00:00 — Welcome to The Score
Introduction to the episode and today’s guest, Janine Larkin from JCB.
01:14 — Ice breaker
The interview question that should stay in 1997
02:54 — Why JCB overhauled its entire early careers process
8,000 applicants, a tiny team, and the need for a fair, scalable system.
05:35 — What early careers candidates really value
Why human interaction still beats a flawless ATS.
07:54 — Managing expectations (and nerves) at scale
Communication, clarity, timelines, and what candidates actually need.
09:58 — Cheating, AI, and Integrity Guard
How to design your process so candidates don’t need to cheat.
14:17 — What predicts early careers success at JCB
Self-drive, emotional intelligence, and early leadership potential.
17:23 — Giving meaningful feedback at volume
How JCB delivers personalised insights to every assessment centre attendee.
21:02 — The future of early careers hiring
Skills-based models and spotting potential early in a candidate’s journey.
22:01 — Science or Fiction?
Gen Z attention spans, grades as predictors, and AI detection myths.
26:33 — Final takeaways
Human-first hiring, transparent AI guidance, and why planning matters.
Caroline Fry (00:00)
Welcome to The Score, where we make sense of hiring trends, we sort science from fiction, and find out what's new in talent acquisition from top experts in the field.
Nicola Tatham (00:08)
Hello, I'm Nicola Tatham. I'm the Chief IO Psychologist here at Sova. I've got over two decades of experience designing fair, predictive, and science-backed talent assessments. I'm here to cut through the noise and talk about what actually works in hiring.
Caroline Fry (00:23)
And I'm Caroline Fry, Head of Product. I spend my time turning smart assessment ideas from Nic into tools that work—scalable, inclusive, and ready for whatever AI throws at us next.
Nicola Tatham (00:33)
So each episode we're joined by a guest to unpack a big question in hiring.
Caroline Fry (00:37)
Because talent deserves better than guesswork.
Nicola Tatham (00:40)
And today I'm really pleased to say that we're joined by Janine Larkin, who is the Resourcing Manager at JCB. Hi Janine. Hello. It's great to have Janine on our podcast today. Janine oversees the design and the delivery of JCB's Early Careers Programme—so that's across apprentices, graduates, and also industrial placements. She's here today to tell us what it takes to build an Early Careers Programme that's fair, that's scalable, and that really enables candidates to thrive. So welcome, Janine.
Janine (00:48)
Hello, hello, how are you? Thank you for having me.
Caroline Fry (01:14)
Great to have you with us. So we like to kick things off with a light one. What's the weirdest, funniest, or most baffling interview question you've ever come across—whether you were asked it or watched it unfold in real time.
Janine (01:27)
Okay, well, I'm proud to say I didn't ask this one, but I was privy to it. This was back in more of a junior time in my career when I was supporting an interview. And this was a long time ago, so I don't want to shame anybody. But that being said, it was a long time ago, but it was quite a retro—I’d class it as a bit of a retro—question. I was supporting an interview, taking notes, and it was going okay in my experience.
Then the interviewer, out of nowhere, just dropped the question of “sell me this pen,” which was a huge curveball. The candidate didn't quite understand what was going on and, as you'd expect, didn't probably do a great job of selling said pen, because what are we trying to get out of it? So yeah, it was one of those learning curves. So on the back of the interview, I obviously gave some feedback as to why that's probably not the best way to ask questions—throw things like that upon people.
But it did remind me that it is a bit of an old-school, retro interview question that hopefully we've come a bit of a way from now. Hopefully it stays in the archives.
Caroline Fry (02:22)
So cringe, isn't it? Was it even a sales rule?
Janine (02:26)
It was, no it was, but not that kind of sales. Not pen Sales, it wasn't pen Sales.
Caroline Fry (02:34)
Oh dear. Yes, hopefully we have come further than that. Okay, right. Icebreaker out the way. Let's dive into our in-depth questions for you. So looking at your professional bio, you've completely redesigned JCB's Early Careers Program. Can you tell us what changes you've introduced and what problems you were trying to solve?
