New Security in Online Assessments

Saville Consulting, a new company founded by Professor Peter Saville are creating new, more secure approaches to online assessment.

ëWhen tests are delivered unsupervised online we know that candidates attempt to cheat or mislead i.e. candidates are willing to help each other get through the testsí. says Professor Peter Saville. ëYet these scores are often taken at face value by recruiters. Who is most likely to be advantaged by this? Unfortunately the dishonest candidate with the poorest ability. The last people employers should employ.í

ëIt was this problem that was one of the reasons I left SHL to found Saville Consulting. I fundamentally disagreed with SHLís policy on cheating and the internet for both personality and ability testingí says Peter Saville, the founder and ëSí from SHL, before starting his new company Saville Consulting.

ëAt Saville Consulting we have pioneered a completely new approach to online assessment with the back up of separate secure supervised versions for both ability and personality online assessment.í

ëFor assessing the aptitude of candidates we have developed invited access versions that are delivered over the internet without supervision and are appropriate for screening. These provide verbal, numerical and diagrammatic scores in just 18 minutes. They also give a profile of the speed, accuracy and caution of the candidate.í

ëSeparate parallel verification versions of our aptitude assessments can be delivered in paper and pencil (hard copy) or online under supervised conditions to check that the results on the unsupervised screening tests were accurate and that you are not employing low ability cheatsí. says Peter Saville.

It is not only the ability area that concerns Peter Saville and his new company. The new Saville Consulting Waveô Styles questionnaires from Saville Consulting, which are the talk of the assessment industry and include information on motive, talent and culture fit, bring the same secure methodology to the personality/styles arena.

ëUnfortunately lots of paper personality questionnaires have been put on the internet without sufficient consideration for the need for security. Our Wave Styles questionnaires have been developed with the challenges and opportunities offered by the internet at the heart of their development. Invited access versions are available for completion unsupervised online and the back up of secure supervised online administration of a separate parallel questionnaireí. says Peter Saville.

ëThe Saville Consulting Wave style questionnaires new dynamic format also interacts with the respondent online. It provides the interpreter with information on where on the profile the respondent may have been self critical and under rated themselves or where specifically on the profile they may have over rated themselves and given more socially desirable responses.í