The global COVID-19 pandemic has taken its toll on almost all governing forces, whether we are talking about the macroeconomic situation across the globe or the more domestic situations such as the substantial household income decreases, social distancing, or scarcity when it comes to the number of job openings. Consequently, the recruiting process has suffered many changes, most of which are related to the loss of human touch and the need to recruit remote employees. Whether you are an employer looking to recruit top candidates or an applicant striving to showcase your talent and skills, this is how a candidate scorecard can help you with both:
What Does a Candidate Scorecard Encompass?
A candidate scorecard is a very useful tool to help recruiters make the best hiring decisions. It is a very clear set of skills that are required for a particular job. Every candidate interested in the job opening will be tested for a specific number of skills and qualities and awarded a score for each, based on their performance during their interview or other practical steps in the application process. Here are some of the points of interest you may come across when looking at a candidate scorecard:
- Cultural Fit
- Social Skills
- Teamwork
- Leadership Capabilities
- Self-Awareness
- Attention to Detail
- Initiative
- Time Management
- Customer Service
The information on a candidate scorecard will vary depending on the nature of the job, however, a candidate will always be able to predict what sort of skills and qualities an employer will seek and test for. This will allow them to prepare for a job interview in a more targeted manner, focusing on the most important traits of their chosen field of work.
How Does a Candidate Scorecard Help Recruiters?
A candidate scorecard will bring an advantage to recruiters from a number of perspectives:
Selecting Competitive Applications
Most talent recruiters know how difficult and demanding it is to make a fair decision when selecting which candidates will move on to the next step of the application process. Depending on the size of your business, you could be dealing with tens, hundreds, or only a couple of resumes coming in. A candidate scorecard could really simplify the whole selection process and prove to be a valuable recruiting asset for a small business or a large one. By having a look at the scorecard template, a recruiter will be able to decide which candidates hold the potential to score for one, two, or more skills and qualities required for the job.
Structuring and Conducting a Focused Interview
A recruiting interview will always differ in structure, as each workplace follows a different set of core values, rules, and goals. Whether you are planning on structuring a remote interview or a face-to-face meeting, a candidate scorecard will help you arrange the focus points of discussion in a very natural order. For instance, if the first part of your interview will focus on getting to know your candidate, his educational background or past work experience, the second half of your interview can be structured with situational questions that will testify to the skills noted on your candidate scorecard.
Making a Final Decision
When a number of candidates have successfully completed the last step of the interview process for the same job, it is time to make a final decision. Now that recruiters have a little bit of background on all candidates, making an objective choice can become rather difficult. This is the moment when going back to the candidates’ scorecards could turn out to be the most important tool in assessing the performance of each applicant. Spread the scorecards side by side and pick the best one through elimination. To make sure that you made the right choice, take into consideration other objectives you’ve set throughout the recruitment process. Choosing the highest score doesn’t imply a perfect decision. It should be an aggregate of all skills and qualities you observe in an applicant, whether these are personal or professional. Remember: training a less experienced candidate could turn out to be a better decision than hiring a candidate with exceptional skills, but no initiative of need for self-improvement.
Bottom Line
A candidate scorecard is a very clean and useful tool for evaluating an applicant during the interview process. It helps recruiters with their line of questioning, making sure they assess their candidates in the right direction and conduct an objective final evaluation. If this practice isn’t something that you’ve tried before, it is definitely worth experimenting with. If you are not sure about how to start integrating this into your application process, you can easily create a candidate scorecard with The Hire Talent’s tool.