Janine (02:54)
Yeah, so I'll talk about the problems first actually, because we're at JCB in a really fortunate position. We've got a great brand, lots of people at the point in the career that they're at want to come and apply to JCB. We're in a really fortunate position. We get lots of applications. So for this campaign for 2025's cohort, we were sitting on around 8,000 applications.
I've got a really lean team, and at the forefront of my expectations is making sure that people have a fair assessment process and a great candidate experience. I’m really passionate about that. So how do you get a small team of recruiters who have got to get through 8,000 applications to the fairest possible way to get the best people for JCB? We have to overhaul everything really.
We do a great job every year. There wasn't necessarily lots that was broken, but there were lots of improvements that could be made. So, a bit of a pitch: we implemented the Sova platform, which really was a game changer for us because it actually forced us to look at the end-to-end journey. So, right the way from what do we actually want to be bringing into JCB? What skills, what behaviours, what attributes do we want from those people? And what's going to make them good and successful at JCB in the long run?
And then we wound it back and we looked at what we're assessing from people at all different parts of the process. Ultimately, to cut a long story short, we got to a point where we designed a couple of different projects within the system that allowed us to run different situational judgment testing, personality questionnaire and profiling, right the way through to meaning that we could essentially review video interview questions and spend a bit more time around that because we've got some data from the actual assessment part. We have a brilliant conversion rate now, so we have much better attendance records in terms of people actually attending the assessment centres. And we get lots of anecdotal feedback that, wow, the candidates are all brilliant. This is a really tough decision to have to make.
Whilst that's nice, we've also got the data to back up the fact that since then we've definitely got the best calibre of people for JCB. And that's really important, and I would say to recommend to businesses that you can have great candidates, but it's about how they're going to do in your business and understanding how they're going to fit into your culture and what looks good there.
Nicola Tatham (05:03)
Thank you. You've sort of—not even hinted—you've made quite clear here that you do get a lot of high-end candidates. And with that comes candidate expectations that are also high, sometimes even verging on unrealistic. In your recent experience, what do you think these kinds of early careers candidates are really valuing from a potential employer? What do they think they want, but actually might not matter in practice when it comes down to it?
Janine (05:35)
Well, to answer the first point—and not only do I think they want it, but I think they deserve it—is human interaction. So whilst technology is brilliant, it is. I'm so glad we've got it now because back in my early days of recruitment it wasn't there; thank goodness we've got better technology around us now to stop lots of unnecessary repetitive admin. But for me, human interaction really levels us up in terms of the campaigns that we run and the processes we take candidates through.
I try and maximise as much technology as I can with all the automated elements of the journey. So touch points that are going to go through every different part of your workflow, from an ATS perspective, meaning that my team then can get to the good stuff. Before they speak, before they are actually going to come on site and speak to people, we find that they've all got different things that they might be feeling a bit nervous or unsure about. So actually speaking to a person that's going to be there on the day—we've had brilliant feedback and it's landed really well.
Some people just want really obvious things like, “Oh, where can I park?” They're coming to a big, daunting site where there's lots of car parking. There are little things like that; you can't skim over those. And whilst there's a place for automation, there's a place for AI, we can't lose that importance of human interaction. Because it would be easy to—in 8,000 applications a year—would be very easy to not do those bits. But for me, I'm really passionate about making sure that my team do a great job of just making sure candidates, before they come to us, know what to expect.
Nicola Tatham (07:05)
Yes, it's always about clarity in your communication with them. Those things like car parking really matter because they just set the tone for the rest of the day, don't they? Yeah.
Janine (07:09)
Yeah. Yeah, but I think it could really send you west if you turn up to the wrong place. Actually, I'm just putting myself in candidate shoes. I'd get really nervous if I turned up to an interview and taken the wrong turning because the car parking wasn't clear. So just all these little things, they can build up, can't they? So yeah, for me, just being really upfront, clear, lots of clarity around what to expect, where to come to, who to ask for—all of those little bits—and what we're looking for on the day as well, just so they're really as prepared as they can be.
