Wall Street Journal Says Some Employers May Increase Testing Following New Haven Firefighters Decision

In spite of the many advances made in the testing industry regarding fairness, many employers are still hesitant to use it during employment screening. A recent WSJ article says that some are encouraged by the recent Supreme Court ruling in the New Haven Firefighters case. We thought you'd like to know about this article on pre-employment testing.

Professional Certification for Hogan Personality Inventory

No one can predict the future performance of a new hire, but we have found that employers who use personality tests from Hogan Assessments take a lot of the guesswork out of their hiring. To assure best use of these tests, Hogan Assessment Systems requires certification for coaches and HR professionals prior to delivering test results to their clients and workgroups.

Next Sessions: September 24 and November 12, 2009

Performance Programs chose Hogan instruments over the many others available in the market because they meet all the criteria of excellence in workplace assessment, including rigorous scientific standards and no adverse impact. We have worked with Hogan instruments for 10 years, helping hundreds of clients implement them for both candidate selection and development.

We use all of the Hogan-authorized materials, workbooks, PowerPoint, assessments, information and complete all Hogan training objectives. The Hogan Workshops have pre-work modules and a self-assessment. Registration should be completed at least two weeks in advance. All Hogan workshops are pre-approved for credit by the SHRMS's Human Resource Certification Institute for SPHR, PHR, and GPHR certifications. APA credits are also available.

These one-day seminars are scheduled from 8:30 – 4:30 in Westbrook, CT at Water's Edge Resort. This is close to Rt. 95 and accessible by Amtrak or Shoreline East/MetroNorth trains. The workshop location is within one hour of either the Providence, RI or Hartford, CT airports.

All seminars are $1200, discounted from the full retail value of $ 2300. Certification includes: a personal assessment ($450 value), a copy of The Hogan Guide ($75 value), all Certification Materials ($300), two free assessment IDs for post-workshop use ($800 value), one hour of pre-conference telephone review of your own reports and one-half hour of post-conference telephone review of your first live case ($675 value). In addition, you receive access to the DYAD Training Tool for rapid report interpretation.

Please inquire about rates for additional telephone consultation beyond the first hour.

Please call if we can be of assistance: 1-800-565-4223 or register now.

Another Way to Identify High Potential Candidates

We keep hearing about the importance of talent identification and management. We thought our friends and customers would like to know about a new tool: the High Potential Candidate Assessment Report from Hogan Assessments.

The High Potential Candidate Assessment Report allows employers to identify top candidates in relation to specific business competencies. It is based on research from a global sample of more than a thousand executive MBA program graduates. This sample group represents one of the highest-level talent pools ever used to create a profile of high potential candidates for leadership roles. The assessment involves three instruments and provides a highly integrated view of the candidate's strengths and challenges.

Visit our site and obtain a sample report for more information.

Personality Test Predicts Safety Consciousness

The caller on the other end of the line was a long time acquaintance from the HR field. "How do I know if I’m hiring a safety-conscious trucker?” he asked. "Are there any tools out there help predict safety?"

Two things struck me about the call.

First, he was in luck--I was able to offer him a new personality-based safety report from Hogan Assessments that addresses this question.

But second, I noted that I’ve been asked the prediction question in recent months more than at any time in our 20+ years in the human resources assessment business. "How can I tell if the person really has leadership potential?” is a common variation. We also get questions such as these:

"How can I predict if she's going to boil over under stress?"

"How do I predict if he's suited to working in a team environment?"

"How do I know if she's too competitive? (or not competitive enough?)"

I am the last person to claim there is any air-tight method of answering these and the thousands of other selection questions we all face. I am impressed, however, by the results our customers are getting from personality-based evaluations by Hogan Assessments’ research instruments.

You'll probably want to know about the The Hogan Safety Report. This new report determines a job candidate's work style and overall safety orientation, helping employers assure a high-quality, safety-conscious workforce. The report has three sections:

Section I defines the dimensions of safety-related behaviors.

Section II provides a graphic report of the candidate’s assessment results.

Section III summarizes the candidate’s results and our recommendation regarding potential hiring.

Happy to talk with you about how this report can fit into your selection process.

