Candidate assessment is a critical aspect of any successful recruitment strategy. Whether you're using aptitude testing or skill tests, leveraging the right candidate assessment methods can help ensure a supply of quality candidates. The key to reliable candidate assessment is using the right technology and tools. In fact, 68% of recruiting professionals indicate that better-recruiting tools and technology are the most effective way to boost recruiter performance. Sixty percent say that soft skills assessments will meaningfully impact recruitment over the next five years.  

What are different types of candidate assessment methods?

Candidate assessment methods differ based on your company's particular needs and the job for which you are hiring. They help you determine whether the candidate is capable of performing the tasks assigned to their role and whether they will be a good fit within your company culture. You can use these assessments to pare down your candidate pool to ensure that you are interviewing only the most qualified individuals, for a more efficient and cost-effective hiring process. In this article, we outline some of the most useful candidate assessment and talent measurement methods and tools to enhance your search for quality talent. 

Skills Assessments for Screening Candidates

Individual skills assessments are one of the first interactions your recruiters will have with potential employees. They can be used to gauge candidate skill levels for word processing, spreadsheet programs, and other computer programs and software used by your company. Skills assessments are also available to test candidates for crucial job-related skills, such as:

• Writing: When hiring copywriters, journalists, or other writing-related professionals, you can test for writing skills in a few ways: 1) have candidates take a formal writing assessment test, 2) ask to see a portfolio of work samples, or 3) conduct a writing exercise as part of their interview process. In each of these, you are looking for proper usage of grammar, vocabulary level and tone, and word context and logic. 
• Reading comprehension: Employers may give a reading assessment to candidates to test their ability to analyze what they read, test their memory and recall of information, ability to understand what they read and apply what they learned.

• Basic math & verbal: Also known as the Criteria Basic Skills Test (CBST), this is used mainly for entry-level jobs. It measures basic math, grammar, spelling, and language skills. This test has 40 questions and is to be answered in 20 minutes.

• Accounting & Finance:  The purpose of these assessments is to evaluate a candidate's ability to measure, process, and communicate the financial information of an organization, as well as the aptitude for logical, numerical, and verbal reasoning. The assessment administered by most firms is called the Criteria Cognitive Aptitude Test (CCAT) which assesses an applicant's critical thinking skills, problem-solving ability, and ability to appl​​y new information. It has 50 questions to be answered in 15 minutes. 
• Critical thinking and problem solving: These are psychometric tests and are conducted at all levels. They are open to all industries for testing, but common for the legal sector with Watson-Glaser critical thinking tests. These are given to the candidate to assess their ability to use a range of logical skills to evaluate given information and make a judgment. The assessment is usually administered online in a multiple-choice format: 30 questions in 40 minutes, or 80 questions in 60 minutes.
• Technical and Engineering - This assessment is designed to test general abilities and intelligence, solve quantitative problems, critically analyze information, and work with numbers, graphs, and charts. A popular choice for screening candidates is using an online coding test like HackerRank. 

Skills assessments are a quick and easy way to quantify the skill level of incoming candidates so that you can eliminate unqualified individuals before moving to the next stage of recruitment. 

Did you know?
Crosschq streamlines your talent search using assessments and comprehensive data analytics to establish a qualified talent pipeline for dynamic job matching that funnels top talent into your company. 

Aptitude and Personality Assessments for Selection

Aptitude and personality tests measure a candidate's soft skills, such as: 

• Communication style
• Customer service skills
• Multi-tasking
• Critical thinking
• Crisis management 

These types of assessments, while not 100% accurate, can help you determine whether a candidate is the right match for the role or for the company as a whole.

A toxic employee may have a stellar resume and excellent scores on skills assessments, but can ultimately compromise your company's morale, productivity, and reputation. Aptitude and personality assessments ask key questions to help you hire candidates with the right personality and soft skills for your organization. Crosschq's AI analytics convert data from these assessments into a score that will allow you to quickly determine which candidates are the best fit. 

Quality Metrics for Candidate Assessment

With increasing competition in the job market, recruiters are modifying their strategies to take advantage of advanced technology. Using cutting-edge data collection and analytics like Crosschq's, you can establish recruitment metrics specifically tailored to the needs of your business, in order to filter your candidate pool for top talent. 

Quality metrics allow you to analyze the non-quantifiable skills and talents of both prospective and current employees. Quality metrics for candidate assessments may include: 

• Resume and Qualifications
• Reputation and References
• Awards and Accolades
• Fit to Company Culture

Quantity Metrics for Candidate Assessment

Quantity metrics offer a tangible method of candidate assessment, with more objective metrics used to score individuals on a uniform scale. While these metrics do not create a full picture, they can contribute useful, actionable information when analyzing a candidate's suitability for a position. Quantity metrics that are useful for candidate assessments include: 

• Number of Positive References
• Amount of Published Work
• Profit and Commission Numbers
• Net Promoter Scores
• Skill Assessment Scores

Since this kind of analysis can be time-consuming for a business, Crosschq's quality metrics are highly customizable to help you meet the particular needs of each role within your company. 

How Candidate Assessment Methods Improve Your Recruitment Quality

Crosschq's candidate assessment services streamline your recruitment and hiring processes and attract top talent. Using quantifiable data and analysis, your hiring and recruiting teams can work toward the same goals and tailor your talent searches to ensure that you are drawing only the highest quality employees from your candidate pool. 

There are numerous benefits to adding candidate assessments to your recruitment and hiring processes, including:

• Clear Goals and Expectations: Using a uniform method of assessment ensures that your recruiters and hiring managers are working toward the same goals. With everyone on the same page, your recruitment process is more efficient, organized, and cost-effective.
• Greater Productivity: Assessments remove a great deal of uncertainty from the selection process, which allows recruiters to conduct recruitment activities with a greater degree of confidence. This allows for more productive recruitment and better-quality candidates. 
• More Top-Performing Candidates: Candidate assessments allow your recruiters to weed out under-qualified candidates and individuals who are not a good match for the role or company. The data collected from these assessments also help recruiters in the future to create better job descriptions with clearly outlined duties, challenges, and opportunities for growth, in order to attract more top performers. 
• Competent and Motivated Employees: Using candidate assessments, you can select higher-quality candidates who display the knowledge, experience, and motivation needed for the position. 
• Reduced Recruitment Costs: Assessments help recruiters to narrow the candidate pool to include only candidates with the hard and soft skills necessary to fit in both the role and the company as a whole. This reduces the amount of time your hiring manager will spend on unnecessary interviews, saving you both time and money.

Cutting-Edge Candidate Assessment Technology by Crosschq

Establish effective and cost-efficient candidate assessment methods with Crosschq data analytics and AI technology. Don't overload your recruitment team and hiring managers with data analysis and complex calculations. Crosschq’s technology allows you to establish specific data collection and analytics tailored to your business needs. Conduct thorough reference checks, employee screening, practical assessments, interviews, and onboarding activities using the latest automation software. Crosschq’s 360 talent acquisition software, Recruit candidate referral network, and data-driven Analytics will help you attract and retain the top talent in your industry.

To learn more about Crosschq, contact us to schedule your demo.