Psychometric Tests

Guide to Psychometric Tests

Psychometric tests are the standard and logical method used to measure the behavioral capacity and mental capabilities of people. These assessments are primarily intended to gauge whether the person is suitable for a particular role based on two core skills – personality and ability. They are used to measure unseen skills which cannot be accurately evaluated during a face-to-face interview. They are actually the complementary weapon which is used to select people for hiring and training. Using these tests for hiring any person will be effective and aid in better and precise decision making.

James Cattell was the pioneer of the psychometric test. The first term that was labelled to psychometric test was mental test because the first psychometric test was on intelligence. Psychometric assessment is a way to measure the mental capabilities, personality, and behaviour of an individual.  There are different types of psychometric assessment, but they are broadly divided into two categories that is, assessment of typical performance and assessment of maximum performance. Assessment of typical performance will measure that one tends to adopt in different situations. This will help in picturing the behavioural style, preferences and the choices one might take. The behavior of the person is all about the way he/she looks at things or the way he/she approaches things.

These tests follow the 5-personality model which is the Ocean model of Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. In organizations when we want to understand the candidate’s behavior whether they would perform well in a team or strive for better or not be able to cope with criticism, personality assessment is the way out. These tests are the ones which assess the behavior, motivators and thoughts of a person.

On the other hand, assessments of maximum performance will determine the best one can do under restrictive conditions. For example, aptitude tests, ability tests are assessment of maximum performance because they determine an individual’s capability under restrictive conditions. This a way to check how an individual will work under pressure. The aptitude and ability tests measure the cognitive capacity of a person. In these tests, each question has one right answer and people need to solve them in a time frame. These tests measure the fluid intelligence of a person which defines the ability to think, reason and solve issues. These tests also measure how people learn from past experiences and apply those to a given situation.

Psychometrics can play a pivotal role in broad-based talent development. Companies want to hire employees who have the right skill and attitude. They want employees to fit in with the job role and work efficiently. It will be very valuable for the companies to hire people who can work effectively and productively and help organizations to grow more. There are psychometric tools which can accurately assess the personality and skills of employees. Tests like the Workplace Big Five Profile help in understanding the personality of potential candidates and help in making decisions during recruitment. Organizational Culture Inventory (OCI) can be used to measure organizational culture preference.

Ability Test Style and Format

Psychometric tests help in assessing the personality, attitude, skill, etc of the individual. They are basically a series of questions which are timed and are often numerical, verbal, logical in nature. Most of the organizations use these psychometric tests to recruit candidates because these tests give a clearer picture of the skill set. This will help the employer to understand the potential of the candidate and make an informed decision about whether to hire him/her.

Ability Test

Ability test assesses what can an individual do i.e., test his/her ability on various domains.  It incorporates a lot of different tests like numerical reasoning test, verbal reasoning tests, logical reasoning tests, mechanical reasoning tests, critical thinking test, etc.

• Numerical Reasoning Test – The objective of this test is to assess the candidate’s ability to understand, interpret, and manipulate numbers. The test questions are in form of numbers or numerical information which are represented either in the form of graphs, charts, tables, etc. Candidates usually have to understand the pattern and interpret the meaning out of it and then select the answer. These tests are generally used when an organization has to hire accountants, analysts, etc.
• Verbal Reasoning Test – The objective of this test is to assess the candidate’s ability to understand and interpret verbal/written material. This will majorly analyse whether the candidate can interpret a passage, assess whether statements from the passage are true or false, etc.
• Logical Reasoning Test – The objective of this test is to assess the candidate’s ability to understand different patterns, trends, etc. Also, interpret the meaning from the abstract information. This kind of tests usually have patterns, designs, a sequence of images, series, etc. These tests are usually, used when the organization wants to hire someone who has to solve problems effectively, understand how different patterns and elements are interrelated, how to manage new situations. These tests are used for the people who have applied for the leadership and managerial positions.
• Mechanical Reasoning Test – The objective of this test is to assess the candidate’s technical or mechanical ability. It mainly assesses whether the candidate is able to understand how things work mechanically. This kind of tests usually have questions related to pulleys, gears, conveyor belt, weights, etc. This test is used when an organization wants to hire an engineer.
• Critical Thinking Tests – The objective of the test is to assess the candidate’s ability to think critically and interpret the information. It focuses on analyses, reasoning, and interpretation. This kind of test usually has arguments, assumptions. Candidate has to identify the assumptions, infer meaning and generate information. This test is usually taken by the people who have applied for the managerial position, analysts, lawyers, statisticians, etc

Psychometric test vs Personality test

A psychometric test is a tool to scientifically and objectively evaluate an individual’s abilities, aptitudes and reasoning skills. A psychometric test can have multiple purposes, one of them being the measurement of personality. Personality tests on the other hand, evaluate an individual’s personality traits, their behavioral tendencies, how they act and react in situations, how they handle pressure and stress and whether they work well on their own or in teams. Both tests can be used to evaluate professionals, their strengths and weaknesses to enable them to perform more effectively in the workplace. It can be used during selection, training evaluation, career mapping and so on.

A psychometric test does not require preparation since it measures the innate facets of people. Some people may answer questions in a way they seem more socially desirable, hence the social desirability score indicates whether the individual has answered honestly or in ways that make them look more appealing. If one wants to benefit from the results and constructive feedback from any psychometric test, they need to be as honest as possible while taking the test. Psychometric tests come in various forms, from questionnaires that have objective or descriptive answers to situational questions that assess the subjective experience. Reasoning tests, language proficiency tests, and other technical or cognitive abilities are commonly used by organizations during selection and training processes.

A personality test focuses on the personality of the individual being tested and their social interactions. It is largely useful in the organizational context since it distinguishes whether a person has the potential to be a leader and whether they are a team player or someone who thrives on their own. It also gives a definitive picture of how a person will react in certain situations and of their social skills. Some people are better suited to handling high pressure situations than others, personality tests give an insight into whether a person can handle high levels of stress or whether they will thrive better in a job that presents less stressful situations. DISC Assessments and the Big Five profile are personality tests that are widely being used in organizations. This helps map the workings styles of professionals, improve teamwork and identify development areas.

Psychometric tests, including personality tests, must be reliable and valid. This means that they must be proven to give stable results in a variety of situations involving the same individual and measure what they set out to measure. Once these two factors are present, they can be used for multiple purposes like selection, training, career mapping organization development and so on. Usually, the executive level employees are subject to psychometric test that are not personality tests since they mainly measure the abilities and skills whereas leaders are subject to personality tests since soft skills and personality play a larger role in the performance of their roles and responsibilities. Organizations are increasingly investing in psychometric tests including personality tests as they have been proven to measure the factors that directly influence the performance of professionals.

Cognitive Psychometric Assessment

Cognitive psychometric assessments have become an important part of many organizations’ hiring process. They are a type of psychometric assessment designed to measure intelligence through logic, reasoning and problem-solving exercises. Cognitive psychometric assessments began to be developed in the later 19^th century as a way to measure general mental ability of individuals. Earlier these assessments were highly inaccurate, leading to psychologists developing a standard method of qualitative scoring for intelligence and comparing assessment results.

In the year 1904, psychologist Charles Spearman recognized that individuals who show the ability to complete one task, such as identifying patterns are highly likely to perform well in other tasks like solving arithmetic problems.  Spearman gave the theory that individuals who possess general mental ability are intelligent. Thus, the concept of an assessment which assesses cognitive ability came to the picture.

After the ground-breaking research and work by Spearman and Stern, cognitive psychometric assessments have become an obvious recruitment tool for many organizations across the globe, from military hiring to sales and every job in between.

A traditional cognitive psychometric assessment includes the following types of questions in their questionnaire:

• Numerical Reasoning: These are type of questions which assesses an individual’s ability to understand, analyse and apply numerical and statistical data. Example for this can questions asking to calculate percentages, completing the series, etc
• Verbal Reasoning: These are type of questions which test an individual’s ability to understand written texts and information and use critical thinking. Example for this can be questions asking to read the passage and answer the questions relating to it.
• Abstract Reasoning: These are type of questions which assesses an individual’s ability to think out of the box like abstract ideas or concepts. Example for this can be questions asking for visual diagrams, which are used to identify missing information or complete a sequence
• Spatial Awareness: These are type of questions which assess an individual’s ability to work with patterns and shapes. Example for this can be questions asking for rearranging shapes to new ones or rearranging visual patterns.