Importance of Understanding Work Values during Career Transition

Values Assessment Different from Interest Inventories, Personality Tests

Recognition, power, tradition, security, fun, pleasing surroundings, money--these are the values that often make the difference between a job that someone can do and a job they really, really want to do. In the human resources assessment world, we often look at interest inventories and personality tests. But I feel there's a source of information that is mostly overlooked in placement settings--values. This is especially important in more experienced adults, such as the ones so many of our clients and consultants are encountering in a "career transition" setting during these turbulent days.

Values Assessment vs. Interest Inventories vs. Personality Tests

Measures of motives, values, and interests are somewhat different from personality measures.

Values and motives inventories tell us what a person wants to do, shining a light on their inner conversation about their wishes. To quote the technical manual for the Motives, Values, Preferences Inventory, published by Hogan Assessments, “Personality measures ask about a person’s typical response in various situations, but interest measures ask about a person’s preferred activities, roles, and associates." Values measures allow people to describe themselves as they would like to be.

Personality tests tell us what a person may do in certain situations and how their behavior is likely to appear to others. Personality reports describe such characteristics as sociability, inquisitiveness, confidence, ambition, interpersonal sensitivity, cautiousness, and curiosity.

Motives and values are more fundamental than interests. Your interests are likely to move over time, but they are always an expression of what you value. For example, you might have once enjoyed an extreme sport such as mountain biking (an interest). Over time you may have become bored with this activity, and turned your attention to rock climbing (another interest). The core values that tie both of these interests together, and which have not shifted, are love of physical activity, the freedom of the outdoors, and more than a hint of physical risk. Your interests have shifted; your motives and values have not.

This is why we're now emphasizing the Career Compass report from Hogan Assessments. It helps shine a light on the elusive and hard-to-articulate nature of work motivations. It is a comprehensive survey of the 10 key values found in every culture throughout history. The only commercially available measure of values that has been developed, validated, and normed for business contexts.

We now offer Career Compass along with an exclusive 20-page interpretive guide that helps you and your client take action on the report. Career Compass OnLine is only $49. It is based on the Motives, Values, Preferences Inventory (MVPI), a scientifically validated values inventory, developed and published by Hogan Assessments. MVPI is validated for individuals over 21.

Learn more...

Fast Track to Intepreting Personality Tests

Free of Charge for Certified Users of Hogan Assessments

We were recently pleased to get a new tool to help interpret Hogan Personality Inventory reports. Called the "Dyad" Training Tool, it allows you to pair scales (see below for example) in test results and click to a suggestion of what that pair might mean. For example:

Question: What do you get when you have high ambition and high adjustment in the same personality profile?

Answer: You are likely to find a person who is calm, poised, self-confident, and eager to be in charge.

The new tool will help people who are involved in large-scale hiring or training projects make quicker interpretations. It's also fun to use and helps build your knowledge of the how different personality characteristics interact with one another.

DYAD is written in PowerPoint and is available free of charge to individuals who have attended the Hogan Certifications Workshop. If you are certified, get your free copy by contacting us and putting DYAD Training Tool in the subject line. We'll send the PowerPoint file as an attachment.

Hogan Business Reasoning Inventory Updated

Most psychologists believe that cognitive ability is the best single predictor of occupational performance and other important developmental outcomes, including health, wealth, and life satisfaction. Most tests of cognitive ability, however, are designed for a general population or educational settings. The Hogan Business Reasoning Inventory(HBRI) is a cognitive ability measure designed for the workplace. The inventory draws on the distinction between tactical and strategic reasoning.

Originally published two years ago, the report has now been updated, based on user feedback, with a new format and guidelines for administration. The new report offers four categories of thinkers, based on their style of problem-solving. When used in a business setting, it must be administered in a "lightly proctored setting" on the employer's premises. Please let us know if you would like to know more about the HBRI. See a sample HBRI report . See an HBRI brochure.

Faking It: Can Job Applicants 'Outsmart' Personality Tests?

"Faking" is probably the biggest apprehension employers have about using personality tests during the hiring process. These concerns are well founded. Job applicants are motivated to "pass the test" and come closer to a job offer. To get the most from their investment in personality tests to screen job candidates, employers need to become skilled in test administration and interpretation.