Nicola Tatham (07:42)
Yeah. And I think I also sort of hinted there as well around, are there any unrealistic expectations that you see or hear from candidates? Or is it fair to say that they do deserve everything that they believe they need?
Janine (07:54)
For me, the amount of people that I've been privileged enough to help get started in their careers—I think we can't shy away from how important the roles we play in early careers recruitment is. Whether you hire those people or not, you've got to give them a good experience, and you've got to make them go away thinking, “Do you know what? JCB and me didn't work out, but actually I know exactly what I need to do to be better for the next company I go and start my career with.” So that's really key.
I guess in answer to your question about unrealistic expectations, I think we start our cycle in line with what a lot of other big corporate companies do—so probably in October time. And we put touch points and really visible timelines as much as we can. Every year we review how many touch points we've got, how many email comms we've got, as well as, where possible, phoning people. But it's around that. There isn't always an immediate—there might sometimes be a couple of weeks to wait if we've got a couple of assessment centres running for the same scheme. But I think it comes from a place of, you know, they're excited. If we're the first choice, I get why they want to get an immediate answer. But I think it would just be to be patient with the process. Make sure you reach out to people if you've got a contact that you can follow up with. But no news for a week or two isn't necessarily bad news. It's just that we're churning through big volumes and it's a busy period in time.
Nicola Tatham (09:10)
Yeah, yeah, and I understand that. And I guess from your point, from your perspective, it is vital that you move as quickly as you can within the confines of what's practical because you don't want to lose a candidate to a competitor or a different grad school that they might opt for if you don't get back to them in time.
Janine (09:23)
Yeah, I definitely find that by opening up our schemes earlier, which is what we do every year, we generally run our assessment centres from January for the first few months of the year. We generally find that at that point we're getting the best people by doing that. Because early careers people are generally quite loyal to the places that they get offered a job. We find, you know, sometimes it's a case that they might decline our offer go to a competitor, which is fine, because it'll happen the other way around as well.
But yeah, think the timeframes that we work to are set out for that reason because it's a competitive market. Yeah.
Nicola Tatham (09:56)
Yeah, yeah. Thank you.
Caroline Fry (09:58)
Some really, really interesting insights you've been laying out there, Janine. I think I hear so strongly in your responses how—I would call it user-centric you are, like from a product perspective—how candidate-centric you are, how human you want the process to feel for everybody, which I really admire. Because I think you mentioned AI as well. We see quantities go up, you're working at scale, there's a lot to churn through, but you want people to be valued as people, which is so admirable. I can hear that in every response you've given us. But how about the sort of trickier side? We're finding this with a feature that we've fairly recently brought out called Integrity Guard. Like with cheating and AI tools—and, you know, AI tools completely ubiquitous everywhere—candidates can do it. Cheating is a contentious topic. Sometimes you think “where's the line between being well prepared or using AI?” How can TA teams design their early careers process to minimise cheating, or to some extent how do we even define cheating? Whether it's the way the questions are structured, the mix of assessments you use, how you verify responses—what have you found that works for you to satisfy that you're getting genuine insight into a candidate?
Janine (11:12)
Yeah, it was one that I really—myself and my team—we really had to scratch our heads over this a couple of years ago. Because, as you know, ChatGPT, AI tools, started going up on the rise, which just came out of nowhere, and we’re definitely seeing an increase in people using it. And rightly so, you know, outside of work, inside of work, I use it too. We can't shy away from it. I want people that are going to be thinking outside the box to help themselves and make their own lives easier.
So for me, in short, it's “make it so they don't need to cheat” would be my answer. I think, again, being really clear throughout all the parts of the process in telling candidates where we'd recommend you don't use AI to help you answer these questions. As an example, we redesigned our video interview questions to make candidates actually pause and reflect a little bit before they could answer. Actually, some candidates on their answers said “that's really made me think a little bit,” which I think is brilliant. We've moved away from more competency-based questions, which was “give me an example of a time when,” and you could throw that into ChatGPT. We could quite clearly see that their eyes were reading from the screen, the answer on another browser. And it wasn't getting the best out of people.
