Introduction

A proliferation of new assessment types in recent years has resulted in much more choice for companies but also more complex decision-making when designing an assessment process. Which assessments should you use and why? How can you be assured that the assessments you have chosen will deliver accurate, fair results?

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This e-book on the fundamentals of assessment is an introduction to the ‘what’, ‘why’, and ‘how’ of assessment.

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Why do we use assessment?

Assessment enables us to measure the extent to which an individual is likely to grow, learn, adapt and develop in a way that is aligned with a role.

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For hiring we use assessments to determine a person's fit to a role, whether it be an external or internal hire. In learning and development, we use assessment to help raise an individual’s awareness of their strengths and development needs.

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Increasingly, assessment is being used across businesses to support internal mobility to offer insight into the strength of the talent pipeline.

The Basics of Assessment Strategy

Once you’ve decided to design and implement a new assessment strategy, the next step is to define and set assessment criteria so that you can choose the best assessments to use. There are six key considerations that will help steer you towards the right assessment solution.

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1. What do you need to measure?

The first step in choosing to assessments comes back to what you are trying to measure. To determine this, you may need to begin with job analysis to define the responsibilities involved and what qualities are important to success. Information can be drawn from job descriptions and person requirements for roles.

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2. What is the purpose of the assessment?

The second step is to think about the context of your assessments. For example, if you are planning assessments for the recruitment of early career and graduate talent, the choice will be different to assessing internal candidates to join a leadership development programme. Some assessments are also only designed for use in either the develop mentor recruitment process. Ensuring your choice of assessment aligns with your assessment context will help ensure outcomes provide you with meaningful information to support decision making.

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3. Who are your assessments for?

Different assessments are designed for different audiences, which will influence the language used and the range of abilities the assessment is designed to assess. Knowing your audience enables you to choose assessments that are not only accurate but are more likely to offer a positive candidate experience.

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4. Is the assessment robust?

There are so many providers and types of tests, it can be difficult to choose reputable assessment providers will share technical details of their assessments to demonstrate that they are validated, reliable and fair. This is an important check to carry out to guarantee the quality of an assessment.

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5. Is the assessment accessible?

The ability to provide accessible assessments for candidates is vital. Check whether the assessments you would like to use can be adapted to ensure they are accessible to individuals with different requirements. This includes being able to make reasonable adjustments to remove disadvantage for candidates with a disability.

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6. Can you ensure a positive candidate experience?

A negative candidate experiences can have impacts on multiple fronts including the bottom line. Virgin Media calculated that the business was losing £4.4 million per year due to poor candidate experience. Ask a diverse group of colleagues to sample the proposed assessments and gather feedback. This will ensure you are happy the experience will be positive for your candidates.

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Are the assessments fair for all?

The foundation of assessment should be fairness. When selecting assessments or designing an assessment strategy, run through the following checklist with your team to explore how objective your proposed approach will be.

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Can your proposed approach to assessment:

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1. Measure only what is important for effectiveness in a particular role?
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2. Be structured and standardised to minimise the risk of error or bias?
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3. Minimise bias that can be introduced by human judgement?
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4. Be underpinned by scientific theory and supported by research data?

Choosing Assessments

Once you’ve decided what you want to measure within your assessment process, you can consider your assessment selection, all of which can now be delivered online, as part of a digitalised process. A variety of assessments are available, depending on your needs.

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For example, some are focused on ability, while others are focused on behaviours or motivation. Whichever assessments you select, they can be combined into a blended assessment for an engaging candidate experience, or, used individually.

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Blended Assessment / Whole-person approach

A blended assessment brings together elements from a variety of tests in one assessment experience. Blended assessments ask less but learn more to get a view of the whole person. A blended assessment is designed for a specific role and organisation, and may include numerical, verbal and logical reasoning, situational judgement items, alongside personality questions.

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Reasoning tests

Reasoning tests typically measure verbal reasoning, numerical reasoning or logical reasoning. These tests measure how quickly and accurately a candidate can process a specific type of information and use it to draw the correct conclusions.

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Situational judgement test

This test measures how a candidate responds to specific scenarios that they are likely to encounter in their role. Scenarios can be brought to life using imagery, video, or animation. In response to each scenario, candidates choose a ‘most effective’ and ‘least effective’ response. The scenario presented in the situational judgment assessment can also evolve depending on how the candidates responds, reflecting a real-life situation.

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Assessment centre

Assessment centre exercises are more practical exercises that assess competencies or behaviours that are important in a role. Assessment centres can be conducted in-person, fully virtual, or a combination of the two. Virtual assessment centres can offer a clear, consistent journey for both candidates and assessors plus time and cost savings in running the centre. Examples of assessment centre exercises include:

• Case study – working through information and developing a presentation or a written response, such as recommendations for a project.
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• Group exercise – focused on how candidates work with others to solve a problem or develop an idea.
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• In-tray – in which candidates are presented with incoming information in real-time to manage and prioritise.
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• Role-play – focused on how a candidate interacts with key stakeholders, for example, how they might coach an underperforming team member.

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Structured interview

Interviews can be used to measure either behavioural competency or technical knowledge. Interviews maybe virtual or in person, one-to one or one with a panel of interviewers. In today’s working environment, video interviews can provide a consistent interview experience for every candidate, removing geographical barriers and significantly reducing costs and administrator resource.

