The Accuracy of Video Based Testing - Not a Fad For the Serious Recruiter!

You have heard the saying a picture paints a thousand words! Well what about video? The average frame rate is 29 fps(frames per second) so could we say 30,000 words.

On that light note let us start to explore the relevance of video based testing and the human resources fundamental!
Well you have seen the explosion of the likes of YouTube on the net which shows that there are plenty of takers for video technology once it starts to work seamlessly.

With so many people adapted to this technology, large firms create products to facilitate that need (volume sales with lower prices). So now you have cell phone firms that allow cameras on phones at a cost close to nothing, broadband carriers allowing the larger population to get fast connection at a cost never seen before and top rated shows like CNN touting Ireporter to create the "hipness" of using such technologies for the masses.

With such technologies being present, why has this craze not been rapidly absorbed by the employment industry? As stated earlier, video can offer accuracy as never viable before on the HR scene. It is stated that the online jobs marketplace will rise to 20bn in 2009 from 3Bn in 2003. With this growth, no doubt more and more jobs will filter through this route. Once the net was a place for hardcore techies, now it is commonplace.
Sure there are filters out there today but how far can you go with skills to job match databases, with the increasing responders to each job. Also how many calls do you need to make to get the right connection with the best candidate. With these thoughts, here comes our notion of efficiency. Make something that can filter quickly without removing the quality of traditional methods. Video can offer just that.

Now there are many ideas out there or partial solutions but none that offers a real solution, or so you think. For example, a product called called Captivate by Adobe, seems at first glance a product that allows you to easily create video based questions... Well wait a minute, read the fine print - Do you know how to use Flash, or do you have an integration reporting tool - Woe - did that just become complicated! Or how about the costs associated with integrating such technologies - seem too much..

One has to believe that for the HR industry to use video, it has to be within budget, save them more money then they are currently spending and actually address practical problems. So let us examine those to see the viability of video to these key areas.

Video technology has to be readily available for rapid deployment and as I have explained the average budget cell phone has video technology.

Video technology needs to integrate without additional cost (or significant cost) to current mediums. So the idea is that everything should be uncomplicated from the upload of the video, to the running of the tests, to the reporting of the results via the net, cell phone etc. For best results these should all reside on one platform which is easily managed.
The time factor and current spend has to be reduced while the quality of candidates per spend improves. This is a practical reason for a change.

You only have to go to supercandidate.com to see that this exists! However the importance of such technology has to be leveled against usability. What would you use it for. Sure there is video technology (which means pictures, motion and sound) but how could it improve your selection process?

Consider a technical job where the person offering the job role understands the critical processes with that job. Shooting a video to show that process and then uploading it to a question which asked a possible candidate to provide a correct procedure, could make a fundamental difference between the right person for the role and someone who just has skills on a resume!

How about a customer services role where the reaction to an irate customer could mean the difference between repeat business or lost sales - again recording the soundbite from the department where the work is to be carried out, can easily be transferred to the questioning process for a accuracy never achieved by traditional techniques or text based questioning - just image that customer facing role included bilingual skills - how relevant could the native language skills be exploited in the selection process.

The bottom line is that video testing by super candidate.com can really work for those who require pinpoint accuracy for jobs that expect the person to be knowledgeable for a role. For example, someone after simple typing skills will not see any improvement in using video based testing for accuracy. However there are a host of skilled trades that depend on up to date experience of a possible candidate and the best way to see if they have the skills before you get them into the interview them or worse still place them in a job, is to allow interaction with the original employer, using the net and video technology to heavily improve your filter process while removing unnecessarily costs and time constraints you currently have by not deploying such methods.