When we really looked at what we are looking for in people, it's that authenticity—which I think is an easy word to throw around—but really, when people have just graduated or they're just leaving school or college, it's all about potential, isn't it, let's be honest. So we need to understand from them what things get them excited, what's really important to them as a person. We found some real success in that. That was just an idea I had, and I said, let's try it and see how it works. And I'm pleased to say we're doing it for the second year this year running. We've tweaked the questions again a little bit. We ask questions now that are more about lessons learned, or people that inspire you, so we can really dig into people and the things that they value and are important to them. For me, that's far more important, and it gives you a truer reflection of the person than a very scripted answer.
I think, Caroline, you mentioned there before, there's a difference between over-prepared and preparing enough. With JCB, you can Google search and you'll get the same sort of first page on Google every time—we were finding that. We had to do something quite drastic to change it. And what we tend to do now is we do still dig into candidates' motivations for wanting to come and work at JCB, of course. But we tend to do that in person where we can get an assessor that's worked here for some time to talk about their experiences and just bring that to life on a more personal level.
So yeah, it's really worked well. So I guess to summarise that answer: it's being really upfront at the front end of the process on the parts where we'd recommend you don't use AI, because we can't be surprised—or we can't reject people—for using it if we haven't told them it's not okay to use it. Because in every other part of their life they probably think it's okay. So I would, you know, for me, I think we've got a responsibility—if we're mapping out these processes as businesses—we've got to look at that and be fair to people. Because I didn't want to reject people for using initiative, because that will serve them well in a career at JCB for sure.
Nicola Tatham (14:17)
Thank you. We're going to shift gear a little bit and go back to one of the earlier questions actually, where you talked about when you did the overhaul of the assessment process, and you talked about looking for what are we assessing and how are we assessing it. So when you look at early careers success at JCB, what are those traits, those skills that you believe genuinely matter most, and perhaps also how have those perhaps changed over the last few years?
Janine (14:44)
Well, I'm actually really fortunate. I've been at JCB for—this is my eighth year, actually. So what's really nice about my job is I get to see people that are hired in the first couple of years being here now doing really big jobs, which is lovely. And sometimes I'll have little conversations about that, and you ask me what gets me into work every day—it's those kind of chats really, being honest. I think in terms of the traits that are commonly valued at JCB, I think it's that sort of… you need to be self-driven at JCB. And I think in a lot of apprentice and graduate opportunities, you know, we're not scared of giving you a big job here. It's not just come in and sort of shadow people. You'll often come in and do a big job quite quickly, with coaching and guidance. So don't be scared to make a few mistakes. Be humble about it. It's okay. I'll often say to my team, you know, it's fine to make a few mistakes. It's a safe place; you're in a learning journey.
I think taking development into their own hands. And we quite like people who've got quite an entrepreneurial spirit at JCB. Because we're a family-owned business, we've seen lots of really successful people—because they've had some great ideas, they can take them forward if they're sensible and they make sense. So people who aren't scared to take it with both hands really and drive it themselves.
The things that I've seen shift more recently is that kind of… I think emotional intelligence and leadership is really key. So, you know, I think expectations of Gen Z coming into the ranks now—they want to progress, which I think is brilliant. Ambition's fantastic. So I think those leadership capabilities, and understanding where the potential is at a more junior level, and actually building on them so we can recognise them at a more junior level. Sometimes people have to move into management roles, and then we're only just unpicking that they could be great leaders in the business. Well, let's find them at a more junior point in the career, when it's a safe place to do so. Build on them and nurture them at that point—that is what I've sort of found. And we're definitely focusing on that a lot more within the business here at the moment.
Nicola Tatham (16:38)
Thank you.
Caroline Fry (16:39)
That's fantastic. All of your answers are making me want to apply for a job at JCB. It sounds like a great process.
Janine (16:42)
You'll be pleased to know we have actually just gone live, Caroline, so you are welcome to.
