7 Ways to Develop Effective Pre-Employment Assessments in Volume Recruitment

Companies in the volume hiring space that are beginning to digitalize their recruitment process often use a combination of manual and digital operations. For example, a company might use digital assessments, but then interpret the results manually. 

The problem is this introduces human interpretation which can lead to bias or at least inconsistent application to the hiring process. It also makes it challenging to maintain consistent standards on selection criteria. This influences the predictability of the hiring process because organizations are not able to tell how effective their pre-employment assessments are in their relationship to organizational outcomes.

It is, therefore, critical for companies in the volume hiring space to develop a standard and objective way of measuring the effectiveness of their candidate screening and selection methods. 

Enter pre-employment assessments. Pre-employment assessments are tools organizations can use to compare critical competencies of candidates and find the best match for a particular role. 

There are many different pre-employment assessments (e.g., situational judgment tests, personality questionnaires, language skills tests, and cognitive ability tests). They can be tailor-made to assess the specific work-related characteristics needed to be successful in a role and company, and to support recruitment teams in making objective hiring decisions. 

Below are seven ways organizations can develop effective pre-employment assessments in volume recruitment.

The first step in measuring the effectiveness of a pre-employment assessment is to understand the company’s goals, and what they need to fix. Assessments can help improve several areas, including recruitment process efficiency, quality of hire, candidate experience, and fairness. 

Is a company more concerned with employees hitting targets, or are they trying to build a stronger team and company culture? Are skills more critical, or are motivation and a strong work ethic more valuable?

Organizations get the most value from assessments if they understand the challenges they are currently facing and what they want to improve. 

The next step is to decide whether a pre-hire assessment is right for what they want to measure. Not everything a company wants to track is suitably measured with a pre-employment assessment. 

For example, if an organization is hiring for an entry-level retail role and they want to determine if this person had strong communications skills, they may want to use a personality questionnaire to determine if the person is extroverted and agreeable, but then use the interview to confirm the specific aspects of communication skills they are looking for in the role.

Assessments should be seen as a way to match, rather than filter, candidates. If an organization uses the right combination of screening methods and pre-employment assessments, it should end up with candidates who are a good match for open roles and company culture. 

Harver uses matching technology to assess candidate skills and identify which roles they would best fit, based on their unique skills and characteristics. This makes it simple for organizations to know what skills to select if they want to fill certain positions and improve their retention rates. The technology enables companies to assess a wide range of skills and determine where a candidate would be best placed, rather than where their limitations lie. This helps make the most of a candidate pool which is crucial in volume hiring in today’s tight labor market.

To hire the best candidates, organizations need to define what a quality candidate looks like. Chances are that a quality candidate is someone who continues to become a top-performing employee. 
To pinpoint the next top performer, identify the common skills and behaviors of current employees, who shine the brightest. 

Although this will vary depending on the recruited position, there will inevitably be crossover skills and competencies that are important to look for in new entry-level, hourly employees. 

Harver allows organizations to develop a custom assessment based on those skills and behaviors rather than use an out-of-the-box assessment. The best part is that the recruitment team sees a score, not a cover letter or CV, so they can make a fair, objective hiring decision.

The effectiveness of pre-employment assessments is based on the specific assessments someone will choose. Once the skills and behaviors have been determined, a company can select assessments to test them. 

Organizations will know the chosen assessments are the right ones when their recruitment metrics, from operational metrics to candidate satisfaction scores, are improving across locations and vacancies. 

Harver’s clients have access to a series of dashboards to help them keep track of important metrics and ensure their chosen assessments are effective. Along with these, quarterly business reviews look at what can be optimized, to help organizations adjust their strategy when needed. 

For chosen pre-employment assessments to truly help achieve goals, they need to be relied on to produce the same output consistently. Do assessments act as intelligent predictors to help reliably hire candidates, who go on to become top performers in an organization? 

Once an organization is clear on the KPIs of top performers, they will be able to identify the skills their candidates should possess and demonstrate through the hiring process. The ultimate goal is to have assessments yield the same output, which means an organization is standardizing the hiring process. 

In high-volume hiring, in particular, organizations can still hire a diverse applicant pool. There is no one way to be a top performer because performance is multi-faceted. Therefore, organizations can index the perfect employee, however, know that most individuals will have gaps in different areas, but all are still able to be top performers.

Most standard assessments do not cater to candidate experience, making them ineffective. Do they provide recruiters with some answers? Yes. Do they provide candidates with insight? No. 

This is one of the key contributing factors to high application abandonment because the candidate is not engaged in the process, ultimately driving high attrition because there’s a mismatch in expectations. 

Job simulations create an interactive experience and give candidates a richer understanding of what the role will be like day-to-day. It is equally important to allow candidates to opt out of the hiring process if they decide the position is unsuitable. 

By providing a realistic job preview, organizations set expectations of what the roles and responsibilities are so the candidate can make an informed decision and is more to stay longer because they are not missed expectations when starting the job.

 
Effective pre-employment assessments are achieved by setting clear goals, identifying what a top-performing candidate looks like for each of an organization’s roles, and using a volume recruitment software that helps create tailored assessments and deliver a digital experience that both the TA team and candidates love.

Ben Porr, Ph.D., is Global Vice President, People Science, at Harver. Dr. Ben is an Industrial-Organizational practitioner with expertise across the full employee lifecycle. His technical expertise includes talent assessment, organizational development and people analytics to support workforce planning, selection, training, and succession management. He volunteers on multiple committees and presents his work at local and national conferences. Visit Harver Connect Ben Porr