, I took the time to also communicate this model for decision-making to our Senior Leadership Team, as I regularly held conversations with them to report on progress during Summer Institute Selection using the 9-box matrix.
Project Outcome
As a result of this project, we were able to save a significant number of time in our deliberation discussions. Instead of spending time on making sure individuals were in the right box or not we were able to focus conversations on individual performance and whether candidates in specific boxes were demonstrating the requirements needed for induction and whether or not they could still be trained and coached to meet them.
This system of making decisions was also integrated into other aspects of our Admissions process, such as Assessment Centers, so that we could track and monitor performance from the beginning of a candidate's application all the way to the end of their Admissions experience. Eventually, this served as the foundation of our automated model that could help forecast our cohort intake, as an individual's performance in the selection process as well as potential concerns allowed us to anticipate candidate attrition and predict different scenarios for the cohort.
This system of decision-making has also opened the avenue for more long-term analysis, such as whether an individual's placement in the 9-box matrix could be predictive of what their performance is like during the Fellowship program.