Getting a second opinion
Getting a second opinion
In the hunt for scarce talent and an eagerness to seal a deal quickly, it can be tempting to settle for establishing a candidate’s skills, abilities, and performance through internal selection processes. However, in many roles leadership potential, business attitude, and cultural compatibility are crucial when it comes to making the right decisions in a hiring process. This article explores how getting a second opinion can make a difference in the recruitment process, avoid bias, and improve employers’ ability to make the right choice.
Insight from Psychometrics
In traditional recruitment processes it can be practically impossible to identify top performers at an early stage - and particularly for emerging talent roles. Candidates who appear to be perfect for the job on paper are not always as successful when the reality of a workplace come into play. Making a poor recruitment decision can have a high price for both employers and candidates.
Applying psychometrics in a recruitment process is proven to have many benefits and can improve the accuracy of any selection. By assessing traits such as aptitude, emotional stability and communication style in a candidate upfront, recruiters are able to get a much clearer picture of them and their suitability for a specific role or position. Psychometric tests allow you to compare a candidate against the norm, therefore highlighting those likely to perform optimally in the role at hand.
Since objectivity is key to candidate assessments, a good psychometric test provides fair and accurate results each time it's given.
To ensure this, the test must meet three key criteria:
Standardisation – A standardised test is administered the same way every time, to reduce any test bias. This ensures the ability to compare the results with anyone whose characteristics are similar to those of the sample group.
Reliability – Good psychometric tests should produce consistent results, and not be significantly influenced by outside factors. Taking a test when stressed for example should provide similar results to taking it when excited or relaxed.
Validity – This is perhaps the most important quality of a test. A valid test has to measure what it's designed to measure. If a test is supposed to measure decision-making, then it must clearly demonstrate that it does actually measure decision-making, and not something else that is simply related to it.
Matching attitude to role
In a hiring process, taking an approach that emphasises work ethics, flexibility, and teamwork alongside expertise and technical skills, truly helps build dynamic teams. Candidates who pass the aptitude test are likely to make better employees in the long-term. They have the right mindset to learn, develop new skills, and contribute to the company's future. Furthermore, the required skills for a role today will be different in a few years’ time – consequently the tools, systems and business approaches needed, will change as well.
Supplementing psychometrics with in-depth functional interviews brings the added benefit of objective, thorough and competency-based assessments. It allows organisations to get a prediction of how the candidate will truly perform in role.
Another benefit of psychometrics is that candidates can also gain new insights and learning about themselves through the process, allowing them to make better career decisions and work on their own professional and personal development.
Avoiding bias
Recruitment panels are only human, and decision-making is not a mechanical process but based on judgment; this means we are all potentially susceptible to unconscious bias, distortion, or stereotyping. Furthermore, there is always a possibility that people disagree on what ‘good’ looks like. Having reviewers with different opinions about a candidate will provide a more nuanced picture and make for better judgemental accuracy.
It may be tempting for recruiters to favour people who are similar to themselves or those already in the team. Getting a second opinion ensure that these judgements are more objective, and that bias is removed from the equation. The best teams have a range of people with different personalities and skills.
A second opinion from Alumni
The role of objectivity in recruitment is key to making the right talent decisions. Psychometric testing and value-based assessments both have their place at varying stages in the recruitment process. Our clients often ask us to apply our objectivity to shortlisted candidates based on the information already available. One reason might be that they want to see how the candidates would fit in with other members of the team, explore certain issues of concern, or asses their leadership potential. In short; a second opinion is– , a way of validating their own recruitment. Working with Alumni, we guarantee that we will treat your process with the utmost sensitivity and confidentiality. Candidates participating in our second opinion processes are off-limits to the rest of our operations.
If you would like an objective second opinion on the potential of your future hires in order to make the best decision first time, please get in touch.
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