Caroline Fry (16:46)
Okay, all right, I'll take a look. So again, like carrying on with your sort of, you know, focus on identifying talents and traits, but also, I guess at some point, you do have to filter people out. Constructive feedback, as we know, is particularly important with early careers candidates. You said something really nice earlier about how it doesn't matter if they go with a competitor—you know the industry, people bounce around, right? So whether you select them for the role or not, constructive feedback is important. And how do you make sure that JCB's candidates walk away with feedback that feels useful, fair, and, you know, worth the time that they've given you as they apply.
Janine (17:23)
Yeah, it's a really valid point. And again, this is something I'm really passionate about. So a couple of different answers. I guess we can't take everybody to an assessment centre. So for those people that have gone through an application and taken part in the Sova—the online assessment platform—they’re able to get a developmental feedback report from the personality questionnaire. That gives them some direct recommendations. I think that is really, really, really useful. And it also helps a small team like us to be able to operate at volume and make sure that they get that real personalised feel.
And then on to the point of assessment centres. When any candidates come to an assessment centre at JCB, mine and my team's promise is to make sure that they get feedback, whether they've been successful or not. That is a guarantee. I think for me we can't underestimate the power of that feedback for people at that point in their careers. It is really, really crucial that it's not just a quick skim over of “well, you did great in this but not so good in this.” You need to really dig into what they could have done a little bit better and actually praise them for the stuff that they did well.
We assess people in our in-person assessment centres on a few different things. And I make sure that within my team, we cover off the feedback for each of those activities to make sure they've got a really rounded overview of the areas that they could have improved on, or the things that they actually did a really good job on, but it was the other activity that just let them down a little bit. And that lands really well. Don't get me wrong, some of those conversations are difficult, and it might be, you know, well—it likely can be—the first time that people have had that call. But it's a call that we take really seriously. And I'm really proud of the conversations I hear my team having, and we've bedded in a real… we stick to our promises for candidates. And I would urge all businesses to make sure that they do the same in that respect, because at that point in the career that could be make or break for someone. And actually we find within the early careers population sometimes they'll be influenced by family, friends that think they should go and do x, y and z. That conversation could really flip and change people's perspectives of what they're good at. We can't underestimate the power of giving those detailed feedback conversations and making sure that they've got something to go away with that's tangible and they can actually act on.
Caroline Fry (19:39)
I was just going to say, it's just—yeah, again, I can hear in your answers as well that from both sides, obviously for the candidate it's been worth their time, but you guys put… your team puts a lot of effort into this sort of thing. So I guess it closes that loop for you guys too, to be able to give that back and say, okay, we've shared this together. These things are hopefully something that you can take forward, and it makes it more worthwhile for your team as well. Like you say, it's really a passion of yours. I can hear that.
Janine (20:05)
Yeah, they—you know, I'll do a quick shout-out to the team because they're fantastic. And it's not an easy job, or it's never an easy campaign every year. It's hard going. But they all take a lot of pride in making sure that people… and, you know, actually sometimes when you've met people in person and nerves have got in the way, or for whatever reason it's just not quite worked out, it's a difficult call for them as well sometimes to make. But it's important nonetheless. Yeah.
Nicola Tatham (20:27)
Thank you. Looking ahead—so we've reflected on the process that's in place already and what you're doing to support candidates now—but looking ahead, what are you most excited about in the future of early careers hiring? Whether that be related to new technology, or shifting how organisations are developing talent, or even some of the areas that you're assessing for? I know you've already said why you do the job, and you talked about some of those really nice elements of the role, but what are you excited about in terms of the future of early careers hiring?
Janine (21:02)
I think for me early careers hiring is always going to be a moving landscape. So my team don't just recruit for early careers—we recruit across the board at JCB. So we see this as a common theme in both areas, but I'm really excited about moving towards the more skill-based hiring model, particularly around early careers. I think when you really strip it back, people in JCB know what the key ingredients of making somebody good at JCB are.
