Pre-Employment Finance Test: Definition, Purpose, Types, and Benefits

Employees working in the financial sector are mostly in charge of managing company finances, conducting market research, and making crucial decisions that are profitable for an organization while minimizing risks.

Also, organizations in this sector face the challenges of keeping up with evolving customer needs, technology breakthroughs, and changing regulations. Therefore, firms must recruit the right talent who can help them adapt quickly to this business climate. 

That’s where a pre-employment finance test comes into the picture. 

This kind of testing:

• brings in high-quality talent, 
• helps you build a pool of competent employees, 
• ensures consistency in hiring, and 
• reduces turnovers. 

Testing candidates before hiring helps you assess if the candidate has the aptitude and skills to perform the job you’re hiring them for. 

With that in mind, let’s find out what pre-employment financial testing is, its types, purpose, why, when, and how you should use it, and some of the skills to consider in a candidate applying for a financial role. 

What Is a Pre-Employment Finance Test?

A pre-employment finance test is a form of assessment for candidates applying for financial jobs. It helps employers identify competent applicants having the greatest potential and highest proficiency levels within this sector.

The idea is to assess their knowledge, general financial acumen, and various financial skills, such as budgeting, financial planning, and analytical thinking. 

It’s a great way to narrow down a large pool of candidates and select those who can contribute to the growth and profitability of your organization. 

Related Read: What are Pre-Employment Assessments and Tests? 

Reasons Why Employers Must Use Pre-Employment Finance Tests

There are plenty of sound reasons why employers should use pre-employment tests. Some of them are:

• To Get Insights Into a Candidate’s Skills and Knowledge 

The main purpose behind using finance assessment is to understand if candidates possess the skills they need to perform their job. Identifying skills is important because it’s a proven indicator of future performance. 

When you assess a candidate’s knowledge and skills, it becomes easy for hiring authorities to check if they are fit for the job and how efficiently they can perform it in the future. 

• Recruiting the Best Talent for a Specific Job Role 

Pre-employment finance test makes it easier to identify the potential candidates for a job. A finance assessment test can easily eliminate unqualified candidates and select the deserving ones. 

It helps screen candidates out of many applications and prevents missing out on good candidates. 

Surprisingly, some candidates lie on their resumes. 

As per statistics, financial professionals and IT workers are more likely to lie on their resumes. These lies are about their educational qualification, skills, and years of experience. This is where finance tests can be super helpful. They can help you identify whether candidates possess the skills mentioned in their resumes. That way, picking the best candidate for a finance role becomes easier and you can avoid the risks of poor hiring.

• Cost and Time-Saving 

Recruitment processes are not only lengthy but also costly. HR teams have to efficiently manage the recruitment budget while also keeping a check on turnovers. You can use pre-employment financial testing to screen applicants based on their skills, knowledge, cognitive abilities, and more. 

The results of these tests are likely to play an important role in finding good hires and saving money and time spent on recruiting bad hires. 

Pro Tip: You can use a finance quiz tool for the best results. Tools with ready-to-use questions, security settings, customization options, reports, and integrations are ideal for a finance assessment test. There are various online assessment software available in the market. For example, ProProfs Quiz Maker lets you create questions in multiple formats and also view test results anytime, anywhere. 

There’s often an ongoing battle among finance companies to recruit the best talent. Since this industry is driven by technology, finance assessments make it easy to find and recruit the best talent. 

Keeping the purpose in mind, let’s now understand the different types of pre-employment finance tests you must conduct to find the best candidates. 

Did you know?

The average cost of a bad hire can be up to 30% of an employee’s earnings in the first hyear as per the U.S. Department of Labor. 

4 Different Types of Finance Assessment Tests

It’s important to remember that financial roles are quite challenging, and candidates need to demonstrate various competencies apart from numerical skills. Here are some tests that hiring managers should use as a part of the recruiting process. The test you use will depend on the role you are hiring. 

1. Financial Skills Test 

This test lets you assess candidates for financial skills, such as financial numeracy, accounting skills, financial management, and more. 

Recruiters need to keep in mind that these tests should be specific and highly targeted. For example, if you’re hiring for bookkeeping roles, you must use the bookkeeping skills assessment test. Therefore, you need to choose the test based on the role. 

2. Numerical Reasoning 

A numerical reasoning test is the most important financial test, assessing a candidate’s ability to interpret data and draw logical conclusions from numerical information. It’is an arithmetic test that focuses on understanding the candidate’s mathematical knowledge. 

It presents data in the form of tables, charts, or graphs, and candidates need to analyze and solve problems with accuracy and speed.

3. Abstract Reasoning 

This type of test measures a candidate’s inductive reasoning skills. In abstract reasoning, the test taker has to complete visual sequences by identifying shapes and patterns. 

These assessments help employers find candidates who can process information quickly and have strong problem-solving capacities. 

Did you know?

Abstract reasoning tests were part of research conducted by psychologist Charles Spearman in the 1920s. 

4. Communication Skills 

Communication skills test is another important test for various finance sector roles. The test aims to identify how well candidates can communicate and collaborate with others. It measures several dimensions of interpersonal skills, including verbal and nonverbal communication skills. 

