• Employment prospects are improving and hiring activity is increasing in almost all jurisdictions. The pace is faster in Canada, Australia and New Zealand but all of the G7 countries are trending in this direction.  If you are not hiring right now you will probably need to do so within the next few months.
• As employment and hiring activity pick up, competition for the best candidates will increase which in turn will drive a need to reduce the time to hire. This is already the case for those seeking IT and Software Development personnel.
• Businesses are still licking their wounds and rebuilding balance sheets from the 2009 recession so they need to do everything more quickly, more simply and at a lower cost, while still being effective – a very tall order to fill.
• In comparison to 20 or even 10 years ago businesses are employing fewer people while expecting them to assume greater responsibility and to be more productive than their predecessors. To accomplish this end businesses have to continuously seek to improve the quality of their hires.

How can you clear all of these hurdles? The following three initiatives will make your business more competitive and effective in finding top performers for your positions:

1. Know What You Are Looking For: You can’t possibly hire the best if you haven’t defined what characteristics differentiate top performers from the rest of the persons you employ in any position. Job analysis will enable you to identify the key characteristics for job success to provide better job descriptions, job ads and behavioral interview questions.
2. Move to Online Recruiting: Start with a career web site for a central source of job posting and candidate information. Couple your career web site with an online Applicant Processing System (“APS”) that enables applicants to apply for jobs posted on your career web site and enables you to identify the best candidates. These two steps will reduce your time and/or increase your quality of hire – guaranteed. Your APS will enable you to collect resumes and required applicant information, administer screening questions, administer your Prevue Assessments and receive all of this information instantaneously. In a tight labor market you can respond immediately to the best prospects. If there are too many applicants for your job openings your APS can automatically filter out the best candidates with screening questions and Prevue job fit scores. You focus your attention on selecting the best instead of sifting through a pile of resumes.
3. Source Smarter: You have to fill your recruiting funnel with good prospects if you want to make good hires. Give some thought to where the best applicants for your types of job postings will likely seek employment and make sure you are positioned to get in front of those applicants. This could be a paid job board like Monster or an industry specific job board. Expand your search to social networks and the hundreds of free job boards that should be accessible through your APS. You should be able to automate the posting process through your APS to source the most qualified candidates faster. Also consider going beyond the job boards to sourcing passive job seekers who are not actively seeking a position through postings on major social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

If you think these three steps sound too time consuming or expensive, you are wrong. Your Prevue Distributor can show you how to implement all of these steps efficiently and economically.

Written by: Ken Danderfer

March, 2011

The Prevue Selection report is the most frequently used report.  It is designed to assist in hiring decisions by utilizing job benchmarks and matching candidates’ scores to the benchmarks.  Below are some frequently asked questions that we receive from Customers.

Q:  I need to assess the Abilities only.  Can this be done and is a report available for the Abilities only?

A:  Prevue introduced the Abilities only assessment and the associated Learning & Reasoning report in August 2008.

For the assessment, you may assess candidates on the Abilities only by first establishing a Prevue Position with the scope “WNS1S2”.  Then create the Position’s benchmark and activate it before you establish an Activity for your position.  Be sure to set the assessment scope in your Activity to “WNS1S2” to ensure you assess the Abilities only when inviting candidates to this activity.

Once the candidates complete the Abilities only assessment, you may use the Prevue Online Report Viewer to generate the Learning & Reasoning report which is an abbreviated Selection-type report that looks at the Abilities only.

Q:  The Position’s benchmark does not seem to screen out candidates very well.  What should we do?

A:  Clients sometimes find that benchmark scale ranges have been set too short being only 3 stens wide, particularly for scales that are not proven to be key factors in job performance for a particular position.  This will affect a job incumbent’s ability to land on the benchmark, thereby reducing their overall benchmark suitability score.  It is recommended that benchmarks be reviewed periodically and adjustments made where necessary.  This is part of the benchmark validation process.

Q:  The Hiring Report Family has 3 other report types in addition to the Selection report.  How and when should these other reports be used?

A:  The Learning & Reasoning report can be used when assessing on Abilities only for selection.

The Working Characteristics report augments the Selection report that provides a five-page report describing how the candidate prefers to be paid, how important work is, how risky their decision making is, how they deal with change and their perception of the world.

The Individual report does not match candidates’ scores against a Position’s benchmark.  It only displays the candidates’ scores on the Prevue Assessments.  Due to the absence of a benchmark this report does not provide interview questions.

