(Lack of) Confidence in Correctly Assessing Candidates

 Talent acquisition professionals fear that they are losing out on qualified job candidates by relying on traditional applicant screening methods.

Only 20 percent of 520 recruiting professionals said they were fully confident in their employers’ overall ability to effectively assess the skills of entry-level applicants using time-honored selection methods like interviews and application and resume scans, according to a survey conducted by global consultancy Mercer and the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM).

Most employers use in-person interviews (95 percent), application reviews (87 percent) and resume reviews (86 percent), but nearly one-half of respondents said they have “little or no confidence” in application and resume reviews.

A top HR professional says, “Since application and resume reviews are typically the first line of screening for job applicants, many candidates never even get to the interview,” Respondents expressed much more confidence in using in-person interviews to assess candidates. Entry-level applicants without any work experience often have trouble getting past the review phase because HR dismisses them for lack of experience.

If this is the state of a relatively mature talent market like US, the results in India would perhaps be even more dramatic.

Read the full article here.