Most of these assessments are done using electronic devices like computers or laptops. Typically, the questionnaire for this type of assessment is made up of multiple-choice questions at different difficulty level. It also comes with a time limit for completion – some ask to complete all the questions within that timeframe and others ask to complete as many as possible within a timeframe.

Many psychologists recommend cognitive psychometric assessments as an excellent tool to be used for hiring processes as these assessments measure the following:

• Ability to comprehend the concepts
• Application of abstract thinking
• Problem-solving skills
• Ability to plan and organize
• Ability to learn quickly from past
• Ability to flex in an unknow situation
• Ability to apply new knowledge

Scoring higher grade in cognition ability demonstrates that a candidate is flexible to the new environment, makes informed decisions, has a ready-to-learn attitude which are the basic skills to excel in a new job. Candidates with higher scores tends to be more efficient and productive than the ones who scored less.

All in all, cognitive psychometric assessments are a fantastic tool to be plugged in one recruitment process, you can reach out to Strengthscape to get access to these cognitive psychometric assessments.

Online Psychometric Tests

What is Psychometric Test? Psychometric tests are the standard and logical method used to measure the behavioral capacity and mental capabilities of people. These assessments are primarily intended to gauge whether the person is suitable for a particular role based on two core skills personality and ability. They are used to measure the unseen skills which cannot be accurately evaluated during a face to face interview. They are actually the complementary weapon which is used to select people for hiring and training. Using these tests for hiring any person will be effective and aid in better and precise decision making.

Psychometric tests can be conducted online to assess different aspects. Reports will be automatically generated based on the responses selected by the test-taker. Online psychometric tests save a lot of manual work, can be released to wide audience without any geographical boundaries. This method is faster, efficient, and cost-effective. Nowadays, there are a lot of online tests available for various aspects like leadership, personality, stress, etc.

Types of Psychometric Test

They are an amalgamation of 2 basic categories. The first one is aptitude and ability tests and the other one is personality and aptitude test.

1. The aptitude and ability tests: Measure the cognitive capacity of a person. In these tests, each question has one right answer and people need to solve them in a time frame. These tests measure the fluid intelligence of a person which defines the ability to think, reason and solve issues. These tests also measure how people learn from past experiences and apply to a given situation.
2. The personality and aptitude tests: The behavior of the person is all about the way he/she looks at things or the way he/she approaches things. These tests follow the 5-personality model which is the Ocean model of Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. In organizations when we want to understand the candidate’s behavior whether they would perform well in a team or strive for better or not be able to cope with criticism, personality assessment is the way out. These tests are the ones which assess the behavior, motivators and thoughts of a person.

Application of Psychometrics

Psychometric assessment can be an asset to the organization in many ways. Employers can use these tests in the process of recruitment. This will help the employers to hire the candidate who can be the great fit for the organization and probability of turnover would be reduced. These tests will be used in training and development also. During training need analysis these tests can be used to find the performance or skill gap and hence help in getting a clear picture of the skill level of the employees. That information will help in training because the level of training will be based on the scores of employees on varied skills. Psychometric tests also help in finding the level of job satisfaction. Based on that, organization can work on its employee engagement and can ensure that employees are engaged and satisfied in the organization.

Customizable psychometric tests

Psychometric tests are a set of problems or questions that will test an individual’s cognitive skills and abilities. Customizable psychometric tests allow organizations to measure the specific competencies that they require rather than the generic set of skills and competencies measured by psychometric tests.

Resumes, CVs and interviews are made to allow job candidates to showcase their skills and market themselves in a positive light. Employers are aware that the candidate’s view of themselves is biased and is in their own favor. They know that people will sometimes claim to be good at things when they are not or even claim to have skills that they do not possess. For instance, everyone knows that skills like teamwork and interpersonal skills are very important at the workplace and will answer accordingly. This is where psychometric tests can help corroborate these claims and help employers pick the right candidates.

Some organizations may have a specific set of skills and competencies that they want to measure, and this can be done using customizable psychometric tests. Although lower-level jobs may not require customization, since they are mostly related to aptitude tests, higher-level positions will often require some customizations in these kinds of organizations. The tests are customized to test skill in certain areas or fields that relate to the job position and cater to the specific needs that the organization has.

Customizable psychometric tests can cater to organizations in the forms of hiring assessments, training-based assessments, career planning assessments and learning and development tests. Many vendors offer customizable psychometric tests to see whether the organizations can be involved in the creation of the tests. They can combine aptitude, attitude and personality tests on a single test under different modules so that they get the requirements for the generic behaviors that are expected in their workplace, the skills the candidates need to have and their personality types for certain teams or positions. For example, a sales-based organization will need every employee to have communication skills, influencing skills and negotiation skills. Although the proficiency in these skills can be varied, all sales executives and managers need to possess these skills.

Customizable psychometric tests are often used in personality testing and behavioral profiling for leadership roles in larger organizations. Behavioral profiling is the method using which organizations identify behavioral traits of employees to suit the organization culture and the specific job role.

The process usually includes the following steps

• The organization culture is defined
• The vision, mission and values of the organization are incorporated
• Job roles are assessed
• Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) will recommend personality traits that a potential candidate needs to possess.
• The test reports will have detailed and customized information that will help the organization with their hiring decision

Customizable psychometric assessments not only help organizations select candidates, map training and development programs and plan a career map for their employees, according to the requirements of their organizational culture, but can also help brand value and save them time and money in the long run.

How to answer psychometric assessment

Psychometric Assessments are the standard and logical tools that are used to measure the behavioral capacity and mental capabilities of people. These tests are usually used to see how well a person fits a job profile based on two factors, their abilities and their personality. These factors cannot be measured in face-to-face interviews. The aptitude tests measure a person’s numerical, verbal and reasoning abilities whereas the personality tests assess the behaviors, thoughts and motivating factors of a person.

Aptitude tests measure the person’s cognitive ability and each job role requires a different set of abilities and has a defined baseline ability that is required to perform the job effectively. These types of tests have definitive right and wrong answers. Some of these even measure the speed at which an individual can apply their cognitive abilities. Here the correctness of the answer as well as the speed are taken into consideration and a baseline that is required for the job is mapped. Aptitude tests are primarily of two types:

• Speed – Some aptitude tests will be focused on speed with a timer that makes it almost impossible to complete all the questions on time.
• Complexity – Some aptitude tests will focus on complexity and will have a lot more complex questions that quite a few cannot solve given enough time.

Organizations that recruit for high potential individuals will often combine speed and complexity in order to raise the standard of successfully getting through the recruitment process and joining the organization. In order to prepare for aptitude tests, an individual can start practicing aptitude tests from a variety of sources to focus on getting the right answers and slowly progress into working at speed. This practice requires time, effort and patience if there is to be a noticeable improvement since aptitude is innate and although it can be improved, a lot depends on the individuals’ default ability.

Personality tests measure characteristics such as personality traits and behavior. This can be used to indicate a person’s behavior and working style in the organization, and to ascertain whether their personality matches the requirements of the job role they are applying for. It is commonly suggested to answer questions on interpersonal behaviors and teamwork in way that makes an individual seem outgoing and team oriented but reliable psychometric tests have a social desirability score that measures how much the individual is inclined to give answers to get impressive results. When the social desirability is high, the scores are rejected, and this may be a bad start to the recruitment process. It is best to answer honestly about behaviors and preferences since personality tests for the workplace are never intended to vilify anyone.

Usually, psychometric assessments that organizations use for the process of selection or training are a mix of both these assessments. Earlier, there was a divide between the kind of psychometric assessments used for executives and those used for leadership roles. Executives were administered ability tests exclusively. Those in leadership roles were administered higher level ability tests along intensive personality tests. These days the trend for executives is changing. A few organizations have started administering personality tests for executives as well, especially during the process of selection. This allows the organization to check the “culture fit” of the individual with the organization and its goals.

Importance of Psychometric Tests

Nowadays, a lot of organization are inclined towards using psychometric tests for the recruitment process. These tests are extremely useful for employers because these tests will enable them to assess the attitude, intelligence, skill, personality, etc of the potential candidates. It gives valuable insights about the potential candidates on various things and helps to make an informed decision on whether to recruit or not. Psychometric tests also help employers to understand the emotional and mental strength of the candidates.

The results generated from the tests help employers to understand the work capacity, capacity to adjust in the new environment, and the capacity to cope with stress and pressure of the candidates. Psychometric tests can be conducted both online and offline.

