BY C. Lee Smith
If you haven’t incorporated skills testing into the hiring process, it’s time to start. A report from the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) shows that using hiring assessment tools is a growing trend. Businesses realize that unbiased assessments can quickly identify top candidates for open positions.
Why Skills Testing is Becoming More Important
Employers are finding it challenging to hire candidates with the skills they need for their open positions. This situation is especially true for employers who are seeking to hire recent college graduates.
While the GPA used to be a focal point, hiring managers now consider other details. The NACE surveyed employers and reports that well over 60% are relying on skills-based hiring. Specifically, employers want to know if a candidate has the ability to do the job.
They are not as concerned with years of experience or a candidate’s background as they used to be.
Types of Hiring Assessment Tools Being Used
If you’re planning to hire a new college grad, you want to be sure they can handle the work. If they can’t, you’ll be spending a lot more time on coaching and training. Even then, if the person is a poor match for the position, they may not stay with you for long.
The most common way of hiring for skill level is to develop a competency-based job description, according to the NACE report. 74% of employers do this. Another 53% use interview rubrics. (Note that the survey allowed employers to select more than one option.)
These tactics may work in some cases. However, eager candidates may stretch the truth during an interview because they really want the job.
Around 64% of employers use assessment tools. For 39%, the tool has been internally created. About 25% use an external assessment tool.
Assessment results present an unbiased account of a candidate’s skill level. When taking an assessment, a candidate has no room to oversell themselves. And the hiring manager is not swayed by someone else’s opinion of a candidate’s abilities.
Skills-Based Hiring
Around 75% of employers reported that this shift to skills-based hiring is slightly or moderately challenging. But the benefits to making this change are quantifiable.
The LinkedIn Economic Graph Research Institute studied the impact of shifting to skills-based hiring. In some industries, such as real estate and equipment rental, hiring managers “could see a massive 86.4 times increase in potential candidates.”
One explanation for this change is that employers and applicant tracking systems will not only look at a candidate’s previous job titles. In the past, the lack of a match between a previous job title and the one being applied for meant a candidate was excluded. These exclusions were happening even if a candidate possessed applicable skills.
Analysts also reported that the Gen Z hiring pool can increase by 6.8 times when skills-based hiring is used. In the past, these candidates may have been overlooked because they lacked enough years of experience. But with a skills-based focus, responsibilities they learned in one position often apply in another position. The same logic applies to candidates who may not have a 4‑year degree.
When skills-based hiring is combined with hiring assessment tools, managers increase their chances of finding a star employee.
When to Ask Candidates to Take Skills-Based Tests
Hiring new employees can be time-consuming. You don’t want to overlook a highly skilled candidate. And you also don’t want to waste time interviewing a high-energy conversationalist who doesn’t know how to code, for example.
To save time, ask candidates to take a psychometric assessment before the interview. This type of assessment, such as TeamTraitTM, typically includes a skills test. Around 90% of employers who use these tests roll them out at the interview stage.
The resulting data quickly reveals which candidates should move forward in the hiring process. When the assessment results show some potential for a candidate to succeed, you may want to interview them. In this case, use the results to guide the questions you’ll ask the candidate. And you may opt to have them complete a project as a further test of their skills.
Why Employers Have Not Shifted to Skills-Based Hiring
Employers report several reasons for not moving to a skills-based hiring process. Over half of the NACE respondents note that getting buy-in from their managers has been a problem. In 30% of organizations, the lack of hiring assessment tools is the issue. Don’t let these administrative details slow you down. Remind your manager that hiring the wrong person is likely more expensive than the cost of a good tool to assess applicant skills.
Photo by RDNE Stock project on Pexels.
