talk to me about psychometric testing

Years ago I got books out the library and after a week my scoring was up substantially

Not used them as a recruiter but been through them as a prospective employee. No practice and I always got through to the interview or offer stage. Good luck to your daughter.

It is, of course, twaddle. But that's typical of what an INTP would say. 😁

The line in the sand I had was always, "can I see the results?" If the answer is no then I'm not doing them, you're not holding metrics on me in secret. If yes, eh, might be interesting.

That was always with an existing employer though, rather an a recruiter. At an recruitment stage I'd wonder if they were stuck for something to do.

When he was 16, my mate had to do one of these for a summer shelf-stacking job at Safeway's(!). He was rejected.

He's the smartest person I know and now earns a lot of money as an engineer with a PhD.

So either it was a load of shite, or it correctly predicted that he would have got bored quickly. He got a job in a Curry's warehouse instead.

It is, of course, twaddle.

Not necessarily.
The personality test subset are twaddle but the aptitude tests (eg logic, financial etc) can be good for junior roles where you want a better idea of potential than just school grades. Although as with most tests have the problem they can be trained for.
Without knowing what tests they do its hard to offer useful advice though

the aptitude tests (eg logic, financial etc) can be good for junior roles where you want a better idea of potential than just school grades. Although as with most tests have the problem they can be trained for.
Without knowing what tests they do its hard to offer useful advice though

1. Ideally the "training" will involve learning relevant knowledge or skills. This might not be the case for poorly designed tests, but a well-designed test can be trained for by learning stuff.

2. Yes, it's impossible to give any useful advice without knowing what the test is and how the scores are interpreted.

It is, of course, twaddle. But that’s typical of what an INTP would say.

I know that's said partly for effect, and generally for recruitment I'd agree - we don't use them and if we did I wouldn't make a decision based on a candidate having the right or wrong personality indicator. We do though make decisions after interviews that do take into account 'personality', how they came across, are they likely to fit in (or more likely be such a misfit that it is problematic for them and others they work with).

Capability testing, such as verbal reasoning or numeracy is a different matter; I don't think many reject evidential testing for them. If the candidate has no basic maths skills, then the job in budget forecasting probably isn't for them.

So that's a bit weird when written down.....in that we use evidence based systems for numeracy, but don't for personality. I guess comes down to whether we believe personality type testing is reliable, and there seems to be a mistrust for it and instead we favour our own instinct above it.

For personal use - the MB indicators, etc., can be quite interesting. Not to the point where it goes on to list out the jobs you're suited to, but I think they can reveal some of your preferences and styles, and help to understand that there are others with different ones. Likewise, would I use them when putting eg: a task and finish team together - "Steve's the right skill set but he's an I and we don't have enough E's, so let's have Marie on the team instead....' absolutely not.

Absolute load of rubbish, we scrapped them.

So that’s a bit weird when written down…..in that we use evidence based systems for numeracy, but don’t for personality. I guess comes down to whether we believe personality type testing is reliable, and there seems to be a mistrust for it and instead we favour our own instinct above it.

There are a whole lot of issues with personality testing. One problem is simply that the theoretical basis is weak, it's difficult to define the construct being measured.

Another issue is the use of self-report questionnaires. In poorly designed tests, it's obvious what the desirable response is so anyone with any sense will just respond dishonestly (because everyone else will so being honest is just dumb).

A better approach is to interview the candidates and ask them to recount a situation where they demonstrated some desirable trait, leadership for example. Of course, it's still possible to lie about this but it's more difficult to lie plausibly than in a questionnaire.

Best thing is to be able to observe them at work and see how they actually behave in real situations. Some people who do spectacularly in interviews will turn out to be terrible employees, others who struggle in interview situations will turn out to be excellent employees.

That's what I was trying to express but not very well. If the psychological tests could be developed sufficiently to be properly reliable they wouldn't get such a bad hearing. But where people aren't honest in answering and/or the answers are too easy to game they lose meaning and trust. You can't really game a numeracy test by giving the answer the interviewer wants rather that the one you really think it should be!

Another interesting bit I read.....for young interviewees without life and job experience the interview is a very unreliable selection process, they don't have the time served to be able to answer with examples and all answers will be either  'what I would do' or for the well prepared, 'should do' answers. Their formal qualifications are reckoned to be a better indicator at this point, of intelligence and work ethic.  Of course some kids are just god at exams, some are just bad and what these last few COVID years have done to exam results as an indicator, who knows.

