Written by Sally-Ann King | 9th June 2023

CVs have long been the traditional way to make a comparison between candidates, and who could be right for a role. So, you may find it surprising, that some businesses are considering cutting them out completely.

Research from behaviour experts Arctic Shores found that 61% of companies use CVs as their first means of assessing candidates, but 59% have considered removing them from the hiring process.

This could be for a few reasons – the most likely being the amount of time, energy and resources it takes to sort through CVs, particularly if it is a role applied for by hundreds of hopeful candidates. Some employers may also believe that it is too easy for people to exaggerate or lie about their skills and experience on a CV, and prefer alternative ways of verifying a candidate’s claims.

So is it time to lose CVs? We don’t believe so – not yet, at least. We see CVs as an integral part of the recruitment process, a concise way to present skills, career history and other details about yourself to give that positive first impression to potential employers.

There are, however, tools that work together with CVs to help you find the right talent and streamline the recruitment process.

Screening questions

Screening questions are used to filter candidates which can save significant time when sifting through CVs. These are questions specific to the company and role itself – sometimes about the skills or experience required for the role.

In general, employers request answers to screening questions either in writing, in the form of a short video, or both.

Several companies even use screening questions and their answers as replacement for initial phone interviews, sometimes also called “screenings”. Those are usually done by a hiring manager to check and confirm experience and determine an initial “fit”.

Written screening questions can assess the candidate’s written communication skills, critical thinking and problem solving and video answers give you the ability to assess similar skills but also give you an insight into their personality.

Our specialist recruiters can help by supporting with or taking on the screening stage, saving employers time in whittling down many applicants to a pool of candidates to interview.

The screening process

At Reality HR, we can help design a recruitment process that sources candidates and helps select those who will be the best for your business, using a combination of interviewing, testing and psychometrics.

To screen a candidate, hiring managers should review each applicant’s education, work experience, and skills to assess whether they would be a good fit for the role. This could mean not only reviewing CVs, but online portfolios, social media profiles and skill test results.

Quest Profiler is a personality questionnaire used for both selection and development. It helps suggest relevant interview questions, which can be very useful to gain clarification on points that need further investigation.

Some clients use this at the end of the interview process to help make a final decision. However, these should not be used in isolation and as an additional tool to gain an understanding of how a person is likely to behave within an organisational setting.

It is beneficial for hiring managers to be pro-active in the screening process, as the very best candidates are in high demand and often receive multiple offers. Nothing is worse than having your top candidates take up an alternative position, because the process was taking too long.

It is also important for hiring managers to investigate into work experience, and not to assume the short tenures in a role are due to ‘job-hopping’, they may be temporary or contracting roles. They should also avoid making assumptions on location and find out if the candidate is planning on moving to the area.

Whether you keep CVs or decide to mix up how you approach recruitment within your business, make sure you think about what you’re trying to achieve. We can help design a recruitment process that is closely aligned to the needs of your organisation and culture.

For more information about our recruitment support services, please get in touch with our team at info@realityhr.co.uk.