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5 Best Practices for Pre-Employment Assessments Hiring Managers Should Be Tracking

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The hiring process is oftentimes littered with pink slips because of unreliable gut instincts about new hires.

Pre-employment assessments are excellent tools that provide a wealth of data, and much needed objectivity, when used correctly. But those same pre-employment tests can perpetuate bias if hiring managers aren’t paying attention to the whole story.

In this post, we’ll explain how employee assessment tests can help you make successful hiring decisions. We’ll also tell you how to measure an assessment’s validity and outcomes to prevent pre-employment assessment bias.

“one-quarter of the people hired by the traditional methods of interviewing and reviewing resumes will fail.”

Pre-Employment Assessment Tools for Better Hiring Decisions

According to Dianna Podmoroff, author of How to Hire, Train, and Keep the Best Employees for your Small Business, “one-quarter of the people hired by the traditional methods of interviewing and reviewing resumes will fail.”

According to Gallup, turnover costs businesses $1 trillion a year—and that’s just voluntary turnover. Clearly, businesses need to increase their employee retention, and the hiring process is the first place to start. Pre-employment assessments are excellent tools that can help you make more successful hiring decisions.

Pre-employment assessment tools are tests that can measure a variety of candidate attributes. Hiring managers can use pre-assessments to know if a candidate really has the job skills to perform well in the role. Leaders can use a hiring assessment test to reduce theft and increase workplace safety. Pre-employment assessments can help you hire people based personality traits that lead to innovation, teamwork, and a strong culture.

If you’re wondering if pre-employment assessments can really result in better hires, take a look at this article on the U.S. Bureau of Labor website. The article summarizes a 2017 study on the effectiveness of pre-employment assessments. The researchers found that hiring managers make better recruiting decisions when they relied on free pre-employment assessment tools.

Legally Using Employment Tests in the Hiring Process

Yet many hiring managers are reluctant to use an employment test in the selection process because they mistakenly believe they make companies more vulnerable to recruitment-related lawsuits. The fact is that any hiring decision made without objective examination of the candidate’s suitability for the role is vulnerable to litigation. And that, of course, includes your subjective gut instinct.

Pre-employment assessments supplement your gut instinct with an objective measure of a candidate’s characteristics. The 25% of new hires that ultimately fail in their roles interviewed just as well as the other 75%. Several types of employment tests can help you uncover traits that make a candidate unsuitable for your open position.

All that being said, employment tests can lead to discrimination litigation if they are not used properly.

Improper Use of Pre-Employment Assessment Example

Just because a test is standardized and has been around for a long time doesn’t mean it’s legal. In 2015, Target became the target of more than irresistible puns. Everybody’s favorite place for soy candles and rope baskets came under fire in a class-action employment discrimination lawsuit.

Target was using a psychiatric test called the MMPI to screen for security guards. The MMPI was first developed in the 1930s, had undergone countless updates, and had been used as a pre-employment test since World War II. But the MMPI contained several questions pertaining to religion and sexual orientation. These inappropriate questions should be red flags for any hiring manager.

Reduce Bias with Pre-Employment Assessments

Some companies are turning to pre-employment assessments to reduce bias and achieve their diversity goals. Forbes reports, “Some of America’s biggest companies… dropped college degree requirements from job postings” and “turned to skills-based hiring to provide an unbiased, fair and consistent basis for employee selection.”

Such a move is especially important for diversity since racial gaps in college degrees are widening. Removing the requirement for the degree while still ensuring candidates possess necessary skills can diversify your workforce. Skills-based testing can also circumvent a growing problem in recruitment: the growing number of applicants who lie during the hiring process.

Legal Yardstick for Pre-Employment Assessment Test

We’ve already seen the types of pre-employment tests can help you make better hiring decisions, increase productivity and lower turnover. Far from job assessments being a waste of time, there are many pros and few cons of skills tests.

How can you avoid a pre-employment testing lawsuit that sometimes arises from their irresponsible use? To ensure that you’re using pre-employment assessments legally, you must show that they are valid and don’t produce adverse outcomes.

Pre-Employment Assessments Must Be Valid

Your pre-employment tests need to be useful for predicting job performance. That means you can only test for skills and traits that lead to success in that particular role. For example, you can administer a personality test for sales candidates to gauge their extroversion. Or you can test typing skills for an administrative position responsible for data entry. But you can’t test for either of those characteristics when hiring for a manufacturing position.

Pre-Employments Assessments Must Not Have an Adverse Impact on Protected Groups

An otherwise neutral selection tool may nonetheless have an adverse impact on women or minorities. Adverse impact was actually the basis for the first discrimination case against employment testing. In 1971, Duke Power Company was sued when it required aptitude testing, along with a high school diploma, for employees wishing to transfer to high paying positions. The Supreme Court found that the requirements had an adverse impact on Duke’s African-American employees.

Best Practices for Skills Assessment Test

We have a list of best practices for using pre-employment assessments responsibly and successfully. Following these tips will help you get all the benefits of pre-employment assessments, like lower turnover and more successful employees.