Lynn McFarland, Ph.D., an assistant professor at Clemson University's industrial/organizational psychology program and president of Human Capital Solutions, Inc., studies the "faking" phenomenon. She works primarily with self-reported measures, such as personality tests and biodata. "Not just my research but the literature in general indicates that applicant groups score higher on 'social desirability' on tests than groups we can be fairly certain are responding honestly," she says. "Job incumbents or college students, for instance, have no consequence tied to the test. Therefore, it seems that at least some applicants do try to "fake" the test and are successful at doing so."

How Big a Problem?

Employers have forever had some clear preferences in personality traits of candidates: Total honesty is a no-brainer, closely followed by the ability to control one's own anger. Beyond this, conscientiousness, ability to work in teams and persistence are three top examples of universally desirable traits. Extraversion is also more attractive than introversion for many jobs, particularly when direct client contact is involved. But if the "right" answers are an open secret, is testing a valid tool in selection? To answer that, it's important to look at some of the subtleties that experienced testers come to know.

Take the following examples:

Case 1: Some faking is devious and intentional. Let's say an applicant for a retail position intends to shoplift. He or she does not want (lack of) integrity to come out during the hiring process. The applicant might try to "beat the test" by providing what he or she believes to be the "correct" answers.

Case 2: Some faking is motivated by a desire to look good “in front of the camera.” Consider the example of an applicant who seeks to please the employer with the "correct" answers so they can get past the test phase and get to second or third interviews. This person does not intend any harm. They may simply feel that testing doesn't show their real strengths and may exclude them from consideration for the wrong reasons.

Case 3: Some faking is based on an elevated self-evaluation. Some applicants’ self-awareness is very optimistic. He or she believes they have many socially desirable characteristics. Whether they really do or not is a question for the skilled interviewer to ascertain. Careful review of educational and work history might affirm the possibility that the optimism is well founded — or not.

For testing to be useful as an adjunct to interviewing and other hiring tools, each of the above situations need to be detectable by the employer.


How Tests Detect Faking


Most test publishers would not dispute that test profiles can be elevated or falsified. So they strive to overcome the problem.

“‘What’s the point? Anybody can fake them!' We hear people ask that question," says test designer Robert Hogan, Ph.D., president of Hogan Assessment Systems. He claims this can be overcome with the "faking profile" that his company's tests generate. "We're doing a whole personality profile," he says of his organization's tests. "They may be able to fake a whole scale (a single aspect of the measurement), but they won't fake a whole profile."

Clemson University's Dr. McFarland affirms that faking often is reported through special test scales: "I think the most common strategy to detect faking is to use what's called a social desirability scale, also called a lie scale. These scales ask the test-taker to indicate the extent to which a number of statements are true of them. The trick is that these statements refer to behaviors that are very common, but undesirable."

For instance, an example of such an item is "I have never been untruthful, even to save someone's feelings."

"A test-taker who denies many of these undesirable behaviors that are extremely common will receive a high socially desirable score," says McFarland. "The employer may use this to identify fakers." She has some doubts about the effectiveness of this strategy, however. For instance, some people may have unusually high scores on "social desirability" scales, but may simply be trying to please, may have poor reading skills, or may have overly optimistic beliefs about themselves.

Questionnaire wording is one of the primary tools in the battle to thwart would-be deceivers. People who give extreme answers to questions are often - but not always -overcompensating to hide their true intent than those who do not answer with the extreme choices.

Consider the shoplifter/retail applicant mentioned earlier in the article (Case 1) as he or she confronts this statement: "I have never known a person who shoplifts." The options provided to the test taker are: Strongly Agree, Somewhat Agree, Neutral, Somewhat Disagree, and Strongly Disagree. If the shoplifter is being honest, they would have to indicate "Strongly Disagree" because they themselves are shoplifters. The shoplifter might naively believe the socially desirable answer is "Strongly Agree." If he or she gives enough of these desirable answers, a "faking" report will be generated. But what if the shoplifter is experienced at beating tests? We'll consider that again a bit later.

In Case 2, the applicant sought to please the employer with the "correct" answers. They are motivated by a need to get past the test phase and get a job offer. On the shoplifter question above, they answer "Somewhat Agree" or "Neutral." This places them within the employer's expectations from an honest person.

