RESEARCH REPORT
2018 Pre-Employment Assessments Benchmark Report
About the Report
The hiring landscape is changing, and employers are finding new ways to attract, evaluate, and retain top talent. We created this report to learn more about how companies hire, the challenges they face, and the priorities they have when evaluating candidates.
The results in this report are based on responses from companies that use pre-employment testing in the hiring process. Respondents include companies of all sizes across a wide breadth of industries.
6 Key Insights from the Report
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The demand for talent is still rising. In an already competitive labor market, companies expect their hiring volume to increase in the next year. This will continue to challenge employers to attract and retain talent.
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HR spend is increasing even faster. Companies expect to increase their financial investment not just in hiring but in other key initiatives that are designed to promote retention. Some of the major priorities include strengthening employer branding efforts, cultivating a positive work environment, and fostering career development opportunities within the organization.
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Employers use a wide variety of factors to make hiring decisions. Aside from pre-employment tests, most companies use resumes, interviews, phone screens, background checks, and reference checks.
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The biggest benefit of pre-employment tests is better quality of hire. 97% of respondents agreed that this was a top benefit of testing.
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The most used tests are cognitive aptitude and personality tests. These also happen to be the most predictive of job success.
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Pre-employment tests are versatile and flexible. Our respondents administer tests for just about every job level and at nearly every stage of the hiring process. Pre-employment assessments provide the flexibility for an organization to gain predictive insight into a candidate’s abilities in a way that best suits that organization.
Hiring Professionals Wear A Lot Of Hats
Beyond just recruitment and selection, many hiring professionals are responsible for managing other HR activities post-hire, including onboarding, managing employee relations, and training and development. This means they aren’t just invested in filling open positions - they’re also invested in the long-term success of their hires within the company.
The Biggest And Most Important Priority For Hiring Professionals Is To Find High Quality Job Candidates
Because hiring professionals have many roles, they also have many different priorities for their organization. Most agree, however, that finding high quality job candidates is the most important priority - 96% regarded this as extremely or very important.
Desktop Still Dominates.
Hiring professionals still turn to desktop when it comes to the amount of time spent on hiring activities - they spend 85% of their time on a desktop device.
Mobile Trends. From online shopping and gaming to social media and the job search, people are spending more and more time on their mobile devices. But does this extend to the hiring process? Based on the survey results, hiring professionals still complete most of their hiring activities on a desktop or laptop. This makes sense - hiring is a process that happens at work, where most professionals have access to a desktop. It will be interesting to see if time spent hiring on mobile devices increases over time, or if the hiring process will remain squarely within the domain of the desktop.
Hiring Demand Is Still Rising, But Hr Budgets Are Increasing Even Faster
In an already tight labor market, employers expect to continue increasing their hiring volume in the next year. This could signal even more competition for hiring the best candidates - the number of open positions in the United States now exceeds the number of individuals who are unemployed, and companies are already struggling to fill open positions.
With increased hiring demand on the horizon, HR professionals may have to get more creative in order to source and attract great candidates. This could explain the anticipated increase in HR budgets, which exceeds the expected increase in hiring volume, a possible sign that companies are setting aside more funds for HR priorities designed to attract top talent.
COMPANIES ARE SETTING ASIDE MORE FUNDS TO ATTRACT AND INVEST IN TOP TALENT
In line with the expected increase in HR spending, most companies either predicted that they would increase spending in these key areas or keep them the same. Only about 2% of respondents expected to reduce investment in these areas.
Companies Are Using Multiple Factors In The Hiring Process In Order To Make More Informed, Holistic Hiring Decisions
Aside from pre-employment tests, the most used hiring criteria amongst the survey respondents are resumes and in-person interviews, which have long been at the core of the traditional hiring process. But what other factors are companies incorporating into their hiring processes? With hiring competition at its peak, companies are seeing the value of investing in a variety of hiring tactics to help make the hiring decision both more objective and predictive of job success.
How Does Pre-employment Testing Fit Into The Hiring Landscape?
Companies are adopting unique strategies for getting the most out of pre-employment testing.
Far And Away, The Clearest Benefit of Pre-employment Testing is Better Quality of Hire
Almost all of the respondents, at 97%, selected better quality of hire as a top benefit of pre-employment testing. Pre-employment tests fill a critical role in the employee selection process - they provide a clear signal of potential and job fit that ultimately leads to better quality of hire. In turn, better quality of hire helps to drive other business goals across the entire organization, from employee performance and productivity to turnover and revenue.
The Most Commonly Used Tests Are Cognitive Aptitude Tests and Personality Tests, Often Used in Conjunction With Each Other
Skills Tests Are Close Behind in Frequency of Use.
These results reflect our testing philosophy. We recommend companies prioritize cognitive aptitude tests when assessing candidates because they are the most highly predictive of future job performance. They reflect whether an applicant will be capable of successfully performing the job. We also recommend pairing personality tests with cognitive aptitude to get a sense of job fit for the day-to-day tasks associated with a particular role.
While skills tests are great at evaluating a candidate’s ability to do a particular task at the time, they are less predictive of long-term job success because they don’t consider an individual’s ability to learn new skills.
Companies are Confident that the Tests Can Successfully Predict Job Success
Employers feel similarly confident about the ability of each type of test to predict job success. Cognitive aptitude and personality tests garner the greatest confidence, which is in line with their greater predictive ability.
Most Companies Administer Tests Earlier In The Hiring Process
We typically recommend testing candidates as early as possible in the hiring process. By testing up front, you get a clear, objective metric that helps you filter out unqualified candidates but also helps you identify applicants that may not have stood out based on a resume alone. In essence, it helps you prioritize your candidate pipeline from the start.
According to the results, most companies test sooner rather than later in the process, but only 30% test at the very top of the hiring funnel, at the point when the applicant applies. This reflects the different hiring needs of companies. Where you choose to test in the hiring process is based on a wide variety of factors specific to your organization, including the length of required testing, the average applicant pool size, and the job requirements.
Tests Provide Insights That Are Applicable To Any Job Level
According to the survey results, companies are less likely to test upper-level roles, such as VPs and Executives. However, pre-employment tests provide insights that are applicable to any role and job level. They can be especially useful for testing upper-level roles because these positions are typically higher stakes, and testing provides an extra layer of information to guide these critical hiring decisions.
SURVEY RESPONDENTS
The respondents use pre-employment tests for hiring within a wide range of industries.
