Job candidate - best spelling/grammar tests

[Admiral Beez]

In my role I am responsible for hiring for marketing and sales positions. One of the requirements for marketing roles is very good spelling and grammar. We may think in this age of spellcheck that this is a superfluous requirement, but I have seen some terrible errors in accuracy on marketing materials, where the chosen word may be in the dictionary, but is incorrectly used. Three recent examples are "formally" used instead of "formerly", "stationery" in place of "stationary" and worst of all, "sow" instead of "sew".

The British University of Kent has an online spelling/grammar tool https://www.kent.ac.uk/careers/tests/spelling.htm. I think something similar but with Canadian spelling would suffice.

I'd welcome any info from recent job seekers on how their spelling and grammar skills were tested. Thanks.

BTW, I am not going to argue the merits of verifying spelling/grammar abilities as an essential part of the hiring process. If you're a poor speller I'm sure you'll find a job elsewhere, perhaps the Toronto Star, where editors seem to have been removed.

EDIT - typo fixed. Oh the irony....

 

[Johnny Au]

Beez, it would also be good to detect "its" vs. "it's," "lose" vs. "loose," "then" vs. "than," and "they're" vs. "their" vs. "there." I see those as very common errors made by native English speakers as well.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Beez, it would also be good to detect "its" vs. "it's," "lose" vs. "loose," "then" vs. "than," and "they're" vs. "their" vs. "there." I see those as very common errors made by native English speakers as well.

Good choices, and some of the worst offences I see. Don't get me started on who and whoever instead of whom and whomever.

I do have a reliable speller and grammarian in my office that I ask to go over all resumes and cover letters. Her instructions are to toss out any with any obvious spelling or grammar errors.

 

[Tuscani01]

Ask for samples of their writing? And if you can find their accounts on social media, go through some of their posts to see if they make those mistakes in everyday conversation.

There grammer and speling should definiteley stand out on theyre social media accounts.

 

[Filip]

I automatically discard someone who says supposebly. I also love when someone writes 'I defiantly agree' instead of definitely. You are certainly defiant!

There's a girl in the office who always writes I conquer instead of I concur. It drives me nuts.

 

[Admiral Beez]

There's a girl in the office who always writes I conquer instead of I concur.

Perhaps she's a Terminator droid just giving an unintended warning.

 

[Admiral Beez]

I automatically discard someone who says supposebly.

One my biggest peeves is people applying the made-up word pronounciation instead of the correct pronunciation.

 

[Filip]

Perhaps she's a Terminator droid just giving an unintended warning.

Bless her she's trying to look smart, but it's really backfiring when you're putting that in an email being shared across the organization... SMH.

 

[TOareaFan]

If a resume refers to "organizing the 1st annual"...anything no one gets a call back.

In the interview, if the word literally gets used...it has to be, literally, used correctly.

 

[James]

A big tell for me is simply how they write their e-mail to you. How they address you and how they sign off. Proper sentence structure and basic paragraphing is also very important.

When I get an email within a business capacity and we aren't fully acquainted, it better be written like a letter and not a tweet or text message.

 

[Johnny Au]

I see this "alot"

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.ca/2010/04/alot-is-better-than-you-at-everything.html

 

[Armour]

Don't forget classic writing mistakes based on lazy phonetics (eg. "could of" instead of "could have").

 

[Filip]

A big tell for me is simply how they write their e-mail to you. How they address you and how they sign off. Proper sentence structure and basic paragraphing is also very important.

When I get an email within a business capacity and we aren't fully acquainted, it better be written like a letter and not a tweet or text message.

My best friend's dad texts him formal emails. It makes me laugh each time.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Don't forget classic writing mistakes based on lazy phonetics (eg. "could of" instead of "could have").

Ah, my eyes are burning.

Oar is that, my aye's our bearning

 

[Johnny Au]

There are also those greengrocers' apostrophes as well. These are apostrophes used to mark pluralization rather than the genitive case.