Every day, organizations make tough, high-stakes decisions that directly impact people’s lives where there is little room for error.
Companies must hire and promote only the best and brightest. Schools must decide whether students are ready for the next grade. Leaders must figure out how to harness the power of their “big data” to drive organizational growth. Professional associations must decide what level of performance reflects an industry-wide, “best in class” certification standard. And our military must fashion personnel policies that put the right soldiers into the right positions at the right time.
What is the essential ingredient needed to make all these decisions? In our view, it is a rigorous, high-quality assessment. Amidst the din of biased speculation and opinions, rigorous assessment is what counts—it cuts through the noise. And it provides decision makers with the information they need to choose the best way forward.
Our custom services have helped our clients solve their most challenging human capital, educational, and credentialing assessment challenges. We are industry leaders in a wide range of innovative assessments such as rich-media simulations and logic-based reasoning, as well as more traditional approaches, i.e., knowledge, cognitive ability, and situational judgment tests; personality and interest inventories; and physical ability tests.
For example, we:
- Develop custom hiring and promotion tools for clients ranging from the U.S. Secret Service to a Fortune 500 insurance company.
- Led the development of the world’s first large-scale operational computer-adaptive test platform for the U.S. military.
- Scale and equate approximately 150 educational assessments every year—impacting over 15 million students.
- Designed and implemented a 360-degree feedback system for leaders across the U.S. intelligence community.
Our reputation as an honest broker with an independent and unbiased perspective has also led to a stream of work evaluating the quality and impact of many different operational assessments. In one instance, HumRRO served as the quality assurance lead for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), commonly known as the “Nation’s Report Card,” for over 15 years. In another, we recently conducted a “Value of Certification” study for the HR Certification Institute to explore the career- and financial-related outcomes associated with holding the Professional in Human Resources (PHR®) and the Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR®) credentials.
Our assessment-focused research projects extend beyond the purely operational realm, helping our clients address more fundamental questions. One recent effort used complex statistical models and simulations to help employers identify “insider threats”—employees who may be likely to steal confidential data or sabotage critical information systems. We are also working with the U.S. Army Research Institute to investigate how game-like simulations can shed light on people’s personalities.