Using the Prevue Selection Report

The Prevue Selection report is the most frequently used report.  It is designed to assist in hiring decisions by utilizing job benchmarks and matching candidates’ scores to the benchmarks.  Below are some frequently asked questions that we receive from Customers.

Q:  During the hiring process, at which point should I use the Prevue Selection Report?

A: The Prevue Selection Report is part of the Hiring family of reports.  It is often used for initial screening.  Most customers opt to utilize the Prevue Selection report after short listing their candidates from the initial group, and prior to either the first or second interview.  This decision is influenced by the cost of using Prevue Assessments for screening and selection.  Those who have subscribed for unlimited use of Prevue Assessments invariably use Prevue for both screening and selection.

Q:  How much weight should the Prevue Selection report have in our hiring decisions?

A:  It is recommended that the weight given to Prevue scores should not exceed one -third (1/3) of your decision making process.  The other two-thirds (2/3) should come from the resume review, interviews and background checks.

Q: Can the text or language in the Prevue Selection report be modified?

A: The text in the Selection reports is driven by the candidates’ responses to the questions and the resulting scores.  You will not be able to amend the text; however, you may choose the “Style” of the Position to allow for role specific text at the time you develop or modify the Prevue benchmark for a Position.  The “Style” of the Selection report is driven by the “Style” set for the Position.  The Position’s Style may be edited and saved, before regenerating the Selection report using the Report Viewer, until the desired style of text appears in the Selection reports.

Q:  I don’t want to use the full assessment.  Can I assess job incumbents for Interests & Personality Only?

A: Yes, you may assess for Interests & Personality only.  You must use an Activity with the assessment scope set to “IP” to ensure you assess Interests & Personality only when inviting candidates to take the assessment.  If you have a previously established the Position with a full scope of WNS1S2IP, you may use this Position when creating an activity, or generating reports using the Report Viewer by limiting the scope to IP.

If you do not have a Position or Position specific Activity, you may use one of the default Activities in PrevueOnline.com designed to assess specific portions of the assessment.  Simply select the Activity called, “Assessment Only – IP (Coaching)” when you use the Prevue Wizard to invite candidates.

Although not extensively promoted, a software career planning application of the Prevue Assessments was introduced in North America as early as 1995 under the Career Mapper brand. A UK version of Career Mapper was developed in 2001 supported by the UK Occupations 2000 job taxonomy, a significant improvement over the earlier North American version. Online testing was developed for the UK version in 2003 but required the use of Career Mapper software to generate a report. Career Mapper was merged into the Prevue family with the introduction of Prevue for Careers in the UK in early 2009.

A new North American version of Prevue for Careers is to be designed in 2011, prompted in part by the success of the UK version, but more significantly by some very exciting new Prevue research and development work that will be brought to market in 2011. The Prevue psychometricians have been mapping the scales of the Prevue Assessments to the relevant domains of the O’NET Job Content model. This research will ultimately enable the development of valid Prevue Benchmarks for every occupation in the O’NET-SOC Job Taxonomy starting with the 1000+ occupations that are currently available. Although this research was initiated for the purpose of developing a valid and reliable Prevue Benchmark Library for screening and selection applications, it will be obvious that the use of the Benchmark Library is a slam dunk opportunity for matching career seekers to the 1000 + occupations in the O’NET-SOC job Taxonomy. Not only will Users be able to identify their best job match prospects, they will have immediate access to extensive information regarding the requirements and demands of any position in the Taxonomy.

If you would like more information on this subject or would be interested in acting as an advisor in the design of the new North American version of Prevue for Careers, please send us a note to that effect at support@prevueassessments.com.

We hope all of you are looking forward to 2011 as much as we here are at Prevue Assessments. Prevue for Careers is only one of several developments we’ll be working on through 2011. We hope it will ultimately be recorded as a watershed year for everyone in the Prevue family. We extend our best wishes to all of you for a healthy, happy and productive 2011.

Written by Ken Danderfer
December 10, 2010

Question  1.  Do you feel that the worst of the recession is behind us?

Answer 1:

Yes: 56.3%

No: 43.8%

Question 2: Have you shrunk, maintained or grown your business in 2010?

Answer 2:

Shrunk:  37.5%

Maintained: 40.6%

Grown: 21.9%

Question 3:  Do you see 2011 as a growth year?

Answer 3:

Yes: 68.8%

No: 31.3%

Question 4:  How would you rate your overall satisfaction level with Prevue Assessments, with one (1) being very unsatisfied and five (5) being extremely satisfied?

Answer 4:

1: 0%

2: 0%

3: 28.1%

4: 43.8%

5: 28.1%

Question 5: Please explain the reason for the rating you gave in question #4.