And I don't always believe that you can see that in a CV or, you know, get that out of an interview always. So I think it's about how we, again, start from the finish. Because I think, you know, businesses—not just us—could be sitting on gems there, and we need to tap into those people. It's around the potential for me.
Places like JCB, we are brilliant at giving people a chance to come in and do something a little bit different than they might have done before. So I think it's about not being scared to do something a little bit different. And I'm definitely excited to see—from a sort of manufacturing and engineering business—how that goes really, in the future.
Nicola Tatham (22:01)
Thank you. We're going to move on now. I think we've finished the main element of the grilling, but we're going to move on to a little game now that we call Science or Fiction. So we're going to throw a few statements your way. Some are grounded in science, some of them not so much. And your job is to tell us which is which and just help us to set the record straight on each of them. So I'll start with…
Gen Z has a shorter attention span. Is that science or fiction?
Janine (22:31)
I feel like this could be a trick question. So I know—obviously it's a TikTok generation, but I'm part of that, but I'm definitely not a Gen Z, unfortunately. I'm going to say… I think science maybe? Is it science?
Nicola Tatham (22:42)
So you're saying that you are seeing people coming through that perhaps have got a shorter attention span.
Janine (22:47)
But I think they want more quality in a shorter space of time—and I'm here for that as well. I would like that too.
Nicola Tatham (22:52)
Yeah.
Yeah. So is it more about “don't waste my time,” “I deserve more”?
Janine (22:56)
Yeah, just short and snappy. Yeah, short and snappy.
Caroline Fry (23:00)
I think it's just the way the world's evolved, right? Like I think, you know, you can't blame a generation for that—it's just what they've been exposed to, what they're used to, I suppose. Okay, all right. Next one. Science or fiction: integrity issues in assessments are mostly caused by poor process design.
Janine (23:16)
Yeah, I would say that's science for me. I think take the time to get it right. Don't feel like we need to rush into it. I think I've felt the pressures of needing to get something over the line. And when you've got early careers campaigns in particular, that's set in stone—you can't push those go-live campaigns back, they've got to go live when they're ready to go live. I think I can see where it could go wrong. So poor process design—you’ve got to be thinking about both the business and the candidate as an end customer for me. And just making sure that the people who are involved in designing the process are all working together and have got the same end goal in mind, I would say.
Caroline Fry (23:53)
I agree. I think I heard in your response earlier around cheating as well—design the process so that they know exactly… you want an authentic response, you don't want something generic from ChatGPT or other AI tools. Yeah, okay, yeah.
Nicola Tatham (24:07)
Next science or fiction: academic grades are the best predictors of early careers success.
Janine (24:14)
Fiction.
Nicola Tatham (24:15)
Do you want to embellish on that or…?
Janine (24:17)
Yeah, I'll build on that. So, yes, it's not to say we don't value people's academic grades because, you know, we need to for some of the schemes that we run—we’ll send the candidates to go to university, that sort of thing. So some of that's defined by the training partners that we pair up with. But for me, those… again, I've touched on it already, but the skills-based, the behaviours, them as a person—how they're actually going to come in, what's their enthusiasm, their motivations—that will usually outweigh those things in reality.
So yeah, for me, and I would say that's probably a bit of a misconception depending on the sort of business you're working in actually. I don't know if you've found that with other people you've spoken to, but for me I would say definitely fiction. I'm a big believer in people's potential. And the grades don't always translate into operationally working day to day in a business.
Nicola Tatham (25:13)
Thank you. Caroline, you've got one now.
Caroline Fry (25:15)
Okay, yeah—back on the AI train, seem to always be on board. Recruiters can always tell when a candidate has used AI to complete an assignment.
Janine (25:25)
I would say… okay, probably fiction. But I would say that when you've reviewed as many video interviews as me and my team have, you start to get a bit of a hunch when people's eyes are in the wrong place. You can tell when people are scanning a screen or it sounds a little bit too rehearsed. Yes, we probably can tell. So again—but then, as I've alluded to earlier in the conversation, make it so that it doesn't have to be sneaky and actually just call it out from the get-go. Say: we'd recommend you don't use it; if you choose to use it, then that's going against the recommendations and it will probably give us a less authentic answer, and we really value the authenticity. So that would be my recommendation.
