The importance of selecting the right candidate for a task can’t be discounted as a bad choice can harm your business in significant ways. While some organizations depend on recruitment agencies to do this job, it is quite a risky thing to do. It is better to also use standardized tests to measure a candidate’s skills.
Why Are Assessments Important for Hiring?
Traditionally, hiring has been a very subjective process. The hiring committee made use of their own life experiences and observations to select the ideal candidate.
However, in today’s age, you can’t compromise on certain skills required for the job because of the decentralized nature of business operations. Therefore, it is very important to test a candidate’s skills using the ability tests.
Importance of Differentiating Between Aptitude and Interest
Aptitude is often mistaken for Interest. It is important to clarify that these are two very different things. While a person may have an aptitude for mathematics, he/she might not be interested in it. At the same time, a person with an interest in art might not be good at it.
Therefore, it is very important to keep in mind that a candidate that has both interest and an aptitude for the job is the ideal one.
Types of Ability Tests
These are Achievements and Aptitudes. Achievements are a measure of a person’s knowledge, accomplishments, and training in the past. Aptitudes indicate a person’s ability to learn something in the future.
While achievements are very important indicators of a person’s eligibility for the job, these shouldn’t be the only ones to lead the hiring process. What an individual has to offer for the future is an equally promising aspect to consider.
Types of Aptitude Tests
It is important to carefully consider the details of the job when deciding on the kind of aptitude test to make use of. Here are a few kinds of these:
Knowledge Tests
These are a measure of a candidate’s understanding of a specific part of a job. For example, if you are looking for an accountant, he/she can be asked to apply a few formulas.
Skills Tests
Skill tests measure a person’s ability to accurately perform a significant part of a job. For-example you can test a person’s typing speed for a position of a data entry specialist.
Ability Tests
Ability tests measure a person’s mental abilities. An individual can be presented with a scenario and might be asked to find a solution. An example could be the common business question “Can you sell me this pen?”
Personality Tests
Personality tests measure an individual’s openness, extroversion, compliance, dutifulness, and emotional balance.
Advantages of Aptitude Tests
Some of these are:
Celerity and Cost-Effectiveness
Aptitude tests can speed up the screening of candidates by offering real-time reporting and quicker results uploading. These are also a cheaper choice than traditional means.
Testing Large Number of Candidates at the Same Time
Aptitude tests can make your job easier by allowing you to test a lot of candidates. As these tests are standardized, you can ensure that each candidate has an equal opportunity to perform well on the test.
Objective and Efficient Comparisons
Properly and efficiently designed aptitude tests can offer great insights into a candidate’s potential and his/her skills required for the job. It can make the process of comparing candidates easier and more effective than the traditional one.
Identification of Aptitudes for Crucial Competency Areas
Aptitude tests help you correctly identify skills in an individual that are essential for a job. You can test a range of things like numerical abilities, communication abilities and customer service aptitude extra.
Disadvantages of Aptitude Tests
Cultural Bias
Our experiences get shaped by our cultural backgrounds. Therefore, how well we perform on a test has a lot to do with it. For-example if English is not a candidate’s first language, he/she might not be able to perform well on an English test.
The Link Between Aptitude and Performance Is Not Perfect
I have stressed this earlier as well that a great aptitude doesn’t automatically get translated into a great skill and vice versa.
Final Words
While there are some disadvantages of aptitude tests, the advantages surely outnumber the former. It might be a good idea to design an aptitude test that takes the cultural differences into account so that it doesn’t have an impact on the performance. So whether you are worried about finding suitable candidates for IT or Manufacturing staffing, make sure that you use an aptitude test to power up the hiring process.