  • Take your pre-employment assessments for a test drive. No one knows when anyone on Target’s executive team bothered to read the MMPI. But the moral of Target’s serious hiring gaff is that hiring managers should experience their recruiting process from the candidate’s perspective. At least once a year, hop onto your company’s careers site, fill out the application, and take the pre-employment tests. Doing so will not only alert you to potential legal issues, it will also give you insight on how to improve your candidate experience.
  • Perform your own adverse impact analysis. Track data surrounding your use of skills assessment test for employment. Most importantly, track changes to the diversity of your new hires as a result of the assessments. Applicant tracking software can track this data for you automatically.
  • Use your pre-employment assessment in addition to an unbiased, informal screening. Economic researchers at MIT found that companies using pre-employment assessments were able to improve their retention rates and productivity without impacting their diversity efforts when they hire the best scorers within groups. Don’t simply hire the highest scoring applicants. Instead, use pre-employment testing to improve your selection within minority groups as well.
  • Use more than one pre-employment assessment. There’s a wide variety of pre-employment assessments to help you make the best hiring decision. Some, however, are more likely than other to create an adverse impact. Pairing these with useful tests less likely to create an adverse impact can help you make a more informed, unbiased decision.
  • Provide accommodations for test takers. Providing extra time or providing a reader for pre-employment tests are reasonable accommodations under the ADA. Applicant tracking software that includes pre-employment testing makes providing these accommodations easy. Within the software, hiring managers can use text-to-speech or adjust the time allotted for completion.

Best Pre-Employment Testing Software

The traditional interview is beset with blind spots. And that’s why a quarter of all new hires ultimately fail. Pre-employment assessments are proven to help you make better hiring decisions. Don’t shy away from these vital tools just because you’re unsure how to handle them legally.

The fact is, without objective measures like the kind assessments provide, hiring teams are prone to all sorts of biases.  The ability to improve your hiring decisions and avoid costly litigation are examples of the benefits of pre-employment assessments.

The keys to using pre-employment tests are successfully are to understand how the results of pre-employment assessments can help ensure the new hire’s success, as well as how they can   and taking steps to avoid adverse effects are keys to using pre-employment tests successfully. The best practices we’ve provided here can help you achieve higher productivity and retention rates by using pre-employment assessments.

But you don’t have to go it alone. ExactHire’s pre-employment assessments are written to be effective and avoid adverse effects. Our applicant tracking system can help you analyze all of your hiring practices so you can avoid handing a pink slip to a quarter of your new hires.

Contact us today!

 

 

Photo by Nguyen Dang Hoang Nhu on Unsplash

 

Why You Need Applicant Tracking Software that Integrates with Employee Assessments

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In the Human Resources profession, what happens when you’re strapped for time, working in software silos and unclear about which fire to put out next? In my experience, work culture suffers. Those tasked with traditional HR responsibilities, including some smaller business owners, are all too often drowning in administrative drudgery instead of working on strategic workforce initiatives and championing culture.

It’s not that you don’t appreciate the critical role that employee assessments play in the hiring and succession planning processes, but it can be one more hurdle to overcome when assessment technology lives outside of your applicant tracking software (ATS). What if you could streamline your talent acquisition process with hiring software that seamlessly integrates with a proven, well-respected and validated assessment tool?

In this blog, we’ll focus on the The Predictive Index® (PI) assessment and discuss some scenarios in which you may consider an applicant tracking system that integrates with PI, specifically. I’ll guide you through how the integration works within our hiring platform, HireCentric ATS, and introduce you to our PI Partner, ADVISA. We work with ADVISA to combine our recruiting technology with their expertise in interpreting and using The Predictive Index® to automate and improve the hiring process.

Watch assessment integration webinar

Overcoming HR Obstacles

Whether you are an HR department of one or a relatively small team, like it or not the business of human resources is often accompanied by unexpected fires. Time is at a premium…which means you need to move candidates through the hiring process efficiently.

In the age of “Big Data,” studying desirable behavioral traits for individuals in the same job category over time is essential to making sound hiring decisions in the future. Hopefully that isn’t news to you, but it is easier said than done when your candidates’ assessment results aren’t easily visible within your other recruiting tools. Plus, it’s even more challenging when business growth outpaces your organization’s prioritization of implementing smart technology.

If you’re like many of ExactHire’s clients, you wear many different hats in your human resources or recruiting role. While you’d love to have the time to scour every software application’s Knowledge Base to find answers, you don’t have time to do so. You need recruitment solutions that are easy to learn and intuitive.

Why Consider ATS Integration with The Predictive Index®?

As you likely already know, there are many applicant tracking solutions on the market, but what makes ExactHire’s HireCentric applicant tracking software appealing is that it fully integrates with an employer’s Predictive Index® portal.

In our experience, PI assessment users are attracted to HireCentric ATS thanks to the ability to streamline the assessment invitation process from right within the ATS. Recruiters may invite job candidates to complete an assessment at the point of application or later in the process from the applicant record.

Employers are also pleased with the availability of integrated assessment launch options. HireCentric allows you to customize the delivery of the assessment invitation in two distinct ways:

  • Candidates may be invited to complete an assessment during the employment application process. HireCentric allows employers to have multiple application versions to accommodate different geographic locations, job levels and/or job categories. This level of customization offers employers a great deal of flexibility when it comes to crafting applications that are suited for different circumstances and built for conversion optimization.
  • Additionally, assessments may be reserved for use later in the hiring process. HireCentric allows employers to launch email invitations to invite select candidates to take the PI.

Employers also appreciate the simple way in which candidate assessment results are visible from within the HireCentric applicant tracking system. While a deeper dive is always an option from within the PI portal, it’s convenient to pull up a candidate’s PI placard directly from the applicant profile in HireCentric.

Assessment Integration Options and Considerations

Let’s dig into the options available to you for using HireCentric to invite candidates to take the PI. In this blog, I’m going to refer to the PI “Enterprise Plan,” as it is the only plan with open API access which allows candidate results to flow back into HireCentric ATS and be visible on the applicant record.

