Why conducting an assessment centre test is important?

Recruitment is long process which has to be done properly. Here, any organisation or company mostly try to assess all the applicants together by conducting some proper methods of selection process.There have been many studies and researches on what can be the best selection method when it comes to recruitment in a job. Results have found out that assessment centre can be a great method in predicting the suitability of an applicant along with their sustainability when it comes to a specific job profile in a company. By conducting an assessment centre a company can easily avoid in making wrong decisions in the recruitment process. Making wrong decisions in the recruitment process is not a good idea at all because it is a costly process and also hiring wrong people means they need to keep recruiting till they get the right one. When a company goes for an assessment centre then the candidates who have applied also get a very positive experience from the test rather than just going for a face to face interview.

In many organisations or companies, this assessment centre is only done in order to recruit people for high positions. Here, the company also gets to choose from the wide varieties of exercises that are given here along with some structured interview and work samples. They can also go for some group exercises and role plays as well for the candidates when they are going for an assessment centre test. But before going for any assessment centre test, the company must have a clear idea about what their job profile is and what are they expecting from the candidates. Then they can select the test to see if the competency of the applicant matches the job profile or not. The recruiters can also go for some off the self exercises here so that they can analyse the applicant even better. So, this assessment centre can very well be a combination of online and offline test procedures. For the offline test one can for a pen and paper based test and for the online one, there can be an online test with the use of technology.

When the entire process of testing is done, then the recruiter can see the behaviour of each and every applicant and then measure their performance directly and also objectively. They can also match if there are any specific criteria or some needed competencies for a particular job role. But on top of everything one has to keep in mind that these assessment centre tests are very much time consuming. That is why; the recruiters need to invest a good amount of time and money only after ensuring the fact that this test is their requirement when it comes to their recruitment process. If yes, then only they can go ahead with it.

Here, the test exercises are often designed in such a way that they can give arise to a situation which one can easily face at work. Here are some ideas:

• In case of an assessment centre for the teaching job the applicants may need to teach a class about a lesson that they have prepared already in advance.
• When it comes to a sales job then the assessment centre for it can ask the candidates to take part in a situation where they have to sell a service or a product to any retail buyer.
• In case of an armed force job, if an assessment centre is performed then one may have to lead a team with a very demanding physical challenge.

Not only that, but the employers also get a chance to:

• See how each of the applicants behaves under pressure.
• Observe all of the applicants for an extended time period.
• Keep an eye on how the interact with each other and work together under various social situations.

Also, all the applicants must keep in mind that the recruiters never look for a candidate who can excel in each and every exercise but they must perform well in all the given sections. If they perform mediocre in one subject then they must make it up to the other aspects. The key things in an assessment centre are as follows:

• Assessors
• Assessment centre designers
• Role players
• Administrators or facilitators
• Checkers or quality controllers

Also, the company needs to provide a few trainings to the people whom they have employed recently in a new job role. When the applicant is done with the test, then there is one or more that one assessor who has a major decision making discussion. They check the total score of the candidate and then go for the final selection process or the decision making process. The assessors must not keep in mind any kind of prior personal knowledge about the candidates when they are assessing them by the scores. In fact, they must give proper feedback to each and every candidate after the selection is done. This can be very beneficial for the candidates even if they are not being selected in the job. This also puts the organisation in a very positive light.

There are many assessors who have proper inputs in the selection process and this can be also termed as the personal biasness. As a result, one may end up getting wrong hiring decisions. As assessment centre can prevent one from doing that. This testing process is actually a great opportunity for the recruiters to have a clear insight of the company and all its job profiles. The assessors come together at the end of the testing process. This is also professionally known as the wash up session. Then they consider each and every candidate and reach their final decision.

Conclusion

Thus assessment centre testing process is very much needed for an organisation if they want to hire the right people. It is convenient because if they hire the right people then the productivity of the company increases and they get a lot of profit from it.