Pre-employment testing has seen a dramatic increase in popularity over the past few years. As applicant pool growth is increasing due to the ease of applying online for jobs, recruiters and hiring managers are increasingly relying on data-driven talent management techniques that simplify the hiring process. The American Management Association (AMA) has found that pre-employment testing is on the rise over the past 15 years. According to the AMA data:
Figure 3: According the American Management Association (AMA) surveys, 70% of employers conduct some type of job skill testing. 46% of employers perform personality or psychological tests on potential employees and applicants, while 41% of employers screen applicants for basic literacy and math skills.
One way to maximize the effectiveness and efficiency of pre-employment testing is to use multiple types of tests. It is common to test aptitude, personality, and skills, as well as personality. Employers can use more than one test to evaluate a candidate, which allows them to provide more objective and reliable data that will help streamline the hiring process.
What kind of results can companies expect from pre-employment testing? It is important that you have realistic expectations and goals for the results of a pre-employment program. By using professionally-developed, validated testing instruments, employers are adding objective, data-driven metrics to the hiring process. Employers can make incremental improvements to their hiring process and reduce the chance of making bad hires. It should dramatically simplify the hiring process and result in demonstrable improvements to a company's productivity, turnover, training and hiring costs. This streamlining should yield tangible benefits - an ROI Calculator can show the company what returns it can expect to implement testing.
Skills tests assess job-related skills. They can be broad like communication, math and verbal skills or more narrow like typing and computer skills. These skills are acquired skills candidates have gained through their education and careers. They do not reflect basic aptitude, but rather reflect the candidate's prior experience.
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Data for the AMA are based upon surveys from its members, which tend to be larger organizations. Criteria Corp believes that small and medium-sized companies should be able to take pre-employment tests. Our mission is to make these assessments available to all organizations.
They are not intended to be a guideline for job-related skills.