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Assessment center
Although often defined as a situational assessment method, the assessment center does not refer to a location, but rather the process organizations use to assess staff as part of the hiring process or for internal promotion.
The assessment center focuses on a variety of techniques and exercises that are designed for candidates to demonstrate, under standardized conditions, the skills necessary for a job position. They vary in length, format, and content and they include as many activities as the different candidates that need to be attracted. They may include written assessments, personality tests, exams, and role playing.
There are different types of cement centers:
- Classic. It consists of bringing together a small group of participants to complete a series of tests and exercises that they will carry out over several hours. Some tests will be individual and others in groups. In this case we need from one to three days to find the perfect candidate for a given position.
- Individual.This is an individual evaluation interview where the candidate is observed in isolation. The group part is dispensed with, avoiding erroneous decisions resulting from the comparison with other candidates.
- Online. Candidates are asked to solve tasks and tests online using questionnaires and In-Tray exercises. To recreate stressful situations there are time limits on some parts of the tests. Normally, in this type of assessment centers there are no group tasks or personal interviews, although they can be done through video calls.
- Development. The employees of a company participate. Also known as a "development-center" it seeks to find points of potential improvement. Through tests, the strengths and weaknesses of the participants are analyzed. When the process is finished, an evaluation of each participant is carried out, and with these results it is possible to inform each employee of the points that they should improve to increase their performance.