• Psychometric tests save a lot of time and money of employers in the recruitment process. Using psychometric tests will act as a filter where candidates who have crossed the benchmark set by the organization will move to the next level of the recruitment process. As results are generated automatically, it will be easier for the employer to filter.
• Psychometric tests show a clear and accurate picture of candidate’s skills and attitude. As resumes don’t show the actual skill set of candidates and even in personal interviews, there is a tendency that candidates might fake about their skills. Therefore, the psychometric tests will help the employer to understand the real abilities of the candidates and make decisions appropriately.
• Incorporating psychometric tests in the recruitment process makes it a fair play for everyone. Each candidate will get an equal opportunity to showcase his/her potential. Candidates will not be filtered based on scores secured in school.
• Psychometric tests make the recruitment process more valid because tests help in getting the exact information about the candidates regarding their skill and attitude which interviews might not be able to do. Psychometric test will act as a filter and will help the employer to choose candidates which are above the threshold level set by the organization.
• Psychometric tests also help in hiring the people for the right job profile. Not every job profile requires the same skill set. Tests will help in channelizing the people and will allot them profile which are based on the skill set they come with. If person has possessed a certain skillset, psychometric test will help in figuring out that to which domain a person can belong to. It can be sales, marketing, etc.
• Psychometric tests also help in giving a clear picture of motivational level, stress level, etc of the candidates. Organizations can understand what motivates candidates and how much stress a particular candidate can handle. Based on the scores, employers can select candidates which can be the right fit for the company.

Incorporating psychometric test to hire people is a great strategy. Moreover, knowing about candidate’s scores on various skills will also help in the learning and development. Organization will get to know about the potential of candidates and train them accordingly. As the organization know what skill level it wants for the candidates, the level of training can be provided accordingly.

Psychometric Tests for Supervisors

Supervisors play a very important role in any organization. They help the employees to achieve the targets efficiently. They support them so that they can complete the task within the deadline and they will learn also. Supervisors also solve the problems that employees are facing, hence ensuring that workflows smoothly without much hindrance. It is very important to hire the right supervisor. To assess whether an individual can be the right fit for the position of supervisor, psychometric tests play a significant role. Psychometric tests which assess problem-solving, critical thinking, verbal reasoning, etc can help in finding the right supervisor for the organization.

1. Ability to supervise – It is very important for supervisors to understand the skill set of employees, their strengths and weaknesses. Based on that, tasks will be allotted so that employees can work efficiently and achieve the targets. Supervisors should also be able to solve conflicts. Conflict management is another skill which is required for the supervisors, so that people can work well under him/her.
2. Delegation-  The ability to delegate tasks to employee so that work can be done on time and with good quality. This is a very crucial because being a supervisor is not only about helping the employees to achieve the targets but also about giving them the right tasks at the right time. Then only things can be done efficiently. Being a good delegator is a skill which is required at today’s workplace. Psychometric tests can assess who effectively an individual can prioritize and delegate the tasks, so that they can achieved within the time with a good quality.

3. Critical Thinking Tests – The objective of the test is to assess the candidate’s ability to think critically and interpret the information. It focuses on analyses, reasoning, and interpretation. This kind of test usually has arguments, assumptions. Candidate has to identify the assumptions, infer meaning and generate information. Supervisors should have the ability to think clearly so that he/she can direct the employees with correct information and help them to achieve the target.
4. Interpersonal communication – Communication is the most essential skill which required at the workplace. The ability to communicate or to deliver message effectively to others is highly required. It is of prime importance for supervisors because they have to supervise the employees and to do that effectively, supervisors should communicate clearly. When the thoughts are delivered in the clear manner, employees will get motivated to work and achieve the targets.

Other factors that can be measured for the position of supervisors are attention to detail which means the ability to demonstrate thoroughness and accuracy in completing any task. Abstract reasoning is another crucial factor which means the ability to analyze information, figure out the patterns, solve intangible problems and perform well in a new situation. All these factors are important and to be measured appropriately before hiring someone for the position of supervisors. This will help the organization to hire the right candidate and will reduce the turnover also. Hiring the right candidate with the help of psychometric tests has always been helpful for the organization.

Psychometric Test for Management Position

Managers play a very crucial role in any organization. They have to handle multiple tasks efficiently. Their performance impacts the overall productivity of the organization. It is very crucial to hire a manager who can increase the productivity of the company and manages the team well. In order to understand the skills of a candidate who has applied for managerial position, he/she should take psychometric test to get a clear picture of what he/she has to offer to the organization. Psychometric tests will also help in taking an informed decision about assigning someone a managerial position. Tests like personality tests, abstract reasoning test, verbal reasoning test, numerical reasoning test etc.  help in analysing the skill set of the potential candidate for managerial position.

Generally, managers should have good numerical reasoning, good verbal skills (communication skills), good leadership skills to understand and simplify complex situations etc.  The above-mentioned psychometric tests will help in analyzing those aspects of the candidate. All these are ability tests which asses what can an individual do i.e. test his/her ability on various domains.

1. Cognitive skills: It is the ability to learn, reason, and evaluate things effectively. This is one of the essential skills because people at management position have to handle situations with logic and discretion. When an individual is able to reason and evaluate the situation well, then only he/she can take accurate decisions and lead to the growth of the organization.
2. Leadership skill: A manager has to lead his/her team in order to achieve the goals. The manager should be able to inspire and motivate his/her team members so that they can complete their work without facing many problems. Psychometric tests which assess the leadership skills should be used to assess the potential candidates for the management position.
    
3. Abstract Reasoning: It is the ability to understand and analyze information and situation, detect relationships, and solve problems which are complex in nature. It is very important for a manager to understand situations which are complex in nature because business is a dynamic world and each day is a new challenge. Psychometric tests which assess abstract reasoning should be used before hiring a potential candidate for the managerial position. The abstract reasoning test usually has different patterns where the test-taker has to understand the patterns, understand the relationship, and figure out the next pattern in the series.
    
4. Problem Solving: It is one of the most crucial skills for the people who want to apply for managerial position. Being a good problem solver is required because while doing business or managing situations, one will come across multiple problems. In order, to complete work efficiently it is important to solve problems. Psychometric tests which assess problem solving skills should be used before hiring a candidate for managerial position.
5. Performance Management: The process of ensuring that the outputs of the team meet the goals of the organization effectively. This is important because it helps in maintaining the performance of the department and ultimately of the organization. This skill is important for the managers because it is their responsibility to ensure that team is achieving the targets and hence improving organization’s effectiveness.

There can be other psychometric test which can be used to assess the skills of the potential candidate for managerial position.

Assessing People in Management using Psychometric Test

People management is one of the most difficult parts of any managerial and leadership role. We could only wish that people or employees came with an operating manual so that we could manage them more effectively. Due to the differences and complexity amongst people, every operating manual would have been completely different. There would, then be, hundreds and thousands of operating manuals available, one unique to each person. Even then, things would probably have been much simpler.

Unfortunately, there is no such operating manual and people are of course, not robots. Therefore, managers must learn the key skills of people management so that they can keep them motivated, develop them and drive their performance. People management is one of the key differences between an Individual Contributor and a People Manager. It is also one of the most critical competencies. At the end, as the saying by Marcus Buckingham goes, “People leave managers, not companies”.

With that context, assessing managerial potential and people management skills is most important and that is where, psychometric test for managers become important. Most organizations focus on developing their managers as they are responsible for recruiting, retaining and inspiring the assets of the organization. Here are the most important people management competencies that one should aim to assess in managers.

List of People Management Competencies

1. Affiliation: Managers must be approachable so that doubts can be clarified on time and productivity doesn’t decrease. Affiliation means being warm and amicable instead of being distant and solitary.
2. Trust: Building trust in the team is most crucial. Especially, if the trust is vulnerability-based trust where each team member can be their true self. To build trust within the team, managers must also trust others easily. Withholding tasks and completing them on their own is a sign that managers do not trust their team. By giving away a task, providing structure, allowing the employee to speak up and giving feedback are all factors leading to building trust.
3. Assertiveness and Control: These two may be different competencies or can be clubbed together. Either way, too much people orientation may also be detrimental to productivity and practicing assertiveness and control then becomes important. Managers must intervene when needed and should not allow others to act on their own. At the end, the accountability of a certain task remains with the manager.
4. Tactical: This is one very important people management competency that can be assessed using psychometric test for managers. Managers need to be tactical and diplomatic when dealing with people, must be able to adapt their conversations and flex their behavior based on the other person. Tactical managers are straightforward and transparent when required and prevent divulging too much information at other times.
5. Delegation: Managers are responsible for the team’s work productivity and for that, delegation as a competency becomes important. Managers must be able to delegate to develop the team members and to get the work done.
6. Developing people: Managers must also from time to time wear the hat of a coach or a mentor. They must take out time to support the people to reach their full potential and make them more efficient. Managers must play on individual strengths and create holistic teams to deliver value to the organization.

