Answer:
Actually, I have more than five. The context of which ones are favorites is changing with the increased sophistication the Web offers for recruiting. So your question caused me to stumble for a bit.

First, I had to dredge through my files and find the entire list of assessment sites I've found and recommended throughout last year.

Second, I had to revisit some of them so that I could recall

• what they offer,
• see if they have modified their sites and offerings,
• determine whether they're still favorites, and finally,
• recall whether they are better suited to
  • new college students,
  • new college graduates,
  • new job force candidates,
  • mature candidates making a transition,
  • older workers who want to remove the career blinders they've been wearing.

Good challenge; good review.

So here goes:

First, the Internet. Recruiting and screening candidates in an electronic environment has evolved drastically in the past nine months. There are some new ways to get an assessment of occupations and careers that would be a best fit for both the individual and the recruiter.

Fitability
At Fitability, the recruiter or hiring manager initiates a request for pre-personal interview screening in order to determine whether the candidate has the minimum requirements above the paper representation. When initiated by the hiring manager or recruiter, a small fee is paid by the client. The candidate is given an identification code and goes through a three-part questionnaire. The questionnaire considers the person's self image, industry or technical knowledge, and problem-solving skills type questions that would more than likely be asked during a face-to-face interview.

The only people who have access to the results are the client who ordered the profile and assessment and the recruiter. The selection report is kept private. Says Darryl Toor, Fitability's Public Relations Director, "Our new products will offer the recruiter or employer the ability to give the candidate access to his/her Personal Profile only, but not the 'Selection Report' that the recruiter or employer got, and not the answers or scores from the Online Interview questions. The candidate would become a "member" of Fitability and could purchase the more detailed 'Development' and 'Career' reports if they wanted."

Continuing, Toor explains, "The Fitability results are meant only to supplement other information gathered in the hiring process. We will not purge any candidate's results, whether or not our system suggested a good fit to the position. Our clients have access to that data and do not have to share it with the candidate, and, in fact, most do not."

One nice feature about this site is that in the near future, the candidate may initiate a screening for him- or herself for a small fee of about $9.95 and refer to that profile as they interview and vie for opportunities.

So, pre-screening assessments will be streamlining the screening and interviewing process and lowering (although marginally) the cost of hire.

AnalyzeMyCareer
Now AnalyzeMyCareer has taken a really interesting concept. It unites the old-style personality and aptitude evaluative tests, putting them online along with occupational interest inventories and then providing online counseling once the results are derived. The site has a database of 1500 career descriptions. Never fear, you won't be bombarded with all of those choices. Just two to select from that appear to be the best match. There is a fee for using this service.

Career Advantage
What about taking a 30-day course on deciphering who you are and what your best career options are? Career Advantage allows 500 page views (that's 16 per day) of the site as you complete their battery of evaluations. They say at the end of the course, you will be able to identify 10 personal interests and abilities, five types of careers and non-work activities that interest you in addition to two balanced career/life plans and meaningful directions for your career.

The fee for all of this is $24.95. If you need to return for a 30-day refresher or additional work, a small fee of $9.99 is charged.

Tip of the Iceberg
These are just the new evaluation styles for getting a fix on direction, for both the recruiter and the candidate, via online resources. There are the old standbys that still need to be discussed. They will be in the next article.