Should You Only Test Candidates That Look Good On Paper?

A resume makes it clear which candidates are just finishing school and which ones have experience in the field. But should candidates that don’t stand out visually be tested? We’ve analyzed over 100 resumes of potential hires and found some surprising answers to that question.

It is hard for many hiring managers to understand the value of a poorly written CV

It is hard for many hiring managers to understand the value of a poorly written CV. They can spot a well-written CV a mile away. It’s easy to tell if someone has taken the time to proofread and ensure that all of their content makes sense. Because of that, it is incredibly easy to explain why a badly written CV will be removed from consideration while a well-written one might still be considered.

However, it doesn’t mean that candidates who don’t look good on paper shouldn’t be tested. For some people, the quality of their work and experience plays a greater role than using suitable words in their CVs. For example, a programmer with 20 years of experience expects that their skills will be tested with a candidate assessment test or at least live coding. However, they would be surprised if they found out that they were rejected just because a recruiter thought that because a candidate worked in the same place for 20 years, they didn’t have many opportunities to develop their skills and work with different people. Some jobs aren’t restricted to the same people and requirements!

Programming skills and personal qualities that can be measured by a recruiting assessment test

While looking for a perfect match for a developer position, lots of HR managers and recruiters look through candidates’ resumes. Experience, languages currently known, platforms currently known, development environments currently known — this is what they see there. However, such lines as intelligence, ability to learn, problem-solving skills, knowledge of programming concepts are missing. The main question is: how to find a candidate that has all these fundamental qualities and can learn new technologies quickly?

A recruitment assessment test is a well-designed set of questions that evaluates job applicants’ skills, personal qualities, and motivations. It’s used to assess the knowledge, skills, abilities, and preferences of job applicants objectively and consistently.

Tests are not just a way to assess your technical ability (what you know), they are also a great tool for assessing your aptitude (what you can do with what you know) and personality (who you are). What can be achieved with such tests:

• Finding the core abilities of the candidate, which cannot be determined from their resume. In this case, the assessment test will ensure that the candidate can cope with the demands of the job.
• Focusing on a candidate’s real potential rather than their past experience. By gauging someone’s ability to think on their feet, communicate with others, and problem-solve, businesses can better know whether they have the right person for the job.
• Assessing intelligence, problem-solving skills, ability to learn, knowledge of core development skills… none of which will be on a candidate’s resume. An assessment test is more effective at measuring these aspects rather than a plain interview. These are critical components of any job, but they are especially important in programming jobs because so much of what we do is done in teams of different people.

Besides, with the help of an AI-powered assessment test, it’s possible to compare the score of those who took it and use a wide range of instruments for full metrics to make as correct decisions considering job applicants as possible.

What is the quickest way to assess a programmer for a position?

The quickest way to assess a programmer for a position is with the Wild Noodle AI-powered programming assessment test!

Wild Noodle is the first language-independent programming test designed to measure superior job-related skills. The 12-year study of Wild Noodle’s AI assessment test has shown a clear correlation between the assessment results and subsequent job success.

Wild Noodle’s AI-based test improves the quality of candidates and speeds up hiring decisions by assessing how their skills and how well they can use them. The purpose of the test is for participants to demonstrate their skills by solving as many of the 10 programming puzzles as possible in a given amount of time (30 minutes).

Wild Noodle’s assessment is easy to administer and doesn’t require knowledge of any particular programming language. Recruiters and hiring managers can easily gain insights into a candidate’s creativity, problem-solving skills, ability to learn, critical thinking, level of knowledge about software, aptitude for logic and mathematical reasoning, and more.

Interested? Get your free trial of the Wild Noodle AI-powered programming assessment right now: https://www.wildnoodle.com/contact

Conclusion

Recruiting and hiring managers should not overlook those candidates with poorly written CVs. A bad CV doesn’t mean that candidate’s skills are bad too. Instead, it’s recommended to use special hiring assessment tools to evaluate a candidate to the full value. One of the best tools for programming assessment is the Wild Noodle assessment test that will help you find a rockstar team member in just a couple of days.