You are a consultant who specializes in job candidate evaluation and employee selection. A moving company is seeking your advice about the appropriate selection measures to evaluate candidates for the position of driver/mover. When people are moving from one home to another, they contact the moving company to take care of relocating their belongings. The people responsible for the move are the driver/movers. Applicants for this job must be able to drive long hours and lift and carry heavy objects for a long period of time.
Because driving a truck is an essential function of the job, applicants must not only be physically capable of driving, but must also have an impeccable driving record. Driving a truck is a dangerous safety hazard if the applicant is not a good driver. Also, the job description requires that applicants for a driver/mover position with the moving company must have the physical ability necessary to move heavy furniture safely and without damage. An applicant unable to perform this task would be a risk to the employer, as well as to the safety of co-workers, clients, or the clients' belongings.
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1) Which one of the following techniques would you advise the moving company NOT to use to detect misrepresentations an applicant might make in an interview?
Asking how many days of work the candidate missed last year.
(Asking how many days the candidate missed is not a good technique, because it would violate the Americans with Disabilities Act; preemployment questions must focus on job performance, not physical disability.)
2) Which one of the following techniques would you consider least valuable to the moving company in predicting performance and injuries for this physically demanding job?
Cognitive ability test.
(A cognitive ability test would be least valuable, because a personality inventory would better assess the candidate's flexibility and problem-solving abilities than an intelligence test would.)
3) Which of the following is NOT one of the reasons you would advise the moving company to select its physical ability test with care?
Applicants may not like the tests.
(The fact that applicants may not like the test is not a strong factor weighing against the usefulness of conducting a physical ability test for a job as driver/mover.)
4) Which one of the following is an example of a job performance test that you would advise the company to ask of an applicant?
A judged competition among applicants where they drive, pack up a house, load the truck, drive to the drop-off location, and unload the truck.
(A judged competition asking applicants to perform the tasks they would actually do on the job would be an acceptable job performance test.)
5) Driving safety is an important part of the job. Because there are safety hazards associated with abusing substances while driving, you advise the moving company to conduct ________________ tests for ________ applicants.
drug; all
(The moving company should conduct drug tests for all applicants because of the risk of harm and damage associated with substance abuse while driving.)
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A large fashion retailer is hiring a new human resource manager for one of its new locations. The company's senior VP of Human Resources will spearhead the interviewing process and will use several different interviewing techniques. The position requires 5-8 years of human resource management experience. The experience does not necessarily need to be in the fashion industry, but that would be a bonus. The new human resource manager will be responsible for running the entire Human Resource Department at the new location. In addition to this individual's overall management role, his or her responsibilities will also include motivating employees, resolving conflicts, and overcoming resistance to change.
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1) Which of the following questions would be asked in a behavior description interview?
In the past, how have you motivated an employee to perform a task that he or she did not like?
(In a behavior description interview, the interviewer asks the candidate to describe how he or she handled a type of situation in the past. Questions about candidates' actual experiences tend to have the highest validity.)
2) Which type of interview typically has the highest validity in predicting job performance?
Situational interview.
(A situational interview may have high validity in predicting job performance because it focuses on how a candidate has handled a type of situation in a previous job situation.)
3) Conducting computerized interviews _________.
Discourages personal interaction, does not assess personal skills, eliminates personal bias, and is useful for gathering objective data.
(Conducting computerized interviews eliminates a lot of personal bias--along with the opportunity to see how people interact. Computer interviews are useful for gathering objective data rather than assessing people skills.)
4) Which one of the following best describes the most effective way to select the best candidate for the job?
Learn how applicants have reacted in the past to similar situations as a way to predict how they may perform in the job.
(Learning how applicants have reacted in the past to similiar situations is an effective way of predicting how they will handle a situation going forward in a new position.)
5) Which of the following is NOT true about a nondirective interview?
Their reliability is great.
(In a nondirective interview, the interviewer has great discretion in choosing questions. The candidate's reply to one question may suggest other questions to ask. Because these types of interviews give the interviewer wide latitude, their reliability is not great, and some interviewers may ask questions that are not valid or even legal.)
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Civil Rights Act of 1991
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Dealt with discrimination and preferential treatment.
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Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967
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Dealt with older workers and mandatory retirement.
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Americans with Disabilities Act of 1991
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Dealt with disabilities and reasonable accommodations.
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Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986
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Dealt with verification and form.
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Research that uses the test scores of all applicants and looks for a relationship between the scores and future performance of the applicants who were hired is referred to as _____ validation.
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Predictive
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Which of the following refers to the extent to which something provides economic value greater than its cost?
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Utility
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Which of the following is a permissible question for applications and interviews?
applicants control the content of the information.
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Which of the following "Big Five" personality dimensions is associated with a person who is courteous, trusting, good-natured, tolerant, cooperative, and forgiving?
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Agreeableness
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Neuz, Inc. reviewed applications of 90 candidates for the post of a production manager. Of these, it selected 50 candidates and asked them to take a cognitive ability test. On the basis of the test results, Neuz asked 20 candidates to appear for two rounds of interviews. It then selected the top performer of the interviews for the vacant post. Which of the following models of selecting employees was used by Neuz for making the selection decision?
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The multiple-hurdle model
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Questions about which of the following would be inappropriate in a job application form?
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Marital status.
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The _____ of a type of measurement indicates how free that measurement is from random error.
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reliability
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Tests that assess how well a person can learn or acquire skills and abilities are referred to as _____ tests.
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aptitude
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Which of the following is a type of a structured interview?
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A situational interview.
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Which of the following is the federal law requiring employers to verify and maintain records on applicants' legal rights to work in the United States?
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The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986.
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A selection interview in which the interviewer has great discretion in choosing questions to ask each candidate is termed a _____ interview.
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nondirective
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Which of the following is most likely to be the first step in personnel selection?
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Screening applications
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Which of the following is a type of background check?
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A credit check.
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Which among the following models for making a selection decision is more expensive than others?
The content of the information is controlled by applicants.
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If a person who is the reference gives negative information about the job candidate, there is a chance the candidate will claim _____, meaning the person damaged the applicant's reputation by making statements that cannot be proved truthful.
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defamation
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Which of the following is a permissible question for job applications and interviews?
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Will you need any reasonable accommodation for this hiring process
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Which of the following holds good under the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986?
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Employers must verify and maintain records on the legal rights of applicants to work in the United States.
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Which of the following tests is a legal means to test the integrity of job applicants and generally involves asking applicants directly about their attitudes toward theft and their own experiences with theft?
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Paper-and-pencil honesty test
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Which of the following is true about predictive validation?
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It uses the test scores of all applicants and looks for a relationship between the scores and future performance.
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The _____ of an employment test is indicated by the extent to which the test scores relate to the actual job performance.
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validity
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_____ tests are sometimes called "intelligence tests."
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Cognitive ability
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_____ validity is a measure of validity based on showing a substantial correlation between test scores and job performance scores.