Such a test-taker, however, can face some other difficulties. Consider this test item (with the same answering options as in the first example): "It is very important to me that my career interests do not outweigh my personal interests." Applicants like this one are not deliberately lying. They are simply reporting what they believe the employer wants to hear so they can get past the test. In some organization cultures or job descriptions, the person with strong career focus is definitely favored over the person who works at balancing the two. In other organization cultures or job descriptions, a very ambitious, career-focused person might be viewed as a poor fit. So what is the "correct" answer? Both extremes ("Strongly Agree" or "Strongly Disagree") can be socially desirable, depending on the context. This applicant might assume that no employer wants to hear that a personal life is as important as work life, and answer accordingly. In fact, this may not be the employer's desired answer. Too many such answers could generate a "faking report."

Our third example illustrates how some people have inflated or distorted self-awareness. These people haven't necessarily strayed from the truth - as they perceive it. For instance, effective sales people often have extraordinarily high adjustment or self-confidence scores on personality tests. Their answers might generate a warning flag, but that does not necessarily mean that they should be disqualified from further consideration-if they are being considered for sales.
McFarland, however, has serious reservations about the fairness of social desirability scales. "I advise employers to stop using social desirability scales until reasons for differences in social desirability scores across racial groups are better understood." She notes that current research shows differences in responses among racial groups, and the reasons for it are not yet understood. "More research needs to be conducted to determine what's going on here to ensure that personality tests are fair to all applicantts," she says.


Steps for Employers

What separates the experienced, effective user of tests from the ineffective? The dividing line is often defined by the test-givers ability to read the subtleties. It is also determined by following some preventive disciplines. First, employers must cover the basics. They must choose a test with proven reliability and validity. They must become knowledgeable about the test or tests, usually through the publisher's certification programs. If this is not possible for an organization staff member, then an outside consultant who is certified and experienced should be considered. Some other key measures include:

Consider the requirements of the job. Jobs have "personality requirements." For instance, the ability to work long hours without social interaction is far more "natural" to an introvert than an extrovert. Likewise, elevated confidence is often exactly what's called for in an effective salesperson. The personality requirements of the job description can be examined through job analysis. This can help you assess the real importance of elevated scores in terms of your requirements.

Monitor the process. Though it may be convenient to have applicants take on-line tests at home, this can invite outright cheating. For instance, the applicant could have someone else take the test. (They could also be recording the test questions for distribution to other applicants.) All tests should probably be taken with adequate monitoring.

Use two tests. Let's say you are hiring for a job where anger-proneness would immediately disqualify a candidate. Two tests may be advisable. The chances of someone successfully deceiving two tests are considerably slimmer than one. Hogan Assessments, for instance, offers companion tests-one that deals with the applicant's visible, positive personality characteristics -and a second test to look at the darker sides of workplace behavior, such as tendencies to lose one's temper, to become disruptive, or to be disrespectful of authority or coworkers.

Tell participants they will be discussing their answers at a later date. Dr. McFarland says this strategy shows some promise. It holds an applicant responsible for consistent answers at a later date. "Applicants can be told their answers will be discussed in an interview if they are selected to go on," says McFarland.

For those who pass the testing screen, conduct interviews that are at least partially based on the test results. Some test publishers provide interview recommendations with the test reports, which can save time. If someone has intentionally provided false or inflated answers, you may spot discomfort or hesitation during the interview.

Most applicants are not informed consumers of tests. If tests become more and more widely used, it is possible that some applicants will become experienced at beating the tests. For the time being, though, faking reports -- used with caution -- and other current strategies offer some assurance to employers. They must be aware that not all results that look like faking are actually untrue. Armed with these skills, you are ready to gain the advantages of pre-employment personality testing.

Dr. McFarland summarizes, "I would use personality tests to select applicants. They have been shown to be valid selection measures. However, I would not base selection decisions solely on such tests."

Author: Kathleen Groll Connolly writes on a variety of human resources topics and is a partner in Performance Programs, Inc., an organization specializing in human resources surveys and measurement. Click here to contact Performance Programs or call 1-800-565-4223.

Copyright 2007 Performance Programs, Inc.

New Hogan Hiring Report Shows Candidate's Job Fit

Trial Available: Three Free Reports Until August 31

The Candidate Potential Report Series (CPR) joins the report options for the Hogan Assessment Systems product line. This hiring recommendation report is designed for organizations assessing fewer than 80 job candidates per year across different job titles. CPR helps select the right candidates for jobs throughout an organization, providing an immediate rating of “high,” “medium” or “low” job fit based on Hogan's archive of job families*. CPR is based on seven job families that capture more than 95% of jobs in the economy.

