I'm not a line pilot, but I am an HR consultant.
Were I to be advising a client about investing a considerable amount of money in training a new employee in skills based on an existing competency (i.e. a type rating for an ATPL), I would certainly advise that that existing competency was assessed very carefully at a peer level (e.g. by TRI/TRE or whatever they are called these days) before the hire decision was taken. (BTW, competency includes attitudes as well as skills, so the assessor may also see a cultural non-fit under a little sress.)
Just a slight bit of divergence here but..a question directed for you 3 greens
Why is it that there is a plethora of airline "HR" consultants that seem to delight in making candidates endure various psychometric tests as well as further numerical and linguistic gymnastics to enable them to be assessed as "suitable"
Where I currently work, these kind of aptitude tests are viewed on with derisiveness and suspicion as the companies experience has been overwhelming indifference... i.e. they have made little or no difference to identifying suitable and experienced candidates...as an aside ostensibly we operate a similar recruitment program to VS.
Is there a pay off for this kind of testing? or is it as I suspect, a less expensive way of weeding out those who the company may have difficulty rejecting on other grounds.. i.e. the candidate is a twit