Baselining in skill assessments is popular for its one-size-fits-all approach to selecting picture-perfect employees. However, considering that requirements vary depending on the organization, this rigidity makes it inadequate for building a dynamic team that understands and meets your organization’s needs. In effect, baselining gives you employees who look good on paper but, in reality, may struggle within the company.
For employees who are an ideal match for your company, you need a more adaptive option—active learning. Here, we’ll explore reasons why you should consider active learning over baselining in candidate skill assessments and how this can benefit your team. But before that, let’s explore the importance of skill assessments in modern hiring.
The role of skill assessments in modern hiring
According to a 2021 Resume Builder survey, 32% of Americans admitted to lying on their resume. Additionally, 80% of the people who lied were hired, although nearly half of them had the job offer withdrawn. However, the mistake had already been made, and with a 2021 SHRM study stating that the average cost per hire in the US is nearly $4700, this was a costly error.
These numbers show that a prospect may excel in traditional hiring methods like resume screening and interviews but lack actual job competence. Moreover, others may be subject to the interviewer’s perceptions and unconscious bias. This creates the need for a purely objective method of candidate evaluation, and skill assessments are an ideal choice.
Skill assessments test the candidate’s abilities using questions that mimic realistic situations likely to occur on the job. Based on their responses, you get a full view of each person’s suitability and how successful they will be in the role. Thus, you can make an accurate, informed decision, select the best candidate, and reduce the chances of hiring bias or employee turnover.
Active learning vs. baselining: A quick overview
Alt text: Woman reading a resume
Knowing the difference between active learning and baselining in candidate skill assessments forms the basis of understanding active learning’s advantages. Both active learning and baselining influence assessment, but in very distinct ways. Here’s how.
Active learning in skill assessments recognizes your preferred responses and provides skill testing that’s relevant to your company’s specific needs. Even within the same roles, two companies can still have notably distinct challenges. Thus, using generic assessments for every organization filling a certain position is inefficient.
Active learning-based candidate assessments understand your organization’s precise requirements for a role and sift out candidates that meet them. They train your system to learn what kind of answers you favor from previous responses, giving you the best candidate quickly and accurately. Even better, they constantly adapt to your changing needs, ensuring you always have quality candidates that suit your current situation.
In contrast, baselining maintains a fixed reference test for all candidates and judges them by this yardstick, irrespective of the company’s specific required skills. Here, there are standard criteria—usually educational qualifications or experience—for all candidates in a particular job role, and you can’t tweak the system to reflect your preferences.
Active learning consistently refines the assessments toward your desires, while baselining retains initially set benchmarks. As a result, baselining produces assessments that may not match your company’s exact needs, creating room for hiring mistakes.
Diversity impact: How active learning promotes inclusive hiring
Workplace diversity is an important factor in building a balanced, multifaceted team. To achieve company goals faster, you want team members with varying experiences and problem-solving approaches. This means your hiring process must have a wide selection pool and identify unique candidates offering distinct value.
Baselining uses the same benchmarks for every company and candidate in a role, but this can leave you with similar candidates who have identical experiences. With active learning, you can train your assessments to recognize diversity from its data bank while focusing on the actual skills your company needs.
Rather than emphasizing traditional qualifications or theoretical knowledge, your candidate evaluations spot applicants with practical, job-relevant skills despite their background or previous work experience. This way, you can hire and select skilled candidates regardless of background, leading to a more inclusive, diverse team.
Reducing bias: Active learning’s adaptive edge
An expensive degree or lengthy work experience are handy assets for a candidate, but they don’t necessarily translate to job competence. Baselining tends to rely on such standardized qualifications rather than employer preferences, consequently creating unconscious bias.
Meanwhile, active learning updates assessments to adapt to your needs and evaluates based on the replies you deem best. This process reduces dependence on historical data or predetermined qualifications, eliminating opportunities for bias. Instead, it objectively ranks your most eligible options according to your foremost requirements.
