By Doug Reynolds, Ph.D.
I’ve been asked by several colleagues now about the implications of the Ricci case for hiring practices in the U.S. This is the one where the City of New Haven chose to discard the results of a promotion test for firefighters because it produced an adverse impact on protected classes who failed the test. The city was sued by a group of firefighters who passed the test, and the Supreme Court found in favor of the firefighters, citing that the city had engaged in disparate treatment by using race as a factor in their decision to throw out results from a validated test.
Some labor attorneys believe this decision will dampen enthusiasm for employment testing. My feeling is that this interpretation is short-sighted. The legal logic is that employers will see the decision as a damned-if-you-do-and-damned-if-you-don’t conclusion, with risk coming from all directions, so you’d might as well give up and not use tests at all (and pick fire lieutenants by lottery, perhaps?).
For those who design selection procedures, the case means something much different. Employers use valid assessment tools because they add tremendous value and fairness to the process of making decisions about people. Decades of scientific research support this, and organizations that use well-designed tools stand by them even when the lawyers start sniffing around. In fact, the use of assessments has been steadily increasing over the past decade.
A better interpretation of the Supreme Court’s decision is based on the fact that the validity of the test was supported. To be clear, the New Haven test was far from perfect. However, the test designers did take necessary steps to map the test to the body of knowledge required for promotion, and outside experts in testing and in firefighting looked at the test and judged it to be reasonable and relevant. In the end, the court did not take issue with the validity of the test—giving employers who use valid assessments the confidence that selection decisions made based on a well-designed process can be defended.
Had the New Haven test not been validated, most people would never have heard of the Ricci case; the test would have been thrown out with good reason and the case would not have made its way to the Supreme Court. Sophisticated employers will continue to benefit from the value that objective and valid assessments provide, regardless of the shenanigans in New Haven.
Doug Reynolds is vice president of assessment technology at Development Dimensions International (DDI).
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