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360 Feedback

This type of assessment is a powerful way of gathering feedback from those we work with post-hire. In this assessment, self-feedback is combined with feedback from colleagues, direct reports, managers and sometimes external clients or suppliers which is mapped against a company’s talent framework to provide feedback to the person being assessed. This type of assessment is primarily designed for use in personal development, leadership development and coaching programmes.

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What are behavioural competencies?

Behavioural competencies are a sum of attitudes, motivations and personality traits that help predict how effective a candidate will be in a role. They are an important part of assessment because they can be correlated to performance in the job, and they enable us to look beyond criteria such as academic record and previous experience.

Creating a Positive Candidate Experience

Candidates are forming a judgement about your organisation when they participate in an assessment process and poor candidate experiences can affect the validity, reliability and fairness of your assessment process. In fact, research by Bright Network found that a poor recruitment experience or a long and complicated application process are the factors most likely to deter applications.

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Conversely, when applicants perceive the assessment process as fair and job related, they are more likely to hold a more positive image of the company, recommend the company to others, accept job offers and perform well on selection tests.

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It’s therefore essential ensure a positive candidate experience.

8 Steps to Creating a Positive Candidate Experience

To ensure you create a positive experience for candidates, consider how you can incorporate thesefactors below into your process.

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1. Ensure that candidates understand what’s involved

Provide candidates with clear information about what the process entails and what to expect. Offer candidates the opportunity to raise questions or make requests if they require any reasonable adjustments in order to be able to participate fairly. Include practice questions and example questions which can help to level the playing field if some candidates have completed similar questions before while others may not have done so.

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What are reasonable adjustments?

A reasonable adjustment is a change that is made to remove or reduce a disadvantage related to a candidate’s disability when applying for a job. This might include the ability to add extra time, compatibility with screen reading software, or the ability to complete the assessment via different media.

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2. Use effective communication at every stage

Consider what communication would be helpful at each stage of the assessment process, from initial invitations, through completion, and after candidates exit the process. The language used in communications should also be carefully thought through to ensure it is clear, accessible, non-binary in terms of gender and that it is appropriate for the role. The automation of some of these tasks can ensure that candidates are kept up to date, and that HR resources are deployed effectively on high-impact touch points with candidates.

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3. Treat candidates with respect

Treating candidates with respect threads through every part of the assessment process, in the language we use and how quickly we reply to queries. A lack of respect or fair treatment through the assessment process can be incredibly damaging to candidate wellbeing and self-esteem. This remains one of the key threats to inclusivity in assessment and it can lead to candidates self-withdrawing from the process.

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4. Recognise the needs of each candidate

Even in high volume recruitment, it is important to ensure every candidate is made to feel that they are an individual. This includes checking whether candidates have any circumstances that might impact their completion and following up to see if they have any concerns. Ensure that assessors and interviewers take steps to build rapport and prepare sufficiently for the assessment.

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5. Consider human factors in assessment

Consider the length of the assessment process and whether you need to factor in breaks for candidates(and assessors and interviewers). Fatigue, hunger and thirst, attention and concentration, memory constraints and overload can all affect candidate experience and therefore, performance.

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6. Offer constructive feedback

It is possible to provide feedback to a candidate in a way that leaves them with a positive impression of your organisation and means they feel they have been valued through your process, even if they have not been successful. Provide advice on how candidates can develop any gaps in their knowledge or skills, which will support them in applying for similar roles in the future.

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7. Respect candidate data

Candidate data includes personal data, such as email addresses and contact details, but also the data from any assessments they complete. Keep candidates informed as to how their data will be used, who will have access to it and how long it will be kept for. Assessment professionals and those involved in the assessment process should also be trained in the relevant data protection and privacy legislation.

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8. Assure candidates of fair, non-discriminatory, assessment

Promoting diversity ensures organisations benefit from the widest possible talent pool and a socio-culturally and cognitively diverse workforce. Fairness and diversity should be considered at every stage of the assessment process and reinforced throughout in the way that organisations communicate with candidates and steps taken to minimise the risk of bias whether this is conscious or unconscious.

The Benefits of Digitalised Assessment

Digital transformation of assessment offers benefits to the business well beyond the assessments themselves. From the first point of contact, automation of communications and self-scheduling improve engagement and participation. Once assessments have been completed, joined up data enables better decision-making and ongoing development planning.

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Beyond this, there are broader benefits of a reduced environmental impact of virtual assessment and improved diversity of candidates through the removal of travel and geographical barriers. From beginning to end, digitalised assessment is better for candidates, for hiring managers and for talent acquisition teams.

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As we move forward into a new phase of economic and labour market recovery, there is an opportunity to enhance assessment with technology.

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Admin task reduction

• Can be 100% virtual or a blend of in-person and virtual
• Simple auto-distribution of schedules, virtual room links and assessment materials to assessors and candidates
• No data entry and collation required
• Easy access to data for auditing and analysis

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Environmental benefits

• Reduced travel
• Reduced need for accommodation
• Reduced printing

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Improved performance

• Faster hiring decisions
• Speed up scoring and shortlisting
• Immediate reporting mapped against your competency framework
• Monitor and provide feedback on fairness and adverse impact

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Engaging and immersive

• Personalised to your brand
• Flexible and secure presentation of materials
• Showcase the benefits of working at your organisation