Time investment: The efficiency of active learning
When faced with a flood of applicants per open job role, you want to minimize the time spent analyzing each submission and get accurate results without compromising speed. Active learning is a sure way to hire fast and effectively, as it grades and ranks each candidate immediately while adhering to your preferred criteria.
Unlike baselining, active learning assessments score candidates in real-time, letting you instantly identify the best fit to fill your open position. Equipped with customizable templates, they’re also easy to set up and automatically adapt continuously without requiring time-consuming adjustments.
Flexibility: Why active learning offers greater agility
A functional hiring system should improve easily without halting the entire process or requiring a total overhaul. Baselining doesn’t automatically adapt to new data and requires re-establishing the reference benchmarks. Not only is this difficult, but it also hampers the seamlessness that every effective hiring process should have.
On the other hand, active learning assessments learn from new data, constantly refining and improving its quality without strenuous effort on your end. You can modify your questions or change the assessment’s focus at any point without negatively affecting your hiring process. This gives you a more agile, flexible, and reliable assessment system, paving the way for hiring the best candidates.
Quality of outcomes: Ensuring the best fit for your organization
Baselining relies strictly on existing, widely accepted standards. While this provides a generic solution, the lack of personalization makes it unlikely that you will select a hire who is perfect for your company’s exact needs.
Active learning trains from both external and internal data to ensure high-quality predictions suited particularly to your organization. Besides general industry requirements, it goes the extra mile to learn from your company’s data, including your hiring metrics and feedback on candidates’ responses. As a result, it can accurately assess applicants and make selections that are industry-certified and tailored to your organization’s pressing needs.
Transparency and continuous improvement: The power of active learning
According to a 2024 Deloitte study, 86% of interviewed leaders said that the more transparent the organization is, the greater the workforce trust. But, with baselining, there’s little to no explanation or insight into the decision-making process for both the employer and the candidates. Coupled with its inherent bias, this lack of clarity can make candidates mistrust your hiring process.
However, active learning presents visible, real-time data to both candidates and employers, showing what makes an individual a better choice compared to others. You can see the process behind every candidate’s score and provide feedback to ensure continuous updates and improvement. This way, you have a foolproof, fair, and transparent system at all times.
How Vervoe includes active learning in skill assessments
Your skill assessment software can make all the difference in your hiring process. Choosing a platform that uses active learning and gives you access to top-notch assessment features is key, and Vervoe is just the solution you need.
Vervoe is a recruitment software built with powerful features to help you hire the best employees specifically for your organization. Our data-driven, AI-powered objective tests give you a robust hiring tool that accurately predicts which candidates will give you optimum results.
Vervoe offers a rich assessment library with 300+ validated assessments and over 300,000 test questions. With this question bank, you can create customized assessments that reflect your exact requirements or use pre-made templates for ease and speed.
These tests come with anti-cheating features like question randomizers and geolocators to ensure each candidate gets a fair, accurate assessment of their abilities. Combine this with our job simulations, which replicate everyday tasks for the role, and you’ll be able to detect possible high-performers instantly and easily.
Additionally, Vervoe offers an outstanding AI optimization and active learning feature that you can train to identify what makes a great employee for your organization. Using this tool, you can select talented candidates who are sure to solve your organization’s problems, prevent bias, and maintain an up-to-date, relevant hiring process.
Our AI also provides grading and ranking features, so you’ll be able to see how the candidates compare to each other immediately. You can view and share detailed reports that break down the decision-making process, improving transparency and eliminating bias in your process.
Why active learning is the future of skill assessments
Skill assessments give you an edge over traditional hiring processes, but baselining reduces the quality of their results. By utilizing active learning, you can improve the quality of your assessments, tailor them to your company’s needs, and ensure you always have the best fit for every job role.
Vervoe’s active learning assessments can transform your hiring game and help you build a competent, skilled team. With a comprehensive assessment library, job simulations, personalized grading, and AI active learning, our software is fully equipped to handle your recruitment process and identify best-fit employees.
So, schedule a demo with Vervoe today and enjoy assessments that provide the results that your organization truly needs.
