Why Use Testing?
from Gately Consulting

• 13 Principles of Assessment*
• Testing and Assessment: an Employer's Guide to Good Practices*
• Quotes courtesy of Randy Austad Profiles of CO.

* from Testing and Assessment: an Employer's Guide to Good Practices, Employment and Training Administration U.S. Department of Labor, 1999

"If an employee is not performing as expected, it is probably because he is miscast for the job."

W. Edwards Deming

“My observation is that whenever one person is found adequate to the discharge of a duty by close application thereto, it is worse executed by two persons, and scarcely done at all if three or more are employed therein.”

George Washington

“If the first person who answers the phone cannot answer your question, it is a bureaucracy.”

Lyndon Johnson

“One has to look out for engineers---they begin with sewing machines and end up with the atomic bomb.”

Marcel Pagnol

“Tests should be an integral part of most selection processes because they are generally accurate and reliable and can allow more effective and efficient evaluation than an interview.”

Hiring Great People
page 151

“You learn more about a person when you see them under stress than at any other time”

John Chambers
CEO, Cisco Systems
Boss of the Year

• Losing an employee doesn’t really hurt our company.
• We don’t really know why people leave or stay.
• We can’t afford higher pay so there is
  no way we can keep top employees.
• Our employees won’t leave because they
  know we have their best interests at heart.
• You just have to live with turnover.
• People leave because the work is
  naturally boring and repetitive.
• People can be easily and inexpensively replaced.

Wayne Outlaw
Smart Staffing

• Tests are more reliable
• Tests evaluate competencies
• Tests reduce expensive interview time

Hiring Great People
pages 146-147

• Limit Legal Liability
• Minimize Poor Performance
• Identify Potential Problems
• Reduce Turnover
• Increase Quality of Employees

Wayne Outlaw, Smart Staffing
pages 125-126

Statistics show that 92% of applicants surveyed found tests acceptable, while only three percent resented it. The rest had no opinion.

Molding Systems
May 1999 v57 i5 p56(1)

Applicants Lie

"95 percent of 1997 college graduates were willing to make at least one false statement to get a job. Forty-one percent had already done so."

Nation’s Business
May, 1999

• They don’t think you are strong enough to handle the truth
• They are too ashamed of themselves
  to take responsibility for their actions
• They think they can talk their way out of anything
• They do not respect you

Lou Holtz
Winning Every Day

"A study in the Harvard Business Review found that 90 percent of hiring decisions are based on the interview. A Michigan State University study found that interviews are only 14 percent accurate."

Crain’s Business
October, 1999

Hiring Great People
page x

Turnover is Expensive

Consulting Psychologist

"Conservative estimates are that hiring, training and creating a productive employee costs a minimum of 700 times the worker's hourly wage. Recent articles quote costs that range up to 1.5 times the annual salary."

Crain’s Business
October, 1999

“You're going to lose 2 1/2 times the person's annual salary," even if you rectify a mistake in hiring in the first six months.”

Dr. Pierre Mornell, a psychiatrist
Mill Valley, Calif

Nation’s Business
May, 1999

“The time from when [employers] realize they've made a mistake [in hiring] until they resolve the situation is about a year. It's a long time of putting off the inevitable."

Dr. Mornell

Nation’s Business
May, 1999

• Performance --
  Quality & Quantity
  
  
• Dependability --
  Turnover, Absenteeism, Tardiness
  
  
• Workplace Health --
  Tension, Stress, Accidents
  
  
• Negative Attitudes --
  Poor Morale
  
  
• Counterproductive Behaviors --
  Dishonesty, Substance Abuse, Sabotage, Harassment
  
  
• Loss of Image --
  Negative Reputation

INC. Magazine

• Fastest growing area of litigation
• 80% filed by former employees
• 33% filed for wrongful termination
• Only 3% filed by unhappy,
  unsuccessful job candidates

Denver Post
June 20, 1999

“Organization doesn’t really accomplish anything. Plans don’t accomplish anything either. Theories of management don’t matter much. Endeavors succeed or fail because of the people involved. Only by attracting the best people will you accomplish great deeds.”

Admiral Hyman Rickover

“We don’t hire jerks. We don’t work with jerks.”

Ed McVaney, Founder and CEO, on why
JD Edwards has been so successful

• Centers of Influence (33% success rate)
• Door knock firms that interest you (47%)
• Yellow page calling (69%)
• Group yellow page calling (84%)
• Use an assessment and target (86%)

Richard Bolles, Fast Company
September, 1999, page 242

1. Random resumes (7% success rate)
2. Answer trade ads (7% success rate)
3. Answer out-of-town newspaper ads (10%)
4. Answer local newspaper ads (5% - 24%)
5. Use employment agency (5% - 24%)

Richard Bolles
What Color is Your Parachute?