How to Measure Quality of Hire
Learn of our 5 great ways to measure quality of hire which makes organisations make informed decisions about future hires.
As an HR professional, candidate selection is one of the most crucial responsibilities in your role. Not only does it play a critical part in the success of an organisation, but it also determines the quality of its workforce. The process of candidate selection can be a complex and time-consuming task, involving various stages, from screening resumes to conducting multiple rounds of interviews. However, it is essential to ensure that the right candidate is selected for the right job.
In this guide we will provide a complete overview of candidate section. We will to provide HR professionals and hiring managers with a comprehensive overview of the candidate selection process. We will cover the different stages involved, from screening resumes to conducting interviews, and discuss how to make the best use of the information gathered to select the right candidate for the job. This guide is an essential resource for HR professionals who are looking to improve their candidate selection process and build a high-performing workforce.
Candidate selection is the process of identifying, evaluating, and choosing the most suitable candidate for a job opening. This process is a critical responsibility for HR professionals, as the success of an organisation depends on the quality of its workforce.
The goal of candidate selection is to find the best match between the needs of the job and the qualifications, skills, and characteristics of the candidate.
Ultimately, there are two aims associated with employee selection:
Candidate selection is best conceptualised as a funnel, with a large number of candidates at the top of the funnel and a smaller subset at the bottom. This tallies well with how typically selection processes operate, as typically only a small proportion of candidates will be presented with offers of employment. When a candidate selection process is functioning well, each stage of the recruitment process results in an increase in the overall quality of candidates, as low-potential candidates are deselected and high-potential candidates are progressed to the subsequent stage.
Each organisation tends to utilise a unique approach to employee selection, and thus it can be difficult to outline every stage in every recruitment process. Nevertheless, there are many common themes among selection processes, which can include the following:
The criteria for selecting employees are the factors that employers use to determine the suitability of a candidate for a job. These criteria are based on the requirements of the job and are used to evaluate the skills, knowledge, qualifications, and characteristics of the candidate. Organisations often formalise their selection criteria using competency frameworks, which are a set of key competencies that underpin performance in-role. Alternatively, other organisations rely on job descriptions alone to determine selection criteria, representing a more ad-hoc approach. Common criteria for selection include:
Naturally, identifying and outlining candidate selection criteria is the easy part. More difficult is reliably measuring these characteristics and using that information to form employee selection decisions. Consequently, organisations have a wide range of potential tools at their disposal, and a number of third-party providers are available to support organisations in estimating their candidates' potential.
Employers use a variety of tools to improve the effectiveness of candidate selection and ensure that they are selecting the best candidate for the job. Usually, these tools require the expertise of a third-party provider, usually a psychometric testing publisher, HR consultancy, or occupational psychologist. Here are some of the more commonly used employee selection tools available on the market today:
When deciding which assessment tools to use, there are several factors to account for. You must ensure that the assessment method is fair, reliable, and valid, effectively measuring your intended selection criteria. Many products on the market today simply aren't fit for purpose, and you must conduct thorough due diligence when making purchasing decisions. For example, you should also ask for technical manuals for assessments, evidence of fairness across legally protected groups, and reliability coefficients, avoiding providers who fail to provide these.
Improving employee selection requires a structured and comprehensive approach. First, organisations must acknowledge the inherent weaknesses of the existing approach, taking an honest and objective look at historic practices. Once areas of weakness have been identified, they can adopt a range of measures to improve their selection processes, increasing the probability of hiring great candidates. The following actions can help employers to achieve this:
If you would prefer to watch a video, here Ben talks about how to improve candidate selection:
In reality, most HR professionals and hiring managers overestimate their ability to hire the right candidates and simultaneously underestimate the effectiveness of candidate selection tools available to them. This is because traditional candidate selection often relies heavily on face-to-face interviews, which are often flawed. A skilled interviewee could easily convince a hiring manager that they are resilient, hardworking, diligent, and creative, even though interviews are not capable of measuring these traits.
However, as organisations grow, the need for external employee selection tools becomes unavoidable. The larger the candidate pool size, the more beneficial selection tools become, and eventually leading organisations to adopt them. Instead of waiting for it to become necessary, organisations should start researching these tools now, allowing them to implement solutions before problems arise in the future, while also improving their current candidate selection processes.