Assessment centre recruitment and selection
17, November 2017

In 2012 the Government of Western Australia charged a mid-sized public sector agency with developing and running two, 10-bed disability justice centres to accommodate people with intellectual or cognitive disability. These centres were to house people who had been charged with an offence but not able to understand the court process and therefore would be deemed unfit to plead. The centres were to be staffed on a 24 hour basis and the staff was to be specifically employed for their capabilities and expertise in working with people who have disability and who require supervision. The opening date for the first centre was May 2015. In order to staff the centre the agency required up to 20 Level 3 Disability Justice Officers.

After winning a competitive RFQ the agency engaged Maitland to develop and run an assessment centre for the recruitment of the 20 Disability Justice Officers.

One difficulty the agency had had in the past was it received a large number of applications from applicants who were clearly not suitable for the advertised positions. Maitland recommended a change to the way they advertised what the job entailed.

This was done using a hybrid assessment centre model. The Maitland consultant and the agency worked together to achieve the outcome, while having separate roles.

The consultant:

• Provided training and manuals to the agency’s staff so that they would be able to run future assessment centres for this job role

• Conducted the assessment centres

• Provided psychometric testing and analysis

• Provided the selection report

• Provided feedback to participants

The agency:

• Advertised the positions

• Provided the necessary job role documentation

• Participated in the assessment centres

• On-boarded recruits

Most of the applicants were suitable for the position, which indicates that Maitland’s recommendations about how to target the right type of applicants worked.

The recruitment process was completed in the required time frames and the new recruits began their training and induction early the following year.