The key benefit with CPR is that you do not need to conduct local validation through job analysis. CPR reports are valid and legally defensible. Performance Programs looks forward to offering this to our clients as one of the fastest ways yet to manage the risks of bad hires. CPR is part of Hogan’s Selection Series.

Free: Screen three candidates with Candidate Potential Reports before August 31, 2007. If you wish to continue using the reports, you will be billed a one-time fee of $400 to set up your account and $50 per report thereafter.

* Some examples of job types supported by these reports include Protective Services, Managing Others, Sales, Clerical/administrative, Care Giving, Research, Customer Service, and Design/Creativity. All Hogan tests have passed requirements of no adverse impact.

Can Personality Tests Cause You to Miss a Great Employee?

We were recently asked by a visitor to this blog: If you add personality assessments such as Hogan Personality Inventory to your hiring program, is it likely the assessment might lead you to miss a “great” employee or hire a disaster employee?


In our experience, no, that's not likely at all. That’s the attraction of testing. You reduce the likelihood of such extreme things happening.

With that said, no test is 100% accurate. It always possible that someone who could do a job could be missed, and someone who will fail at the job could be hired. The same is true with any selection procedure you might use. This is the primary reason that you must always use multiple selection methods when hiring. For example, one of the primary advantages of testing and assessment is that you can see very quickly where the candidate may have problems, and then interview to either confirm or deny that the problem area is real.

For more information, see our previous posts on this subject:
The Competency Connection
Job Candidate Personality Testing: What Can a Hiring Employer Expect?

They Can Sell But Can They Do Fundraising?

Last year I got involved with an interesting validation study, one that asked who is likely to succeed as a nonprofit fundraiser. The question came up when I met David Edell, an associate who had spent 13 years in fundraising and 16 years as a nonprofit search consultant with DRG Inc. in New York City. David had seen firsthand the difficulty nonprofits have in recruiting talented fundraisers. Fundraising seems on the surface like a job that should parallel commercial sales jobs. But in David’s extensive experience, skilled commercial salespeople don’t always make the transition successfully.

I chose the job personality tests published by Hogan Assessment Systems as the testing vehicles for our investigation. I prefer the Hogan instruments for their theoretical premises, rigorous mathematical foundations, and the fact that they don’t discriminate on age, race, or gender.

We approached the question much the same as we would have for any employer who wanted to validate the use of a pre-employment test. The difference was that we were validating a set of characteristics for a common job title within a business sector. We recruited twelve Subject Matter Experts (SMEs), all vice presidents of development, from major nonprofit organizations to create the study.

Our SMEs quickly informed us we needed to define two fundraising jobs in our investigation: Fundraising Generalist and Major Gifts Professionals. Different personality charactertistics and competencies, they felt, may be required to succeed in each of these job titles.

Fundraiser Generalists are responsible for working with volunteers and professionals to conduct special events to raise support from individual supporters and constituent groups.
Major Gift Professionals handle all aspects of marketing, management and administration of activities associated with major donor development.

We used the Hogan Job Environment Tool to evaluate the factors that would make a difference in successful performance of these two jobs. The JET has been shown in other research to provide the link between job demands and the kind of individual who can best perform a job.

Personality Characteristics

Current thinking in personality assessment says that most personality characteristics can be described in terms of five dimensions, referred to in the testing industry as “the Bigs”:
I. Extraversion – outgoing and talkative
II. Agreeableness – warm and pleasant
III. Conscientiousness – rule following
IV. Emotional Stability – calm and composed
V. Openness – creative and open-minded

These are measured on the Hogan instruments in seven scales. (Contact us for more information.) Results showed that that the most important personality characteristics for both Fundraiser Generalist and Major Gifts Professional candidates are associated with high social interaction, social sensitivity, goal achievement, stress tolerance, and vision. The personality profiles for both jobs are similar, although scale scores of Fundraiser Generalist on Adjustment, Ambition, Sociability, and Creative Problem Solving are slightly lower than those of Major Gifts Professional. Major Gift professionals score somewhat higher on Adjustment, Ambition, and Sociability.