There are two primary options for inviting candidates to complete the PI. In the first method, you may include a link to begin the PI at the point of application. This occurs immediately after the candidate completes the HireCentric employment application questions, and it can be done with either a traditional one-step application or HireCentric’s popular two-step application option. This point of application approach is ideal if you want to assess all applicants as part of the initial screening process.

The other approach is to wait and manually invite only a portion of job candidates to complete the PI later in the hiring process.This may occur after the initial pre-screen, but before any in-person interviews. This option is worth consideration if you prefer to be selective and only ask final candidates to undergo the assessment process; or, if your employment application is already quite lengthy at the beginning of the hiring process.

The Predictive Index® only allows one assessment per user per company. Once an assessment is sent to an applicant in your ATS, then all job applications by that applicant will share the same assessment status and results.

How Does the HireCentric ATS and PI Assessment Integration Work?

Employment Application

Let’s take a closer look at what your applicants experience if you utilize the point of application option to present an invitation at the end of your employment application questions. In the following image, you see a glimpse of the mobile-responsive employment application that job applicants would complete just prior to starting the PI assessment.

Submit Application HireCentric | ExactHire

As you can see, questions are organized by category and navigable via the ribbon down the left side of the application. Question sections may be customized per organization and per job category within an organization. HireCentric applicant tracking software also has an option for a two-step application. Since this applicant has already completed all sections of the application, the next step is to select the “Submit” button.

Then, the applicant is presented with confirmation that the application questions are complete. The text at the top of the following image may be customized.

Start Predictive Index Assessment | HireCentric

The next step for the candidate is to start the assessment by clicking the button on the lower half of the screen. Once the applicant clicks the “Start” button, a new window will prompt the applicant to follow a link at the completion of an application.

PI Login Screen HireCentric | ExactHire

In the above image, you can see that the applicant’s name and email have “followed” him to The Predictive Index® site from the HireCentric ATS employment application. This means your candidate won’t have to re-enter this information to take the assessment–creating a more streamlined and positive application experience.

Manual Email Invitation

Now, take a look at the workflow for the other assessment invitation option. An Administrator or Manager-level user may easily manually send an assessment later in the hiring process by accessing an applicant’s record within HireCentric and clicking on the “Integrations” tab.

Integration Tab HireCentric Applicant Tracking

Within the Integrations tab, you may click on the view button, and then a new tab will open within the browser to reveal this dashboard, where you may manually launch the assessment email invitation to the candidate by clicking the “Send Assessment” button.

Send Assessment from HireCentric ATS

Then, you may view the status of an applicant’s assessment by visiting the PI dashboard within HireCentric. This is located in an applicant’s profile in the “Integrations” tab.
In this image, note that the assessment has already been sent (as in the case of a manual invitation), but is not yet complete.

Pending Assessment HireCentric ATS | ExactHire

Once a candidate’s results are in, you may view them in the PI Dashboard within HireCentric. PI Patterns and Placards can be viewed within the ATS using the buttons indicated in this screenshot. For a deeper dive, the “View Report” and “View Profile” links will open a new tab and take you to the login page of your own PI portal.

Result Buttons PI ExactHire ATS

What Do Assessment Results Look Like Within the ATS?

Here’s a look at how the PI patterns populate within the dashboard area within the HireCentric applicant tracking system when you select one of the buttons.

PI Results Within HireCentric ATS

At the bottom of each pattern, a link allows you to open a pattern in a new tab where you may print or save the pattern. HireCentric’s integration with PI saves you the time it would otherwise take to log into a separate portal to review assessment results. This is critical when you have many jobs open and are screening multiple candidates. Plus, HireCentric’s interface is easy to understand, so you can find the results for various applicants in a cinch.

PI Plan Considerations

There are two plan options available from The Predictive Index®–Enterprise and Professional. While both plans offer unlimited usage of the assessment tool, in order to take advantage of the full integration between PI and HireCentric, your organization needs to use the Enterprise plan. This more flexible option allows the candidate’s results to flow back into the applicant tracking software thanks to the open API access which supports full software integration.

However, if your organization currently uses the Professional Plan instead, you may still include a link to invite candidates to complete the PI on the thank you page of your employment application. However, the results will not be visible within HireCentric. Additionally, the invitation link would have to be present on every application on every job listing. Unlike the Enterprise plan option, you cannot turn it on or off per job listing or application version.

You may also still use the manual email invitation option on the Professional plan. But again, results will not flow back into the applicant tracking system. Results would have to be reviewed within the PI portal only.

A Return on Your Investment

Take advantage of the integration between HireCentric applicant tracking system and PI to mitigate pain inflamed by

  • narrow staff bandwidth,
  • software application silos, and
  • no time to learn complex user interfaces.

HireCentric streamlines the invitation process for multiple job candidates, allows information to flow to and from the PI portal, and is easy to learn and use. And, HireCentric ATS is priced just right for small- and medium-sized employers with access fees starting at $120/month. The exact pricing for your organization would be determined by your number of current employees and how many employees you hire each year.

Explore Assessments

To learn more about assessments available from The Predictive Index®, contact our partner, ADVISA; or, connect with ExactHire and we’ll be happy to make an introduction.

Contact ADVISA

Watch Assessment Integration Webinar | ExactHire

Minimize Business Risk with HR Technology that Streamlines Recruiting

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A clean work space is just one of the advantages HR technology can provide. Other goals of technology in business are to reduce costs by streamlining workflows, eliminating manual tasks, increasing accuracy and reducing labor. These concepts can apply to any employer and any discipline within that organization. Operations, accounting, human resources, etc. can all benefit from the advantages of technology.

