Use Selection Tests As Well As Interviews
August 16, 2009
Some firms use psychometric tests, including reasoning, intelligence and personality profiling, as part of their selection processes. Generally speaking these are handled by trained specialists in the human resource function or by external consultants. The results and their significance are made available to other selectors, including the team leaders, for consideration along with the rest of the information about the candidates. Many firms take the view that the objective information about people that is made available from psychometric tests, when added to all of the other data about candidates, does improve predictions about future performance. When they are used it is clearly important for those team leaders involved in the selection process, as well as the human resource specialists, to be trained to interpret the results.
It is well worthwhile to design and use what are sometimes described as ‘situational tests’ as part of the selection arrangements. These provide opportunities for candidates to demonstrate their abilities, or potentiality to develop competence, in specific aspects of work. For example, if it is important that people have the skills to present information to groups of colleagues or clients then candidates can be asked to prepare and give short presentations on an agreed topic to the selectors. It is possible to assess team-working abilities, including support for and cooperation with others and the ability to provide and assess ideas, by getting candidates to undertake a group exercise that is observed by the selectors. Requiring candidates to explain a technical issue to a layperson, and to check for understanding, is a good way to assess communication skills. Information contained in CVs and application forms and obtained from interviews, whilst very valuable, is usually insufficient to provide a reasonably objective assessment of the existing and potential capabilities of the candidates. Situational tests, used to assess some of the critical qualities that you are looking for, in addition to all of the other sources of information, provide an excellent way of giving a rounded picture of each of the short-listed applicants.
An effective selection process takes up a considerable amount of time. It is not cheap therefore. There are firms that mistakenly cut corners to save money. Getting effective people into jobs is important in all organizations. It is crucial in professional service firms where the most significant asset, by far, is the human one. Agood selection process that involves interviews with human resource specialists and team leaders and that incorporates carefully designed situational tests reduces the risks considerably of hiring the wrong people. Firms that are serious about selection put applicants through more than one round of interviews and exercises. There are two benefits. The first is that it ensures that those who survive the process have been carefully scrutinized. Secondly, it promotes the feeling among those who are hired that the firm is really worth joining because it takes the recruitment process so seriously.