Many hiring decisions are still based on gut feeling. Yet research in occupational psychology and competency-based recruitment clearly shows that subjective assessments often lead to lower hiring accuracy, more costly mis-hires, and higher employee turnover.

So what actually works best — intuition or scientifically validated recruitment assessments?

The research is clear: objective and validated methods deliver significantly better results.

What Does Validity Mean in Recruitment?

In recruitment, validity refers to how well a method can predict future job performance.

This is known as predictive validity.

The higher the predictive validity of a recruitment tool, the greater the likelihood of selecting the right candidate for the role.

A recruitment assessment with high validity helps organisations:

• reduce costly hiring mistakes
• improve quality of hire
• increase performance and productivity
• lower staff turnover
• create stronger team dynamics
• make more objective hiring decisions

For employers, this leads to both lower costs and stronger long-term organisational performance.

The Problem with Gut Feeling in Hiring

Many managers and recruiters believe they are good judges of character. However, research shows that gut feeling in recruitment is heavily influenced by unconscious bias and subjective impressions.

For example, people are often influenced by:

• first impressions
• similarity bias
• body language and charisma
• stereotypes
• mood and energy levels
• personal chemistry

As a result, two interviewers may make completely different assessments of the same candidate.

Unstructured interviews in particular have been shown to have relatively low predictive accuracy when it comes to forecasting future workplace performance.

What Does Research Say About Recruitment Assessments?

One of the world’s most widely cited research reviews in recruitment and personnel selection was conducted by researchers Frank Schmidt and John Hunter.

Their meta-analyses demonstrate that different selection methods vary significantly in predictive validity.

Examples include:

The conclusion is clear:
scientifically validated recruitment assessments are significantly more accurate than hiring decisions based solely on intuition.

JobMatch Talent Has an Exceptionally High Predictive Validity

One area becoming increasingly important in modern HR and talent acquisition is the quality of the assessments and analytics tools being used.

Jobmatch Sweden offers the DNV-certified assessment tool JobMatch Talent, which has a documented predictive validity of 0.63.

This is considered exceptionally high within occupational psychometric testing and indicates a very strong ability to predict future job performance.

For employers, this means better decision-making support and a greater likelihood of identifying candidates who will both perform well and thrive in the role long term.

Why More Companies Are Choosing Evidence-Based Recruitment

More organisations are now moving away from subjective hiring processes and towards evidence-based recruitment.

The reason is simple:
bad hires are expensive.

A poor recruitment decision affects not only productivity and financial results, but also team dynamics, leadership effectiveness, and workplace culture.

By using:

• personality assessments
• cognitive ability tests
• structured interviews
• objective selection methods

companies can create fairer, more accurate, and more sustainable recruitment processes.

Recruitment Should Not Be Based on Guesswork

Gut feeling can still play a role in recruitment. But research clearly shows that intuition alone is not enough to make accurate hiring decisions.

The most successful organisations combine:

• experience
• structure
• data
• occupational psychology research

This leads to better hires, stronger teams, and higher long-term performance.

In a market where competition for talent continues to increase, the question becomes increasingly important:

Can organisations really afford to recruit based on gut feeling alone?