Many hiring managers look at their hiring process and think they should use some type of assessment process. They implement some assessments and check off the box. Done. But when it comes to how you use your hiring assessments, just checking off the box is not enough and leaves big opportunities to improve your company untouched. If you find yourself simply saying "yes, we use hiring assessments" then you may not be leveraging pre-hire assessments to their full capabilities. In fact, you might even hinder your own talent acquisition effectiveness.
Pre-hire assessments are powerful talent acquisition tools. They’re sophisticated pieces of technology that can help provide valuable insights about candidates, identify top talent, and drive improved hiring decisions. But like any other piece of technology, if you’re only using it for one dimensional purpose, you’re missing out on its true potential.
The difference, however, is that while you’re missing out on most of the benefits, you’re also harming your talent acquisition process indirectly. Some of these risks are:
- Poor Measurements: By taking a passive approach with your hiring assessments, you’re not directly investing the resources necessary to make them effective. And since you’re using these hiring assessments to measure, evaluate, and ultimately make hiring decisions on your candidates, the passiveness means you won’t get a good read on your candidates and won’t truly know where they lack and excel.
- Lack of Improvement: By just taking a checklist approach to hiring, you limit your ability to improve your hiring process. Your pre-hire process can be used to inform your recruiting team and department leaders about your quality of hire. This can help you build a better talent pool with both external and internal job candidates. You’ll find your company is struggling to improve quality of hire because one of the tools you’re using to select those employees isn’t giving you the feedback you need.
- Unreliable Data: One of the biggest drivers in hiring improvements today is the use of data analytics, and one of the best places to start collecting data is at the start of the hiring process. By nature, your assessments can be used to collect data that you can analyze, evaluate, and leverage for improvement opportunities. However, if your assessments are flawed and unfocused, you’re doing yourself – and your data collection – a giant disservice in the short and long term.
- Retention & Quality: Two big things that your assessments can help measure are potential attrition rates for candidates, as well as the quality of said candidate. By not investing in your hiring assessments and taking a “having assessments is enough” approach, you’re not properly evaluating how well a candidate will perform in the job, or how long they’ll even stay at the job. These once-fluid concepts are now measurable through assessments – provided the assessment is designed well.
Don't fall in the trap that you're doing enough just by having a hiring assessment. Take the time to build a truly powerful recruiting tool that can boost your talent acquisition processes, as well as improve the quality of the candidate you hire. For more information about pre-hire assessments, contact us today or download our e-book on a rock-solid quality of hire report card below:
Topics: Better Interviewing