CareerJournal.com again with this article – Pre-Hire Tests Aim To Stop ‘Fakers’. I like to riff on this topic often. My comment – if we could simply keep the fakers off your payroll, we would be worth our weight in gold. Along those lines, I think the most accurate pricing model for our assessments would be $500 for determining a strong candidate and $1,000 for identifying a weak candidate. I doubt that would fly, but the logic is sound.
Some excerpts:
Despite the tests’ flaws, Dr. Griffith says pre-employment tests are generally more reliable predictors of performance than an interview alone.
Generally? An understatement in my opinion. Our primary focus is in the sales hiring arena and we have yet to encounter a hiring manager who has a perfectly tuned intuition. Every sales manager we have encountered has a sales hiring horror story.
Facing the perennial challenge of hiring the right applicant, more employers have adopted prehire tests in recent years, thanks in part to the Internet making distribution cheaper and easier. About 70% of entry and midlevel jobs at big companies now include testing, says Scott Erker, a senior vice president at Development Dimensions International, a Bridgeville, Pa., human-resources consultancy.
We have seen a significant increase in assessment usage over the past 2 years especially. We offer web-based assessments which are not proctored so fake answers are an issue. The author continues in this vein:
Employers and testing companies are aware that some applicants give misleading answers. So they include questions designed to weed out fakers.
Yes we do. Our assessments provide reliability scores and verification questions.
Sherri Merbach, senior director for organizational development for Orange Lake Resorts, which sells time shares in Florida, says prehire personality tests are especially helpful in hiring salespeople. Sales applicants are usually able to make a good impression — and thus interview well…
Welcome to our world. Most of the sales hiring horror stories we hear involve a smooth-talking sales candidate who appeared strong in the interview. Once they are on the payroll, the sales manager learns that their new salesperson couldn’t close a door.
In case you couldn’t tell, we are unabashed advocates of objective assessments used in conjunction with a structured hiring process.