For Best Results: Blend Cognitive Aptitude Testing with Personality Assessments
There are several important factors to consider when evaluating aptitude and personality together. Aptitude testing measures specific skills required to perform a job, personality predicts how a person will go about that job day after day. General cognitive aptitude, which commonly includes measures of verbal, numerical and abstract reasoning, is significantly...
Visionary vs. Operational Leaders: Which is the Right Fit for Your Business?
Visionary vs. Operational Leaders: Which is the Right Fit for Your Business? It might surprise some and be common knowledge to others that there is more than one type of leadership style. One common distinction can be made between Visionary Leaders and Operational Leaders. Work history, resume, pre-employment tests and interviews all provide evidence of a...
Hiring Information Technology Professionals: 4 Vital Personality Traits
IT professionals must perform for a business to perform, and thankfully, you can find a high-performing IT employee using the evidence gathered in a pre-employment personality test. Traits including Emotional Stability, Optimism, Extroversion and Openness should be high on your list when searching for an IT professional who fits the needs of the job. Whether you are...
Pre-Employment Testing for Leadership: 6 Personality Traits of Good Leaders
Effective managers are cut from a different cloth than other employees. These leaders exhibit a particular set of personality traits that mix emotional strength with hard work and positive attitude. High on the list of personality traits these leaders display are assertiveness, work drive, teamwork orientation, extraversion, emotional stability and optimism.
Can I Justify the Costs of Adding Pre-Employment Testing Into My Hiring Practice?
Testing can dramatically increase your success in hiring superior employees, while at the same time reducing the number of “bad or unsuccessful candidates” hired. Superior employees are an excellent investment of company resources because they: Learn more quickly so the investment in training dollars is spent wisely. Use their job knowledge to make wise decisions to...
Testing Best Practices: Dealing With Disabilities
This post is part of an ongoing series about assessment testing best practices. Click here to view other posts in the series. Discrimination: Not something that an employer wants to be accused of. Luckily, as far as assessment testing goes, there is little reason to worry (assuming of course that you are using Resources Associates tests. We can’t make...
Testing Best Practices: How To Use The Test Results
This post is part of an ongoing series about assessment testing best practices. Click here to view other posts in the series. If you want to have a happy, productive team, then you must always do your best to ensure that you are hiring smart, hard-working employees who have the potential to fit in well with your company. The cost of hiring a bad worker is far too...
Testing Best Practices: Should I Test For Mental Ability Or Personality?
This post is part of an ongoing series about assessment testing best practices. Click here to view other posts in the series. Throughout our childhood many of the tests we take in school measure little more than our ability to memorize information. But, optimal job performance is dependent on various factors, many of which are far more important than our...
Testing Best Practices: Showing Results
This post is part of an ongoing series about assessment testing best practices. Click here to view other posts in the series. From kindergarten through college and beyond, we have to take tests. But taking a test in school and taking a test as part of a job application process are obviously two very different things. For example, throughout school we study...
Testing Best Practices: When Should I Test a Job Candidate?
This post is part of an ongoing series about assessment testing best practices. Click here to view other posts in the series. The Internet has transformed our lives. The political world seems to be experiencing one revolution after another. The rising generation of millennials seems to have radically different values than their parents and grandparents had. Modern...
What is “Validity” in Personality Assessments?
The validity of a pre-hire assessment is the extent to which the assessment is well-grounded in research and corresponds accurately to the real-world dimensions it claims to represent; in short, validity is the degree to which a test measures what it is supposed to measure. Types of Validity Content validity is evaluated by showing how well the content of a...
What is “Reliability” in Personality Assessments?
Reliability of measurement refers to consistency of measurement. Other synonyms for reliability are repeatability, reproducibility, precision, dependability, fidelity, accuracy, and generalizability. Suppose you wanted to test the reliability (or, if you will, the consistency or reproducibility) of your car odometer. You drive from your house to the post office and...
The new way people work: Which personalities work best from home?
Telecommuting, or working at home, is expected to reach an all-time high. Technology makes it possible, and the increasing desire to achieve a harmonious work-life balance makes employees brave enough to ask for the opportunity to work from home, or in some cases, expect the option before taking a new job. If you are considering making the switch with some of your...
