Spotting diamonds in the rough: Mining for top performers with psychological assessments

1. Spotting diamonds in the rough: Mining for top performers with psychological assessments Ilona Jerabek, PhD PsychTests AIM Inc.

2. Table of contents • Introduction • Hiring pitfalls • Types of assessments and tests • When to use tests • Selecting the right assessments • Evaluating results/reports and analyzing gaps • Summary and take-home message • Quick overview of PsychTests’ services

3. How to recognize talent Selection process Screening process – review of résumés Interview References and background checks Assessment Work sampling

4. So what if they all look like Superstars?

5. Screening pitfalls Résumé References Candidate’s side Choosing only people who will give good reference Can cheat … fake references May not have contact info (turnover) Reference Many provide only confirmation of employment Fear of being sued if they share something negative Recruiter Not asking the right questions Not reading between the lines • Candidate’s side • Cookie cutter • Omissions • Spinning • “Embellishment” • Recruiter’s side • Funky résumés or those with things in common with recruiter get to the top of the pile • Screening out people who don’t meet requirements exactly but who are close (especially when done by software)

6. Interview pitfalls – The candidate • Candidates well-trained in interviewing skills • Rehearsed responses • Spinning • Outright cheating So you have to • Read between the lines • Probe deeper • Ask unusual questions • Ask situational questions • Good candidates inexperienced in interviewing process • Disadvantaged – have to think about answers on the spot • Can miss diamonds in the rough • Cultural differences • Humbleness • Language issues • Acceptability of spinning • Appropriateness of sharing and talkativeness in this situation • Respect for hierarchy/authority

7. Interview pitfalls – Interviewer bias • First impression • It takes seven seconds to make a first impression • 50% of it is based on the person’s appearance • First opinions are formed in the first 12 minutes of an interview • Halo effect • strength (or weakness) in one area is generalized to other areas • Similarity bias • Looking for someone similar to self • Primacy and recency effects: • The interviews we remember most are the first and the last of the group • We tend to remember the beginning and the end of individual interviews • Rationalization • Especially of negative aspects if we like the candidate • Self-fulfilling prophecy • Based on first impression, interviewer subconsciously asks leading questions, resulting in confirmation of said first impression

8. Consequences of hiring errors On company level On individual level Low job satisfaction Low motivation Presenteeism Absenteeism Social loafing Low initiative Negativity Poor work ethics High likelihood of leaving • High turnover • Low engagement • Poor morale • Lower productivity • Lower quality of work • Lower overall efficiency • Poor customer service • Opportunity cost • “Us vs. Them” attitude

9. But if you get it right … People who perform well have: • Increased self-awareness • Improved morale • Increased retention • Increased engagement • Enhanced productivity • Better job satisfaction . . . profits surge!

10. Solution? • Hire the right person the first time around • Hire those who match the job, team and company • Manage the gap between personality and “job persona” • Facilitate onboarding • Facilitate integration into new team and work environment • Train to improve areas that need to be developed • Tailor job functions/tasks to new hire’s strengths and preferences • Prevent future performance issues – address potential problems before they start • Increase retention of top talent • Career development • Personal development • Keep them challenged & interested • Identify leadership potential

11. If you can’t measure it, you can’t control it “Assess and conquer” • Define the job • Assess the incumbent • Assess the candidate • Perform gap analysis • Assess and manage performance • Assess and manage promotions • Retain your best people

12. Assess the job:Define the framework • Task analysis • Task description • Shadowing • Job analysis • Job description • Personality profile of the ideal candidate • Key characteristics and attitudes • Behavioral benchmarks for the position • Reach consensus among the stakeholders

13. Assess the incumbent:Create a blueprint • Strengths • What traits and attitudes contribute to good performance? • What are the downsides? • Challenges • What are the traits and attitudes that hinder performance? • What do you wish you could change in the incumbent?