Nicola Tatham (26:05)
Thank you. I think this has been a really, really great conversation and I want to come and work for you in JCB basically, so I'm off…
Caroline Fry (26:06)
Thank you.
Get in line, Nic—get in line.
I said it first.
Janine (26:16)
We've got plenty of opportunities for you both.
Nicola Tatham (26:18)
Yeah. How recent do you have to have graduated to be on the scheme?
If you wanted our listeners to take a few takeaways from this, what would be some of the key elements of what we've talked about that you would ask our listeners to take away from this?
Janine (26:33)
Probably the things I've mentioned and got the most passionate about through this conversation. So I would say: don't forget the human element, because we're dealing with people and we're dealing with people who haven't got much experience in life so far, so they need a little bit more—we need to wrap our arms around them a little bit more. I would say let's just accept that AI is there and let's utilise it as much as we can. But also let's not be taking candidates out of the process because they've used it if you've not told them that it's not recommended. That's really important.
And yeah, I guess the final bit would be just to make sure you give yourself enough time and planning to make sure you're building a really decent process and you're looking for the right things and you understand exactly what you're looking for. We've all got busy day jobs—it’s really easy to skim over these things and see them as something that will just work. Well, actually, when it comes to a busy campaign and you're in the thick of lots of applications, you'll wish you'd spent a bit more time on the front end of it just making sure you nail it down and you've got it right.
Nicola Tatham (27:29)
Thank you.
Caroline Fry (27:30)
Some great advice there. I think, yeah, that thread for me that you've had that's just been human-focused, human-centric, is really loud and clear. I think I can see the success that you've had making that the cornerstone of what you're putting together. So thank you so much for sharing all of those great insights. And thank you for joining us on The Score.
Janine (27:49)
Thank you.
Caroline Fry (27:52)
We'll be back every two weeks with more conversations on hiring, assessment, and the people shaping talent acquisition today. You can catch every episode on Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your talent acquisition news.
AI isn’t the enemy, poorly designed processes are. When assessments rely on generic competency questions or predictable prompts, candidates naturally turn to tools that generate polished answers. By shifting to reflective, personal, and harder-to-fabricate questions, organisations can encourage authenticity without resorting to policing. Clear upfront guidance on when AI is appropriate also removes ambiguity. The goal isn’t to catch people out; it’s to build a process that naturally invites honest responses.
Automation helps teams manage high application volumes, but it doesn’t replace the reassurance early careers candidates need. Simple human touchpoints—clear instructions, a friendly call before an assessment centre, transparency about what to expect—can dramatically reduce stress and improve performance. These moments show candidates they’re valued as people, not numbers, and distinguish great hiring experiences from transactional ones.
Early careers candidates rarely have long track records, so academic grades or polished CVs aren’t reliable predictors of success. Skills, behaviours, and mindset matter more: self-drive, openness to feedback, emotional intelligence, and early signs of leadership potential. Organisations benefit when they define the qualities that truly correlate with success in their environment and design assessments that uncover them. This approach broadens access and surfaces talent that traditional methods overlook.
Constructive, specific feedback—whether or not a candidate is hired—has a powerful impact. It helps young people understand their strengths, identifies areas to develop, and leaves them with a positive impression even if they weren’t selected. Feedback is especially influential early in someone’s career, and when delivered thoughtfully, it can shape better outcomes not just for the individual but for the wider talent ecosystem.
High-volume early careers cycles leave no room for improvisation. The most effective programmes start with a clear definition of what “success” looks like in the role, then build the assessment journey backwards from those outcomes. This ensures consistency, fairness, and efficiency when applications surge. A well-structured foundation also allows hiring teams to focus on what matters most: engaging with candidates, supporting assessors, and making confident decisions based on robust evidence.
Sova is a talent assessment platform that provides the right tools to evaluate candidates faster, fairer and more accurately than ever.
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