Like most technology systems the concept of “garbage in, garbage out” applies. There is nothing automatic about technology. Solutions will only work well if the person inputting the data is doing a good job. Most technology in the workplace aims to either house data for quick reference, perform complex calculations and analysis, report on data, or eliminate transactional tasks. However, it still takes the human touch to leverage technology to its fullest.

HR Technology Solutions

In the world of human resources, enterprise-level technology often comes in the form of Human Resources Information Systems (HRIS), used to house and track large stores of information traditionally placed in a personnel file. On the other end of the spectrum, stand-alone software platforms that specialize in a specific aspect of human resources management (e.g. applicant tracking, employee onboarding, payroll, time and attendance, performance management and/or learning and development, etc.) will often cater to small- and medium-sized employers. Most HRIS solutions will boast an integrated approach that may meet all of an employer’s needs. However, there’s mixed opinions on any one solution providing all your needs–in a robust enough manner–and in an integrated fashion.

Another benefit of HR technology is that it can help you with compliance, record keeping and holding you true to certain processes that will ultimately reduce your risk of error. Human error in the HR world can lead to both compliance issues and poor decision making. This is especially true when it comes to hiring, as decisions are usually made on limited data that must be analyzed from multiple sources.

Fortunately, there are a number of HR technology solutions available that can reduce risk and streamline the recruiting effort. Luckily, using some of these technologies can result in quicker time-to-hire, better decision making and more accurate outcomes.

Applicant Tracking Systems

Application Tracking Systems are powerful tools that can both reduce risk and make the talent acquisition process more efficient and effective. As with any powerful technology solution, they are only as good as the user. The features a standard applicant tracking system can provide can sometimes be overwhelming if your technology partner is not focused on customized training and ongoing customer service. A seasoned recruiter with working experience of applicant tracking systems should be able to take advantage of these features fairly easily.

Easy application management

For starters, applicant tracking systems can streamline the hiring process by collating and storing applicant data in an easy to access and recall fashion. Often, an applicant tracking system will also allow you to search and filter applicants based on specific objective data. This can help with compliance as you take subjectivity out of the equation and base more of your decision on criteria being applied objectively to all applicants.

Compliant employment data

Other basic compliance assistance comes in the form of collecting EEO data and providing for the appropriate disclosures and releases to the applicant that may be required in your hiring process. The data from these forms and documents can be hidden from a hiring manager’s view while still maintaining compliance with regulatory requirements.

The ability to store and recall information in an applicant tracking system is one of the biggest benefits. No need to worry about retaining applicant records for a statutory length of time. Nor do you need to worry about printing all this information and keeping it in a file. Most applicant tracking systems will even allow you to purge applicant information of a certain age to keep your database clean.

Assessments

There are a number of online assessments you can utilize in the hiring process to increase your odds of a successful hire and reduce your chances of a failed hire. These assessments can look at a number of things from identifying certain skills, the application of required knowledge as well as an overall personality inventory. Combining and using the results of these assessments can dramatically increase your ability to hire more effectively.

Personality assessments are one of the most useful tools in helping to identify information about a candidate that you may not be able to identify in a standard interview. Some of the benefits of personality assessments include the identification of work behaviors, personality traits and competencies. They can also provide an overall picture of how an individual may perform in your work environment and what type of conflict may ensue. When used correctly, assessments can paint a pretty good picture of an inevitable outcome.

You can reduce hiring risk by actually paying attention to the results of these assessments. Now, they aren’t an all inclusive decision making tool–and the law would agree. However, they are another set of valuable data that should be combined with all the other information you have gathered and used to make a more informed and accurate hiring decision.

Some of the more useful features of assessments are the ability for you to benchmark the results of an applicant against the results of some of your top performers in similar positions. After all, one of the main objectives of recruiting is to find people that are like your top performers so you can replicate that performance. Background and experience are only part of the equation.

Skill-based assessments are usually used in more technical roles and are structured as interactive tools aimed at identifying if an individual has the correct level of technical ability to perform successfully in the role. The best example of these types of assessments would be for software developers, graphic designers, etc. You would choose a solution that gives individuals a project that tracks certain metrics and results as they complete the project.

Another type of assessment, a knowledge assessment, can measure not only if an individual possesses a certain base of knowledge that you require, but can also apply it. Some employers who require a license or registration of some sort will use the fact that a candidate possesses the credentials as evidence enough that they can apply the knowledge. The trouble, is most credentialing programs do not test application of knowledge. As such, employers should seek solutions that measure an individual’s ability to actually apply this knowledge.

Assessments and applicant tracking systems are just two of the many HR technologies available to you, but they are two of the most commonly used in both reducing risk and improving results. ExactHire provides both solutions in an integrated fashion to help you achieve your compliance requirements and recruiting needs.

Applicant Tracking + Employee Assessments = HireCentric ATS

Looking for both solutions in one platform? Contact ExactHire to schedule a live demo of our HireCentric applicant tracking system with embedded employee assessments.

Contact

 

Photo Credit: Kelly Britto

Rethink Customer Service to Create Exceptional Employee Experiences

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Customer service is commonly understood as how an organization interacts with–or serves– its customers (those individuals who buy its product or service). A key tenet of customer service is that an organization should have the goal of providing an exceptional experience by anticipating and meeting customer needs before the customer even asks. Imagine if the employees of an organization did the same for each other. Well, businesses with a strong employer brand do.

