Finding the right talent for your role, particularly for management-level positions in the fenestration industry, can be a real challenge.
You may find that you have lots of CVs all looking similar-ish, leading to an exhausting number of interviews to try to tease out past achievements and to assess skill sets, the approach they might take, and the persons personality. Eventually a decision will hopefully be made, but with fingers crossed somewhat that this new starter can effectively deliver what they have promised – and in a way that takes others with them on the journey.
Getting this wrong is expensive.
Recruitment costs, notice periods, onboarding and initial time spent training up wasted – the lost productivity that you would have benefited from if you had appointed a high performer can run into many tens of thousands of pounds. In a worst case situation, you may also experience this plus increased staff turnover from your existing high performing staff who might react negatively to the new hire.
What is Psychometric testing and profiling?
Psychometric testing is a tool that can be used to give you as the interviewer additional and valuable data-driven insights into a candidate as a person. There are personality, situational judgement and aptitude tests that can give you more of an understanding as to how they might prefer to operate and how they may react to situations, and how they might fit into your team.
A psychometric test is usually an online questionnaire sent out to the candidate to complete with a series of multiple-choice questions asking them to select which word is ‘most like them’ or ‘least like them’. From the series of answers a profile is constructed with an accompanying summary detailing the personality, drivers and motivations and personal style indicated.
What are the benefits of psychometric testing in recruitment?
While CVs are vital to get an overview of the professional journey and employment history of a candidate, psychometric testing in recruitment delves much deeper, uncovering personality traits, cognitive abilities, values, and behavioural patterns that might not be shown through CVs and interviews alone and is a great way to gain more insight and help take the ‘gut feeling’ / guess work out of the decision making.
Incorporating psychometric testing into the recruitment strategy helps both the organisation with a vacancy to fill as well as the potential candidates by matching them better on a deeper level than just experience. By aligning individuals with roles that match their strengths and motivations, organisations are able to build a solid workforce that is aligned with the values, vision and culture.
Companies using these types tests typically see much higher employee retention rates and can reduce staff turnover by getting the right people for the right job.
Another benefit of using psychometric testing in the recruitment process is that it mitigates unconscious biases (positive and negative) which can often cloud the decision-making processes, and provide impartial data-driven insights, helping to lead to a more diverse and inclusive workforce.
How could you incorporate psychometric testing into your recruitment process?
Very few organisations in the fenestration industry are using psychometric testing as part of their recruitment process, but it can be a game changer and could give you a competitive edge as you evolve your team over time.
In terms of the practical application, when working with my clients I tend to use the psychometric tools after the first interviews and before a second interview takes place.
Once you have a short list of people that you’re satisfied can hopefully do the job, it is useful to help find out more about the person and how they might fit the business, the existing team and the challenges to overcome in the role. Profiling helps to identify areas to probe further in that final interview.
It can help you to make data-driven decisions which can ultimately boost the chances of you hiring an employee that is the right fit for your company goals and culture, saving a lot of valuable time and resources – and improve your chances of hitting that new hire jackpot!
How get started with psychometric testing
At MacGregor Recruitment we’re advocates of the use of profiling as one part of a thorough selection process. If you partner with us to support your recruitment, we would be pleased to add this stage as an addition to our service offering.
There are a number of psychometric test providers available and various options that can be used that focus on different areas. If this is an area of interest to you to use as part of your internal process, please see the three websites below that we recommend you check out:
- SHL: www.shl.com
- Thomas International: www.thomas.co
- Finding Potential: www.findingpotential.com
However, if you’d like to talk to us about how we can help do this for you then get in touch with our team today by calling 07549 194159 or emailing hello@macgregorrecruitment.co.uk