Strengths Based Assessment

A bad hire can cost your organisation anywhere from 1 to 5 times that employee’s annual salary so you need to get it right. If you’ve made a bad hire in the past you are not alone: 62% of UK companies have been negatively impacted by a bad hire (Career builder).

Being the right person in the wrong job creates unnecessary stress for the individual and the organisation. Due to a phenomenon called ‘emotional contagion’, a demotivated individual will negatively impact those individuals around them and those around them causing a downward spiral dragging down performance and engagement.

Getting assessment and selection right is probably the most important ROI of any HR process. Whilst there are many outstanding chartered and business psychologists who can undertake your assessment, our approach is based on a trained understanding of how jobs are best designed together with more than 25 years’ experience working across a range of industries, jobs and structures. We have concluded that a strengths based approach is preferable above all others.

Why strengths?

Whether you are recruiting for one or many here are some things you need to think about:

People who use their strengths are 85% more likely to be more productive
They are also 44% more likely to deliver higher customer satisfaction
And 50% more likely to have higher employee retention
Finally, 78% feel more engaged at work

Take a look at this BAD HIRE CALCULATOR to work out the staggering cost of recruitment. http://www.hrworld.com/calculators/badhire/

Benefits to strengths based assessment:

Better engagement

We know that 78% of employees who get to use their strengths each day are more engaged at work. If you are not using strengths as you recruit people into the business, you are missing a very obvious opportunity to engage with individuals. And funnily enough, getting to use your strengths every day is also the key difference between high and low performers (Gallup Research).

More realistic view of candidates

We all have strengths and weaknesses so wouldn’t it be more honest to acknowledge that so we can have more open and honest recruitment conversations? Having more open conversations generates more data upon which to make a decision on a candidate.

Microsoft has found that 78% of staff involved in their strength based recruitment process found it differentiated candidates better and EY have found the quality of candidates attracted by their strengths based campaign to be better quality.

Greater diversity and social mobility

“Strength based questions are very good for social mobility as they don’t require the very polished interview technique and rehearsal applied to competency questions. We are seeing more candidates from diverse backgrounds excelling at interview.”

Shearman & Sterling, International Law Firm

Katie Meer, Graduate Recruitment Advisor

Strengths based recruitment seeks to understand what an individual is passionate about. As such, potential can be found anywhere and as a result, your talent pool is more diverse. And we know that more diverse workforces are typically better performing.

More positive employer brand

When you are competing with Google, Microsoft or the latest start-up for the best talent, you need to make yourself attractive to as wide a range of people as possible. A strengths based advert will appeal to people who see how their strengths will fit your company and creates a positive image. And so you don’t have to compete on salary alone.

Since using strengths based adverts, Nestlé’s brand perception has increased with 100% of candidates having a positive assessment experience and 96% feeling Nestlé stood out from other graduate recruiters because they used a strengths based approach. In addition, they improved social mobility and gender balance, saved costs and won some awards along the way.

Cost effective

With strengths based recruitment candidates feel more positive about the assessment process and the recruiting organisation and as a result conversion rates for job offers are better. With more data upon which to make a decision, job person fit is also improved and turnover once on the job is lower. This results in savings to the bottom line – the so called ‘hidden costs’.

Our credentials

Assessment is led by Pam Kennett. Pam is registered with the British Psychological Society (Level A and B) to use and interpret personality tests. She has also been trained in strengths based assessment by the market leader, CAPP, job analysis and evaluation by the Hay Group and has developed a significant number of competency models for organisations including: HSBC, AMEX, NatWest, Thales, Bar Standards Board, Lloyds Bank, Centre-File, Woolworths.

Tools we are trained to use:

Hay McBer Emotional Competence Inventory; Climate and Leadership Styles
Saville Wave and SWIFT
Hogan – HPI, HDS, HVPI
15FQ
Talent Q
VIA Strengths
Realise 2
Watson Glaser
NFER
SHL Numerical and Verbal Aptitude
16PF
Ravens Progressive Matrices
OPQ

Next steps

If you are interested in getting a better fit through your assessment process, please contact Pam for an obligation free chat.