14. Assess the candidate:Fit the pattern • Screen out candidates with the wrong attitudes or poor work ethics • Find people with the right profile for the position • Skills • Personality • Attitudes and values • Work environment preferences • Accurately predict successful performance • Recognize true team players

15. Many pieces in a puzzle • ‘Hire for attitudes, train for skills’ vs. ‘Hit the road running’ • Cannot possibly assess everything => identify the information that is essential to success on the job

16. Types of tests Skills and knowledge Psychological Personality assessments Objective Projective Aptitude, IQ and achievement tests Mechanical reasoning Analytical reasoning Attitudes assessments Rarely used in HR setting Neuropsychological tests Direct observation tests • Technical competency • Theoretical knowledge • Practical skills • Experience • Level of expertise • Psychological competencies • Leadership skills • Management skills • Emotional intelligence • Coping skills • Assertiveness • Communication ability • Soft skills

18. Personality tests • Personality traits • Is this person a person a good fit into a company’s atmosphere and image (e.g. extrovert vs. introvert, straight-laced vs. laidback, independent-minded vs. compliant, etc.)? • Which specific traits are a must for a position (e.g. integrity, self-control, empathy)? • What makes this person unique? Some quirks are adorable, some may cause problems. • Values – What is important to this person? • Beliefs – What views of the world, others, and self does this person hold? • Attitudes – What kind of a work ethic can you expect? Is s/he assertive, proactive, risk-taker, procrastinator? • Motivators – What drives this person? • Emotions – What makes this person tick? What stresses this person out? • Behavior – If put in a specific situation, how will this person respond? What makes this person behave this way?

19. When to use assessments: Pre-hire • Prescreen before interview to identify candidates who are clearly a bad fit • narrow down candidate pool to those who meet minimum requirements (lenient cut-off points) • Assess candidates who make the first cut for job fit (skills, personality, attitudes) • narrow down candidate pool to those with best potential (use benchmarks to assess match) • Interview top candidates with test results in mind • Probe deeper to validate test results • Evaluate trade-offs • Evaluate culture fit

20. When to use assessments: Onboarding • Focus on-the-job training and coaching on areas that need development • Use insight from tests to manage employees effectively • Tailor job functions to the new hire's strengths and preferences • Facilitate integration into existing teams • Prevent future performance issues by addressing potential problems before they start

21. When to use assessments: Career development • Use assessments as a learning and personal development tool • Optimize training process • Identify training needs (individual and groups) • Offer custom-tailored learning opportunities • Determine the effectiveness of your training process • Monitor individual progress • Assess who is ready for a promotion, more responsibility or learning opportunities • Groom young employees for future leadership positions

22. When to use assessments: Engagement & Talent retention • Optimize motivation • Understand what motivates individual employees and manage accordingly • Ensure right job fit • Help them grow • Keep them challenged and interested • Problem prevention • Develop leadership and management skills of those in charge • Monitor trends company-wide • Identify budding problems before they escalate (e.g. stress levels)

23. Tests, tests, tests …

24. What assessments CAN do • Cut costs and save time by • improving the size and quality of candidate pool by assessing large number of candidates during pre-screening process • narrowing down the candidate pool and enabling HR staff to focus on good fit candidates • Assess traits and skills that are relevant to a job (job-specific or custom-designed competency and personality tests) • Identify a person’s strengths and areas that will need development/training • Improve objectivity of selection process • Paint a more complete picture of a person’s skills and personality than what is offered in a résumé or references • Provide objective, standardized assessment, free of individual interviewer biases • Give a chance to real diamonds in the rough … great candidates who are humble or untrained in interviewing skills • Use existing top-performing employees as benchmarks to whom you compare potential candidates

25. What assessments CANNOT do • Replace human judgment • Make the hiring decisions instead of you • Predict performance with 100% accuracy • Guarantee candidate’s future success • Assess all factors that might possibly play a role in an individual’s performance • Guarantee accuracy for everybody (some particular circumstances in one’s life might skew results) • Prevent test-taker from “gaming” the test BUT there are ways to minimize cheating and social desirability bias • Validity scales (impression management, acquiescence, social desirability index) • Situational/behavioral questions rather than adjectives or short phrases • Well-designed questionnaire (avoiding leading questions, ambiguity, double-barrelled questions)

26. How do I judge the quality of a test? • Statistics – Reliability and Validity • Test must be created based on APA (American Psychological Association) standards • Overall “Cronbach’s Alpha” (statistical test of reliability) should be 0.70 or higher • Determine if any studies have been done on the test • What population has this test been used on? (Age, Gender , Ethnicity, Education, Job field) • Sample must be at least 500 or more people • The larger the test (i.e. the more scales) the larger the sample should be • What have the studies conducted on the test revealed? • If the test is job specific - e.g. sales - determine how people with sales experience compare to the rest of the population – they should score better • Determine if test is biased toward a certain population i.e. if one population is scoring significantly better than the rest – this should not be the case • Evaluate adverse impact on protected groups – score differences of 10% or more are unacceptable and the use of the test can be legally challenged

