Alison and the Assessment Test

I met Alison during my Clinical Pastoral Education. We have stayed in touch now and again, like you do when you live in different neighborhoods and run busy lives - yet have been through life transforming experiences together.

Recently, Alison let me know about postings for a chaplaincy position in a nearby hospital. She was going to apply – was I interested too? I appreciated her generous spirit; after all if I applied, we would become competitors. But I declined – God led me to another path and I now work in this awesome church, UPPC.

Alison contacted me again after she applied. She was troubled.

“They sent me this link and that led me to a test, she said. There were at least 50 questions and they were all the kind of problems we had to solve at school. You know, Jane lives in A, and Bob lives in B, and John lives near Jane, what is the distance between Bob and John… Rhetorical questions of logic. I was bewildered. None of the questions were related to chaplaincy or even human relations!”

Alison was concerned. She was so taken aback by the test (which took her about an hour to take) that she was pretty sure she had not done very well. She wondered how it would impact her application.

I tried to reassure her. Her application was strong, with very positive evaluations and her previous supervisor, a noted senior chaplain, as a reference.

A few days ago, late in the evening, I heard from Alison again. I could tell she had been crying. “I just received an email from Human Relations, she said. My application has been rejected. And they asked me not to apply again for any chaplain position for a year.”

I could not believe it. I was so stunned that I thought she had misunderstood. I had her read me the email she received. An unsuccessful application is always a possibility, but a one-year ban? What was that? Did a chaplain even look at her application? Who decided that her resume and experience were so unworthy that she was vetoed out for a year?

Alison told me she felt humiliated when she read this email. She did not say anything to her husband, who was in the same room and looking at his own lap top. She went upstairs and cried. “Worthless”. “That’s the word that kept flashing through my mind, she said. That I was worthless. That they had to get rid of me for a year because I was so bad.” 

She breathed in silence for a while. “Then I called you.” I was feeling bad for her. My guess is that I would have received the same email if I had applied myself.  “You must feel awful, I said. I feel awful too actually – and mad ! Where does this come from? I never heard of such a reply to an application.”

“I guess I need to know, said Alison with a sigh. Of course, I know in my mind that I am not worthless. I am not going to let anyone define me – especially anyone who does not even know me. I just don’t understand. Why would you want to humiliate applicants? I wonder if this comes from this test…"

Well, it came from this test, Alison found out. Human Resources had created this “assessment tool” a month before. About half of the chaplains who applied for the position failed the test – probably due to the same state of disbelief she was in. Their applications were then simply discarded and never sent to the manager of the hiring department. A one-year prohibition to apply was emailed to them.

“I heard there are talks in process to review ‘this assessment tool’ for the Pastoral care department, she said. Because it does not assess anything chaplains need… But that will be too late for me.”

Fortunately, this was not the end of the story. Another position opened up, and Alison was offered the possibility to appeal the ban. The appeal was received, and Alison has applied for the new position. Her new application is being processed. She allowed me to share her story – as long as I did not use her real name.

I thought I had seen lots of bizarre situations through my chaplaincy education. This one is definitely off the chart.