If we go back to the definition of brand, we are reminded that brand is not smoke and mirrors, it is the core of what you are as a business. To extend that concept to employer brand, an organization cannot expect an “employee appreciation day”, company swag, and an annual “employee satisfaction survey” to be the drivers of its employment brand. Those are nice expressions, but to truly possess a strong employment brand, an organization must offer an exceptional experience on the other days of the year too.

Every week, and indeed, every day will bring its own ups and downs–this is true inside and outside the workplace. When we talk about providing an exceptional experience for employees, our goal is not to create a workplace utopia. Rather, a business should seek to foster a culture that respects the dignity of the individual and affirms their contribution to the business on a daily basis. By doing this, employees feel supported and confident in their work, and thus, are more likely to collaborate with each other in an open and honest way.

5 Ways to Foster an Exceptional Employer Brand Experience

  1. Set realistic expectations of your work culture during the application process
  2. Provide new hires with a “culture book” that summarizes your work culture
  3. Announce milestone achievements, while also affirming the work and small wins that helped the organization get there
  4. Provide monthly or quarterly group incentives for valuable, collaborative objectives
  5. Develop a continual improvement plan that engages employees

ExactHire provides hiring technology for small to medium-sized organizations. Our SaaS solutions include HireCentric ATS and OnboardCentric which can streamline your hiring and onboarding processes, while providing an exceptional experience for new employees. To learn more about how you can enhance your hiring process through the use of our software, contact us today!

Image credit: People seldom notice old clothes if you wear a big smile – Lee Mildon by rohit gowaikar (contact)

Colts Vs. Patriots–Background Check

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Big game in Foxborough this weekend. And while the matchup features two teams–106 men total–much of the discussion is around just two: Andrew Luck and Tom Brady.

These two quarterbacks differ in many ways, most obviously their age: Brady is 37 (frequently the age when an elite QB’s production drops off) and Luck is 25 (frequently the age when elite QBs start earning the title “elite”). So you don’t need John Clayton to tell you that Brady has the advantage of experience, and Luck the advantage of youth.

But that simple comparison–and the countless, more nuanced ones–will mean nothing come Sunday. The best TEAM will win, and these two franchises know a lot about winning.

A Little Background Check

It’s no accident that the Colts and Patriots are playing for the right to represent the AFC in Super Bowl 49. The ownerships expect excellence, and they’ve brought in the right people to make that happen. Imagine what would happen if these teams  handled personnel differently…say, like the Browns.

Actually, you don’t have to imagine that. Here’s what it would look like:

Cleveland Browns Past 15 Years

(Source: http://www.clevelandbrowns.com)
1999214.125
2000313.188
200179.438
200297.563
2003511.313
2004412.250
2005610.375
2006412.250
2007106.625
2008412.250
2009511.313
2010511.313
2011412.250
2012511.313

Ouch. Note that the past two seasons are not even listed on the team website. Yeah, it’s that bad. But why?

Is it bad luck? Is it the “Cleveland Curse”? Perhaps, but successful organizations like the Colts and Patriots don’t operate at the mercy of superstition. They take control of their situation, do the work, and are prepared to make the critical hiring (signing) decisions that will ensure continued success.

It’s the difference between: Drafting Peyton Manning or picking Ryan Leaf; Drafting Tom Brady in the sixth round or choosing Tim Rattay; Making Brady your franchise player or sticking with Drew Bledsoe; Handing over the reins to Andrew Luck or hanging on to a five-time League MVP.

It’s the difference between drafting “Johnny Football” or choosing character over celebrity.

The Colts and Patriots have sustained success over the past decade because they possess a clear vision for their organization. But more importantly, they have effectively vetted their “job candidates” to maximize the number of players who fit in with their vision. And when faced with critical personnel matters, they gather the best information, perform thorough analysis, and remain true to their vision in making the right hiring decisions.

Sunday’s Game

Back to the matter at hand: big game in Foxborough. I’ve listened to a lot of talk. I’ve heard from the experts and from less-than objective fans. A cold, wet night will make things interesting. Everything indicates that this should be a fantastic game to watch. But who will win?

As an Indianapolis native, I am certainly biased. But I’ll not let that keep me from making the right pick…

Colts 24 – Patriots 20

Note: This prediction takes into account that Luck’s beard has grown much more powerful since Week 11. Now gimme 2 claps and a Rick Flair!

 

ExactHire provides SaaS solutions that optimize the hiring process for organizations who seek excellence. Our HireCentric ATS includes background check integration and, when paired with other pre-employment screening programs like reference checking and behavioral assessments, supports smart hiring based on job fit.

Learn how your organization can improve your hiring process with HireCentric. Contact us today!

 

Image credit: Go Colts…Go Colts…Go Colts! by Steve Baker (contact)

How to Assess Your Small Business’s Pre-Employment Screening Maturity

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A turnkey, effective pre-employment screening process is critical for today’s small business. We rely on pre-employment screening efforts to alert us of red flags with a candidate, verify the accuracy of one’s employment records, ensure the safety of existing employees, and explore whether one may thrive despite the demands of a position. And don’t forget the importance of saving time for busy HR Directors by reducing the chance of expensive turnover later.

There is a wide spectrum onto which companies may fall when it comes to pre-employment screening process maturity. Identify your small business’s place on this Bell curve as a first step toward improving your new hire screening, background checking, and reference checking methods.

Your Pre-Employment Screening Process Maturity Level

It’s time to get real. How do your company’s resources impact your placement on the maturity curve? Into which category does your company fall on the image below?

