HR: when the computer does the recruiting

“We can predict the future. We can tell you what problems you will have with which employees. We can even predict what kind of affinity there will be between a manager and a new colleague. Or we could for example predict that there is an 80% chance that an individual will only stay at a company for 3 years”. On paper the promises made by David Bernard are an attractive prospect. This occupational psychologist is co-founder of the Parisian company AssessFirst, which for two years has been proposing a method consisting of predictive analytics, mixing statistics and algorithms, allowing predictions regarding a potential candidate’s personality and attitude in the job. “Previously everyone shouted me down when I spoke about predictive analytics at conferences, because there was a kind of unwillingness to relinquish the omnipotence of recruiters. Things are different now, and demand is increasing hugely”, he states.

Are computers more objective than human beings? At the technical level, AssessFirst relies on three online tests. They are more or less the traditional tests that allow you to evaluate peoples’ intellectual aptitude, motivation and personality. “David Bernard continues, “we get a sample number of employees in a company to sit these tests.…