Where Are They Now: Steve Sieke

Finding the right people and putting them in the right roles is key to any company’s success, and Steve Sieke is taking nearly 25 years of experience to help companies do just that.

Most recently, Sieke was CEO of the Americas for Serco Global Services, the business process outsourcing arm of Serco Group plc. This was after spending several years in Serco’s government business in North America. In July 2014, he stepped away from about five years with Serco to start SRS Growth Partners.

SRS offers Predictive Index to clients through its association with PI Midlantic, allowing Sieke to show clients how to use PI metrics to drive improvements in hiring, retention and employee engagement. Inconsistent hiring outcomes are common for some companies, he said, and that’s an important area where Predictive Index’s EEOC compliant assessments can be useful.

“Resumes obviously matter, but a person’s behaviors and drives are actually more predictive of success in a role than their resume,” he said. “We can help clients avoid the mistake of hiring someone who aces the interview but never translates the great interview into actual performance.”

The characteristics that make a person successful in one job don’t guarantee success in the next, he said.

“My work using Predictive Index is designed to help companies quickly define the success traits for any role, and then measure how closely applicants match those success traits,” he said. “When the fit is right, a person is going to be more engaged, more productive, and more willing to go the extra mile.”

Sieke studied accounting at The University of Delaware and went on to complete a master’s degree in taxation at Villanova University. Sieke said one of his greatest career highlights was in the early 1990s when he was tasked to work on the savings and loan crisis that began a few years earlier.

“I was given the opportunity to establish an office for PricewaterhouseCoopers dedicated to supporting the work of the Resolution Trust Corporation,” he said. “The RTC took over assets from failed savings and loan associations, and we in turn recovered as much money as possible on those assets for the American taxpayer. Over a 4-year period, our 100-person team was the top-performing government contractor out of 17 others doing similar work.”

Another of his career highlights was with Serco.

“From 2010-2012, when I was a senior vice president in Serco’s government business, I led a phenomenal team that was willing to develop and try new strategies for growth and in some cases take on new roles that could better leverage their talents,” he said. “They challenged me as much as I challenged them, and we delivered some great results.”

An accountant with a penchant for numbers and applied analytics he is, but Sieke isn’t all business all the time. Little-known fact: He once won a Steve Martin stand-up comedy impersonation contest when he was in college.

These days, he enjoys paddle boarding, walking his 75-pound golden retriever, traveling, playing tennis and racquetball, and listening to Audible books. Robert Reich’s “Saving Capitalism” is a recent read he said “takes the idea of free markets and turns it on its head.”

“For people like me concerned about growing income inequality, it can radically change some long-held assumptions,” he said.

Sieke and his wife, Marian, have one grown son who lives in New York City and works for a recruiting firm, and another grown son who is married and lives in San Francisco. With his first grandchild due in August, Sieke plans to spend a good chunk of any spare time enjoying his new role as a grandfather.

“There is nothing better than spending time with your adult children and their growing families,” he said.

In the near future, Sieke plans to continue expanding his business and getting the word out.

“It’s very rewarding to help companies solve their talent and management problems with the help of behavioral analytics,” he said. “It’s valuable data that can dramatically change the way a business performs. So, I’d like to have more speaking engagements to get this word out—and to get out to more businesses where I can help make a difference.”