Pre-Employment Screening Process Maturity Curve

Manual

Companies lagging behind in this phase are resistant to technology in most areas of talent management. They are focused on manual activities such as using hard copy paper employment applications, collecting printed resumes at job fairs, and promoting the ability to apply in person (despite the absence of an on-site kiosk for electronic submission of applications). Businesses in this bucket may not even be doing background checks or reference checks on candidates who have received a conditional offer of employment. If the company has started to grow more quickly recently, putting these methods in place can be further delayed if nepotism is present and new hires frequently come from existing employee referrals.  Additionally, it is unlikely that the standard employment application offers the opportunity to incorporate well-planned screening questions that flesh out whether candidates meet at least the basic qualifications for a position. Lastly, you can assume that any web presence on behalf of human resources is completely managed by the IT department.

Disjointed

Companies in this bucket are often plagued by a lack of staff bandwidth (often an HR department of one trying to support too many employees) and poor buy-in from upper management. They launch isolated efforts to supplement the pre-employment screening process, but do not execute a universal, organization-wide strategy. For example, they utilize employee assessments for only some positions; use inconsistent techniques for reference checking and/or fail to train all hiring managers to follow the same protocol; inconsistently use social media to screen applicants (potentially a big liability); job-specific screening questions are underutilized and ultimately depend on the attentiveness of the hiring manager involved; and there is no automated way to group job candidates based on whether they satisfied basic qualifications. Additionally, these companies may still be collecting background check-related information (such as previous residences and Social Security number) on the employment application (without a compelling industry-related reason) because it is easier for them…neglecting the fact that it can disengage applicants and raise a red flag when the solicitation of that information is not connected with a conditional offer of employment.

Organizing & Conforming

Companies in this stage have the right structure in place for optimizing the pre-employment screening process – including an applicant tracking system and a means to collect employment references and electronic employment applications from applicants. While the integration of technology has advanced these companies into the “late majority” part of the cycle, activities such as reference checking are likely still handled inconsistently and may eat up the HR staff’s time. Though they probably have a go-to background checking vendor in place, they still may be collecting disclosures to run these checks in a cumbersome way (i.e. emailing candidates later in the process with a separate request form and then not having an automatic way for results for the check to flow back into an applicant tracking system). Upper management supports HR initiatives as it recognizes the need to put sound practices in place as the company grows, but the pace of growth is still outpacing the ability to get the right HR resources in place quickly enough. The HR department has a lot on its plate and needs to become even more efficient and strategic as pre-employment screening efforts have covered the tactical bases like background checking and reference checking, but still haven’t touched screening question development on a consistent basis.

Embracing & Engaging

For these companies, a strategic process is in place so that consistent screening techniques are used for every position in the organization and thoughtful job evaluation is used to create relevant and results-oriented job-specific screening questions. The right applicant tracking software technology is in place to allow human resource administrators the ability to quickly and easily view applicants that meet basic qualifications based on answers to questions…and those applicants that score particularly well are highlighted, accordingly. Success in hiring leads to further engagement from hiring managers to help develop job questions, respond about candidates quickly and utilize pre-employment testing tools. This partnership with hiring managers leads to opportunities to continuously re-evaluate and repeat success in the future.

Performance & Scaling

Scalability is of central concern for companies in this stage. They seek to further optimize their pre-screening efforts and are intimately attune with promoting a positive employment brand to both applicants and current employees. By regularly tracking key performance indicators such as time to hire and cost per hire, among others, HR personnel have already proven the business case for using technology to their CFO and company ownership. Many of these companies have undergone a significant spike in hiring recently, and have sought additional ways to leverage technology to avoid taking on more staff unnecessarily. Examples include bi-directional integration with background checking, behavioral and cognitive employee assessment tools and automated reference checking software in which the applicant is especially engaged to impact the responsiveness of his/her references. The HR department, whether comprised of one person or many individuals at this near-mastery level, is very agile, uses practical, easy-to-learn HR technology software and likely has enviable statistics when it comes to number of offers extended to accepted and turnover.

Talent Leader

These companies are completely passionate about attracting and hiring top talent…having employment brand ambassadors from entry-level employees all the way up to the CEO. The return on investment for pre-employment screening efforts has repeatedly been proven as well as scaled as the business expands (and expansion for small business can often mean a pretty drastic percentage increase in growth)…thanks in part to savvy reporting tools available in hiring software such as applicant tracking systems and online reference checking software. Other companies will look to this organization to mimic its hiring techniques and try to steal talent…but the latter attempt will often fail as the leading company has done a great job of pre-screening talent and engaging candidates and employees in the process. The talent leader will have little trouble fielding applicants for most job postings due to its reputation as a choice employer.

Does your business fall into your preferred category when it comes pre-employment screening maturity? What resources can help you move ahead on the pre-employment screening process maturity curve? To find out, visit our ExactHire resources section or contact us today.

SMB Pre-Employment Screening Guide Ebook

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5 Tips to Shorten Your Hiring Cycle & Get Better Hires

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In case you don’t already know, we work mostly with small- to mid-sized businesses (SMB’s). For most of the organizations who fall into this category, hiring is often something that’s done without much thought given to ways it might be improved. With limited resources, improvement initiatives are often focused more on things like product development, sales, technology, etc.

