The science is clear, to achieve the best result for candidate selection organisations must incorporate highly validated Psychometric assessments into their recruitment process.
There are many Psychometric assessments available but buyers beware, many are not properly validated, are not very reliable, and as a result, have a low propensity of selecting the best candidate for the role. This reduces an organisation’s potential, and negatively impacts job seekers’ as they are being unfairly assessed and missing out on working in a job they may have otherwise secured.
Another issue we have come across are organisations using tools intended for employee development during the recruitment process – these tools may provide them with insight for on-boarding and future development but they add little to the recruitment process.
The best Psychometric assessments for recruitment are “Predictive Normative – Multi-Construct” instruments that measure the Total Person (Cognitive Abilities, Behavioural Traits and Occupational Interests) and measure the candidate against high-performance role benchmarks to provide a measure of ‘fit’. Overall, this predicts whether they can perform to a high standard, whether they will be engaged in the job, and whether they will be motivated to come to work every day.
It is critical you ensure any assessment you use provides valid and reliable measurement so you can trust the results.
Tests which are valid have high levels of:
- Predictive Validity. They have been demonstrated to have a strong link to future job performance. In other words, a candidate who receives a high score on the assessment will meet and exceed their KPIs once placed in the position. A predictive validity coefficient of .35 or higher is considered very beneficial; any assessment scoring under .20 is not recommended.
- Face Validity. They are perceived by the candidate to be relevant to the job role, and the candidate agrees with the results of the assessment.
- Content Validity. The test is supported by psychological theory and measures what it claims to measure accurately.
Tests which are reliable have high levels of:
- Test Re-Test Reliability. Psychometric assessments for recruitment should measure stable Cognitive Abilities and Behavioural Traits, and therefore, if a candidate takes the same test twice within a short time period, we should expect that they should receive the same or at least highly similar results. A test-retest coefficient of .70 is considered the minimum threshold.
- Internal Consistency: Each individual question measures what it is intended to measure. For example, a question about how sociable someone is would be demonstrably linked to their extraversion score. A Cronbach’s alpha score of .70 is considered the minimum threshold.
When looking for an appropriate Psychometric assessment for recruitment, it is therefore critical you ensure the one you select is supported by research and application to have high validity and reliability scores.
Peoplogica’s JobFit assessments fulfil all of these requirements and they been relied upon globally to make accurate hiring decisions for over 20 years. If you would like to know more, please contact michael@peoplogica.com
Written by Michael Mancinone