These were some of the critical people management competencies that psychometric tests for managers can help us assess. Additionally, these tests can also help us assess various other managerial competencies to arrive at hiring and developing decisions for managers.

Psychometric test for marketing manager

Psychometric testing is available in a wide range of psychometric tests, including aptitude, personality and skills tests, with varied complexity levels. A combination of psychometric tests and a variation in their level of difficulty can be customized to the role of a marketing manager. These psychometric tests can be used for recruitment, training and development and even career mapping of marketing managers. For a marketing manager, the psychometric tests cannot solely focus on their marketing side or just their leadership side, it would have to include both and measure them through a combination of personality and aptitude tests.

Psychometric tests for marketing managers can include personality tests. Personality tests can measure the marketing managers’ or candidates’ attitude towards and the ability to work with stakeholders, their project management style, their behavioral style with co-worker and managers, their decision-making style, their ability to cope with workplace stress, their ability to think creatively and accept change and so on. By mapping these characteristics, the employer can assess the extent to which the candidate’s personality characteristics match the role of a marketing manager. Some of the characteristics that organizations look for in a marketing manager are:

• Ability to see the big picture and be open to different ways of thinking
• Self-confidence
• Ability to take calculated risks
• Influencing skills
• People leadership
• Creative thinking and innovation
• Organizing and planning skills
• Project management
• Inquisitiveness
• Drive for achievement
• Ability to collaborate with others
• Accepting feedback constructively
• Taking ownership and responsibility
• Challenging the status quo

The personality test allows the organization and the candidate or employee to determine the strengths and improvement areas. This can either influence the hiring decision or even be used to identify training needs in order to have well rounded marketing managers in the organization.

Aptitude tests measure the natural ability an individual has towards performing a particular type of task. For a marketing manager, numerical reasoning, verbal reasoning and abstract reasoning tests are the aptitude tests that can measure the abilities relevant to the role.

• Numerical reasoning – Marketing managers are expected to have moderate numerical skills which will ensure that the candidate will be able to quickly and effectively identify critical work-related issues and use logic to draw conclusions from numerical data such as market research, analysis of purchasing and marketing campaigns.
• Verbal Reasoning – They are also expected to showcase moderate verbal reasoning skills in their psychometric tests which measure their oral and written verbal skills. A good performance on these indicate that they will be able to logically interpret verbal information and communicate marketing-related information to others.
• Abstract Reasoning – It measures the ability to think laterally, learn new information, identify pattern in data and apply it to solve work-related problems effectively. It indicates that the candidate will be able to quickly gather work-related information to make marketing decisions and handle problems that are out of their scope of knowledge or experience.

Psychometric tests for marketing managers can include aptitude, skill and personality test in order to make an effective recruitment decision or even identify training needs to improve productivity and output. It will enable the organization to consist of marketing managers that are well suited for the job and can produce results that can contribute to organizational growth.

Business Management Aptitude Test

Business management is the process of managing people so that they can achieve their desired goals and objectives which will ultimately help the organization to grow. Business management comprises organizing, planning, leading, staffing, and directing. Managers play a very crucial role in any organization. They have to handle multiple tasks efficiently. Their performance impacts the overall productivity of the organization. It is very crucial to hire a manager who can increase the productivity of the company and manages the team well. Managers with good aptitude can prove to be an asset to the organization as they will enable the organization to grow and be efficient. Psychometric tests are a good way to measure the business aptitude of potential candidates who have applied for the management position.

Business management aptitude test can assess skills like project management, persuasion, delegation, time management, stress management, interpersonal effectiveness etc. If an individual is able to get good scores on these skill, he/she can be a good fit for the position of a business manager. Aptitude test will also help the employer to make an informed decision regarding recruiting a person or not. Using these tests validates the recruitment process and there are higher chances of success of the candidate who is chosen based on the psychometric test scores. The business management aptitude test can have different sections like:

1. Interpersonal effectiveness – This is an essential skill because a manager has to deal with employees in order to get the tasks done. When manager is able to convey the points or thoughts effectively to the people, then only they will be motivated to achieve the target.
2. Persuasion – It is a very crucial skill which is required for the managerial position. As managers have to deal with the clients and employees, it is important to influence them to get the work done. Employees come with different objectives and expectation when they join the organization, it is the manager’s responsibility to align employees with the objectives of the organization. To do that effectively, a manager should be able to influence the employees and motivates them to achieve the goal.
3. Stress Management – Nowadays, workplace stress has become a very common thing and it is important to handle it so that one can work efficiently without getting burn-out. As the employee steps up the career ladder, the level of stress increases. This implies that a manager will have to handle stress at the organization. Psychometric test on stress will give an insight about how well an individual can handle stress. Based on the scores, employers can take an informed decision.
4. Problem Solving – It is a soft-skill which is required for the people who wants to apply for managerial and leadership position. As managers have to deal with different and complex situations on a day-to-day basis, so it is important to understand the situation and simplify it, so that goals can be achieved. For that, it is important to have the ability to solve the problems effectively and efficiently.

Online psychometric test for HR

Human Resource is a vital and important department in an organization. They are responsible for not only bringing in the people that make the company what it is but also set the tone for the culture that aligns with the organizational goals. They also help the newer employees to adapt to this culture and generally oversee the people, their welfare and satisfaction in the organization. To be able to perform such a crucial role, a team of qualified and passionate HR managers and executives are needed. In this article we will discuss the various types of psychometric tests that are used to measure the skills and competencies required for HR managers.

Online psychometric tests are of a wide variety including skills, aptitude and personality tests with varying levels of difficulty and complexity. Following are the main psychometric tests administered to HRs:

• Personality Tests – Personality tests measure the HR attitude towards and their ability to work with other stakeholders, their project management style, their behavioral tendencies towards other at the workplace, their ability to cope with stress, their decision-making style and so on. Through the personality tests, employers gauge whether the candidate or employee are socially confident, emotionally resilient, considerate, logical, compliant and can influence other’s opinions, take charge, manage projects, tolerate stress, work collaboratively with others and have the ability to lead people.

• Numerical Reasoning Tests – HRs are required to have a moderate numerical reasoning ability. Numerical reasoning tests for HRs are designed to measure not so much their mathematical ability but more their ability to quickly and accurately analyze numerical and graphical data to logically draw conclusions and identify critical issues. Numerical data for a HR personnel will include performance figures, analysis reports and ROI in human capital. They must be able to show a moderate capacity to monitor performance and progress using numerical performance indicators.

• Verbal Reasoning Tests – Verbal reasoning tests for HR are designed to measure their oral and written verbal skills. It measures their ability to quickly understand and effectively convey work-related information and go through extensive amounts of written data to identify critical issues and logically draw conclusions. Verbal reasoning tests for HRs will be of high difficulty and complexity since they are expected to have strong verbal reasoning capabilities to perform their role effectively. As a part of their role, they must be able to identify critical business-related issues and draw logical conclusions from written materials such as company policies, manuals, instructions and internal reports. They must also be able to clearly communicate work-related information to other stakeholders and clients.

• Abstract Reasoning Tests – Abstract reasoning tests for HR are designed to measure their conceptual reasoning skills which refers to their ability to quickly learn new information, identify patterns and apply it solve work-related problems. HRs are expected to demonstrate strong abstract reasoning skills. As a part of their role, they will be expected to show a strong capability to learn new skills and assess problems that are outside the scope of their knowledge or experience.

Online psychometric tests for HR enable organizations to recruit HR managers and executives that have the skills, aptitudes and personality that aligns with the requirements of the role. These HRs will further the growth of the organization by closely working with the people and culture of the company.

Psychometric tools for improving productivity in teams

Employees really work better when a company takes into account their individuality, and that is the reason understanding personality is getting increasingly popular in the business world.

Most of the times jobseekers are decided on their qualifications and not on the expert skills that they may have, making a mismatch in an occupation’s necessary previous training and kinds of skills that would be suitable and important to a job.

Psychometric assessments are profitable in this circumstance as they allow a company to find out about an employee’s abilities and personality, without any answers regarded ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

It can be a confusing procedure picking up the right organizational assessment for your company, so here is a list of psychometric tools for teams to increase job satisfaction, improve profitability, and reduce employee turnover.