At the same time, however, the common resource virtually all organizations need to survive (let alone grow & improve) is people. So, if there are ways to get better hires in the door faster (with greater likelihood of fit & engagement), it only makes sense to pursue those. To that point, below are five quick ideas for any SMB to not only get people through the process faster, but to greatly improve the odds of getting better people the first time around:

1 – Have brief and powerful job overviews

No one wants to read a three-paragraph overview of your position. They want to be wowed. Give them an idea of what a “day in the life” will look like for the role. Share where the career path can take them. In other words, sell the sizzle…not the steak.

2 – Share what the position will pay

This shouldn’t be taboo. Putting at least a reasonable range of salary in your job overview helps you and potential applicants. They don’t waste time applying for jobs outside their desired income range, and you don’t waste time pursuing applicants who ultimately will fall by the wayside as they learn what the pay looks like for your opening. This transparency can also help to set you apart from competitors who are hiring from the same pool of applicants, but aren’t sharing what their position will pay.

3 – Make it easy for people to be considered for the position

This is the new normal. With all of the changes in the technology realm over the past three to five years, most applicants (especially those not actively looking to change positions) are no longer willing to provide a full online application to simply be considered for your opening. There are too many other companies out there who will get them through the initial application process in less than 5 minutes. Take advantage of tools available in the market to keep up with what your competitors are doing in this regard.

4 – Use technology to manage your applicants

No matter what matter what applicant tracking system provider you use, please use something. While we’re always open to new clients here at ExactHire, the real message here is to incorporate technology into your hiring process in some way! If you follow the steps above, you’ll likely see a good number of potentially qualified applicants for your positions. That’s the good news. The bad news is that all of those applicants expect to know where they stand in the process on a pretty regular basis. This is nearly impossible without using hiring software of some kind. There are lots of good ones out there that are affordable and geared to our SMB space.

5 – Consider employee assessments

Using a well-validated assessment as one of your final steps is a luxury that you can consider, once you’ve implemented the 4 steps above. Since applicants are now getting through the process faster, asking them to spend a little extra time to complete an assessment (skill-based or behavioral) near the end of the process is viewed as reasonable. The right tool here can help you and your team confirm someone’s fit for both your position and the culture of your organization.
Consider these tips to improve the speed at which you hire, as well as the results you see with those hires. To learn more about ExactHire, please visit our resources section or contact us. 

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Need Employees for Your Small Business? Hire for These 8 Characteristics!

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I believe strongly that I was meant to work for smaller organizations – start-ups especially. And while I have never worked for a really large company (and so have no true frame of comparison), the way I’m hard-wired screams for me to be in a place where I can wear multiple hats. But not everyone is destined to thrive in a smaller business. However, there are some key traits you should seek when screening applicants for jobs available in the office of your start-up company…

1 – Resourcefulness

Let’s face it…many times employees at a small business have no precedent to set the stage for how they might approach a given situation or obstacle. There’s no “way we do things around here” yet and so individuals must jump in and get their feet wet to figure out what works well, and what will just be a temporary bandage to get through the issue. This can be very exciting for some, but cause a near panic attack in others. So it’s simple…just hire MacGyver, or find the most recent Discovery Channel reality TV star that fashioned a fishing basket out of jungle vine, right? But seriously, the tendency for one to be resourceful can be at least partially unearthed through a line of interview questions that ask the candidate to provide specific examples of how previous work obstacles were overcome when a new type of challenge was presented.

2 – Ability to Self-Direct…& Gets Bored Easily!

The ability for one to be autonomous and able to stay on task is not the most earth-shattering revelation on this list. But, have you thought about the “why” behind someone’s motivation to get things done? In the context of a small business environment, many times the most successful people not only cross all their tasks off the proverbial Post-it note regularly, but do so with enthusiasm because they have another Post-it note waiting for them to attack – one that has all the new ideas they jotted down the other day. The important point here is that while these people tend to get bored easily, they are in an environment where they are empowered to create their own work…so it’s impossible to get bored.

Of course all positions have responsibilities that are somewhat reactionary, but your proactive small biz Kool-Aid drinkers are happy as long as they get to dig their hands into many different cookie jars to help improve the company and their role.

3 – Passion

Unless you are screening for new Dancing with the Stars candidates by rating their tango, passion in the context of the SMB market doesn’t have to imply intense emotion, but rather a compulsive drive to continuously improve upon the processes, products and services that propel the organization forward. It basically means that your people honestly give a care about the long-term impact they have on your organization, and that your organization has on its industry and community. They do NOT get a case of the Mondays each week. I’m not trying to say that some people who work for large corporations are not intensely devoted to their occupation…I’m merely saying that in a small biz…it’s blindingly obvious when someone on the team doesn’t have the same mojo as everyone else there.

And while you’d probably begin the search for this trait by asking the candidate to describe an experience where he/she went above and beyond during a project…you might instead start by asking the prospect to tell you a story about someone who went above and beyond for him/her, first. Get details on the impact of that deed on the interviewee’s outlook and ask how he/she hopes to emulate that focus in his/her own life. Then, you might have an even better idea about his/her true passion (and how that could take shape for your organization).

4 – Unpretentious

Don’t hire people who are too fancy for their own good. You might work for a small company if…you bring your own stapler and mouse from home, or you fill up the company Brita water filter pitcher when it’s getting low in the fridge. The point is that employees have to do some things they may not be used to doing if they come from larger offices. If they are too good to help answer the office phone or start the dishwasher in the kitchenette when it fills up, then that’s going to grind some gears down the road.

5 – Inventiveness

To piggy-back off #1 on this list, you should have some people on your team that are gifted at innovation when it comes to creating efficiencies and brainstorming and executing new ideas. The important part here is to spread that creative gene around so that different teammates are engaged to excel in different areas. One might have a keen eye for detail and fresh promotional ideas; while another may have a talent for developing new procedures to anticipate potential hiccups down the road.

