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Running a Development Centre

In the previous article we looked at what needs to be done in planning and preparing for an Assessment/Development Centre. I would now like to go on to consider how to run them in such a way that will maximise the benefits for the participants and for the Organisation.
I make the following assumptions about how you have decided to set up these Development Centres:-
 That you will have 8 participants and 4 observers on each one
 That you are running at least 2 or more Centres
 That you have adequately briefed and prepared each participant
 That you have chosen an appropriate location, rooms and facilities to run the Centres where you and the participants will not be disturbed, interrupted or overlooked
 That you have agreed all of the assessment areas, competences, to be assessed, the rating scale, forms and activities to be used
 That your observers are well trained, knowledgeable, fair and objective and ready to focus on their role
You should then be ready to start the Centres proper by welcoming, introducing and briefing everyone about the Centre, its programme schedule, what is involved and who is doing what. You need a Programme schedule explaining what, when and where to be and to clarify with the observers about who they are focusing on.
You need to be as clear and sensitive as possible with the participants and to strike the right balance of business professionalism and seriousness verses informality and enjoyment. In short you need to ensure that the process is managed in as stress free a way as possible in order not to add to the inevitable stress that some participants will bring with them anyway.
You need to run the programme to your schedule, ensuring that both the participants and the observers are doing what they should be doing at each stage of the process. I like to get feedback from all parties at each of the breaks in the schedule to check that everything is going on track and that all participants are feeling Ok and not struggling unnecessarily. I also patrol the boundaries with the observers to ensure that they are not influencing or interrupting the process of the activities, that they are observing and noting key words, actions and dynamics and that they are making appropriate and fair assessments and judgements about each participant. I will also do a consistency check between the 2 sub-groups to ensure that ratings are fair and consistent across both groups.
The results of any pre-Centre questionnaires or feedback reports would not be given to the observers until most or all of the assessed activities have taken place in order not to influence their thinking about the performance or potential of any particular person.
Equally I would ensure that an observer is not paired with a participant that they manage directly or who they have a particularly strong relationship with such that it might affect their objectivity.
Once the Centre activities have been completed and the observers and participants have been given any questionnaire results or profile reports then we are then ready to get the Development Centre reports prepared for the participants.