How to Make Better Hires

Review Your Hiring Process

Pull a coin out of your pocket and flip it. Your ability to predict what side it will land on is slightly less than your ability to predict a candidate's success in their role based on an interview alone. Let’s state that another way: when you select a job candidate using interviews alone, your chances of choosing the right person are about 50-50. 

Unfortunately, every component of your company’s success depends on your ability to accurately predict who will be the right person for the role and the company culture. Therefore, right hiring decision comes before anything else. Before successful product innovation, before customer loyalty, and before operational efficiency. And yet, most organizations still rely on the traditional hiring process: write a job description, make a job posting, review resumes, check references, execute a standard interview, and make a job offer.

80% of turnover is due to poor hiring decisions. Bad hires not only impact potential employees, but also your company’s performance, growth, and reputation. Before you cast blame on the applicants, (“they were just a ‘bad’ fit,”) think about the role the organization plays in making the “bad hire.” Albert Einstein once said that if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will spend its whole life believing it is stupid. Harsh, but you can unknowingly do this to the people in your span of care.

Placing the right people in the right roles is a caring act of leadership. The right hire is good for your business and good for the person. Here's how to improve your hiring process and increase your confidence in making a good hiring decision by using pre-employment tests.

Assess for Good Fit 

Hiring managers’ judgment and experience must always play a role. However, high-performing organizations are replacing traditional, subjective selection practices with data-driven pre-employment testing. And, they’re achieving a competitive advantage for their business and company culture. This testing is well beyond typical personality assessments and behavior indicators. These are the gold standard and rigorously verified assessments that require credentialed practitioners to access and decipher. Research has repeatedly shown that pre-employment testing is a more accurate predictor of job success than any other selection method including structured interviews, reference checks, and school grades. For roles at the Director level up to the C-Suite, these tests help you find the right candidate with insights into four critical categories:

Pre-employment testing for cognitive ability and personality factors is not “pass/fail.” The results are scored against pre-identified competencies aligned with the job requirements. For example, the competencies needed for a senior leader overseeing an innovation department would be quite different from a senior finance leader. These tests provide the hiring manager with unbiased information on how well the qualified candidates match against the chosen competencies, ranging from poor to superior performance, and whether any competencies are being overused.

Use Data for More than Cultural Fit 

The data gleaned from these assessments can be utilized beyond evaluating potential candidates for a match to the job requirements and company culture. With insights into strengths and opportunities for development, these tests can provide insight into potential employees' opportunity for long-term success at the organization. Assessment results can be integrated into a new team member’s onboarding experience, working relationships, and development planning to increase the chances of success in the role. Rather than providing your new hire a list of rules and policies to sign, give them insights about themselves, tips on working with their leader, and a commitment to increasing their chances of success. 

No tests are 100% accurate to determine a candidate’s potential success. However, organizations using pre-employment assessments can see success rates of up to 94% – meaning that one year later, ideal candidates are excelling in their roles.

To learn more about how to integrate these hiring tests into your interviews, hiring, and onboarding process, reach out to our team of talented experts. We can help you identify the right tests to evaluate critical competencies and build a hiring process that consistently places the right people in the right roles.