There
is no substitute for personally interviewing job candidates.
However, the focus of the personal interview has dramatically
changed. Recent advances in assessment technology have
brought about significant advances in the quality of
information provided by assessment instruments. The
purpose of this article is to encourage you to explore
some of the possibilities available with these new selection
tools.
Use
assessments earlier in the process. It saves time and
money. Too often companies conduct multiple interviews
with a candidate, consuming many hours of time before
using an assessment instrument. When the candidate is
found to be a poor match for the job in question, the
company finds itself in a quandary: Believe the interviews
or believe the test? Experience has shown in far too
many cases, that the assessment's objective information
was more reliable. A more effective and economical strategy
is to limit the initial interview to a brief meeting
with the candidate to satisfy any critical elements
of job suitability, such as certain skills or education,
available transportation, availability for the position,
grooming, language capability, etc. If that brief interview
finds the candidate worthy of further investments of
time and money, the next step is to complete a quick
survey, such as FirstView™, which is designed to assess
the candidate's suitability for the position. This allows
you to screen out unsuitable candidates before spending
hours of valuable management time.
Professional
interviewers feel that "at best", they can
avoid poor performers 70% of the time. This is sometimes
possible with unlimited interviewing time, using the
most sophisticated interviewing techniques. With tools
like FirstView, an average manager, with little training
in interviewing, will have a higher success rate than
the professionals. With such tools, an experienced interviewer
can discover remarkable insights into a candidate's
future performance and even their future potential in
other positions.
New
assessment tools provide interview questions selected
specifically for each candidate. These questions direct
your attention to each candidate's challenges in a particular
job. Our reports include behavioral event interview
questions for the selected Job Category. These questions
are selected based on the candidate's traits and/or
abilities measured by the assessment. You have a choice
of 4-5 behavioral interview questions per trait. The
Report also alerts you to areas of concern that are
critical to job performance in a particular Job Category.
Assessments
can provide up to one-third (1/3) of the information
for a hiring decision. You must obtain the other two-thirds
(2/3) utilizing interviews, background checks and other
resources. Assessments can tell you how well a candidate's
personality traits and cognitive abilities match the
traits and cognitive abilities required for success
in a particular job. Then you add your own questions,
which are typically more directed at exploring the candidate's
skills, experience, and personal attitudes and values,
to what the assessment provided. These other "non-assessment"
activities enable you to determine how well the candidate
matches your company's culture. It also allows you to
determine how well their skills and experience match
those necessary for the job. These three sets of information
(assessment for personality traits and cognitive abilities,
review of skills and experience, and interviews to determine
company fit and attitudes), plus references, background
checks, and other possible sources, combine for a fairly
complete picture of probable job performance and one
that is a sound basis for a hiring decision.
Once
suitable candidates have been identified, your interview
time can be used to examine
how the candidates' skills and experience can be integrated
into the company to the greatest advantage. By screening
out unsuitable candidates, assessments free you from
trying to answer the question, "Can this person
do the job?" You can use your interview time to
answer the question, "Which of the candidates who
fit the job can do the job best?" |