We're doing apprentice selection panels next week, mainly task based in teams and individuals and very little interview based.

The personality test subset are twaddle but the aptitude tests (eg logic, financial etc) can be good

Sure. But psychometric tests and aptitude tests are different things.

Without knowing what tests they do its hard to offer useful advice though

Good point.

Sure. But psychometric tests and aptitude tests are different things.

Both personality and aptitude tests are grouped under the banner of psychometric.
Although I suspect some of the companies concentrating on aptitude do try and use just aptitude to avoid the taint of the personality tests.

If the psychological tests could be developed sufficiently to be properly reliable they wouldn’t get such a bad hearing.

Most of the personality tests have sod all to do with psychology but are just mumbojumble.
At uni did some psychology modules of which one did spend a couple of hours on the popular personality tests. However it was partly to pull them apart and partly as a "gaming tests are bad so these are the things you shouldnt do when applying for jobs".

I know that’s said partly for effect, and generally for recruitment I’d agree

Yeah, I did hope that was fairly obvious!

There's a whole field of psychology and it's something which, really, is likely still quite poorly understood. I don't mean to dismiss that. Rather, psychometric testing tells you what you already knew anyway. Question: "on a scale of 1 to 5, how comfortable are you in giving instructions to others?" Conclusion: you'd be a good / bad manager / trainer. Well, duh. Yes that could be useful information to know of a candidate, but why not just ask "do you have any relevant management experience?" during the interview? Surely that's more reliable than easily lied-about testing.

We do though make decisions after interviews that do take into account ‘personality’, how they came across, are they likely to fit in (or more likely be such a misfit that it is problematic for them and others they work with).

I know this isn't what you meant, but you need to be a little bit careful around rejecting candidates based on whether or not you think their face would fit. If any of those are protected characteristics (or could be interpreted as such) then you have potential for a discrimination claim.

It might seem perfectly logical to think "well, we can't take on Abdul because the shop-floor is full of Express-reading racists" but it's also illegal.

Both personality and aptitude tests are grouped under the banner of psychometric.

I sit corrected.

I've done a few over the years and they've always been the former. Aptitude tests, as you say, have always been referred to as aptitude tests.

I quite enjoy doing them, TBH. I just expect full visibility of what happens with the results.

I know this isn’t what you meant, but you need to be a little bit careful around rejecting candidates based on whether or not you think their face would fit. If any of those are protected characteristics (or could be interpreted as such) then you have potential for a discrimination claim.

It might seem perfectly logical to think “well, we can’t take on Abdul because the shop-floor is full of Express-reading racists” but it’s also illegal.

Oh for sure. We're well drilled on that, but outside of protected characteristics there is a risk/benefit judgement to be made. After we've interviewed when we wash up with the panel that's a key challenge by HR for the interviewers - are we just recruiting people like us (not necessarily demographically like us but who think and react like us). I'm actually one of the people most likely to dig in for someone not like us, seeing the value in alternative ways of thinking, but that's not the same as 'complete arse that will **** everyone off within a week'

Psychometrics is the field that deals with measuring psychological constructs. This includes aptitude tests as well as survey instruments. Validating a test or research instrument requires much more than just adding up scores and calculating a reliability coefficient.

I know this isn’t what you meant, but you need to be a little bit careful around rejecting candidates based on whether or not you think their face would fit.

One of the dangers here is you end up with groupthink. We all want to work with people who get along well, people who are constantly disagreeing and bickering are a pain in the arse to deal with. Problem is that you need contrarians to ask awkward questions. Smart people aren't less susceptible to groupthink than not-smart people, they're actually more susceptible. Most of the time the majority opinion will turn out to be the best option, but sometimes smart people head off in the wrong direction and groupthink prevents them realizing they are lost. Being smart just makes it even more difficult to persuade them that they made a mistake. So, you need people with a diverse range of viewpoints who aren't afraid to ask awkward questions. It can make it difficult to get things done but if you don't encourage diverse viewpoints, you will end up with people sitting around congratulating each other on how clever they are, not realizing that they are in trouble.

Thanks for all responses I think job is for Yorkshire ambulance service patient transfers she tried for apprenticeship but 100 for 4 places I guess test is a filter initially can’t find any practice materials in town so will go online
Fingers crossed 🤞