Case Studies Marine Federal Credit Union Improves Training Outcomes and Quality of Hire

Challenge

Marine Federal Credit Union is a full-service financial institution that operates 14 branches across North Carolina, Virginia, and South Carolina. Marine Federal wanted to improve the quality of hire for their customer-facing staff, including tellers and call center agents. Their goal was to be able to identify qualified candidates who were computer savvy and able to uphold the company’s high standards for customer service.  

Solution

Marine Federal started to work with Criteria to administer assessments to their incoming candidates. They primarily used three assessments:  

• The EPP, or Employee Personality Profile, is a general personality assessment that measures a wide range of behavioral traits associated with particular roles. For example, it can help identify candidates who are suited for customer service roles by measuring traits such as cooperativeness, conscientiousness, and patience.  
• The GAME, or General Aptitude Mobile Evaluation, is a fast, mobile-friendly, game-based assessment of cognitive aptitude. It gives an indication of a candidate’s trainability and critical thinking skills. 
• The CLIK, or Computer Literacy and Internet Knowledge test is an assessment of basic computer proficiency. It can help to establish what a candidate is already able to do on a computer.  

Results

By using Criteria’s assessments, Marine Federal is able to hire better employees who are more likely to successfully complete training and perform well on the job.  

Better Quality of Hire  

Criteria’s assessments have enabled Marine Federal to hire employees who have a strong aptitude for customer service and are able to deliver a high-quality customer experience. The organization found that the EPP was especially useful for identifying employees who have the personality traits to excel in a customer-facing role. 

Thanks to the assessment results, Marine Federal can quickly prioritize which candidates to invite to the interview stage. By highlighting the highest potential candidates, the company is able to interview fewer candidates in order to make a strong hire.  

Higher Training Completion Rate   

Before using Criteria’s assessments to identify candidates with the highest potential, Marine Federal was using resumes and interviews to guess who would be able to succeed once hired. The organization was finding that some new hires would struggle during the initial training period, particularly with adapting to the various computer programs and systems that they would need to operate on a day-to-day basis.  

By using assessments to help select new employees, Marine Federal has found that it’s very rare for a new employee to not be able to pass training. With the vast majority of new hires passing their training and learning their job skills quickly, Marine Federal’s HR team saves countless hours recruiting, interviewing, and training new team members to fill vacant spots.  

Greater Insight for Management and Teams    

The assessment results provide deeper insights that Marine Federal can use to build and manage their teams. For example, they often use the personality insights to pair new employees with managers that would suit their behavioral style. The results also help Marine Federal pair candidates with the open roles that are best suited for their particular strengths.  

Marine Federal is also starting to use the Team Personality component of Develop by Criteria (previously known as Talent Insights) to better develop their existing teams by providing personality insights that managers and individuals can use to enhance communication and collaboration. They look forward to expanding the level of insight for their current teams in order to take their growth to the next level.