DETROIT – Are you often caught playing the waiting game during the assessment of a potential hire? Hesitant to hire someone because you just arent sure that the person is the right fit? Todays challenging and competitive business climate makes it essential for managers to place the right people with the right skills in the right jobs quickly. But with limited time to make hiring decisions, multiple candidates and perhaps an over-reliance on subjective interviewing, more managers are turning to Web-based assessments to help identify the best candidates in their staffing process.
Because of its ease of use, Web-based administration of style and skill assessments is rapidly becoming a preferred method that companies use to help them make key hiring and employee development decisions. Applicants for jobs may encounter these assessment activities in the career center on a companys Web site, as part of the interviewing process, or while working with executive search firms. And with the assistance of outside consultants, human resource professionals are employing online assessments internally to identify strengths or provide skill development opportunities. Using objective assessment has the added advantage of providing valuable information about current employees for progression, succession or promotion purposes.
There are some clear benefits of Web-based assessments:
They help increase confidence in decision-making and accelerate development through individualized feedback to maximize contributions to the organization.
They yield high impact data for making the right decisions about employees and potential hires.
They help ensure that potential hires are a good fit for both the job and company culture.
They help identify success factors for executive positions and those that may derail candidates. This is especially true to help identify a persons work style.
They can be used to provide feedback and development suggestions that benefit the individual as well as the organization.
In addition, Web-based assessment tools are more cost-efficient than their predecessors. Generally speaking, assessment content hasnt changed much over the years, but Web-based administration ensures increased efficiencies for the manager as well as the job candidate.
Here are some key strategies for developing a good Web-assessment program:
Make sure the assessments measure what is important for the particular job and show evidence of reliability and validity. Without these critical elements, be skeptical about using the tool.
Understand how the assessment results relate to the requirements of the position or for the purpose of the assessment.
Use professionals to assist in setting up testing systems and to train internal staff to interpret results. Or, hire outside expertise to interpret the data.
Even though Web-based assessments can provide the elements of computerized convenience, the human element remains an important factor in the process. A human resources professional or consultant still must interpret the reports and make judgments as to what the data means in relation to the job and the strength of a candidate or when used for developmental purposes, how it relates to the employees strengths and development needs.
Plus, testing is still only one component of an effective assessment process. Good interviewing skills are always essential in the interpretation of the assessment results. Many organizations also deploy additional methods, such as behavior-based simulations as components of their overall assessment process.
All in all, hiring and promoting candidates is rarely simple. But with the use of effective online technology, the process can be streamlined to provide quicker results for hiring, or high quality information for employee development.
This article was written by Andor Reiber, Vice President, Organizational Consulting Services, Right Management Consultants Great Lakes Region. Right Management has three Michigan offices: Detroit, Grand Rapids, and Kalamazoo.