For comparison purposes, we looked at a sample of salespeople in three commercial organizations. The corresponding scales for sales people are quite different. Successful commercial sales people have high ambition, self-confidence, and sociability. They have average to high scores for creative problem solving. They have average to low scores for conformity and conscientiousness. They are likely to be highly flexible in their approach to problem-solving.

Competencies

A competency is knowledge, skill, or ability necessary to accomplish a job requirement. We asked the SMEs to rate 62 competencies for both job titles and learned that the top 15 competencies desirable in a Fundraising Generalist differed from those needed by Major Gift Professionals. Tables 1 and 2 show the top five competencies for the two fundraising specialties.

Table 1
Fundraising Generalist

1. Interpersonal Skills
2. Trustworthiness
3. Integrity
4. Written Communication
5. Customer Service

Table 2
Major Gifts Professional
1. Customer Service
2. Achievement Orientation
3. Trustworthiness
4. Interpersonal Skills
5. Oral Communication



In summary, we learned that a personality test can be useful in filling these two fundraising positions. Testing would help a nonprofit organization identify the degree to which individuals possess the charactertistics and competencies needed to succeed in these two job titles.

David Edell and I founded a joint venture, NPEdge LLC, to offer these specialized assessments for nonprofit employers. NPEdge’s JobFit Assessment Profiles for Fundraisers and Major Gifts professionals are the first on-line assessment tools for executives who are responsible for hiring fundraisers. To learn more about David Edell, visit his web site: www.drgnyc.com. To learn more about our joint venture, visit www.jobsnonprofit.com. To learn more about Performance Programs, visit www.performanceprograms.com.

Job Candidate Personality Testing: What Can a Hiring Employer Expect?

If they are mathematically sound, legally defensible, and predictive of a person’s job performance—is it any surprise that personality tests are more and more a part of hiring? No one knows for sure how many employers use tests, but the number is growing, according to professionals in the field of psychological testing.
Pre-employment tests can cover several areas. Basic intelligence tests, skills tests, and multifaceted observations are all part of the suite. This article specifically discusses personality tests. These explore a person’s basic motivations, attitudes, and temperament.

If personality tests are in your hiring future, what can you reasonably expect? What shouldn’t you expect?

Select the Right Test

First, plan on learning something about testing. Tests are not all alike and there are many to choose from.

“The biggest misinformation we experience in the marketplace,” says Robert Hogan, Ph.D., a well-known test designer and psychometrician, “is that a test is a test is a test. There is very poor awareness of the differences in quality among tests.” Hogan is the author, together with Joyce Hogan, Ph.D., of four workplace personality tests. They run Hogan Assessment Systems in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

A quick look at the history of psychological testing provides a clue to the confusion. The only tests that you should consider for a hiring program are those that are mathematically reliable and valid. This is a rigorous process that can take a test designer a number of years and hundreds or thousands of measurements.

Yet this field is relatively unregulated, although is it also highly litigated. There are new tests coming into the market all the time. They may or may not have the research data that you should require. It is a case of “buyer beware.” Don’t be shy about requiring evidence of the research. A reputable testing company will have no problem producing it.

A second issue is that some tests are sold for the workplace but were designed for another purpose. Some of the oldest, best-known, and best-researched tests were developed to detect pathology in the general population. While they might be excellent predictors of tendencies towards violence or dishonesty, they are generally not predictors of a person’s “bright side”—the collection of visible personality characteristics that make normal people different from one another. The bright side also has to do with the ways in which personality predisposes a candidate to be a contributor.

Also, some personality tests have been designed with questions about a person’s religious beliefs and sexual practices, which run the risk of being viewed as discriminatory. You must be able to show that your use of testing is fair and does not adversely impact a protected group, in case an unhappy applicant challenges you. The surest method for meeting this requirement is a formal job analysis.

So, three questions you should ask before a test comes under serious consideration for hiring purposes are these:

1. Is it mathematically reliable and valid?
2. Was it designed specifically for use in the workplace?
3. Has it been fully tested by the test designer for possible adverse impact? In other words, does the test give the same results independent of one’s race, gender, ethnicity, or other background factor?

Make Tests Part of a Process

Tests are not a stand-alone event. The consensus of those we consulted is that tests have much potential for increasing the quality of hiring, assuming you make testing part of a well designed and well managed hiring process. And while you’re designing the hiring process, you’d best install a measurement system for your company’s employment experience as well.

