Issue link: http://palletcentral.uberflip.com/i/1508599
28 PalletCentral • September-October 2023 palletcentral.com "By incorporating assessments into the hiring process, business owners and HR staff can make more informed and effective hiring decisions, leading to improved workforce productivity, reduced turnover, and better organizational outcomes." Strategies To Take Over the last three years, the U.S. labor market has suffered from extreme talent shortages and companies within the pallet industry have experienced these shortages firsthand. As Leverant points out, this demand for employees has lessened the use of employment assessments recently based off of the perceived impact it has on the recruiting and hiring process. Many human resource professionals, talent acquisition specialists, and recruiters shy away from using assessments because of the slowdown and potential limiting affect it can have on their talent flow. "Ultimately, many people look at the results provided by an employment assessment as a pass/ fail for a job," Leverant says. "Instead, those results should be used as simply a piece, or component, of the decision-making process when you are contemplating to hire. Even more impactful, those same results can be used post-hire in order to help in your coaching and development of this employee. As a leader, isn't that what we all strive to do?" Consistency also is absolutely critical when using employment assessments within a company. As a best practice, Leverant advises pallet companies that many of the assessments on the market today allow you to assess your existing staff and start creating benchmarks for your organization. "is benchmarking provides you with an objective viewpoint as to what works, and what doesn't, within your company," Leverant says. For example, if an employer wants to know what makes a great salesperson, a manager would look at their top performers and provide the employment assessments to them. "I'd want to see what their scores are, and use those results as a bellwether to determine if a prospective employee is similar to my most effective/ productive employees," Leverant says. "As an employer, you have to be very careful to not use employment assessments on a 'case-by-case' or 'one- off ' basis. at will open up the potential for claims of discriminatory hiring practices. regardless of the fact that there is any basis for the claim or not." Westover says the best strategies for using employment assessments include selecting assessments that are relevant to the job requirements, using assessments in combination with other evaluation methods, and ensuring that the assessments are valid and reliable. "Companies should also make sure that they are using assessments that are legally defensible and