The Top 5 Psychometric Tests For Your Hiring Process
Did you know that in 2019, 75% of Fortune 500 companies used some form of psychometric testing in their recruitment process? This number shows no signs of going down, which indicates how much modern companies value the positive impact of psychometric testing on hiring cycles.
Nowadays, there are a variety of different psychometric assessments you can choose from, all using different metrics and measures to holistically evaluate a candidate. Because of the wide variety, it can be tricky to figure out which test is the right one for you. Our team here at Skillsarena have put together a comprehensive guide on the top 5 psychometric tests that can help you improve your recruitment process.
But first...
What is a psychometric test?
A psychometric test is a type of assessment used to measure a candidate's personality traits and behaviour. The field of psychometric science was first developed between 1886 and 1889 by scientists at the University of Cambridge and has since been used as the basis to all different types of psychometric assessments. Recruiters often implement these tests early on in the application process, usually before the interview stages. Psychometric tests can help to assess whether an applicant is suited for the role by understanding their cognitive abilities and personality traits.
How can psychometric tests help my hiring process?
Strengthen recruitment
Pre-employment assessments are a great way to create a stronger recruitment strategy. Through using aptitude testing and psychometric testing during recruitment, hiring managers will be able to have an objective metric to help them assess how well a candidate is suited to the role available. This objective framework can also help make your hiring process bias-free and more efficient, helping you identify high-performing applicants quickly and easily.
Maintain company culture
Psychometric testing is also very useful in ensuring any potential hires will suit the company's culture. When hiring using traditional methods, such as relying on CVs and cover letters, it can be tricky to determine whether an applicant's personality will fit with the company's values and culture. Pre-hire personality tests take the guesswork out of this and helps to ensure a cohesive team.
Identify leadership potential
This is especially important for roles that require strong leadership skills or where there is opportunity to progress to a leadership role. By using psychometric tests, recruiters can easily identify which candidates have the necessary traits and create a stronger plan to support their development.
Here are the top 5 psychometric tests that can help you improve your recruitment strategies:
Situational Judgement Tests
Situational Judgement Tests (SJT) are more practice based compared to the previous psychometric tests discussed. They're used to assess a candidate's judgement and decision making abilities. Many employers choose to implement SJTs as they help measure how well applicants respond to real life situations. These are especially useful for more high pressure roles such as customer service call centre roles.
The questions in situational judgement tests are presented through various examples of real life situations. Based on these examples, the applicant will be expected to select the right response using their own good judgement. They'll then be marked based on how many correct responses they input into the test.
Logical Reasoning Tests
Logical reasoning tests are used to assess an applicant's problem-solving skills. These types of psychometric tests are extremely useful as problem solving skills are essential to many jobs, but it can be hard to measure this in the pre-employment phase. Candidates can easily say that they have excellent problem-solving skills but end up falling short when they're put in a practical situation. Through testing their logical reasoning abilities during the pre-screening stages, employers can rest assured that they are narrowing their candidate pool down to only the best and brightest.
Examples of logical reasoning tests include verbal reasoning and numerical reasoning tests. Both numerical reasoning and verbal reasoning are essential skills for almost any job in every industry therefore these tests are often used alongside each other to create a more thorough assessment of the candidate. With logical reasoning tests, applicants will typically be presented with sets of data and information, which they'll have to interpret in order to answer each question accurately. This is a popular form of pre-employment testing due to how it can help create an objective metric that helps assess job applicants.
Skills-Based Aptitude Tests
An aptitude test, also called ability tests or skills tests, are another popular form of pre-employment psychometric tests. Aptitude tests differ from other forms of psychometric testing as they are typically more job-focused and are able to measure specific job-related skill sets. For example, recruiters hiring for an accountancy role may benefit in using a financial accounting skills test to ensure candidates have the right levels of certain accountancy specific skills. Ability tests have become extremely popular as of late due to how they're able to accurately measure a candidate's industry specific knowledge and aptitude.
Aptitude tests work similarly to SJTs in that they both present questions in the form of real life situations. The main difference is that aptitude tests will include real life situations that link directly to a specific role or industry. Candidates will be expected to respond to each real life situation using their own knowledge of and experience with the role.
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, also known as the Myers-Briggs Personality test measures a candidate's personality through four dimensions. This assessment is based on the framework developed by Isabel Myers and Katherine Briggs that organises personality traits in 4 categories: introversion or extroversion, sensing or intuition, thinking or feeling, and judging or perceiving.
With this assessment, the candidate answers a series of multiple choice questions in an online test or on paper. From these answers they will then be able to see what their personality type is, based on the 4 categories. Their personality type will be indicated by 4 letters according to the different categories and there are 16 possible personality combinations. For example, a possible personality type could be INFP. This personality test is widely known and used around the world and can help recruiters understand an applicant's strengths, weaknesses, and potential compatibility.
While we've included Myers-Briggs on this list due to its sheer popularity, the usefulness of this personality assessment is limited for a few key reasons. Firstly, it is overly complex -- the 16 different potential personality results are hard to remember and can be obscure and difficult to apply to real-life decision-making. Secondly, this personality test is not entirely suited to the workplace due to the complexity of the results and the personal or private nature of many of the questions. Using this form of psychometric testing in the recruitment phase might make potential candidates uncomfortable because this form of personality profiling is great for individual self-reflection but less appropriate for a business setting.
In fact, the Myers-Briggs website even states that the test should not be used in recruitment! If your organisation has used this psychometric test in the past, it might be time to look for an alternative.
DiSC Assessments
Also included in this list due to the ubiquity of this psychometric test, DiSC assessments are another popular form of personality tests often used in recruitment. This test is based on the theories of William Moulton Marston. Similarly to the Myers-Briggs test, the DiSC assessment organises a candidate's personality traits into 4 behavioural styles: Dominance, Influence, Steadiness, and Compliance. You may find that different test providers will sometimes swap out different terms (eg. Support instead of Steadiness) but they all follow the same DiSC framework.
The DiSC Assessment requires candidates to answer a string of questions, after which they will receive a comprehensive report with their DiSC profile. This report will identify what their most dominant behavioural style is out of the 4, while also breaking down how present the other styles are within their personality as well.
While DiSC assessments are certainly better suited to the recruitment process than Myers-Briggs, these nonetheless have their own particular shortcomings. One of the biggest issues with DiSC is that the names of the different personality profiles may unfortunately introduce more bias into the hiring process. For example, when hiring for a leadership role, a recruiter may subconsciously assume that a person with the Dominant personality type will be better for the role, even if in reality they are not the most suited to the job.
For this reason, we prefer the Character DNA test, a personality assessment that categorises people into four easy-to-remember colours: Red, Yellow, Green, and Blue. While these are memorable and useful in a recruitment setting, they also avoid the potential bias that DiSC can introduce or the unnecessary complexity and overly personal nature of Myers-Briggs. There are even versions of the Character DNA test that specifically look at the way a candidate's personality style is likely to contribute to their performance as a team manager or remote worker.
Conclusion
Psychometric testing has increasingly become a popular method to help recruiters make the best hiring decisions. This testing helps reduce bias, streamlines the recruitment process, and ensures all hires are a great fit for your company culture. By implementing psychometric tests, we guarantee you'll see a happier and more productive workforce.
If you're interested in implementing psychometric tests in your recruitment process, feel free to contact us and we can help you find the best hiring solution for your company!
