Pre-Hiring Assessments: Smarter Hiring or Hidden Risk?

Employers love the idea of a hiring tool that does the hard work for them — a test that surfaces the right candidate before the interview even starts. But the gap between a useful assessment and a discrimination claim is narrower than most HR leaders realize, and in Massachusetts, the ground keeps shifting underneath them.

This month, Terry Cook and Sarah Piscatelli walk Pete through the real stakes of pre-hiring assessments: what counts as job-related, what the EEOC has already shut down, and why the rise of AI-powered video interviews is creating a brand-new category of legal exposure. If your hiring process leans on any kind of test — physical, technical, behavioral, or otherwise — this is the conversation to hear before you run another candidate through it.

Links & Notes

• AIM members can reach the HR Helpline at 800-470-6277 or helpline@aimnet.org for inquiries Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (EST). Email requests will be responded to within 24 hours. 
• AIM Blog - Ask the Helpline: Are Your Hiring Assessments Creating Legal Risk?
• Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures of 1978 
• Code of Federal Regulations

• AIM HR Solutions Training Catalog
• AIM members can reach the HR Helpline at 800-470-6277 or helpline@aimnet.org for inquiries Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (EST). Email requests will be responded to within 24 hours.