How to build a work simulation
A work simulation is essentially a ‘test drive’ for both you and the candidate. You get a chance to see what the candidate can do, and how they fit in with the company culture and team; and they get a chance to see what it’s like to work for you, and what the role entails.
Work simulations generally go for between four and six hours, in which you will ask candidates to come into the workplace (one at a time) and do a selection of tasks that are closely related to the work required in the new role. By simulating the role as closely as possible, you are gathering accurate data about their abilities, approach and personality - rather than just what you think they can do and how you think they will behave. This puts you in a much better position to make decisions about who should move onto the next step in the process. It also gives candidates another chance to self-select out of the role and the company if they feel it isn’t a good fit for them.
How to choose the tasks
Tasks for a work test should be:
Designed to measure specific skills required for the role, and cover a broad range of skills.
Achievable within the time allotted for the work test.
A mixture of ‘fun’ and ‘not so fun’ tasks associated with the role, to give the candidates as accurate a simulation of the job as possible.
Weighted to represent a typical work week (eg. if a role is 40% meetings and 60% admin, the work simulation should reflect that).
An opportunity to meet and work with everyone the new hire would be involved with on a day-to-day basis. This allows you to see how they interact with the rest of the team, their communication style and any red flags.
Relatively difficult (but still achievable), consisting of tasks that don’t require a lot of specific background knowledge. This will give you an indication of the candidate’s skill level and help differentiate ‘okay’ candidates from great ones.
These tasks should be pre-arranged for the candidate, and well-organised - where appropriate, pre-booking meetings and creating a schedule for the day can be helpful. It can also be helpful to include tasks that someone in your company has already performed. This allows you to accurately measure the candidate against the benchmark that has been set by the person in your team who has already done that task.
How to score a work test
Deciding on the tasks that will be involved in the work test is one thing, but how will you know if a candidate has done a great job? Each task should be designed to measure a specific skill, or set of skills, which will be built as a scorecard in Greenhouse. This will allow you to describe what success looks like in the work test, and easily track how each candidate measures up to your expectations. For each task, you will need to decide:
Which skill(s) is being measured in which task(s)
What successful completion of each tasks looks like
What indicates excellence over ‘good enough.’
This will then allow you to score candidates’ work (out of five, in Greenhouse) against the success criteria that you have set out. You will also need to ask every person on your team who worked with the candidate: “How much do you want to work with this person?” Ask them to score the potential hire out of ten; you are looking for an average score of eight or higher, as this indicates that the candidate is a good culture fit for your team.