Personnel Selection, Assessment In

Assessments of Biographical Information

More than fifty years of research documents strong and systematic links between the information presented on application blanks and resumes (‘biodata’) and future job performance and success. This research describes two different empirically based strategies for using biodata in selection: (1) the development of empirical keys, or data-based systems, and (2) the classification of applicants into homogeneous groups based on biographical information. Biodata inventories developed according to these methods are consistently identified as among the most valid and cost-effective methods of assessment for personnel selection (Stokes, Mumford & Owens, 1994). More recent research has moved in the direction of theories that classify persons on the basis of their patterns of past behaviour and that predict future performance based on those classifications.

Structured Interviews

Nearly all employers use interviews as part of their selection systems, but this technique was long held in disrepute by the research community. From the 1940s to the 1980s, research on the reliability and validity of the employment interview portrayed a consistently negative picture (Arvey & Campion, 1982). The correlations between interview ratings and measures of performance or success rarely exceeded the teens and were often embarrassingly close to zero.

More recent research suggests that interviews can indeed be a valid method of selecting employees, as long as structure is imposed (McDaniel, Whetzel, Schmidt & Maurer, 1994). Campion, Palmer and Campion (1997) review the effects of fifteen possible components of structure (e.g. multiple interviewers, scripted questions, answer guides) and conclude that all methods of adding structure seem to help, but there is no professional consensus about which methods of structuring interviews are best or worst.

One interview format, referred to as a ‘situational interview’, asks examinees to describe how they would behave in several hypothetical but critical situations. Responses are independently rated by multiple interviewers, and composite ratings are used to make decisions about examinees. An alternative is to structure interviews around discussions of past behaviour on the job. Rather than asking what a person might do in a hypothetical situation, interviewers ask what he or she did do in specific situations encountered in previous jobs. McDaniel et al.'s (1994) review suggests that both show higher levels of validity than unstructured interviews, and that situational interviews work best.

Standardized Tests

Written and computer-administered tests of abilities, skills, and personality characteristics are extensively used in personnel assessment, and have been the focus of a substantially large body of research (Schmidt & Hunter, 1999). The use of written tests is much more common for office positions than for production and sales jobs (the Minnesota Clerical Test is an exemplar of this class of tests). Written tests are widely used for selection and placement in the federal, state, county, and local governments, and are very common in the military. The Armed Service Vocational Aptitude Test is administered to over one million examinees each year, making the Armed Services possibly the single largest consumer of tests and structured assessment methods in the world.

...