RUN WITH THE Big dogS™ newsletter
 Volume 3, issue 28

If you are testing applicants, have you validated that the test actually correlates with success?...John

Management idea

Testing applicants to correlate their skills, behaviors, and values with the job you're looking to fill is a valuable and obvious thing to do. Hiring the wrong people is very expensive. Before you commit to this ongoing process, however, you need to validate the tests.

We have a client whose growth is directly tied to recruiting successful route salesmen.  They invested significant resources with a well respected industry consultant to develop and administer a pre-employment test. A test, that would identify candidates with the traits that the company believed would all but guarantee success.

Wisely, just before committing to the new test, the client had every existing route salesman take the test. He covered a wall with the graphic results of each salesman's test results next to their actual performance.  It was immediately obvious that the test results showed little or no correlation with actual performance in the field.  Chalking one up to experience, the client eliminated the test and focused on other less scientific selection criteria that did correlate to actual performance.