David S. Miller is a principal with a consulting firm that has helped the management teams of utility companies. During the past five years, many had to reestablish themselves during deregulation and restructuring. His firm, Human Resources Strategies and Solutions, in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, has worked with numerous downsizing situations.

Consider the rigor of the hiring process they used. One utility had 145 candidates for 25 jobs available in engineering management. Miller and his team instituted a multifaceted process, of which testing was one part. First, they reviewed the candidates’ technical skills. Miller says of the initial cut, “Skills data narrowed it down to about 100. We needed to go farther. We were also recruiting from the outside, to increase the talent pool.”
So they required applicants to take an online personality test. “We needed to level the playing field,” says Miller. “Testing delivered that.”

Next, they used behavioral interviews based on the test results. Two-member teams conducted the interviews. One team member was always a highly experienced HR professional. “That was the tipping factor,” says Miller. “There is no substitute for that.”

Then they administered a critical thinking test to differentiate among candidates’ problem-solving capacities. By this stage, the most desirable candidates were becoming obvious and some executives were now competing with each other for those individuals. Therefore, no interviewing team was able to make a job offer without consulting with the rest of the group. “We tried to make decisions that were good for the whole, not just one of the parts,” says Miller. At this final stage, they also considered diversity issues—both of people’s backgrounds and their relative professional strengths.

He says that tests “knocked out the extremes,” meaning the people who were very clearly wrong for the jobs. He used both the Hogan Assessment Systems Personality Inventory and the Watson-Glaser test.

Measure the Results

Both Hogan and Miller mention that employers have to keep records of company employment experience—preferably before and after tests are introduced.

Assuming the test is well selected and correctly used, employers will be able to prove the value of testing to themselves. “If they (employers) keep records before and after they begin testing, they’ll see a decrease in negative business indicators—turnover, accidents, insubordination, drunkenness—and an increase in positive business indicators—lower turnover, fewer accidents, etc.,” says Bob Hogan.

Miller thinks measurements need to be developed as a part of the overall mission. “First, you’ve got to gain alignment around a vision,” he says. “Then develop key performance indicators as a part of that effort.”

Interviews and Resumes Still Matter

Can testing produce a clear thumbs-up/thumbs-down indicator? When the issue is basic honesty for a security guard or a retail worker, the answer is often yes. When the issue is which candidate to select among a similarly qualified pool of professionals, it is far from clear.

“We were interviewing a lot of engineers with MBAs,” recalls David Miller of the diligent management selection process he conducted for utilities. Testing, he says, “served a winnowing process. But it’s not necessarily going to help you make the final cut.” This problem is greater when the candidate pool is uniformly qualified. Says Miller, “When you boil people down to paper, they all begin to look alike.”

Some might say that the application of personality tests gets more complex in higher level hiring. Edward Hoffman, Ph.D., is the author of Psychological Testing at Work (McGraw-Hill, 2002). Hoffman is a psychologist based in Commack, New York. He thinks that pre-employment testing is most useful for entry-level positions. “For many kinds of entry-level positions, such as in sales, pre-employment personality tests are very useful in screening out potentially undesirable employees. Integrity testing, for example, has a very high success rate …. Personality tests in the hiring process that measure extroversion are quite useful, as are those that measure conscientiousness, anger-proneness, or low tolerance for stress.”

So how important are interviews and the resume? According to Hoffman, who has written extensively on psychological testing and has designed tests as well, “There is no single rule to apply as to how to weight various relevant factors in the hiring process. For certain types of jobs, standardized psychological tests, including personality tests, are probably more important than how the person comes across in the interview.” As pointed out earlier, these jobs are often entry-level. At higher levels, more experienced candidates are likely to be sought. Personality testing still has a role—but that role in the hiring process may be more subtle than a simple "pass" or "fail" rating.

He notes that the candidate’s relevant work experience is still the single most significant indicator of suitability for many positions.

So let’s say you want to use personality tests.

1. You’re prepared to select them carefully.
2. You’ve considered how to integrate them into your hiring process
3. You’re prepared to measure the outcome.

Many employers still have a big question: Can job applicants “fake” their personalities on a personality test? How foolproof are the tests?

For more information on the topic of faking, visit "Faking It" and "Can Personality Tests Be Fooled?"