Why aptitude assessment is important for screening job applicants

Aptitude assessment is a method for screening job applicants before you decide to move them to the interview stage of the hiring process.

Whether you need to assess candidates’ verbal reasoning or reading comprehension, you should simplify your recruitment process by selecting an accurate, reliable platform with a wide range of skills tests.

But what are the benefits of aptitude tests? Why use an assessment for new employees, and why is aptitude important in recruitment? Get the answers to these three questions in our article.

What is an aptitude test, and what is its purpose for hiring?

You probably know that aptitude tests are used in educational settings. But you can also use aptitude tests in job recruitment to evaluate candidates’ skills and determine whether they’re suitable for the role.

The purpose of an aptitude test is to help you assess your candidates’ abilities using expert-crafted questions.

What are some examples of aptitude tests?

The following are some of the most common types of aptitude tests for recruitment:

• Numerical-reasoning aptitude tests measure applicants’ numerical skills and understanding of fractions, percentages, number patterns, graphs, and tables. 

• Critical-thinking aptitude tests evaluate candidates’ deductive reasoning skills, grasp of cause-and-effect relationships, ability to interpret sequences, and skill in recognizing assumptions.

• Personality assessments such as Enneagram tests help you understand candidates’ worldviews and behaviors better.

• Visual attention-to-detail tests help you determine whether your candidates can interpret visual cues and understand visual material. You can also use a textual attention-to-detail test to review your candidates’ understanding of textual details.

• Problem-solving tests assess your applicants’ ability to review problems and use their analytical abilities to solve complex challenges or problems in the workplace.

Why is it important to use aptitude assessments?

There are four main reasons aptitude assessments are crucial in hiring. Let’s look at these reasons and explain why it’s important to use an assessment for recruiting candidates.

1. Aptitude assessments are backed by science and subject-matter experts

Business-related scientific research shows that reliable aptitude assessments are valid predictors of job performance. With an aptitude assessment, you can determine how well your prospective candidate will perform in the role.

Aptitude tests are also useful for HR professionals who lack the specific skills they need to assess.

The best aptitude assessments are created by subject-matter experts who are leaders in their respective fields. Skilled professionals build the tests so that you can assess applicants thoroughly and accurately, even if you don’t have knowledge of the role’s required skills yourself. 

Since they’re backed by science and experts, you can incorporate these assessments in your hiring process and take advantage of their validity and reliability for an objective hiring process.

2. Aptitude assessments save plenty of time

Integrating an aptitude assessment into your hiring process can save significant time and help you complete the recruitment process faster.

On average, companies receive around 250 applications for an open role. Reviewing this many resumes is tedious, and you’ll likely find it hard not to skim through them.

Aptitude assessments are an excellent replacement for resume screening since you can give all of your applicants the same assessment instantly instead of poring over all of their resumes.

3. You can assess culture add with aptitude assessments

With a reliable skills-testing platform, it’s simple to determine whether your candidates’ values suit your organization’s culture. The best platforms will offer a culture-add test or similar value-add test to help you learn more about your candidates’ values.

4. The assessment results help you make better hiring decisions

You can compare your applicants’ assessment results with their work samples or responses during interviews to verify their abilities.

Aptitude assessments will provide data on candidates’ performance to help you make hiring decisions and confer with other HR professionals in your hiring team.

What are the benefits of aptitude tests?

The first advantage of aptitude assessments is that they help you objectively assess your candidates’ skills and mitigate recruitment bias. 

When you make, distribute, and receive the results of an assessment, you can review the results to learn whether the applicant is a good match for your organization or benchmark the skills of your current employees for training purposes.

The second advantage is that aptitude assessments optimize your data-driven candidate review process. If you’re concerned about choosing between two talented candidates, just take a glance at each applicant’s results to compare them easily.

How should you use aptitude assessments in your recruitment process?

The best method to incorporate aptitude assessments into your recruitment process is to distribute them at the candidate-sourcing stage.

With TestGorilla, you can share an assessment with all applicants using a link, through an applicant tracking system, or via email. Afterward, wait for candidates to complete the entire assessment, and use the results to select applicants for an interview.

Prioritize aptitude assessment to hire top experts for your company

Integrating aptitude assessments into the hiring process offers clear advantages to your recruitment team and candidates. Remember, you can achieve the following using aptitude assessments:

• Mitigate unconscious bias in the recruitment process

• Save time during the candidate-sourcing stage

• Easily compare and select candidates

It’s essential to seize the data-driven advantages of aptitude assessments. Check out TestGorilla to find the most popular aptitude assessment tests, like our Culture Add test or Understanding Instructions test.

We’ve got the tests you need to make hiring an absolute breeze. Get started with a free account today.