Two studies were conducted to examine the tenability of Meehl’s (1986) “threat of technological unemployment” explanation for why practitioners of employee selection resist using standardized decision-making practices. The results of Study 1 support the existence of this threat by demonstrating that practitioners received less credit for the outcomes of employment decisions when structured rather than unstructured interviews were used to evaluate candidates and analytical rather than holistic data combination was used to determine candidates’ overall evaluations. The results of Study 2 support the influence of this threat on employee selection by demonstrating that practitioners recognized the effects using the standardized practices have on stakeholders’ perceptions of their causality/control over the hiring process, and that practitioners’ beliefs about stakeholders’ perceptions of their causality/control over the hiring process significantly influenced their intentions to use the employee selection practices via concerns about the perceived value of their employment (i.e., fear of technological unemployment)