It’s a little trickier to screen for this type of trait in a personal interview, as sometimes you don’t truly know until you can see it in action. However, you can certainly assess one’s interests and behavioral tendencies through a pre-employment testing tool to give you a better idea of what makes the applicant tick. That way, you can explore initial assessment results with follow-up questions during a final interview.

6 – Optimism

Because the course of the ship can change frequently and suddenly in the world of a small company, at times there can be a general sense of the “unknown” in terms of what the future may bring. Some personalities can turn a lack of knowledge into the assumption that the worst possible scenario may come true…so the Negative Nancys of the world, in the absence of expectations for a clearly-defined career path inside of the organization might bolt (incidentally…our own Nancy on staff at ExactHire is in no way negative just to be clear!). In contrast, optimistic individuals have the capacity for embracing the fact that while a clear-cut ladder doesn’t exist, maybe other exciting and brand new roles will be carved out by ambitious contributors in the future.

7 – Adaptable

I won’t spend a lot of time on this one because it may be the most obvious necessity in a strong hire. But what are the giveaways to the true nature of someone’s flexibility? Try to probe for an interviewee’s specific reasons for changing positions within an organization or switching companies all together in the past. The bottom line is that small companies need staff members that perhaps even crave change and somewhat fluid circumstances, as these types of organizations can evolve quickly as the result of venture capital funding, unexpected turnover, etc. If you’re familiar with Chaos Theory such that a butterfly flaps its wings in Tennessee and a tidal wave hits Taiwan…know that SMB’s are feeling the butterfly’s blustery effects closer to Texas in contrast with corporate counterparts that can distill the effect over a larger employee base.

8 – Tech-Savviness

Let’s make an argument for having an average to above average knack for embracing technology. You’re probably thinking you’d find the opposite in a small organization where budgets might be too constrained to afford the latest Software-as-a-Service and other technological tools. However, what tends to be more expensive? Automating key processes or hiring more headcount?

Hire individuals who sit at least slightly to the right on the technophobe vs. software geek spectrum. In an environment where people resources are limited and multi-tasking is a way of life, people who can get up to speed on new software applications more quickly, and without a lot of hand-holding, are going to be more productive for your company faster. And in the context of a professional office setting, one of your first clues to this skill might be how effectively the individual completes the web-based employment application available through your applicant tracking system. Or, assess how involved this person is on a business-geared social media site such as LinkedIn.

Working at a startup can be a wild card, fraught with uncertainty about the future profitability of the company…or what your specific career path has in store…or whether you will be exposed to the type of experiences you feel you need in your profession. You’ll probably catch yourself saying “well, that’s part of working at a small business” from time to time when addressing a lack of things that might be readily available at a big business.

However, while your most valuable new hire prospects will certainly consider this expectation; they will realize that this same phrase can work to their advantage, as well, and probably more frequently if the traits they possess align well with their respective position. Above all, hire people that are motivated to see the immediate impact their individual role has on the business as a whole – arguably the most exciting part…and enjoy the ride!

ExactHire offers hiring software solutions specifically designed for the small- to medium-sized company. For more information on tools to help you find employees for small business, please visit our resources section or contact us.

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5 Tips for Small Businesses on Year End Activities

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Well, it’s the time of year to think about taxes and wrapping up all the paperwork! There are many activities that management needs to take care of at the end of a year. Here are a few tips (or reminders) to help make sure the new year starts off right for your small business.

#1 – Get organized / Make a budget

Organization is key! If you run or own a small business, you know what it’s like to wear many different hats. The more organized you are, the easier your year will be. If you have not done so in past years, please consider making a budget or at least a sales forecast for the upcoming year. It can be re-evaluated as the year goes on, but it will give you a good guideline of what to expect with expenses and income; as well as, help forecast cash flow and overall company growth.

#2 – Complete and file 1099’s

These are tax forms that show money paid to independent contractors or other workers not on your payroll. Also, this includes attorneys, janitorial companies, landscaping services and third party accounts. A 1099 is only filed if the person received $600 or more in the tax year. These forms are normally due by the end of January each year.

#3 – File Sales, Use and Withholding Taxes

This can vary by state, but please look at your state’s website to see what you are required to file and the deadline. Many of these are due by mid to late January so do not delay!

#4 – Send out W-2’s

This will likely be handled by your Human Resources department….with a small business, that may even be the owner or a third party company. The W-2 is a form for each employee that shows his/her total earnings, as well as taxes, state and federal, withheld from the employee. Each individual will need to receive this from his/her employer in order to file his/her own taxes. These forms are required to be sent to employees by the end of January.

#5 – Assess your employees and consider giving bonuses

The new year is a perfect time to re-evaluate your staff and workforce structure. Look at all the positives from the past year. What could you do to improve the company culture or to show appreciation to your employees? How could peer feedback be incorporated to help everyone improve in their roles. Consider an employee assessment, such as a 360 degree review tool, to help in this area.

Try to implement a performance-based or profit-sharing-related bonus if you do not already have a plan in place. Or, if a monetary bonus is not an option, look into other options to reward them for a year of hard work and progress, such as a staff retreat or nice lunch out of the office. This will give everyone a sense of accomplishment and boost them to be excited about the new year ahead.

ExactHire’s software applications are specifically designed for small- and medium-sized businesses. For more information about our solutions, please visit our resources section or contact us.

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