I've seen many companies using certification services such as Brainbench when evaluating candidates. Most times they use it as a secondary screen prior to interview or as a validation to choose between candidates.

What is your experience with Brainbench scores? Did you try the tests yourself, and if so do you feel the score is meaningful enough to be used as part of a hiring process?

Difficult choice.

Consensus seems to be that BB cert are not very good as a certification. The biggest argument was around the fact that some of the questions are too precise to form a good evaluation. this view can probably be tempered somewhat but still, to hold someone's future solely on the results of this evaluation would be irresponsible.

That said, I still think it is possible to use them properly to gain additional objective knowledge on a candidate's level of expertise provided the test is done in a controlled environment ensuring that all taking it stand on equal footing.

Thus I went with the answer that best reflected this view keeping in mind that it is still just an hour long 50ish multiple choice question to evaluate skills and knowledge that take years to acquire. To be taken with a grain of salt !

In short, The tests have value but weather or not they are worth the money is another debate.

Thanks all for your time.