Dear member,
Conducting recruitment tests related to the job is a good hiring practice. Nevertheless, if the candidates get filtered out in the recruitment tests then it shows that the candidates were not worthy. Your concern is that administering the recruitment tests is a time-consuming activity. If the candidate fails then it wastes your as well as recruitment agency's time.
Against this backdrop the following questions arise is what kind of these tests are? Are these aptitude tests or tests related to the work? If latter then nothing wrong if the candidates are filtered out. It is common practice in each industry.
While academic score may not show candidate's real talent, can the recruitment tests be related to any academic subject? If yes, then you may fix a level of minimum marks scored in that subject. It could be ≥ 65% or even more
If the candidates' are failing in aptitude tests, then fix the minimum academic score for graduation at ≥ 65%
I have seen in the recruitment of the IT companies engineering candidates' failing in the aptitude tests. But then it is common. Out of 10 barely one candidates reaches to the level. Possibly in this method the recruitment may become costly but then cost of wrong hire is far greater than the cost of the unit recruitment.
Thanks,
Dinesh Divekar