Increase the Odds of Hiring an Outstanding Performer
If only every employee you hired could be a high performer. Or, the better statement may be, “I wish I could predict who the high performers would be before I hired them!” Here’s one strategy for changing the way you hire today to increase the odds of selecting outstanding performers in the future. Step 1: Identify what an “Outstanding Performer” looks like. Note:...
Do Online Personality Tests Account for Generational Differences?
Personality tests are very popular with Fortune 500 companies and large corporations, but many small-to-medium sized businesses still hesitate to begin a pre-employment testing program that includes them. Why don’t more businesses use one of the best tools for predicting performance of new hires? Perhaps employers with smaller (or non-existent) HR departments...
Does the Job Require Repetitive Tasks? How to find the right hire for repeat work
The Problem Some jobs require only a handful of repetitive tasks. That’s not a problem, but the person in the job can be. When an entire position exists for tasks to be performed repeatedly – and at a high level of quality – people who aren’t comfortable with repetition can cause BIG problems. It’s frustrating and costly to hire a worker who says they...
Q & A with RA: “What can pre-employment tests do for our company?”
Pre-employment testing is one of the most powerful, efficient, and cost-effective tools that you can have in your applicant hiring process. Using even a modest selection ratio (defined as the number of hires vs. number of applicants), a good pre-employment testing program can greatly increase the odds of success on the job. By hiring using pre-employment tests that...
7 Traits of Employees that STAY
Big turnover costs big dollars. When employees stay, you save. The Problem As a business owner or manager, very few things feel worse than constant turnover. It’s demoralizing to both you and your staff, and we’re all aware of the thousands of dollars it takes to replace each employee that leaves. Nothing derails the performance of an organization more than...
Personal Social Media Pages: A useful pre-employment screening tool?
Social media madness has gripped modern society and its hold won’t loosen anytime soon. With the mid-2000s surge of MySpace and growth of Google’s search capabilities, it became easy to find people online. After Facebook took over as the social media leader, and grew its user base to 1 billion (only 250 million shy of the population of India), people’s lives were...
All Personality Tests are Not Equal
Professional Personality Testing is based on scientific principles, such as reliability and validity. With the advent of the internet, Personality Tests quickly became a staple of pop culture. Who hasn’t seen a friend or family member’s “personality test results” on social media? Or, have you heard someone describe “what color they are”, or describe themselves as...
The Big Five: What does it mean for your business?
Personality is a stimulating subject. It captures the attention of people looking to learn more about themselves and learn how to better relate to the world around them. They are drawn in by the allure of learning something surprising about themselves, or gaining a better understanding – or even an affirmation of – their own character. Today, businesses...
5 Things You Need to Know About Pre-Employment Testing
Companies large and small use pre-employment tests to help find the right candidates before hiring, so you might think its a good idea, too. You are right. It is a good idea. At least, if the testing is done correctly and with the right expectations. If it isn’t, like most things, it will end up being a frustrating waste of time and money. Get your new...
4 Misconceptions About Pre-Employment Testing
Cheating. Discrimination lawsuits. Bad hires. You’ve heard about the bad things can happen when you use pre-employment testing. What you’ve heard isn’t true. Hiring is a difficult process and sure, pre-employment testing isn’t a perfect solution, especially if it’s used incorrectly. It is an extremely effective solution when used right, however. If you understand...
I am a good interviewer. Why should I use a pre-employment test?
You may be the best interviewer in the nation, and statistics show you’ll still strike out if you rely on interviews alone. Beyond that, research has found that unstructured interviews, where there is no systematic plan for asking questions, have zero validity. However, structured interviews using standardized, relevant questions can be quite valid. Even...
Testing for work ethic using pre-employment personality testing
For hiring managers, human resources professionals, and small business owners, interviewing job candidates can be one of the most stressful and frustrating responsibilities. Trusting someone to protect confidential information, be dependable, represent your company well, and to be a good fit for your team cannot be fully realized during an hour interview, where...