How does your organisation measure up?

When it comes to assessing emerging talent, is your organisation still using traditional models that are not fit for purpose in the digital age? These questions will help you decide:

Is your assessment process designed for mobile?

We’re using our mobile phones to shop, track our health, stay in touch, play music, take photos, navigate a journey and according to research by Glassdoor, 89% of applicants are using their mobiles in the hiring process.

Therefore, your assessment process needs to work as well,
if not better, on a mobile device. The challenge with traditional assessments is that they were not designed with mobiles in mind. Either they were intended for larger screens, or worse still, they have been transposed online from paper-based assessments and do not suit a digital environment at all.

Look for assessments designed from a truly mobile-first perspective and combine shorter, more challenging questions with sophisticated adaptive scoring techniques, saving candidates time and preventing unnecessary scrolling issues.

What are you looking for?

An effective recruitment process starts with knowing what you’re looking for – understanding the demands of the role will and the factors that will contribute to their success.

How long has it been since you conducted a robust job analysis? Jobs and organisations continuously evolve – and, thanks to modern technology, they are evolving faster than ever, so it’s important to revisit the building blocks of each role on a regular basis. Only then, will you be able to design an assessment process that helps you make the right hiring decisions.

Have you put yourself in their shoes?

The quality of the candidate experience is an increasingly pressing issue for organisations everywhere, particularly as candidates become more sophisticated about researching potential employers. There is a growing recognition of the interdependence between employer and consumer brands, and the negative impact of a poor candidate experience. Many candidates, after all, are also consumers.

Core elements that make up a more candidate-centric approach include good communication, two-way feedback and transparency about the job and organisational culture. So, put yourself in the shoes of your applicants and ask yourself:

• Do you provide clear communications about the assessments themselves and why you’re asking candidates to complete them?
• Do you provide feedback to all your applicants, whether successful or not?
• Do you provide information about what it’s like to work at your organisation, your culture and values?

How fair is your hiring process?

Diversity and social mobility are key issues for organisations, as they seek to ensure they have fair
and inclusive processes for identifying and developing talent. But recruitment practices, if they are not carefully managed, can be open to many kinds of bias that unfairly discriminate against certain people based on age, gender, ethnicity or socio-economic status.

Cognitive ability tests have long been a staple part of graduate recruitment, and research shows them to be a strong predictor of future performance. However, they have also been criticised for potentially having an adverse impact on candidates due to their gender or ethnicity. So, whilst acceptable in a strictly legal sense, they are some distance away from achieving the 100% fairness that organisations are striving for.

Interviews and assessment centres are also problematic, as assessors are prone to making assumptions based on their own unconscious biases. Paper-based assessment centres mean this issue can often be hidden, as organisations miss the opportunity to use the data they capture to identify where assessor judgements can be improved.

Is your process built around your business needs, or the ‘boxed’ solutions of your suppliers?

Many organisations find themselves having to compromise on a customized, brand aligned assessment process which matches the specific requirements of the job, opting instead to buy in a variety of generic, off -the-shelf solutions for reasons of practicality or to avoid prohibitive costs. This can result in a disjointed process, made up of different technologies and suppliers which do not ‘speak’ to each other.

Thankfully, recent technological advances mean that compromise is no longer necessary. It is now possible to build robust, fully customised assessments that not only provide personalised and engaging candidate journeys at an affordable cost.

So, if your current assessment solutions have been shaped by the demands of your technology and your suppliers, rather than by the needs of your business and your candidates, then it might be time for a rethink!

For further insight, download our white paper ‘Passing the test: are your assessments fit for today’s emerging talent?’ or get in touch at info@sovaassessment.com