Hiring a new employee is an exciting time. If your business can support additional staff, wonderful news! If you need to replace an exiting employee, it’s an opportunity to make a great match! Whatever the reason behind the new hire, obviously you want it to be successful, for all involved. Which makes it a good time to figure out the best way to know if a potential hire will be the right fit or not. That’s where an assessment test could come in.

Assessment tests are plentiful out here and some are very popular. But you may find drafting your own assessment test that is more aligned to your needs, and your budget, worthwhile. What should you consider? Read on.

Key assessment factors

1. Evaluate for skills. This includes both the knowledge a candidate should possess as well as any relevant tech experience.
2. What would you do if…. You’ll want the candidate to answer some situational questions, such as how they would respond to a specific dilemma. These can be done short answer-style, or you can provide them with a multiple choice list of responses.
3. Pay attention to length. You don’t want your assessment to be too long or complex, as you’ll get into the bigger questions in the interview but you do want each question to count.
4. Involve your team. Assessments should be a collaborative effort with your team. Through discussion, identify the skills that are the most important to the success of both company productivity and culture. Have your team take the assessment test and then review, looking for confusing, irrelevant, or redundant questions.
5. Assess for the bigger picture. It’s not reasonable to assume that you’ll grab a clear understanding of a candidate’s personality during the interview process but you’ll still want to be looking for a good fit with your company’s values and culture. Remember, skills can be learned, so maybe try hiring based on other criteria that will benefit team collaboration.

After you’ve completed your assessment test, it is very important to have it reviewed by HR. And that’s where we come in! Eos HR can take the guesswork and headache out of hiring new staff, making sure your policies and procedures are not only legally legit but also make the process as efficient as possible. We’ll make growing your team less stressful so you can focus on successfully leading them forward. Schedule a free consultation today to learn more.