The DiSC Assessment

In view of the four dimensions of personality, as displayed by American psychologist William Moulton Marston, the DiSC psychometric tools for teams give practical tips and insights to assist teams with interacting and communicating more efficiently.

Individuals are believed to be a mix of each of the four styles and that these styles can be influenced by different factors, for example, life experience and education.

One of the cornerstone principles of DiSC assessments is that by finding out about other colleagues’ styles, the nature of the working environment and work delivered can be improved greatly.

The MBTI Personality Type

One more of the psychometric assessments for teams broadly used by companies is the Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).

Utilizing the basis of Carl Jung’s theory of personality types and the adjustments of his successor, Isabel Briggs Myer, the MBTI arranges people on four divisions/sets of character styles – ‘sensing/intuition’, ‘extraverted/introverted’, ‘judging/perceiving’, and ‘thinking/feeling’. Individuals are considered to lean toward one style more than the other.

Utilizing a person’s style preferences, the questionnaire then recognizes and portrays a person as 1 of 16 potential various personality types. Note that all MBTI personality types are viewed as equivalent with no type seen as “perfect”.

The Big 5 Personality Test

One of the most notable psychometric instruments for teams is the Big 5 Personality Test.

Psychometric evaluation gives understanding into a person’s company fit and job fit by surveying their personality on five primary personality qualities. The five traits are Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism.

For a long time, recruiters have utilized the Big 5 Test to survey an applicant’s suitability to join a group, while managers have used the test to better comprehend their team member’s personality to encourage an increasingly productive workplace.

These assessments can be used in the workplace for recruitment and hiring and for employee improvement. These tools focus on the employee’s skills and not just on their educational background, which provides a better fit. The strengths and weaknesses identified by these assessment tools can be utilized in a better manner to help carry out the business. A mix of these tools can also be used for recruitment and employee development.

Applying psychometrics in coaching sessions

Nowadays, several organizations have focused more on the need for coaching and training their employees. Whether you have a small or big organization, you may find it important to arrange a coaching session for your employees. However, one of the interesting things is that modern coaches have started applying psychometrics during the training session. Now, let us introduce you to psychometrics.

Psychometrics is one of the specialties, dealing with various techniques and theories of one’s psychological measurement.  In fact, it helps in measuring attitudes, abilities, personality and knowledge. To put it simply, the psychometric test is effective at analyzing one’s ability for accomplishing a task. It is also helpful for identifying some details about that person.

Psychometric tests play a very important role in accelerating the process of coaching in the corporate sector. The assessments done through these tests are the best options, to help you in setting the right goals for a coaching session.

What does the coach do by having a psychometric response?

• You may have found the outcomes fromthe psychometric test. Now, as one of the coaches, you have some important roles to play.
• Find the perspective for setting the right frame for communication. You can identify the psychometric value in the conversation.
• Go through a variety of scenarios and perspectives to ensure that you have made the right plan for the ultimate action.
• From a psychometric test, you can focus on the positive aspects and strengths. It will be easier to know what you have to change to eliminate weaknesses. You can do everything to balance the conversation.
• Response to the questions and interpret the information rightly. You may be prepared to elucidate the report, detecting the misinterpretations. Moreover, you will also be able to deal with various emotional responses.

Application of psychometrics during the pre-coaching session

• Establish a policy for psychometrics- You have to be transparent in doing that. Use them properly for building trust.
• Know the goals of your team or organization
• Find out the needs of the trainee for choosing the psychometric
• Use the right psychometric tools, having a high quality
• Now, identify the best practitioner who knows about these tools

Psychometrics during your coaching session

• It is important to present an introduction before applying psychometrics for your coaching.
• Make a professional and considerate presentation of the results.
• The trainees need to take a systematic approach for a positive response
• You can continue managing the outcomes of using the tool.
• The best coaching discussion on psychometric results in valuable insight. Thus, the most important step is to find the strengths for personal development.

Psychometrics during the post-coaching period

When it is a post-coaching period, you can look for some helpful insights. The coaching or training session may be very short. However, the coach must be ready for a follow-up. It is also essential for a coach to track the progress regularly. Another relevant step is to evaluate everything from the overall approach.

Thus, we have discussed in brief how psychometrics is related to a coaching process.

Psychometric test for sales job

Psychometric testing has quickly become one of the most prevalent trends in the industry. These tests can be used to measure the attitude, behavior and personality characteristics of the candidates to map it with the culture of the organization and requirement of the sales job. For a sales role, the individual needs to be self-motivated, competitive, good at rapport building and interpersonal skills, and have an ability to influence customer decisions. This fit, the presence or absence of these skills, predicts the individual’s performance style on the job.

Psychometric test for a sales job can be done during recruitment or for the purpose of training. These tests can be used during the hiring process at a level before the face-to-face interview in order to record the level of skill that the candidate has the potential to exhibit. If the candidate has a low score on any of the critical competencies(job-specific), they can be let go before investing time in the interview process. Candidates that have a mix of average and high scores are a good fit for the role but those who have high scores in all the competencies may be high performing in the Sales role. If the candidate is inducted into the organization, these moderate scores can be used as a reference to provide appropriate training to them while additional psychometric tests of higher level can be used for employees. Care must be taken to note the social desirability scores in these tests since some candidates may have answered in a way that ensures them to be selected in the next round; the test scores are not valid if the social desirability score is high.

Psychometric tests for a sales job are usually designed for specific roles; usually the two tests are segregated into those for managers and for executives. The psychometric test includes:

1. For Managers – Sales managers must drive performance from the sales teams by motivating and coaching them while also recruiting the right people in order to improve the business outcomes. This individual needs to have good managerial skills, sales knowledge and have the attitude and behavioral competencies that add value to the sales team and the organization. A Psychometric test used for a Sales Manager can include the following competencies: customer focus, business acumen, critical thinking, sales knowledge and effective communication.
2. For Executives – In today’s business world sales executives need to reach out to customers across the globe and have good knowledge and skills in business communication. This involves the sales executives to have good skills, aptitude and behavior to establish rapport with customers over various modes of communication, over the phone or email, and build a good enough relation with them to ensure successful closure of the sales. A Psychometric test used for a Sales Executive can include the following competencies: sales knowledge, customer orientation, effective communication, interpersonal effectiveness, reasoning ability and influencing skills.

Psychometric test for a Sales job, essentially measures the alignment between the individual’s abilities, skills and behavior and those that are required for the job. Investing in Psychometric tests ensures that the recruitment and training assessment processes are accurate and effective.

Psychometric Test for Career Counselling

Psychometric tests typically help in measuring the current skills, interests and personality at the same time highlighting the strengths and challenges. As students finishing their studies and starting a professional career face a lot of dilemma and challenges, psychometric tests along with guided career counselling can help students make informed decisions about their career path. Psychometric assessments also help in providing structure and measurable data. The psychometric tests used in career counselling are typically referred as career tests. These are scientific measures to gauge the cognitive and behavioural abilities, skills, interests and personality of the individual.

In situations when a student is willing to choose a stream of education, then the career assessments can become handy. There are lot of interest-based assessments available which help in choosing the right academic path and professional career based on the area of interest. This kind of tests are generally referred to as Tests of Occupational Interest or Vocation and helps to connect one’s area of interest and future role at the workplace. These tests suggest top areas of work or suitable professions based on the interest of the individual.

Apart from analysing a stream of study and selecting a career path, these psychometric assessments also help in clarifying the individual skills and traits as strengths that they can exhibit when they start their professional journey. Additionally, it also highlights the areas of improvement that simultaneously individuals can work on to be successful in their career.

These are just one type of psychometric tests that are generally employed during career counselling which help in assessing the skillsets, abilities and preferences or interests. The other type of psychometric tests for career counselling are personality tests. These help in understanding the personality type, behavioural preferences and the nature of the individual. With help of these tests the career counsellor can help the candidate understand what nature of work will suit their personality and where they can perform to their fullest of abilities. Awareness like this also help individuals to take an informed decision whether they can manage the pressures of the task or not. For instance, if one has an extrovert personality but the role doesn’t have a lot of people interaction or external stimulation, it may eventually lead to job dissatisfaction for the person.

Psychometric tests are a standardized and accurate way of understanding which career suits the candidate. It should, however, be coupled with the guidance of a career counsellor who can help interpret and personalise the reports.  Psychometric tests provide career counsellors the right direction to have productive conversations.

Psychometric assessments not only help in choosing career but comes handy when someone is looking for a career change. Career change is a very risky decision and to take a more strong and informed choice psychometric assessments are helpful. With psychometric assessment reports career counsellors can device an individual handholding plan and help in deciding a second career that would best suit the skillset, abilities, interests, behavioural preference and personality style.

