In this guest post, Ray Slater Berry details the benefits of pre-employment testing and how it can improve new hire culture fit and employee retention.
Pre-employment testing is a useful way of learning more about the candidates you wish to hire. When it comes to recruitment, a lot of businesses rush the process or end up making the wrong decisions. The result is a new employee that may not be right for the job and could end up hindering your company’s progress.
That’s why conducting pre-employment tests is just one of the ways in which you can better your chances of finding the right recruit. Hiring remotely can be challenging when you’re not physically meeting the candidates. You have to rely on what you hear and see from the candidate over the phone or via video conferences.
If you’re hiring remotely this year, then there are some major benefits and reasons as to why you should incorporate pre-employment testing. In this article, you’ll learn more about pre-employment tests, what types exist and how they benefit your recruiting process.
What is pre-employment testing?
Pre-employment testing is an assessment that a candidate would undertake as part of the job they’re applying for. It can be done at any point throughout the process, with some tests being done prior to interviews and others taking place during the second or third round of interviews.
Each employment test will depend on the role that’s being advertised and is intended for the recruiters to gather information on each candidate. There’s only so much you can get when reading a resume or asking questions during an interview. With pre-employment tests, they can be great for showing proof of talents, skills, or knowledge that they claim to have.
It’s a worthwhile practice, especially with jobseekers not always being truthful in their resumes and in interviews. A survey done by ResumeLab found that 36% of Americans admitted to lying on their resumes. These tests are therefore useful to sift out anyone who has overly exaggerated.
Five reasons why you should use pre-employment testing when hiring remotely
There are a number of reasons why pre-employment testing is helpful and are being utilized more so for businesses of all shapes and sizes. As a remote company, it’s handy to use these tests to fill the gaps that a physical interview would often provide. So what reasons are there for helping your business implement this process within your recruiting process?
1. Saves time and money — even for remote companies!
One of the biggest benefits that come from pre-employment testing is the fact it saves a lot of time and money. Recruitment isn’t cheap and it can often cost a lot of money from hiring agencies to advertising on the right platforms. For the majority of recruiters, there’s a lot of money that’s spent on their cost-per-hire. For some, it can be anywhere up to $3,000 per position!
It’s not just about the money either. For recruitment, it means that certain employees will have to take time out of their day to conduct interviews. That can often lead to less time being spent on the work their role requires them to do.
Failure to hire the right candidates can mean repeating the process and spending even more time on recruiting. It’s the resources that are also being used up when trying to hire the right person for the role.
2. Provides a more tailored experience with specific tests
A great way of identifying the right candidates for the role is through a pre-employment test. Some tests are more generic whilst others are fairly specific to the role that’s being recruited.
For example, if you’re recruiting for a data analyst, then you might find a test that assesses the candidate’s ability to work with data, the most useful. General tests like communication and culture tests are beneficial for those entering most types of roles, rather than being specific to one in particular.
3. Helps find the right person for the role in question
Hiring a remote role is one that you want to get right. Despite perhaps never meeting this employee in person, you still want someone who can get the job done.
When recruiting, you may come across a number of candidates that appear good on paper but in reality, aren’t capable of doing the job efficiently. It’s then too late when you’ve hired them based on their resume and interview responses alone.
Pre-employment testing can help you identify the top-quality candidates so that you’re picking from the best of the bunch, rather than the opposite. There’s nothing worse than hiring remotely for it to result in a person that’s not the right fit for the job.
4. Improves employee retention
Keeping your employees happy in their jobs can prove challenging. If an employee isn’t right for the role or satisfied with their experience in the role, they might walk sooner. A study conducted by Kronos found that 87% of human resource leaders have placed employee retention as a top priority for the next few years. Employee retention can be improved by using pre-employment tests, because they help to gauge exactly which candidate is right for the job. Satisfaction in the role is also important, which can be learned from specific tests conducted as well as the interview itself.
5. Creates better working relationships
Working remotely can sometimes make the building of work relationships more difficult. However, pre-employment testing can be handy for learning more about the candidate before hiring. These tests can explore below the surface of what regular interviews will achieve. There can be a lot of direct and indirect questions that explore the candidate’s personality and values. These all help in painting a clearer picture of the employee and how they’d fit into the dynamic of the company.
What types of pre-employment tests are there?
There are a number of pre-employment test types that can be considered when it comes to hiring remotely.
Integrity tests
These tests help to measure the reliability of the candidate that you’re looking to hire. Of these tests, there are two types; overt and covert integrity tests.
The overt integrity tests help to evaluate the candidate’s levels of honesty and behaviors that could be counterproductive. Examples of these questions could be:
- What do you do when you make a mistake? Do you own up to it?
- What has been your biggest failure in life?
- Would you consider taking stationery supplies or work supplies in general, stealing from the workplace?
Covert integrity tests are more personality-based questions that take an indirect approach in their questions.
- Do you like being told what to do?
- Would you consider yourself to be a risk-taker?
- Are you a people pleaser?
Job knowledge tests
These tests will often cater to the specific role in question. With these tests, they’re a great indicator of proving the candidate’s knowledge and experience within the role or industry. It’s a good one for those looking to spot genuine applicants over those that don’t know enough about the position they’re applying for.
Cognitive tests
A useful test for helping understand the capacity that the candidate has for the role itself. This can often be in the form of a GAT (General Aptitude Test). This may involve spatial awareness, numerical reasoning, learning agility, etc. These problem-solving abilities are what many employers would look for in their candidates.
Skills assessment tests
Assessing the skills of the candidate is key. The candidate can say or state on their resume that they have certain skills but the proof is in the pudding. A skills assessment test will typically focus on the skill or skills you’re wanting to see done as they would be on a typical day-to-day basis.
Personality tests
While the ability to perform all the duties of the role is the crucial requirement for a job, personality is also key. It can be worthwhile to conduct pre-employment testing to assess their personality. After all, you want someone to fit in with the company culture and get on with other staff, even when working remotely.
Physical tests
This isn’t always necessary and within remote working, it’s likely not going to be used. However, it’s worth knowing about physical tests that assess the physical ability of the candidate. This might be required for certain roles that are somewhat strenuous on the body.
When hiring for candidates remotely, pre-employment testing can help you dive deeper into the candidate’s skills and personality when it’s needed. Recruiting for remote employees can often lack parts of a traditional recruitment process. With these tests, you can help hire the right people for your business.
Do you think pre-employment testing could help organizations hire better candidates? Connect with Virtual Vocations on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube to share your thoughts and tips. We’d love to hear from you!
Author Bio
Ray Slater Berry is the content lead at Skale. He has been working in social media, content marketing, and SEO for nine years. He specializes in the tech, innovation, design, and product sectors. He has also written about pre-employment screening tests such as c# coding test.
