Recruiting the best modern minds in law

Our client is a Top 10 Global Law Firm with more than 70 offices operating in over 40 countries. The firm's people-focused approach attracts some of the world's biggest organisations and the world's best talent, with a total of 5500 lawyers operating globally.

In the challenging 21st century economic climate, the pressure to make the right hire decision, first time, has never been greater. With a clear relationship between graduate schemes and organisational performance, the role of the graduate recruiter is increasingly viewed as business-critical. So how do you ensure that only the most suitable and able candidates are selected?

With over 2000 graduate application across 12 programmes, our client was facing just such a challenge, with a need to streamline their graduate recruitment process. The Graduate Recruitment team needed a test to be used as a sifting tool to identify the very best candidates to take through the recruitment process. It was vital that any assessment be seamlessly integrated into the firm's existing applicant-tracking system with AllHires. The team set about evaluating a wide range of online psychometric assessments and test providers who could manage the integration from a technical perspective.

The team selected to partner with Getfeedback and Abigail Clayton, Client Director was brought in to help the team to analyse suitable assessments. “After evaluating the wide range of solutions available, we recommended the Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal due to the high calibre of candidates required and the importance of critical thinking for the graduate role. The Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal was selected for its validity, reliability and reputation”, explains Abigail.

The Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal is a higher-level ability test which assesses an individual's capability for critical thinking-a discrete skill distinct from, but not independent of, overall intellectual intelligence. It is generally acknowledged to be one of the toughest tests of critical thinking available with strong links to performance in role.

“The Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal is a very helpful sifting tool to narrow down candidates who we want to bring forward on to the next recruitment stage. It really does test those skills which lawyers need - making sure people can think critically, make the correct judgements and assumptions, and evaluate arguments in a neutral way. It is one of the most popular tests used by law firms”, explains our client's Interim Head of Graduate Recruitment & Development.

Following their selection, Getfeedback completed the technical integration with AllHires and created a client branded Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal. “Getfeedback's online assessment platform easily integrates into applicant tracking systems and is already linked to many of the market leading solutions”, explains Steve Bicknell, Chief Technology Officer at Getfeedback.

“AllHires has lots of previous positive experience integrating with Getfeedback and this time was no exception. This was an existing AllHires client who wanted to switch test provider in 2013. The responsiveness of the team at Getfeedback and the ease of integration with our applicant tracking system means that we have no problems recommending them when asked. The turnaround time for integration was 10 days and due to the smooth and efficient process we both have in place we were able to meet the deadline. This integration has been running smoothly for four years now”, says Kate Stevenson, Operations Manager, AllHires.

The Watson Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal was launched as part of the graduate recruitment online application process in 2013 and has been used successfully ever since, with the firm choosing to continue to use the test following their merger in 2017. The introduction of the assessment has allowed the firm to streamline their recruitment process, focusing recruitment on high calibre candidates and enabling the company to recruit the best modern minds in law.

“I have confidence that Getfeedback are delivering an assessment tool for us which not only provides a good candidate experience but also gives us the crucial information we need to assess candidates at the early stage, in order to work out whether we are confident that they will successfully progress through the graduate recruitment process. Getfeedback are always quick to respond and deliver on the service that they agree to provide”, confirms the Interim Head of Graduate Recruitment & Development.