2023 LEC Prepares Attendees for the Future of Talent Assessment

The 2023 SIOP Leading Edge Consortium (LEC) brought together business professionals from various industries to network, learn, and exchange information in Philadelphia earlier this month.

Led by Consortium Chair Tracy Kantrowitz, the committee assembled a high-quality educational program, featuring nearly 30 experts with backgrounds in assessment practice and research. Attendees also had the opportunity to participate in workshops on validity and diversity outcomes of talent assessment programs, artificial intelligence (AI) assessments and bias audits, and behavioral leadership assessment.

“Assessment is one of the most dynamic areas in I-O practice today,” Kantrowitz said. “This year’s LEC was a sell-out event, which speaks to the interest, progress, and challenges that face this practice. The program committee and I wanted to reflect the significant activity that’s occurred in assessment over the past 5 years. We featured the latest practice and research areas that are most salient in today’s dynamic technological, legal, and business environments. I was thrilled to see this objective play out at the LEC. Attendee engagement was high, and it was great to witness the collaboration and interaction among attendees, who are the stewards of assessment in organizations today.”

In Philadelphia, thought leaders who have pushed assessment forward in the past 5 years shared contemporary research and guidance on how organizations can chart a course forward. They covered topics such as AI applications to assessment, fairness, and diversity in assessment; the latest research on assessment validity for job performance and its implications for practice; remote assessment opportunities and challenges; the role and impact of assessments in development; and a legal update on AI, automated decision tools, and affirmative action.

“The LEC has been my favorite professional conference for 17 years now because the sessions and speakers are consistently top notch,” said SIOP Member Ann Ortiz. “I also appreciate the smaller venue in which we all attend 1.5 days of the same content together—without the chaos of having to move between rooms and constantly having to make decisions about where to spend my time. Finally, we have great camaraderie with professionals from industry, consulting, and academics—all uniting work around focused topics."

Lyle Unger, professor of computer and information science, bioengineering, genomics and computational biology, operations, information, and decisions, and psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, made the opening keynote presentation, while Alexis Fink, vice president of people analytics and workforce strategy at Meta, made the closing keynote presentation.

“It's hard to overstate the impact of having top researchers and practitioners in our field come together,” said LEC Planning Committee Member Tony Boyce. “The conversations questioned 25 years of 'settled' science about the predictive superiority of cognitive ability, challenged aspects of the SIOP principles around assessing fairness, showed computers are (almost) as accurate as human judgments of warmth and other interpersonal skills, and highlighted over 10 separate government bodies and industry groups actively working to influence regulation of artificial intelligence in selection. Attendees told me the conversations sparked real ah-ha moments, causing them to question long-held assumptions and explore new approaches.”

Planning for the 2024 Leading Edge Consortium, which will look at leadership and coaching, is already underway. More details about the event will be shared in late spring/early summer.