Besides evaluating a candidate’s potentiality through finance aptitude tests, you also need to consider several other skills and abilities before hiring a candidate for a financial role. Therefore, our next discussion will be on the skills you should check in a candidate before you send out an offer letter. 

Skills to Look for When Hiring for Finance Roles 

The finance industry is evolving rapidly, and to keep up with the changing pace, finance professionals have to demonstrate various abilities and skills. The pre-employment finance test should analyze the specific skills essential for each role. You can easily personalize these tests to understand whether the candidates have what it takes. 

However, before taking a pre-employment test, you need to check if the candidates qualify for a finance-based position. 

Check their educational background, qualifications, and work experience. This will give you an idea of the candidates’ knowledge or skills. 

Now, let’s discuss the important skills/abilities to consider in a candidate. 

• Excellent Communication Skills

Every role in the finance department would involve communication with team members and other departments. Therefore, the candidate needs to exhibit strong communication skills. This is where the communication skills test can help. 

With a communication test, you can easily identify candidates who can interact, share their ideas, and carry out instructions diligently. 

• Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills

Since finance roles are complex and involve accounting, bookkeeping, budgeting, etc., candidates must have strong critical thinking and problem-solving skills.  

As a recruiter, you might want to check if the candidate can analyze complex data and draw the right conclusions. Problem-solving quizzes can help in determining these skills. 

• Management Skills 

Though every finance role may not require this skill, it still helps to have someone with excellent management skills. 

If candidates can show their management skills during the testing phase, they may progress in their careers faster and be eligible for promotions within a short tenure. 

• Technical Skills

In the present times, the finance sector is driven by game-changing technology. Therefore, candidates who are applying for finance job roles need to be tech-savvy, and they should be open to learning new technologies. 

From automation tools to accounting software, most financial processes have become automated. That’s why, your hiring process should include testing for technical skills.

• Team Work 

The candidate you choose should be a key team player in your organization. 

So, how can you identify if the candidate possesses good teamwork skills? 
You can add group exercises as a part of your hiring process. Allow your candidates to take part in meaningful discussions, as this will show how efficiently they can work together with others and respect their views. Or, you may also use teamwork and collaboration quizzes for this

That was all about the skills you must look for when choosing a candidate for a financial role. However, ensure you do not test for every competency, as that would overwhelm the candidates. Customize your financial skills test based on the requirements of the role. 

With that in mind, you might be thinking – “when is the right time to conduct a finance assessment test.” Well, we will answer it for you. 

Also Read: Best Surveymonkey Alternatives

When to Conduct Financial Testing

Hiring teams often think about when to use a pre-employment test. 

This timing will vary from one recruiter to another. For instance, some hiring managers prefer using these tests after shortlisting the candidates, while some use them even before shortlisting, which means a candidate is shortlisted for further rounds only after passing these tests.

It takes a lot of time to review resumes, especially when the number of candidates is too high. Therefore, we suggest that the best time to introduce these tests is as soon as a candidate submits a job application.  

This will help in disqualifying candidates who are unsuitable for the role and will ease the recruitment process.

Introducing tests early in the hiring process can also help prioritize the best candidates immediately. This will save time and recruitment expenses. Also, it reduces the steps involved in the recruitment phase. 

How to Conduct Pre-Employment Finance Tests

You can create effective pre-employment finance assessments with just a few easy steps. See the following example. 

Step 1: Understand the Job Role 

Before conducting financial assessments, you need to understand for which job role you’re creating the test. There’s no point in taking too many tests as it will overwhelm the job applicants. 

The requirements can be for a financial manager, accountant, or bookkeeper. Understanding each role makes it easy to identify what skills or knowledge each role will demand. Based on that, you can create your assessments.  

Step 2: Choose the Right Assessment Tool 

Once you’ve identified the job role, you need to select the right assessment tool. Generally, a tool with readymade templates, question banks, customizations, reports, and integrations would be the best choice. 

Automated grading, certification, and options for video responses and preventing question skipping are other features you should look for in an assessment tool.  

Watch: How to Create a Video Interview Question

Step 3: Create Assessments from Scratch or Choose from Library  

You can add your own questions or choose from the assessment library and edit them based on your hiring needs. Powerful quiz-making tools provide these features for a quick start to candidate assessment online.

Watch: How to Create an Assessment Online

Step 4: Make Necessary Settings 

Configure your assessments by adding grading logic and make necessary settings to prevent cheating. Once done, you can share the test via email or virtual classroom.

Watch: How to Customize & Configure Your Quiz Settings

Step 5: Evaluate Assessment Results 

Pre-employment finance test reports will give you a holistic view of a candidate’s performance. You can choose the best candidate and disqualify the low-performing candidates based on the results. 

Watch: How to Review Quiz Reports & Statistics

Pick the Best Employee with the Right Pre-Employment Finance Tests 

You can never ignore the importance of pre-employment tests for the finance sector. Conducting assessments before recruiting a finance employee goes a long way in ensuring that you’ve selected a potential candidate who demonstrates all the skills required for handling financial job roles. 

Remember: Resumes may lie but assessments won’t.

Nowadays, plenty of quiz maker software tools are available on the market. Look for the one that best suits your company’s needs. Ideally, the software should be user-friendly and provide readymade assessments, quiz templates, automatic grading, reporting tools, and smart configurations.