The entire process of career counselling follows a framework and personalized approach to ensure the candidate can choose a career that best suits them and provides opportunity to exhibit their talents and abilities.

Psychometric test questions for recruitment

TYPES OF PSYCHOMETRIC TEST QUESTIONS FOR RECRUITMENT

Psychometric tests are used by employers to check applicant’s comprehension abilities, attitudes, personalities and knowledge. These tests are becoming increasingly popular in recruitment process and are now widely used in industries ranging from banking and finance to police and armed forces. These tests are included in the recruitment process because companies want a fair prediction of which applicants are likely to be successful in a job.

There are different kinds of psychometric tests available due to the range of employer priorities and cognitive abilities. The commonly used tests are numerical ability tests, situational judgement tests, reasoning ability tests and personality tests.

How to prepare for psychometric test

Find out what the employer is looking for in the right applicant. When seeking to fill a position, employers want the best person among all the candidates for that job. It is about finding the best fit for that job, from personality, skill, intelligence and cultural perspective.

The results of such tests provide the employer with your behavioral profile – your level of intelligence or aptitude and your personality traits. The profile will indicate whether you are a problem solver, team player or you like to work individually. So, prior to taking the test, have a look at the job description which would give you an idea about the attributes they are looking for.

Learn about psychometric testing techniques. Psychometric tests are not like other tests that you have taken. Often job seekers assume that if they are good at math or they can speed read, they can clear the psychometric test. This assumption is wrong. Psychometric tests will measure your verbal, abstract and numeric reasoning skills. These tests are timed and designed in a unique way. To master this test, you need to add a new set of tests taking strategies to your toolbox as these are more psychology related tests which can be tricky at times.

Be sure not to lie in the personality test. Most tests are designed to indicate whether you were consistent in your answers and to what extent you portrayed yourself in an overly positive manner. Make sure not to overdo positivity in your test as it is going to cause inconsistency in your answer. Just be yourself and know what set of strengths you want to highlight through the test. For that job description must be understood completed.

Get to know the types of aptitude test question. Familiarizing yourself with the typical content and psychometric questions will give you a significant advantage. Verbal and numerical ability tests are generally multiple-choice questions that must be completed in a short period of time. Familiarity with the type of questions will get you a competitive edge over another applicants. Questions would be based on what the company wants to check in a candidate. Online practice tests can be performed, and results should be checked to know what behavior traits are prominent in your test.

Psychometric tests may sometimes seem daunting, but practice and preparation is the key to success. Be well prepared before taking one up and research well about the company you wish to be a part of. Identify the values, culture and qualities they are looking for in a candidate. This will help you in clearing the personality test.

Psychometric Tests for Students

Psychometric tests are a great way to help students in multiple ways. Before jumping on to the fruitful benefits they bring to students, let us first understand what psychometric tests seek to achieve. These tests are a question bank of varied mental queries which intend to get an overall picture of the individual’s mental conditioning and thought process. A lot of examinations aim at examining the learning of the student, but they really never get close to mental makeup of an individual. These tests aim at unfolding the cognitive capacity of an individual before making career-based decisions.

Hence, if done correctly, the psychometric test can indicate the suitability of the student to a particular domain of study related to career. Instead of focusing on what pays more or what student’s parents want, a psychometric assessment would be best to align their capability and interests with the relevant job market.

These tests or assessments come with a questionnaire either in an online form or a hard copy which strive to understand the traits and personality types of individuals. It is important to answer the questions honestly to get the most benefit from the test. If the questions are answered in way to please their someone, the entire purpose of taking this assessment will be falsified. This method of answering keeping in mind what is best as per the society is called social desirability. Hence there are multiple online psychometric assessments which test social desirability of the individual and accordingly throw questions to neutralize it. This also happens when students or individuals ticks neutral answers in a 3 or 5 pointer Likert scale.

The traditional way to assess an individual’s personality traits does not stress on the role of temperament or to be precise, the emotional quotient. The emotional quotient relates an individual to a situation around them and gets the amount of volatility in the person’s temperament. As per the past observations, it rightly indicates that a calm person gets to be in better control of situations no matter how heated and stressed the situation is. With the correct emotional quotient scores, it is easier to guide the students to a domain which fits best to their kind of temperament. This brings stability to the career choice and satisfaction in choosing that career, in the long-term. A mismatch will lead to acute stress to the person and at times, it affects the health of that person to a large extent.

A very prominent question that may be coming to your mind would be, “when should the psychometric test be conducted?”. It would be wrong if the psychometric test is conducted right at the beginning of the school. The child must attain a stable age in their development to have the right assessment done. The traits of a child change as they grow in their early ages as during this earlier age their character is still being formed ad behaviors are getting hard wired. We suggest doing this psychometric test at a crucial stage in the students live to which helps them identify their individuality. Ideally this test should be conducted at an age of fourteen or fifteen. By this age they are in middle school and both boys and girls are sufficiently matured to understand their behaviors.

Thus, by using psychometric test in the best way possible parents and teachers will be able to guide the students and shape them towards the right career which suits them the best.

Utilizing Psychometric Tests in Employee Engagement

Different employees have different preferences for engagement. In order to create a strong engagement plan that caters to everyone, organization need to take into consideration aspects like strengths, expectations, predilections, etc. Employee engagement is also dependent on the aspects like how much they feel their opinions are heard, their level of commitment, team bonding, etc.

By utilizing psychometric tests organizations will be able to gauge whether the individual needs and preferences are aligned with the organizational goals and vision. This would also help in assessing the duties, tasks and job role requirements with the personal interests and preferences to determine the organizational fit.

One aspect to be assessed is the extent to which individual needs are met and the level of satisfaction they possess. The other part to measure is the level of expectation, this helps in suggesting what might demotivate them or in other words what can be improved in the organization. Both these aspects are essential to know the current level of employee engagement and understand the areas of focus to become better. Thus, utilizing psychometric tests offers objective data and helps in planning intervention that addresses the core issues.

Employee engagement should be viewed as a shared responsibility. So, one insight that psychometric test provides is what the organization can do and where they are at or how they are viewed by their employees. There is another side to this coin, which is the individual’s role. Psychometric tests throw light on the various behaviors that hinders or fosters their expectations. This way in a coaching or debrief session, the individual will be able to discuss and plan for an improvement plan.

These psychometric tests also become a solid base for planning individual development plan. This way managers can also track the progress and align the personal needs and preferences to the larger picture. Thus, ultimately having an impact in the employee retention.

Many research studies have proven the correlation between the employee engagement and organizational success thus drawing a period to that debate. So, todays focus is on the implementation rather than measuring the need or importance. Few important things to bear in mind while selecting tools to assess employee engagement are the purpose, the organization structure and culture, its values and whether the assessment tool is industry agnostic. Only then the psychometric assessment and the results from assessment will be useful. Otherwise, all the effort in data collection might end up being ineffective and lead to rework or rejection of the process.

Psychometric tests also come handy in customizing conversations and plans based on individual needs thus addressing the root causes or feeding their needs in a way they want to be. This way the ownership and responsibility are placed on the individual and at the same time they feel valued. This helps in improving the employee engagement with lesser effort from the manager or the management.

To summarize, some of the benefits of utilizing psychometric tests in employee engagement is that it helps to unearth the current engagement levels, devise on strategies to enhance the employee engagement, understand the individual needs, gauge the fit and align individual expectations to the overall picture.

Employment Integrity Test

Integrity tests are conducted in an organization to measure a candidate’s dependability, honesty and trustworthiness. Integrity tests, which are part of psychometric tests, help the organization to select candidates who will boost the production at any organization. These tests can also be important in evaluating job performance and are related to diligence. They in any way overrule dishonesty at work, but poor scoring can negatively affect a candidate’s selection.

There are various reasons why companies use these tests. One of the major reasons is to reduce workplace integrity and unfavorable behavior. Another reason can be to stop absenteeism and reporting late to work, which could hinder the productivity of the business. Here are some psychometric-integrity tests which can be used while recruiting for companies.

Overt Integrity Tests

This is a direct method where the candidates are asked direct questions related to their honesty, integrity and behavior. The test is divided into two sections. This assessment tells the trustworthiness of the candidate for workplace. It is designed to find such traits in a person’s behavior, dishonesty, and past performance which would affect the workplace in order to sort out the potential candidate.

The second series asks the questions the type of counterproductive behaviors they have involved themselves in the past. This will help the employers to identify the risk they would pose at the workplace.

