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AI Pre-Employment Assessments Can Help You Hire Better
Better Headline:
Can AI Pre-Employment Assessments Can Help You Hire Better?
Will AI-powered pre-employment assessments replace the good ‘ol resume? We explore how companies like IBM and Starbucks are skipping the resume with AI.
As a recruiter, you know it’s impossible to evaluate a candidate’s entire career from two sides of a paper. And yet, resumes are the first thing employers ask for when assessing potential candidates.
The Real Problem with Resumes
One of the key issues with traditional resumes is that it’s difficult for recruiters and hiring managers to get a sense of a candidate’s personality. Also, candidates might not be entirely truthful in claims made on their resumes. A survey from CareerBuilder found that 56 percent of hiring managers have caught candidates lying on their resumes. The most common exaggeration seems to be skills and capabilities; over 60 percent of the respondents said they have come across this, and 54 percent said they’ve caught applicants taking liberties when describing the scope of their responsibilities.
Also Read: Many Paths to Success — Making Skills-based Hiring Real
“The majority of screeners spend less than 1 minute reading a resume, that’s hardly a good way to screen candidates. Even if screeners spent more time on resumes, there are still many issues with the resumes themselves. According to HireRight, 85% of people lie on their resume. This includes information that is made to sound better than it actually is as well as information that is completely false. Resumes can also introduce bias, even the most fair-minded screener, can be affected by being aware of things like age, gender and college attended. Studies also show that education, training, and prior experience are not the best predictors of future success,” says Denise Leaser, President at talent assessment solutions provider, WebAssess.
Clearly, the resume isn’t the most accurate representation of a candidate’s skills and abilities. Unfortunately, in hiring though, employers can overlook candidates who’ve followed an unconventional path, in favor of candidates who have the right specific last roles, have the right internships, or a certain number of years of experience. “Even with all the issues with resumes, the biggest issue is with resumes is that tell you what someone might have done, but they can’t tell what they can do or how that translates into what is required for your jobs. By not using a good process to screen candidates, resumes not only hurt great candidates that are screened out but the employer by not hiring the best candidates,” opines Denise.
So, what’s the solution?
Enter pre-employment assessments.
Also read: How to Succeed with AI in Recruiting
What are Pre-Employment Assessments are How Can They Help You Hire Better
Pre-employment assessments can take out the guesswork from talent assessment. Cognitive pre-employment tests can help you understand if a candidate will be able to successfully learn and perform the duties of the role you’re looking to fill. Pre-employment testing also helps determine the candidate’s ability to think quickly, solve problems, and interpret data.
“Cognitive assessments provide much a better way to predict if someone can be successful in your jobs. A good prehire assessment system will also decrease your legal woes by providing a non-biased, legally defensible screening process. Employers spend an enormous amount of time going through hundreds or thousands of resumes. With a good assessment system, like WebAssess, can do a better job screening 1,000 candidates and give you better results in the same amount of time it takes to screen a handful of candidates,” says Denise.
Leading employers like IBM and Starbucks understand this and are ditching the resume to adopt a data-driven approach to talent acquisition. With technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) becoming more accessible to employers of all sizes, recruiters and hiring managers can leverage AI predictions to hire faster and better. By getting all the information you need at the beginning of the hiring process, you can significantly improve key hiring metrics like time-to-fill and quality-of-hire.
Also Read: 3 Ways Artificial Intelligence (AI) will Transform Recruitment
Denise believes AI-driven talent predictions can provide employers with valuable decisions support. She says, “A good assessment system is science-based and has predictive validity behind it to ensure you will get the results you need. Prehire assessments can save thousands of dollars per headcount in turnover costs, not including the higher cost of employing poor performers. And HR tools using AI add a whole new level of screening. With AI you can compare a candidate against an ideal, model employee. AI tools can also analyze the tone of people’s writing to add additional insights into people’s personalities and motivations that screeners can’t see on paper.”
Conclusion
By adopting pre-employment assessments, employers can gain access to valuable hiring insights. AI-driven assessments also empower recruiters and hiring managers to focus their time nurturing and attracting the best candidates for the job. With deep insight into a candidate’s skills and competencies, employers can land the best hires for their organization. “A great prehire assessment system not only saves you an enormous amount of time and money but gives you better results in every area. And that affects the bottom line, especially in a tight labor market where high attrition adds enormous costs. Why not use technology that does a better job, saves time, money and gives you better results?” concludes Denise
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