Computers : Using psychometric tests to streamline your recruitment processes
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By: Andrea Watkins
 
Date Submitted: 2010-08-05 20:28:50 - Article Views: 20252 - Word Count: 917
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The Royal Mail Group asked Kenexa® to design two bespoke online psychometric tests to assess the 250,000 people who apply for postal vacancies every year. The tests will allow the Royal Mail Group to sift out candidates much earlier in the recruitment process—significantly reducing the company's recruitment costs.
Each working day the Royal Mail Group collects, processes and delivers over 84 million items to 27 million addresses across the UK. In recent years the company has undergone a huge transformation and has turned losses of more than £1 million a day into a £537 million annual profit. This success provided a base to meet the next set of challenges, one of which includes the enhancement of the recruitment processes.
Employing over 180,000 people, the company never had a problem with the quantity of job applicants it receives, but the quality had never been given the priority commensurate with a rapidly developing business. Royal Mail Group wanted to identify those people with the right attitudes sooner, allowing them to reducing the rate of staff attrition and improve the quality of person hired.
"We receive over 250,000 applications a year," said Dianne Crookes, project manager, Royal Mail Group. "At any one time, we have 1,500 vacancies so we wanted a more efficient and robust process in place that would allow us to concentrate on the candidates who had the potential to meet our business demands."
REDUCING RESOURCE COSTS
Previously, the process was resource heavy. "Although candidates applied online, we needed to telephone interview candidates before inviting them to an assessment center," said Emma Turner, development advisor, Royal Mail Group. "Invited candidates would then complete a numerical test and a sorting test and were required to attend a line manager interview. Successful candidates would then be offered a job. It was a very long and laborious process."
One of the inherent problems faced by the company was the failure of some candidates to actually turn up for the assessment center, adding a further wastage to the bottom line.
"We needed to bring in the sifting process much earlier, so we could focus on those who could actually meet the requirements of the role, and reduce massively our recruitment costs," said Turner.
SELECTING KENEXA
A tender process was undertaken by Royal Mail's online recruitment partner in conjunction with Royal Mail stakeholders to find a supplier that could provide online tests for its three main brands: Royal Mail, Post Office and Parcelforce Worldwide. "We knew exactly what we wanted and after an in depth review of the suppliers we knew Kenexa was the perfect partner," said Crookes. "They were able to demonstrate they could do what we wanted technically and they had a proven track record."
With over 250,000 applications a year and with candidates potentially completing two online psychometrics—this project became the UK's largest ever online testing contract.
REVIEWING EXISTING PROCESSES
Kenexa's consultants spent three weeks reviewing the existing recruitment processes and tests, as well as visiting sorting and delivery offices across the UK to undertake a detailed job analysis to obtain an understanding of what managers looked for in an ideal candidate.
DESIGNING BESPOKE QUESTIONNAIRES
Two psychometric products were designed: an online sorting test and a ‘work style' questionnaire, both of which integrated seamlessly with the company's applicant tracking software. The sorting test is a timed simulation exercise asking people to sort mail initially by postcode and then by full address. The work style questionnaire measures nine key personality traits: agreeableness, compliance, conscientiousness, drive and energy, leadership and influence, management of emotions, openness to change, positivity, and social confidence; traits that were considered essential for a career at the Royal Mail Group.
A series of self selection questions were also developed to enable candidates to gain a realistic job preview of the role that they are considering applying for. The questions allow potential applicants to gain an understanding of their suitability for the role and whether they should consider applying.
"We are now in a position to pre-screen candidates at the beginning of the process," said Crookes. "When we invite people to the interview stage, we now know they're the people we are most likely to want to hire, and they are the people from the applicant pool that are most likely to be a success in the role."
BUSINESS BENEFITS
This has helped the Royal Mail Group—and its three brands—reduce the recruitment cycle by five days so that within a week the company can now open up a job, have applicants apply, be assessed and be ready for the interview stage.
Since the process has gone live, the Royal Mail Group has been delighted with the results. Turner said, "We've really enjoyed working with Kenexa and sharing their experience. We have different requirements to many other employers, but Kenexa has been very flexible so we could get what we wanted to out of the system."
Crookes continued, "When we set out, we wanted to increase our competitive advantage and the perception of the Royal Mail to future candidates and increase the quality of candidate whilst reducing the candidate cycle time. All these objectives have been met and we're now reaping the benefits."
At present over 5,000 tests a week are being administered and by next year the recruitment team are forecasting that they will have made substantial savings.
Maurice Harbottle, head of recruitment, Royal Mail Group concluded; "Kenexa's tests will bring enormous commercial benefits to our business. An improvement in the quality of staff and a reduction in our staff attrition rate will make an enormous impact on our profit and loss account." |
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Andrea Watkins writes articles for Kenexa, a provider of a range of business solutions and HR Management for some of the largest, most respected companies in the world. Recruitment Process Outsourcing helps organizations to source and recruit the best candidates, with added RPO components such as Employment Branding and Assessments to make the process more efficient. With HR Outsourcing hiring hard-to-find top talent around the globe is a breeze.
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