Covert Personality Tests

These tests do not give immediate results as their overt counterpart, but this test still helps assess individual’s behavior at workplace. The test helps to identify personality which concerns employment. This test may ask you simple questions, but it will test your personality through those questions.

Scope of Integrity Tests

There are various reasons why integrity tests should be made part of the recruitment process. The tests are beyond an individual’s intention to lie or steal. This test takes a holistic view of the whole personality of the applicant and helps to check trustworthiness, tendencies and values.

The right candidate who scores high in every aspect of integrity test is a win for the HR department. So, there is immense importance attached to these tests and practice can be done for these types of questions.

Missing out on conducting these tests from recruitment process will lead to misfit job profiles and disorderly company culture.

Benefits of Integrity Test

The several benefits of the integrity tests are:

• Forecasting job performance and streamlining the interview process by eliminating doubtful candidates.
• It is cost effective as it is possible to conduct mass hiring through this process.
• This considers race and gender factors, so there is less chance of biasness.

So, the value of these tests is very far reaching, and therefore, they should be introduced at the start of the skill tests. These tests will help to improve engagement levels and employee morale. And for recruiters, these tests will help to understand employees in a better way. Practice answering various integrity questions or take an online integrity test to check how your scores match up to desirable ranks.

MOST USED PSYCHOMETRIC TOOLS

Psychology has played a principal role in the process of choosing the best team for any purpose since many eras. With the same vital application psychometrics has now evolved into new fields with several purposes to fulfil. Psychometric tools are used to measure and evaluate one’s intelligence, aptitude, achievements, reasoning, motivation, creativity, personality traits, behaviour pattern and neuro-psychological characteristics. Depending upon what has to be assessed the combination of these assessments is used and a personality type is determined. Which is then compared with that of which is required in the organization. In order to clarify is there is any mis fit or is the person trying to portray as socially desirable individual.

The most notable trends seen these days in the field of job recruitment is the conduction of psychometric assessments. Today, more than ever, people are getting hired with one of the most reliable tools which not only examines them but also examine them among candidates’ skills, knowledge, abilities, personality traits and attitudes.

Psychometric testing was found to be extensively used by over 80% of the Fortune 500 companies in the USA and by over 75% of the Times Top 100 Companies in the UK, whether it be IT companies, management consultancies, local governing bodies, financial institutions, the civil services, police force, fire department and the armed forces. The two best psychometric tools are:

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

MBTI is one of the most widely used assessment, which has a very strong theoretical basis by one of the most renounced psychologist Carl Jung. The test that aims to identify where an individual fall on four different dichotomies—sensing or intuition, introversion or extroversion, thinking or feeling, and judging or perceiving and comes up with 16 unique personality types with these 4 dichotomies labelled by combination of initials of each. Around 80 per cent of new hires at Fortune 500 companies have been administered the MBTI in the past decade, and countless other companies use it as part of the actual employee selection and training process.

Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire (16PF)

It was devised in 1949 by psychologist Raymond Cattell, who came up with the trait theory of personality in which he identified 16 traits that we all possess in varying degrees, like warmth and tension. The 170 questions on the test differ from those on most other personality assessments for they seek to enquire how an individual might react to a certain situation on the job, rather than describe one’s overall personality in some way. It also has a lie score which assesses a conscious or nonconscious effort to leave or to create a favourable impression.

It’s an instrument ideal for hiring and employee development due to its focus on practical situations rather than general personality traits and provides us a good explanation of the ability of an individual to handle high-stress situations.

Situational Judgement Test(SJT)

SJT is one of the top best psychometric tools which is used to measure an employee’s suitability to work related circumstances.  These tests are designed to accurately assess an individual’s ability to use effective judgement in solving problems in work-related situations.

A Situational Judgement test assesses the way an individual think in the face of difficult often critical situations. This analysis gives the companies a fair idea about what kind of employee the person will be and whether or not the applicant has the potential to be a future leader. Situational judgment tests are often tailored to each function such as sales, customer service and IT; and job level such as professional, manager or team leader.

An archetypal SJT uses around 16-20 short work-related circumstances. Each situation comprises of 4-8 possible responses or actions that can be taken. It is one of the most efficient screening tool used to whittle down the huge number of candidates applied. Companies like EON, KPMG, Cancer Research UK and Bank of America often uses SJT as a screening tool.

NEO FFI-III

NEO 5 which has been developed by McCrae and Costa is one of the top used psychometric tools in all the domains. It has trait theories as its theoretical background. Based on Galton’s Lexical approach (lexical hypothesis states that the most of the socially relevant and salient personality characteristics have become encoded in the natural language). The theory aims to measure the core traits which are assumed to remain relatively stable for individuals. Costa and McCrae identified five core traits which identify personality: O – Openness (to experience), C – Conscientiousness, E – Extraversion, A – Agreeableness and
N – Neuroticism. It is a paper pencil, 60 item questionnaires, administration being uncomplicated.  The NEO-FFI-3 can help the HR personnel to understand the client’s basic emotional, interpersonal, experiential, attitudinal, and motivational styles. They found personality to an be an important component of job success at the highest level of management. Peterson and Smith (2003) found Conscientiousness, Agreeableness and Openness to experience was high on correlation with the job satisfaction and an important component of job success at the highest level of management.

FIRO-B

The Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation – Behaviour (FIRO-B) instrument predicts levels of interaction between two people. The FIRO framework (1950s) was created by Harvard scientist William Schutz. The Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation (FIRO) assessments help people understand their interpersonal needs and how those needs influence their communication style and behaviour. FIRO-B helps people understand their individual communication style and improve performance through understanding their behaviour—and that of others—in interpersonal situations. The FIRO-B tool consists of 54-items which measures your interpersonal needs in three areas. Each of these interpersonal needs—Inclusion, Control, and Affection—the FIRO-B instrument also provides a measure of how much each need is expressed or wanted by you. FIRO theory provides the foundation for understanding how to develop sustainable, high-trust, collaborative relationships. It increases one’s understanding about their ability in three key interpersonal ‘need areas’, it helps Individual executive business coaching at all levels, Leadership and management development, Awareness of fit to future role, Senior level assessment, Relationship with stakeholders and clients, Conflict management, Raising self-awareness, Team development, Interpersonal communication and Workplace relationships.

The above were the top best psychometric tools which has been used and researched widely in the organization for various purposes. Psychometric tests are an essential element not just for the recruitment but for screening a large number of people and also helps in training process by knowing where the employees lack and to further train them on that. It makes the recruitment process sharper and smoother as long as they are never used or relied on in isolation. For making the recruitment process a success and effective in making recruitment sharper and smoother, psychometric tests plays a vital role, only if not used in isolation. It only assists and not drives the process of recruitment in any organizations.

ADVANTAGES OF PSYCHOMETRIC TESTS

Psychometrics was initially defined as the art of imposing measurement and number upon the operations of the mind. Psychometrics is a field of psychological study concerned with the theory and technique of measurement of psychological attributes. Because measurement in psychology is often done with tests and questionnaires, it is not so precise and subject to error. Therefore, statistics play a major role in psychometrics. Today, psychometrics covers almost all statistical techniques that are useful for the behavioral and social sciences including the combination of prior information with measured data, handling of missing data, visualization of statistical outcomes, measurement obtained from special experiments, measurement that guarantees personal privacy, and much more. In this article, we are going to discuss the advantages of psychometric tests in mental health.

Advantages of Psychometric Tests

The advantages of psychometric tests are –

1. Accurate and Appropriate – The results that are obtained through psychometric testing are more accurate and appropriate than results that are obtained through other methods. The results obtained are sturdy, unbiased and reliable, which apparently is a major merit of psychometric testing. Psychometric tests are ones that assist the employers to pick individuals who possess personal working styles, motivation and specific skills and abilities. With these tests, the right person for the right role is recruited.
2. Cheap to Acquire – Psychometric testing kits are relatively cheap to acquire because a number of private statistical firms are developing these types of assessments. Though a well-qualified psychometric assessment kit is very expensive in terms of monetary value, it immensely benefits the company in the long run, which means that there is no need to buy a separate kit every time the recruitment is conducted. The old kit itself can be altered according to newer norms and can be used again.
3. Unbiased Approach – Psychometric tests are totally unbiased and no kind of favoritism is involved. If a candidate answers the questions correctly, then he/she is selected. Otherwise, they are not. It is much fairer and simpler. If a candidate is not selected, it gives an opportunity to the person to make a complete analysis about themselves and provides the opportunity to rectify mistakes. These tests provide a way to compare more candidates and choose the best one for the organization.
4. Highly Time-Saving – As these tests are administered to candidates in groups, it saves a lot of time and money for the organization. Psychometric tests are a major component of recruitment, and by making their use, a lot of time is saved in the recruitment process. The recruitment process is found to be facilitated with the help of psychometric testing. This is because only relevant and appropriate candidates are chosen through this method. This saves time as well as money being spent on unsuitable candidates.
5. Understanding the Employee – A psychometric test helps the employer understand the candidates better. Their capabilities such as if they can handle stressful situations, their relationship with clients/co-workers and if they are a perfect fit into the organization’s culture can be assessed with these tests.

