What is an Employment Test

We now need to discuss a legal issue that affects each step of the selection process. The Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures (UGESP) provide information that can be used to avoid discriminatory hiring practices as well as discrimination in other employment decisions. Most often called simply the “Uniform Guidelines,” they were created to guide employers in their efforts to comply with the federal laws concerning all employment decisions, and especially the selection process.

The UGESP formalize and standardize the way in which the federal government identifies and deals with discriminatory employment practices. They define the concept of “tests for employment” that are used in either the selection process or other employment actions. But what is a test for employment? It is a pretty broad term.

The guidelines themselves specifically say that they “apply only to selection procedures which are used as a basis for making employment decisions.” Now that we have a general overview of the selection process and understand that we need to select for fit and follow the UGESP in every step of the selection process, we are ready to discuss the selection steps.