Your entry level hires today are key to the future of your company.
“97% of employers cite that entry-level positions are important to their organizations” (from The State of Entry-Level Employment, March 2017, Rockefeller Foundation)
Select Entry Level Hires to Fit Your Job
Most of us see the truth in the statement above. In many industries, our entry-level or hourly employees make our product, deliver our service and/or interface with our customers.
Entry level employees are directly responsible for:
Product / Service Cost
Customer Satisfaction
The same study confirms that a majority of organizations are still relying on outdated hiring practices. These practices often lead to hiring based on first impressions and selecting candidates based on irrelevant factors.
What do we need to know?
Here are three areas that matter when evaluating entry level hires:
Can They Do the Job?
We are good at evaluating physical abilities like lifting and climbing. However, studies show that fitting a candidate’s cognitive abilities with the job, (ability to learn and reasoning ability), is the biggest factor in productivity and retention. Gaining insight into candidate’s cognitive abilities is critical to making good entry level hires.
Lower cognitive abilities are a fit for repetitive jobs while higher cognitive abilities are needed for jobs that require continual learning, decision making and adaptation. Conversely, a candidate with high cognitive skills will be bored in a repetitive job and is likely to quit.
Will They Do the Job?
This is where a candidate’s personality traits come in. For example, understanding if a candidate is people oriented is key if the job requires customer contact. On the other hand, high sociability is a negative if the job requires working alone. Patience and focus might influence job fit for employees making a product or delivering service.
How Will They Approach the Job?
Conscientiousness is important in any entry level position. Conscientiousness tells us the candidate’s tendency to work with honesty and integrity and to follow the rules of the organization. If your employees enter customers homes or have access to sensitive information, conscientiousness is particularly important.
How Do We Improve Selection of Our Entry Level Hires?
Assessment tools targeted for entry level hires can give us good, objective measures of a candidate’s cognitive ability, personality traits and conscientiousness. They help us to evaluate a candidate’s fit with the job. These tools can be surprisingly inexpensive (~$30 per candidate) and are easy to administer.
See our article title How $30 Can Save You $5000 and learn about the cost of Turnover.
Visit PDServices for more information on entry level assessments. Call 740-326-4494 or email info@PDServices.com to request a complimentary entry level assessment.
Contact PDServices today to schedule a demo and learn how we can help your organization!
Contact Us
PDServices
4015 Executive Park Drive, Suite 100C
Cincinnati, OH 45241
Phone: 740-326-4494
Email: info@pdservices.com
© 2024 PDServices | All Rights Reserved
4015 Executive Park Drive, Suite 100C
Cincinnati, OH 45241
Phone: 740-326-4494
Email: info@pdservices.com
© 2024 PDServices | All Rights Reserved