“Assessments have always provided us with an accurate of the candidates that we have interviewed and are considering hiring.”

“Quick response time, informative results, great customer service.”

“Good response on questions; the software works consistently, and when it’s being upgraded, you keep us informed on delays or possible issues; and the product is useful to our clients”

“The assessment is solid, but the report could use a bit more sizzle.  Lesser assessments turn prospects heads more, requiring a bit of education on why the Prevue is so good.”

“Combined with our own testing of skills, Prevue gives us a good profile of the candidates we are interviewing.  It is usually apparent whether they will be a good fit for us.”

Question 6: How Have you used Prevue Assessments in 2010?

“Recruiting/Selection – 95%; Personal development/succession planning – 5%”

“Making selections on college recruits”

“All candidates must complete the Prevue online.  Hiring teams use the results to assess job fit.

“Hiring and development in mid-to-upper-level positions; team building primarily with executive and management teams.”

“In 2010, I used the assessments the same as in previous years…as part of Training and Coaching programs.  This past year saw a return of other consultants’ businesses that access Prevue through me, which helped me, in essence, ‘sell’ more assessments.”

Question 7: Do you see your use of Prevue Assessments changing in 2011?  If so, how?

“Similar volumes unless we can get new reports and industry specific reports for an area such as health care.  This is a growth area in recruiting yet we do not have anything industry specific.  Clients have asked for “what does the industry do?””

“Succession Planning (more proactive; less reactive)”

“Possibly – would like to use it more in team and development vs. hiring which was a bulk of 2010 business.”

Question 8: If you could change one thing about the Prevue Reports, what would it be?

“Your changes seem to be ahead of the curve.”

“Show a composite graph page with multiple scores without having to generate a benchmark report.”

Question 9: What do you need from the Team at Prevue that currently is not available?

“Industry specific benchmarks for health care.”

“Quick users guide and some easy to understand reference material.  Every hiring mistake could have been avoided if we had a better understanding of the Prevue tool.”

“Comparison tool to allow us to show groups their complementary strengths.”

“You could offer some tele seminars on interpretation; unique applications for Prevue; marketing tips”.

Based on the feedback received, Prevue will take away the following action items to incorporate into our 2011 planning:

• Continue to develop tools to support hiring efforts;
• Develop a Benchmark Library;
• Develop industry specific offerings; and
• Prevue Reports will undergo upgrades.

• Assessments are job suitability tests that are given to job applicants either online or in pencil and paper format before they are hired or promoted.  Assessments are also used for coaching, training and team building activities.
• To be most effective, the assessment should be designed to specifically test for qualities or attitudes that are important for the job by comparing the applicant to a benchmark of the knowledge, skills, abilities and behavior required in the job.
• Tests are based on valid principles of psychology and should be designed and developed by occupational psychologist with expertise in job profiling and test design. Such persons are referred to as Psychometrists.

Q&A

1. What kinds of small businesses find these assessments most helpful? (e.g. size of company, industries)

A: The heaviest use of testing is for the following types of jobs;

• Managerial/supervisory at the entry and mid levels of management
• Technical professionals like programmers
• Sales
• Customer Service
• Call Centres

2. What is the average cost of a new hire for a small business?  This would be based on research you might have done in support of your service.

A:  Cost to hire data is generally only collected by larger companies that have a recruiting department or by recruiting firms. Smaller companies tend to focus more on cost of turnover. In other words, what is the cost of a bad hire? I’ve commented on this subject in question # 5.

3. What problems or challenges do assessments resolve for small business?

A:  Testing is generally focused on two aspects of job performance. The first and most simple is “Skills testing” to measure knowledge on subjects like software programs. The second and somewhat more mysterious is “Job Fit testing” to match applicants to the demands or preferred behaviours of specific positions, usually measured by abilities, interests and personality tests (the Prevue Assessments are Job Fit Assessments).

There is an old saying that “people are hired on skills and fired on fit”. Skills testing assure the candidate actually has the knowledge required for a position while Job Fit testing provides information on whether the candidate will be comfortable addressing the demands of the position in terms of things like ability to assimilate new information quickly, conscientiousness, interest in working with people, capacity to deal with stress, etc.

4. How expensive and time-consuming is it to get an assessment prepared?

A:  With the advent of online testing in the 1990’s the time required to administer a test to job applicants has been reduced to minutes. The cost of testing is usually dependent on the volume of tests used by an employer, and depending on the types of tests that are used and the amount of support required or requested by the employer.  Prevue Distributors may also charge a consulting fee.

