How to assess attention to detail job applicants

If a scenario arises where you have send out an email without an attachment, you would be aware of paying attention to details. Irrespective of seniority or industry this is one of the most sought out job ads. Now the question is why attention to details is so important during the hiring procedure. Let us find about it in details

• Why the quality of attention in details is important as a work related skill in employees
• How it can be measured and how you can handle
• The set of interview questions to assess attention to details

Let us get to the details

What are the reasons attention to details is important?

With numerous job ads coming up in the market, as part of the employee job skills detail orientation is called for. For sure this is a vital quality trait for an employee. For every role and industry it is not important as a whole, for any vacancy attention to details calls for a lot of attention. Here are the reasons.

Focusing on great attention to details leads to higher levels of productivity

Employees who focus on attention to details do not allow things to slip under the carpet. In fact they are not satisfied with the below sub- par work. The quality of work is of superior standards as compared to the employees who lack the quality of paying attention to detail.

The ways by which you can spot a candidate who pays attention to details

Now what are the common ways by which you can find out whether an employee pays attention to details? Rather than asking them there are various ways

Cover letter and resume

By now you might be aware that recruiters along with HR managers spend a lot of time in screening resumes. When they go on to glance over a resume they are figuring out reasons for putting a candidate on a no pile zone and observing whether they are any grammar mistakes works out to be an effective way to trim down the list of applicants.

As per research reports 61 % of recruiters in an automatic manner dismiss candidates who have typo mistakes on their resume and even a cover letter. If the application passes this stage then a further 43 % dismiss resumes on the basis of typing mistakes. From an overall context nearly 59 % of recruiters are going to reject a candidate on the basis of poor grammar and spelling.

This works out to be one of the common ways to pay attention to details. Though spelling is hardly an important role to consider for a job like a system administrator, it showcases how relevant a candidate is for their job search. Either way this side or the other side there are hundreds of jobs for a job applicant and to make the application pixel perfect the candidate sends out a powerful message that they are looking to grab this job.

Test

There are numerous testing mechanisms as there are a series of personality tests to pay attention to details. Out of them the most popular one seems to the culture index. Just like with any personality test, the results should be taken with a pinch of salt. But for practical reasons this works out to be the best assessment.

Sample work

To consider whether a candidate is suitable for a given job, just observe the past work of the candidate. On applying for a position ask them a portfolio sample of their previous work.

Let us explain things with an example. I had the chance to interview a lot of candidates for the position of writers. To get to attention to details, samples were the best method. Because writing seems to be a role where character trait would be important, the writers that I did go on to hire had to be on top of their quality work and not replicating a form of Power point presentation. In case of recruiting developers to determine the quality of applicants the code is considered even before shortlisting the resume. They are aware that if the code is clean it can be easily maintained and followed.

Questions related to attention to details

During the course of an interview it is an ideal situation to figure out whether a candidate pays attention to details. As they need to respond in an immediate manner there is very less chance to fabricate the replies which are not true as the nature stands. Let us observe some of the common questions that you need to pay for evaluating attention to details

• Highlight a mistake that you have gone on to done in your work? When did you take note of it and how you overcame it? Even the most detail oriented employee’s ends up making mistakes. Admitting them is no great sin and these shows a sense of ownership that they like to take responsibility. You need to get to the details on how you plan to overcome these mistakes
• What are the tools you generally follow so that there is no mistake in your work? By doing so it is possible to outline what all processes the candidates goes on to use in order to rectify their mistakes
• What are the things you undertake to finish work within a stipulated time frame?

Conclusion

Though the concept of attention to details is virtually important for any position, for employees it poses to be one of the most common non personal cognitive skills irrespective of their duty or job. Considering the fact that this does not seem to be a walk in the park it would be important to figure out that the candidate is detail oriented and how they are going to perform in a given role and contribute to the betterment of a company.

Well, who might be aware that there is a comma present, and this could end up costing your company hundreds of dollars.