Traditional recruitment methods rely on ploughing through endless resumes and scheduling costly interviews. Often, these methods fail to decipher whether a candidate is as adept as they claim and whether they will fit into your organisation's culture. Talent assessment tools can be pivotal in giving you deeper insights for a well-rounded view of your candidate, closing this gap, and avoiding a bad hire. For the past four decades, Thomas has been committed to developing and perfecting the people science behind a range of talent assessment tools. Let’s take a look at how these tools enhance the hiring process.
Why talent assessment tools are essential
Resumes are often embellished and, in some cases, trivialised. Talent assessment tools allow you to see beyond what is portrayed on a candidate’s resume for a holistic perspective. Depending on the tools you choose, these assessments will give you an idea of a candidate's personality, natural cognitive abilities, and behavioural tendencies in the workplace. If you have a transparent view of your candidate, you’ll be able to make objective, data-led decisions, avoiding bad hires that can be costly and culturally detrimental to your business.
Transforming the hiring process with talent assessment
Did you know that 76% of HR leaders believe that a faster fit means a poor fit? Nothing could be further from the truth! If correctly used, talent assessment tools can streamline the hiring process. This will save you time, money, and resources – and find you the perfect fit. Once you’ve identified what it is you need in a candidate, these tools help you focus on the most promising candidates based on their assessment results. From here, insights from the assessments will guide targeted and effective interview questions, helping you make better hiring decisions. The tools available at Thomas assess different facets of a candidate. Strategically aligning the right assessments to your long-term business goals and to the role you’re hiring for will predict the candidate’s potential for success.
Implementing talent assessment tools in your strategy
Selecting the right assessments
It’s important to select assessment tools according to the specific needs of the roles and the organisational culture to reduce redundancy and save resources. Each assessment offers different insights:
Behavioural assessments will help you understand how a candidate behaves, what motivates them, and how they deal with conflict.
Personality tests measure a candidate's resilience to stress, their openness to change, and their competitiveness level.
Aptitude tests provide insight into abilities like reasoning, perceptual speed, number speed and accuracy, word meaning, and spatial visualisation. It measures competency for the role and cognitive skills like problem-solving and critical thinking.
Emotional intelligence assessments determine how someone deals with conflict and confrontation and how they will interact within a team.
Choose tests based on which information is most important to achieving your goals. For example, you might assess a software engineering candidate on their analytical and problem-solving skills. However, you wouldn’t need the same information from a creative designer – perhaps a behavioural assessment would be more prudent.
Implementing these tools into your workflow
We recommend integrating various assessments at various stages of the recruitment process to maximise the effectiveness of candidate assessments in your hiring workflow. Introduce assessments gradually and at an appropriate time, and make sure these tests form part of a larger strategy. Take the candidate’s journey into consideration. Be transparent about when they are being assessed, what they are being assessed for, and why. Ensure they understand the benefits no matter the outcome and make the process as simple as possible. All our assessments at Thomas are available digitally, making implementation convenient.
Interpreting the results
Your hiring teams must be trained in interpreting assessment results so that the data drives the decision-making. To gain insight from the assessment, the hiring team must understand its purpose and objectives in alignment with the intricacies of the role. Here at Thomas, all our candidate test results are analysed by proprietary technology and presented to you in an easy-to-read report. One assessment in isolation will not capture the full spectrum of a candidate's potential. We recommend using these tests as part of a holistic assessment strategy.
Success stories: Talent assessment in action
Over the years, we’ve adapted and perfected our methodology. Our experiences have informed our improvements, and everything we do is backed by science. Here are a few of our favourite success stories:
- Explore how this major UK university integrated psychometric assessments into its leadership development programme and differentiated itself as an employer of choice.
- See how this enterprise cloud software company improved its candidate experience and started investing in people who would add value to its team.
- This is how Medela used assessments to help their leaders lead with more self-awareness.
- Discover how this consultancy firm used assessments to grow its team by 24% and increase productivity during the pandemic.
It doesn’t matter which sector you’re in, how big or small your company is, or what you’re hoping to improve; we’ve seen it all!
Unlocking the full potential of your hiring process
Traditional recruitment methods often fail to accurately assess a candidate’s abilities and how well they might fit in with the company culture. Talent assessment tools can offer deeper insights into a potential employee’s personality, cognitive abilities, and workplace conduct. Enhance and streamline your hiring process with objective, data-led decisions to save your company time and resources. Select the right assessment tools according to your company's needs and implement changes slowly and with an end goal in mind. To be as fair and as unbiased as possible, results must be interpreted by trained professionals.
If you’re ready to start developing, growing, and improving your workforce, explore the customisable variety of assessment tools we offer at Thomas. Our consultants will help you fine-tune your hiring process to avoid bad hires and build stronger teams. Talent assessment tools will transform the way you hire, and benefits range from improved efficiency to better long-term employee performance. We’re dedicated to advancing talent acquisition strategies through our innovative tools and insights. Speak to a consultant to start redefining successful hiring in your organisation.
