Work-style Profiling & Recruitment – Time for a revolution…

Let’s pull no punches; I am biased in favour of all recruitment being subject to some form of sensible, accurate, cost effective and valued work-style profiling! Not a position that should surprise anyone who knows me, given that I designed the ASL work-style profiling tools, and given that my inspiration came from my time as a CEO. A time filled with frustration at the challenges of finding superstars! At that time I was also challenged by some of the recruitment agencies and their ‘first past the post’ approach to winning business, which involved ‘kissing many frogs to find the Prince or Princess’.

It’s not all their fault as this mentality is, if not liked, widely accepted by the HR profession. In a highly competitive market, that some might say is a little overcrowded, it takes a brave leader to walk out of step. That is exactly what is required and a few brave souls, not only do this but also stand out from the crowd, for all the right reasons.

When the ASL solution (Work-style Profiling) was first designed it was done as a minimum viable product (MVP) in the best traditions of the principles of LEAN business. The world of recruitment is where we had our first successes. That success I speak of was a hard fought battle, harder than I had anticipated and for reasons that simply reflected old habits and lack of innovative thinking.

The main objection we were faced with was the pre-conceived idea that ASL would cost too much and clients would not be willing to pay! The reality is slightly different; the average cost of hiring and then losing an individual varies but costs businesses thousands of pounds. Using work-style profiling improves selection by over 80% with an average cost from ASL of just ￡75 per report.

Here’s a question for HR; if you could improve selection decisions and reduce the cost of recruitment failure by 80% for just ￡75 what would you say?

To be even handed, here’s a question for recruitment specialists; If you could create a significant differential by including work-style profiling for your clients on selected hires, encouraging them to come to you instead of those in completion not using the system, what would that be worth to you?

Maybe, just maybe, you, like me, feel it’s time for that revolution?

The ASL work-style profiling has its foundation in personality testing on steroids. We didn’t invent the process! The actual testing is not unique. In todays world of cloud technologies you can pick up a basic personality test for less than ￡20. But that is only the tip of the iceberg and to get true value you need professional and experienced interpretations.

ASL interpretations are based on specific needs, collated against significant existing data for accuracy, relating to a number of elements that contribute to the work-style of the individual. At ASL we include elements like work-stress triggers, human-error triggers, emotional intelligence and more.

Even then this is only the foundation, dependent on the specific needs. The interpretation and data comparisons cover a range of psychological and work-style issues that will all contribute to a report, weighted to the stated need. That report is accurate, reliable, easy to understand and work with and sensibly priced per unit to ensure it is a regular feature of the recruitment process, rather than something only used now and again. This then contributes to bottom line figures and not just vanity metrics.

ASL is also designed as a time efficient option. Most HR professionals have 101 challenges and tasks to deal with. Our expertise can be thought of on a time cost basis we are often the most commercial option, working in collaboration with HR.

Historically this kind of service has been subject to a little too much ego, resulting in a price structure that would limit its use and almost force the smaller business from considering the service as an option. That makes no sense at all.

Despite the economic challenges we face it is still a fact that significantly more GDP is created by the SME than ‘big business’. Yet historically services like ASL would be priced so high as to make it unreachable for the small business. The paradox being the recruitment into the SME is significantly more damaging when it goes wrong than it is for the multi-national. So surely it is more important for the SME, be given the opportunity to use work-style profiling as a standard tool?

Fine words, and few would disagree with the sentiment. But there is still the need for a revolution to create the environment when using these technologies is commonplace for the recruitment companies, the HR departments and the smaller businesses, advisers and leaders.

At ASL we have already proven the service, delivering exactly what the customer was looking for. Now it’s time to expand our reach, and start the revolution. So what do we need to do to make it happen? We are innovators but importantly market lead. You tell us what you want and we will respond…