Why Do Employers use Psychometric Test?

Psychometric Tests are defined as tests which helps in measuring the mind. Unlike educational qualification and background, competencies, experience, behavioral preferences and personality of a person can be way more difficult to assess during any form of screening or selection.

Employers use these psychometric tests during screening or appraising to help give an overall analysis of a candidate and their fitment to the job role. There have been on-going debates on the value of these tests, but those who have used it believe that it can give a more objective overview of a candidate’s personality, character, working styles, strengths and weaknesses. It is recommended that a psychometric test shouldn’t be used in silo, instead it should be a part of a bigger picture.

Psychometric testing measures number of attributes which include emotional intelligence, critical thinking, reasoning, personality, motivators and stressors. Interviews or people-driven screening techniques can be subjective and even though employers are pretty thorough with their skills and competencies assessments yet there is a need to assess the values and personality and to check if those values align with the organization’s value – this need is fulfilled by plugging in the psychometric tests.

Many employers also use these psychometric tests as a part of multiple assessment process or to be precise, assessment centres wherein a number of candidates come together with a team of assessors to explore and observe their suitability or developmental needs for a certain role or promotion. The term assessment centre is not usually a physical location, as the name suggests – it is planned set of activities that are used to assess the candidates’ fitment of the job. These activities include appropriate psychometrics, competency-based interviews, role-plays, in-basket exercises or group discussions.

Likewise, psychometric tests can be used in multiple stages. To categorize them and to make our lives simpler, here are some broad categories:

• Recruitment and Selection – Psychometric assessments are often used in recruitment and selection process to assess the match between the candidate, role and the organization. As explained earlier, these tests help in analysing beyond skills and competencies.
• Coaching – Psychometric tests play an important role in coaching sessions as they help the coachee in understanding their strengths and improvement areas in order to orchestrate their personal growth and learning. Usually, these tests are used prior to the start of coaching sessions in order to gauge the level of strengths and development areas of the coachee and coaches find it helpful in structuring their conversations through the reports generated.
• Career Development – Many psychometric tests such as VOCATION or interest and values inventories, are used to help individuals consider their future career path and fields where they may want to have a career.
• Team Development – For training and developing teams a very prominent psychometric test that comes to our mind is the Five Behavior of a Cohesive Team by Wiley. This test is based on Patrick Lencioni’s Five Dysfunctions of a team and assesses the current scores of the team on those 5 parameters and tell us the way-forward in improving it. Generally, team assessments will help in improving the teamwork and interpersonal effectiveness of team members.
• Succession Planning – As discussed above, psychometric tests can be used in developing the leadership pipeline by assessing a list of candidates who are suitable for the next role. The assessment part is usually done via assessment centres in which psychometric assessments are used to assess the role fitment.

With the areas where psychometric tests can be used, it is not difficult to foresee the fruitful advantages of a psychometric test. Strengthscape, helps its client in getting the best psychometric tests as per clients’ needs. To know more, Contact Us.

Drawbacks of Psychometric Tests

Psychometrics is the branch of psychology that deals with the design, execution and interpretation of quantitative tests or instruments for the measurement of psychological attributes such as personality, attitudes and intelligence. It is a discipline related to the construction of measurement instruments, assessment tools and formalized models that may serve to connect observable phenomena, for instance, responses to items in an IQ-test to theoretical attributes such as intelligence. In this article, we are going to discuss the disadvantages of psychometric tests in mental health.

Disadvantages of Psychometric Tests

The disadvantages of psychometric tests are –

• Cultural Barriers are Present – Those candidates who hail from different lingual and cultural backgrounds and those who don’t even have a subtle idea about these psychometric tests will not be able to understand them well. They are probably going to be eliminated even though they have the necessary prerequisites for the job.
• False Answers – The other main disadvantage psychometric testing is that candidates tend to give fake responses. In this case, candidates would answer in a way how the recruiters desire to hear. At the time of the interview, they would try to diminish their negative thoughts or traits and try to express a positive image of themselves, just to answer well and get a green signal in the interview. To make it clear, candidates may not be fully honest.
• Inaccuracy – An individual is labeled as one person or the other by means of a psychometric test. The result of a test can describe the person as an introvert, but in general and reality, the individual may possess introvert as well as extrovert personality characteristics. No psychometric test assesses an individual in all his totality, and so some skills or aspects of personality may be measured and some not. Hence, the results from these tests cannot be identified as 100% accurate as they cannot be identified correctly.
• Answers are Fixed – There are more or less a fixed number of responses when psychometric tests are considered. The role of test takers must also be considered because they are forced to pick an answer, even when any of the answers do not match with the skills or personality of the employee. Human nature is complex and these tests are ones that do not account for it. Hence the results cannot be considered accurate.
• Requirement for Training – Psychometric tests are very complex. The administration requires training to handle these tests. Training needs to be provided in their administration, analysis and assessment.

A number of organizations strongly believe that psychometric tests reflect the core competencies and the strong positive abilities of an individual during the pre-recruitment stage, itself thereby giving the companies enough time to consider or reconsider their decision. Although there are a number of advantages and disadvantages of psychometric testing, the method has a has come to be used a lot in the previous years and yields useful results for organizations.

Valuable Psychometric Testing Tips

What are Psychometric Tests

Psychometric tests are ordinarily utilized by some recruiters to assess how appropriate you are as a nominee for a specified job description. These tests assist in evaluating your character traits and intellect by metering your deportment and subconscious aptitudes. Diverse operating positions typically oblige various sorts of psychometric tests to be carried out to estimate the diverse characteristics of the applicants.

There is a psychometric test guide available to facilitate expecting applicants to clear psychometric tests

How is a Psychometric Test Guide Useful?

1. Preparation – Diverse firms and job profiles necessitate various disposition and expertise levels of the nominees. Thus, a comprehensive investigation of the firm and job description will enhance your knowledge of this concern. You should also mention the advantageous expertise and personage traits essential for the job profile as well as the firm’s focal ethics and civilization throughout your preparation.
2. Comprehending Test Questions – Psychometric tests typically comprise mathematical and vocal rationale tests that appear in the format of (MCQ) multiple-choice questions. These questions emphasize on diverse matters, inclusive of tangible or natural sciences, economic science, workforce management, trading, and social sciences. Based on the job profile and domain of service, diverse test themes are ordinarily included either in a single ability examination or in various tests. Abstract aptitude tests typically utilize shapes and figures in their inquiries.
3. Time Keeping – Psychometric tests should be concluded within the assigned period and you should prevent yourself from utilizing too much time on a single question, as this influences your aptitude to finish the whole test in a given period. Some tests have the stipulation of turning back to preceding questions. In such cases, you can leap the difficult questions for the time being and come back to them after the rest has been considered.
4. Vocabulary – Vocal ability assessments help to evaluate the reading and comprehending abilities of the job applicants. You should explore and analyze several topics, emphasizing on the concrete areas of interest in the job position and the firm. Sound knowledge of the thesaurus will assist you to comprehend and respond to the test questions in the most appropriate way. This can be referred to by a psychometric test guide.
5. Consistency – You should sustain analogous or persistent patterns when acknowledging personality quiz questions. Although the questions provided may be formed variously, they may inquire the same thing, so uniformity is essential when you’re acknowledging psychometric test questions. You can refer a psychometric test guide to get an idea about the questions provided.
6. Test Instructions – Frisking through the instruction manual on an assessment is essential, as they ordinarily offer guidance and lucidity to apprehend the questions provided in the test. It is highly recommended to read and heed to all the directions thoroughly before commencing the assessment. This information is available in the psychometric test guide along with sample aptitude tests.

Lastly, psychometric tests are scientifically founded selection approaches that are utilized to discover definite knowledge about job nominees that would contrary be complicated to ascertain by utilizing resumes and eye-to-eye interviews. Possibilities of getting the job position are enhanced if you are quite prepared for your forthcoming psychometric test.