5. How many hires or how long do you expect it would take for the assessments to pay for themselves in saved HR costs?

A:  We expect our Prevue Assessments will more than pay for themselves from the first hire made with the use of assessments. Most turnover is caused by lack of job fit – things such as the inability to close sales, reluctance to make sales calls, failure to make timely decisions, failure to complete and deliver reports, failure to show up to work on time. Information from valid and reliable job fit assessments can provide insight into the characteristics that cause these behaviours.

Cost of turnover has been proven to be at least 30% of an employee’s annual salary and anywhere up to 100% of that annual salary, depending on the extent of recruiting and training costs that are related to the position. So if you can reduce turnover by even as little as 5 to 10%, the cost of testing the best 2 or 3 applicants for a position is pretty cheap relative to the return – and that ignores the cost and interruption to the performance of the manager and fellow workers.

6. How do you think the assessments would help an immigrant business owner (or someone whose first language is not English) to improve their business?

A: This is tough one. Although the concept of typing people based on intelligence, personality and interests goes back almost as far as recorded history, modern business testing was only borne in WW II through the efforts of the English and the British to place people in military positions where they would be most effective. Thus most test development has, until recently, been based upon a white English speaking population. That situation and the use of assessments have however undergone significant change over the last 25 years with the introduction of testing in virtually every corner of the globe. Thus, we at Prevue Assessments have developed and validated versions of our Prevue Assessments in French, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch and Arabic and are scheduled to complete translations to German, Russian, Mandarin, Polish and Japanese.

Testing is definitely finding a market in all cultures and languages so there is no reason why immigrant business owners should not take advantage of these tools in whatever language they or their job applicants prefer.

WHY ORGANIZATONS ARE USING ASSESSMENTS

Over 80% of study participants use assessments in the hiring process. The following graph identifies the top 5 business outcomes or improvements that are sought by companies from the use of pre-hire assessments:

While almost all companies use assessments during the hiring process, only 50% of survey participants use assessments for current workforce management.  Nonetheless, the interest in using assessments for internal human resource management is increasing and particularly for the following applications:

WHAT ASSESSMENTS ORGANIZATIONS ARE USING

The most common types of assessments used by business continue to be personality, skills and cognitive abilities assessments.  New developments in testing such as simulations and bio data analysis are getting a lot of press but seem to be limited in the uptake.

The hiring process used by most organizations also continues to be following the classic steps of resume review, reference checks, prescreening questions, testing, interviews and background investigations. Although 70% + of respondents use or plan to use social media sites for sourcing job applicants, only 20% or so believe such sites are effective tools for determining candidate fit or will have a major impact on how talent is recruited, measured and managed.

ASSESSMENT USAGE BY JOB TYPE

Although assessments are used for virtually all types of jobs, organizations are using assessments more commonly in hiring for the following positions:

• Managerial/supervisor positions at the entry and mid level
• Technical/professional (particularly for knowledge and skills testing)
• Sales
• Customer service
• Administrative

ASSESSMENT EVALUATION BY ORGANIZATIONS

Despite the fact that most organizations (over 70%) pay lip service to proving the return on investment (“ ROI”) or effectiveness of the hiring tools and processes they use, only 50% of organizations actually do anything about it.

Those companies that do evaluate their use of assessments primarily focus on turnover/retention metrics and supervisor ratings to measure the effectiveness. Although companies can measure all of the desired business outcomes or improvements outlined above (as well as training effectiveness, legal compliance and financial metrics like sales revenue per hire), few companies actually do so.

So why is there such a gap between good intentions and practice?  Both the surveys reviewed in this article and our experience at Prevue Assessments suggest the primary cause is the unwillingness of organizations to commit the time and personnel required to gather and analyze data necessary to prove ROI.  Prevue Assessments will be endeavoring to bridge this gap in the future by creating new online data gathering facilities to simplify both the collection and analysis of ROI data to prove the effectiveness of using Prevue products. If you have interest in this subject we would appreciate your observations and suggestions.

The surveys reviewed in this article cover a wide range of subjects beyond those highlighted in this article.  Complete copies of the surveys can be obtained by email request to support@prevueassessments.com.

Bibliography

1. 2009 Rocket-Hire Pre-Employment Assessment usage Survey, Mark C. Healey and Charles A Handler Ph.D.
2. 2010 Global Assessment Trends Report, Sarah S. Fallaw, Ph.D., Andrew L. Solomonson, Ph.D., Previsor Talent Measurement.