With company culture becoming ever more critical within the talent acquisition and retention strategies of businesses, the need for behavioural testing is set to grow. Organisations seek to use the latest technologies to rectify their decision making, de-risk their recruitment costs and build lasting teams for the future. So it is right for all businesses to adopt this now.
Recruiting the right talent means looking for the right combination of technical skills, experience, and potential. As many hiring managers know, the qualifications on your candidate's CV are only one piece of the puzzle.
At Lucy Walker Recruitment, when our clients come to us looking for the ideal new employee, they're not just looking for a good application, they want to hire someone who can thrive in their company's culture and more often than not replicate the characteristics of their star performers
Behavioural testing is a great addition to the recruitment process. With the right interviewing strategy alongside it, they ensure you're finding people who are best suited to both the position and the team they'll be working with.
What Is Behavioural Testing?
Behavioural tests assess the emotional and behavioural traits of your candidates so that your assessment goes beyond the CV.
They ensure that you hire people based both on their technical knowledge and their ability to fit seamlessly into your high-performing teams.
Why Use Behavioural Tests in Recruitment?
A few years ago, Forbes estimated that 70% of employers screen their candidates for personality traits. As company culture becomes even more critical to staff productivity and retention, the need for behavioural testing is set to grow.
Behavioural testing helps you to refine the candidate pool. Companies can conduct these tests as part of a screening interview, to ensure that they're only arranging meetings with the people most likely to thrive in their business.
We are firm believers in that if there is a genuine desire to integrate psychometric testing into your candidate assessment methodology, then the ability to dissect, analyse, interpret and feedback results this gives you is key.
Behavioural assessments will:
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Improve the interview process - knowing which personalities are essential to your team lays the foundation for competency-based questions about soft skills and work attitudes.
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Demonstrates working style - mindset and personality often determine how successful a candidate will be in any role.
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Strengthen teams - personality testing allows companies to choose different, but compatible people for their high-performing teams.
Choosing the Right Personality Test
The first step to success with behavioural assessments is picking the right test for your candidates.
There are plenty of options out there, but not all may be appropriate for your recruitment strategy. Check out this blog on picking a personality test.
We favour the McQuaig Psychometric System which is an easy to use online personality profiling system from which you can:-
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Benchmark a role internally.
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Recruit to the needs of that role.
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Develop your people based on their strengths.
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Retain your stars.
Further details of it can be viewed below in our informative 5 minute Webinar.
Behavioural Testing - Webinar - Lucy Walker Recruitment
Combine Personality Tests with Interview Strategies
After you've found the psychometric test that works best for you, look for ways to implement aspects of it into your interview.
For instance, if you're looking for a new project manager and they've claimed to be "organised" on their personality test, you can ask them to demonstrate this in a competency-based interview, by describing a time they worked well according to a deadline. We have banks of competency-based interview questions which we are able to assist clients in the interview process with should they chose to go down this route.
Combining behavioural insights with your interview questions ensures that the candidate defines the characteristics that you're looking for in the same way that you do and helps you delve further beyond the first impressions stage with probing questions.
Remember to Give Feedback on Cultural Fit
Behavioural testing is great for directing you towards the best candidate, and it's also useful for improving your recruitment processes.
Personality tests go beyond the CV to provide useful insights into cultural fit, team compatibility and more.
When you have the personality you need in mind, as well as the technical skills, you can offer a more comprehensive and holistic interview. At the same time, you'll also be able to give your unsuccessful candidates insightful feedback about why they didn't get the role.
Letting people know that they missed out because of a poor cultural fit ends the hiring journey on a positive note, and improves your employer brand. When jobseekers get feedback for the time they've invested in your company, they're more likely to leave positive reviews about your business online.
Can We Help?
We have placed and filled over 100,000 temp and permanent assignments over the last 30 years so have a range of techniques, ideas and platforms which could help you. Why not call us on 0113 367 2880 to have a conversation with one of our team. Alternatively drop us an email here or check out our Testimonials and Case Studies.
