We have learned that workplace assessment can be used at different stages in the employee life cycle. So let's have a look at these stages in a little more detail, as well as some of the assessment methods that are used.

However, in order to understand which types of assessments are best suited to which stage in the cycle (which we will cover next week in 'How we assess people at work'), we need to gain an understanding of each stage. In this step we will look at recruitment and selection.

The importance of employing the right people

Employing the right people is important. Steve Jobs is quoted as saying 'It's the most important job' (Tatley 2014). We might consider that it's not necessarily recruiting that is hard, but recruiting effectively. A good recruitment strategy will ensure an organisation employs the best candidates. So what is recruitment and how does it differ from selection?

Recruitment is the process of generating a pool of candidates for employment, from which to select an applicant for job selection (Steptoe-Warren 2013: 51),

whereas

Selection is the process of screening the pool of candidates using a number of assessment methods in order to choose the most suitable candidate for the job (Steptoe-Warren 2013: 51).

Assessment in recruitment

The decision-making aspect of recruitment is relatively straightforward. At this stage it will involve assessing the applicant against the job criteria. This can be done using the candidate's job application or CV.

Assessment in selection

The aim of selection is to reduce the number of candidates further. There are a number of methods available to achieve this.

Interviewstelephone interviewspreliminary interviewsfinal interviewsPsychometric testspersonalityability, aptitudeAssessment centresJob knowledge testsSituational judgement tests

Organisations spenda considerable amount of money on recruitment and selection, therefore they need to ensure that the process of recruitment and selection is robust, to ensure they attract the best candidates (Steptoe-Warren 2013: 51).

We will look at methods of assessment in more detail later on in the course. For now, answer the question below.

Your task

It has been argued that the use of online assessment in the recruitment phase is a way of reducing bias (Connolly 2017).

Can you think of any further benefits online assessment could offer a potential employer over the candidate's application form and/or CV at this stage?