Psychometric Testing — How Much Testing Is Too Much?

It is very understood that employers looking forward to hiring new candidates within the company are today looking forward to conducting psychometric testing to evaluate them before making a decision. Many companies have psychometric testing laboratories within their premises to conduct the tests at their convenience. Some companies have a procedure, which can be completed within a couple of hours while the others take longer to complete. Therefore, questions have been raised about how much testing is actually required to understand the intelligence, aptitude and the ability of an applicant. Unfortunately, every individual seems to have his or her opinion about how much is too much. Some have confirmed it only takes a few questions to understand an individual while others have a conflicting stance and believe extensive testing is necessary. Let us look at the reasons why differences have been seen in the time required to complete psychometric testing.

There could be various reasons why companies have psychometric testing of varying durations. Until this moment, there is no information available about whether a standard testing procedure has been made available for use by all employers. This is an indicator that the tests usually are prepared by independent evaluators who may have their own assumptions about how an applicant for a job should be evaluated. It is also certain that most companies have been provided the questionnaire by these independents with the information that this is the best way to screen candidates.

Companies and establishments will have their individual requirements and will be looking forward to adding questions or removing them according to their needs. In these conditions, it is likely that they could be looking forward to information, which does not really matter to them. It is basically for these reasons that various time differences have been seen in the kind of psychometric testing conducted by companies.

Applicants for a job who are subjected to lengthy psychometric testing are likely to become annoyed with the procedure and even begin to believe it is only to show them as candidates who are unfit for the position. They could even begin spreading the word making it known to all that the company advertising the position has a biased approach making it difficult for them to find proper candidates.

Things would have been a lot better if there was a standard procedure for psychometric testing, which would take the basic information needed from applicants to assess them. Information is available to prove psychometric testing, which is effective and provides all the information needed should not take more than 25 minutes to complete. Any employer who is trying to subject applicants for a job to hours of psychometric testing is only wasting time and money when they should be looking forward to utilizing the services of the candidates after completing the selection by getting the information they need.

Therefore, there is a need for employers to understand that they should not indulge in psychometric testing of the endless variety because it will merely hamper their progress making it difficult for them to get good candidates of their choice.

What is Psychometric Testing

Psychometric is a Greek word where psycho means ‘mental’ and metric means ‘measurement’. Therefore psychometric tests can be defined as an attempt to objectively measure the mental ability of an individual. These tests aim to measure different aspects of personality such as aptitude, skills as individual has, capabilities he attained, potential, etc. Psychometric tests are recognized as the most quick and efficient method to assess individual and to obtain in-depth psychological profile to obtain personality and intellectual level of an individual.

The British Psychological Society definition of a psychometric test:

“A psychological test is any procedure on the basis of which inferences are made concerning a person's capacity, propensity or liability to act, react, experience, or to structure or order thought or behavior in particular ways’’.

Psychometric Test is a means to assess candidate’s relevant skills and abilities corresponding to organizational needs. It is a tool that enables HR personnel dealing with the recruitment process to assess potentials and weaknesses in personality and professional abilities required in the candidate to perform the desired organizational tasks. Psychometric tests deal with measurement of knowledge, skills abilities and personality traits of an applicant in relation with the desired skill set. The two important facets of evaluation are cognitive and personality tests. Both of these tests in totality provide correct assessment. It is pertinent to note that this test reveals important information about personality traits of the candidates that are difficult to extract from other methods i.e. face-to-face interviews.

Psychometric Testing is a very extensive approach to comprehend the obligatory skills or traits of a particular individual.

What are the sections of Psychometric tests

They can be in any form as following

1.      Case studies

2.      Group activities

3.      In-Tray exercises

4.      Oral presentations

5.      Battery of tests

6.      Discussions and role plays

7.      Networking and social functions

8.      Online assessments

Number of psychometric tests

There are large numbers of tests available to analyze and interpret. Some common types of tests used are

1.      Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC)

2.      Bender Visual-Motor Gestalt Test

3.      Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS)

4.      Minnesota Multiphase Personality Inventory (MMPI)

5.      Rorschach Ink Blot Test

6.      Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

7.      Sentence Completion

8.      Goodenough Draw-A-Person Test

9.      House-Tree-Person-Test (HTP)

10.  Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale

Assessment areas of psychometric testing

The key skills that are assessed during psychometric testing are

1.      Communication skills

2.      Organizing ability

3.      Problem solving

4.      Working in a team

5.      Drive and initiative

6.      Taking responsibility

7.      Working under pressure

8.      Analytical skills

9.      Creativity

10.  Leadership

11.  Motivation

12.  Planning

13.  Numeracy

Things to look after during/before/after psychometric testing

1.      Prepare for success

2.      Practice, practice and practice

3.      Don’t underestimate the importance of first impressions

4.      Don’t panic

5.      Leave a good impression

6.      Believe in yourself

7.      Be positive, enthusiastic and natural

Who can administer psychometric test

1.      Clinical psychologist

2.      Organizational psychologist

3.      Specialists

4.      Demographers

5.      Statistical analysts

6.      Behaviorists

7.      Specialists in testing and recruitment

8.      Human resource persons

Myths about Psychometric testing

1.      Psychologist can read your mind therefore these tests provide all type of information that is required which cannot be possible through any type of testing

2.      Psychometric tests which are used for selection, development or assessment purposes determines how ‘crazy’ a candidate is- these tests are only used to see if person is capable of doing individual task

3.      Psychometric tests are perfect and they give 100% true picture which cannot be possible as these tests are man-made and there is a chance of error

4.      Good  quality psychometric tools must be expensive and cheap tests do not give original picture-it is not true as now a day’s large number of tests are available in large variety and in different prices

5.      Candidates who undertake unsupervised testing will cheat-this cannot be possible as there are no right or wrong answers.

6.      Psychometric assessments allow us to discriminate between candidates-it is not true as one individual test assessments is compared with standard norms to see the results.

Limitations of using psychometric tests

•         Candidates can fake a good profile because mostly candidates do not know what a “good” profile looks like and in trying of making it perfect or good they give fake information.

•         Candidates can cheat when they do unsupervised testing just to make themselves look perfect however if examiner gains personal trust and clearly describes candidates that what are they are how cheating can make poor impression they might can understand.

•         These tests are based on self report i.e. they are based on individual own perception about themselves rather someone else’s information therefore it might hurdles in finding true results

•         Before testing individual should be cleared that with whom their information will be shared and what the test actually involves therefore any bad experience can put candidates off psych testing.

•         Sometimes data is not recorded that is being reported therefore it should be insured that data should be recorded as it is taken.