27. Other important questions to ask a test creator or distributor • Are the test items and test results job-relevant? • If not, the use of test can be legally challenged • What research and which theories were used to create this test? • Has the test been revised? What were the revisions, and when was the last revision? • Revisions are necessary – new scientific research may reveal new information, social and economical changes affect norms or context of test items, language changes • How often are statistical analyses run on this test? • If significant revisions have been made to the test (new questions, new scales), new data must be collected and analyzed • Is this test suitable for my test population? • Lower level vs. higher-level managers • Cold sales vs. warm • Customer service reps in retail vs. call centers

28. Test Structure – Questions & Reports Overall tips • Ask for a sample of the questions or get a demo • Ask for a sample report • Assess the length of the test • Realistically, the entire personality cannot be assessed in 10 minutes • On the other hand, a 3-hr test would be impractical • Determine whether the test is assessing all the traits and skills that you need • Determine what benchmarks are available, and whether you can create custom benchmarks • Verify whether suggested interview questions based on test results are available

29. Test items • Should be relevant to what the test is supposed to assess (face validity) • Should not include questions about sex life, romantic life – personal life questions can be used, but cannot be too personal and need to be justified (e.g. emotional intelligence) • Must be clear and easy to read, and appropriate in terms of reading level required • NOTE: For sake of clarity, some questions need to be direct (e.g. I am punctual), but may point to the right answer • “Faking good” on a test can be prevented to a large degree BUT • Tests in which a lot is at stake (e.g. pre-employment test) should include a scale that determines whether a person answered in a socially-desirable way – a Faking or Impression Management scale

30. Test report • Verify whether the report offers sufficient information for you to make a clear decision about a person’s potential • Ideally, test report should include • Clear, easy-to-understand graphs with scores • Definitions of each trait or skill assessed • Interpretations of a person’s score • What does a high score indicate? • What does a low score indicate? • How does this impact performance? • Highlights areas that need improvement • Tips on how to improve on weaknesses • Unless you have access to a psychologist or a trained HR professional, make sure the report is written in layperson terms

31. GAP Mind the gap

32. Perform gap analysis • Measure the difference between the candidate and the requirements of the position • Identify significant gaps – changes in behavior and playing a role of the “job persona” are required to close the gap • Determine the actions that support these required changes/behaviors • Predict the energy requirements to make these changes and the resulting frustrations

33. Manage the gap Organize Adapt Adjust management style to what works for individual employees Adapt communication and information transfer to suit an individual’s learning style or intelligence type Customize training process to give employees the skills and tools they need to succeed • Assign tasks according to personal preferences whenever possible or let employees volunteer for assignments • Team up people with complementary skills, personality and preferred team roles • Ensure support and availability of tools/materials that can help to bridge the gap

34. Find your diamond in the rough • Know what you want • Assess personality, attitudes and skills of candidates using psychological tests • Probe deeper using interview questions based on test results • Keep your eyes open and avoid personal biases • Evaluate tradeoffs • Keep polishing your diamond

35. And most importantly … Keep polishing your diamond to really make it sparkle

36. PsychTests’ solutions ARCH Profile Most popular tests Multi-dimensional Emotional Intelligence Quotient (MEIQ) Multi-dimensional Intelligence Test (MIT) Work Accident Likelihood Assessment (WALA) Entrepreneurial Aptitude Profile (EntAP) Customer Service Profile (CSP) Leadership Potential Assessment (LEAP) Logic IQ Test (LIQT) Management Skills and Styles Assessment (MANSSA) Salesperson Personality Profile (SPPP) Coping Skills Assessment (COSA) Employee Attitude and Personality Test (EAPT) IT Aptitude Personality & Attitude Profile (ITAPAP) Work Integrity Test (WINT) Big 5 Personality Test (AMPM) • Online delivery system with more than 80 assessments available • Features • Import users or set up manually • Assign assessments to users • Invite users via email • Decision support tools • Instant reports (web or PDF) • Benchmarks (industry, custom) • Interview questions • Comparison tools • Job analysis • 360 & multi-rater assessments

37. PsychTests AIM Inc. • Website • http://www.archprofile.com/corporate/g/v/i/PP1 • Test catalogue • http://www.archprofile.com/corporate/g/v/i/PP1_cat • White papers • http://corporate.psychtests.com/resources