Situation
People Solutions has been designing and facilitating assessment centres to recruit for a variety of roles across this health service over the last few years. Two years ago, they had their largest ever intake of direct entry and graduate roles in order to meet increasing operational requirements.
Challenge
A large number of applicants for these roles were based interstate or overseas (primarily in the UK). Given the ongoing and rapidly changing travel restrictions posed by COVID-19, it was impossible to assess these candidates in person. Additionally, there was the risk of further lockdowns in WA impacting any in-person assessment centres locally. People Solutions had to find a way to assess candidates across Australia and internationally, that would enable the organisation to identify their fit for the role and the organisation, and that was in line with best practice.
Solution
Off the back of our success running virtual assessment centres in 2020, we designed a fully virtual solution for this recruitment campaign. We designed activities intended to elicit the behaviours necessary to assess the competencies for the role, that could also be run via a virtual platform. This meant using group discussion activities (rather than practical activities), as well as individual activities that did not require materials.
People Solutions set up all of the sessions via Microsoft Teams, using the breakout rooms function on the day to allocate candidates and assessors to their appropriate activities. We also managed the candidate invites ahead of the assessment centre sessions.
On the assessment centre days, People Solutions provided both assessors and facilitators. All assessors were located in the same facility, which enabled us to better manage the transition between activities and any technical issues that arose.
Result
Over four weeks of assessment centres, 245 candidates were able to participate across 36 sessions. While there were expected technological challenges along the way, we were able to find workarounds or solutions to each one and every candidate was able to make it through their session and all of their activities. Running the sessions virtually not only allowed the organisation to process the necessary number of candidates, but also gave them access to a much wider candidate pool that stretched across Australia and the world. Additionally, it gave ex-pat candidates in the UK a chance to apply for a role that could bring them back to Perth.
Ongoing success
Given the success of this large campaign, the organisation rolled out ongoing virtual assessment centres over the last two years for these and other roles, and have continued to reap the benefits of accessing a large pool of candidates from interstate and overseas. People Solutions continues to regularly review, update, and support these assessment centres on a regular basis.