Perfect Personality Profiles (18 page)

This is a complex topic, and answering it is the main content of the training that people must undergo before they are allowed to use tests and questionnaires (see Chapter 5 for a fuller discussion). Most psychological questionnaires are assessed by comparing the individual’s response pattern to a known comparison group. This allows you to say whether the person has answered questions in a particular area, for instance, anxiety, in a more or less extreme manner than is typical of relevant others. It is possible to say whether people have described themselves as more anxious than 10 per cent of the population (so they have described themselves as quite relaxed and not very anxious) or more anxious than 90 per cent of the population (that is, they have described themselves as highly anxious). However, this is just the beginning of interpretation. The test user must go on to say what is the implication of this level of anxiety for the job – is it helpful to have a low, medium or high degree of anxiety in this role, or is anxiety not relevant to the role? In addition, it is important to look at the level of anxiety together with the other facets measured by the questionnaire. For instance, how does the person’s degree of structure interact with their degree of anxiety? Someone who is relaxed and unstructured may cope well with stressful situations but may be too laid back to get things done. Someone who is anxious and structured may be quite obsessively careful in their work. This can be very useful in safety-critical environments but can be an impediment where work needs to be delivered quickly. A shop assistant who takes hours lining up goods perfectly might be wasting time that could be used to encourage sales.

If employers were to specify the exact profile they were looking for on a personality questionnaire for a particular job there would be a danger of cloning. However, this is not the way that questionnaires are used. First, for any job only part of the profile will be relevant. Second, while employers may be looking for scores in a particular range on a scale, this range will be quite broad and encompass a degree of variation within it. Third, employers will often take on people who do not exactly match the criteria they set because they have other desirable qualities – skills and experience, immediate availability – or because they fit the profile better than other candidates assessed. Finally, many employers look at profiles qualitatively rather than in a fixed way. They use the information to better understand how a candidate might perform in the role without having a specific view of what their preferred personality type for the role is.

Although there is benefit to be gained from practising reasoning tests of various sorts, there is no need to practise completing a personality questionnaire. Chapter 6 describes things to do to prepare for a test, but the difficulty in taking a test for practice is that proper personality questionnaires are carefully conserved to prevent them from being overused, so easily available tests, such as those that can be accessed on the web, are of variable quality. However, if you would like to try a short questionnaire as an example, the following link will allow you to do this:
www.bbc.co.uk/science
, then search for personality. This questionnaire is a short questionnaire developed to be like the commonly used type questionnaires.

The University of Waterloo in Canada has a site for students that allows you to self-assess your personality motivation and interests, although it isn’t quite like a standard questionnaire. See
www.cdm.uwaterloo.ca/step1.asp
. Some of the books in the Further Reading allow you to self-assess your personality in different ways.

A personality questionnaire is just a tool to help employers collect information about a candidate. There are no good or bad profiles; it is a question of appropriateness to job requirements. It is the employer who decides, based on this information and other sources, whether the candidate is suitable. You should remember that an employer will typically see between two and ten candidates for every vacancy, and they may have many more applicants at the initial stages. This means that in the end most candidates will be rejected, no matter what selection method is used. Being rejected does not mean that you could not do the job. It simply means that the employer saw someone who, in their opinion, could do the job better than you. Often most of the candidates who apply for a job would be reasonably effective, and it is the nature of the selection process that many able people are rejected. If you are not having much success in applying for a job, try not to be too downhearted. It does not mean that you do not have potential. Always ask for feedback to try to understand why you have not been successful. Look for ways you can develop your skills and approach. At the same time, consider whether you are applying for the right sort of job and organization for you. There are many self-help materials to help you with a career search. See Further Reading for some suggestions.

The British Psychological Society Psychological Testing Centre website (
www.psychtesting.org.uk
) has a directory of test publishers with up-to-date contact details. The British Test Publishers Association also has a directory of members’ contact details on their website (
www.btpa.org
).

Further reading

Listed are a range of books about testing and tests, personality, the recruitment and selection process as well as some self-development books.

Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type
, Isabell Briggs Myers and Peter Myers (Davies Black Publishing, 1995)

The Psychologist’s Book of Personality Tests: 24 Revealing Tests to Identify and Overcome Your Personal Barriers to a Better Life
, Louis H. Janda (John Wiley & Sons Inc, 2001)

Testing People at Work: Competencies in Psychometric Testing
, Mike Smith and Pam Smith (Blackwell Publishing, 2004)

Team Roles at Work
, Meredith Belbin (Butterworth-Heinemann Ltd, 2003)

Type Talk at Work: How the Sixteen Personality Types Determine Your Success on the Job
, O. Kroeger, J. Thuesen and H. Rutledge (Delta, 2002)

Working with Emotional Intelligence
, Daniel Goleman (Bloomsbury Publishing, 1999)

Build Your Own Rainbow: Workbook for Career and Life Management
, Barrie Hopson and Mike Scally (Management Books, 1999)

Perfect Interview
, Max Eggert (Random House, 2003)

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People
, Stephen R. Covey (Simon & Schuster, 1999)

The Work We were Born to Do: Find the Work You Love, Love the Work You Do,
Nick Williams (Element Books, 2000)

What Color Is Your Parachute?: A Practical Guide for Job-Hunters and Career Changers: Workbook
, Richard Bolles (Ten Speed Press, 2006)

Notes

 

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