The slavish use of Personality or Psychometric Profiling of candidates is to be avoided, according to Peter Udall, manager of Relational Designers Limited (RDL)'s Hong Kong office.
Though useful as one of a number of tools for evaluating the suitability of applicants for particular jobs, it should be treated as a servant and not as a master, he says. I have recruited internationally for senior technical executives over a number of years and know that there are many other factors to be taken into consideration.
When recruiters are taken to task over 'value added services, Personality Profiling often gets mentioned. Apparently, it ensures a 'soft' fit to an
organisation while increasing the chances of staff retention and job satisfaction. If these tests aren't used correctly, recruiters might as well claim to reduce global warming too! Are recruiters using these tests correctly ? Many of them aren't and in doing so are providing a disservice to clients, candidates and to a useful tool.
Personality Profiling will quantify a person's major personality traits to create a unique character 'fingerprint' that will either be described, or
illustrated graphically. This provides a greater level of objective detail than you can read into a CV, detect through interviewing or check through
references. Using Personality Profiling as a complementary tool may be useful if you need that level of understanding or if you are faced with a
candidate who is overly 'polished'. The tendency, though, is sometimes to create a benchmark profile and pass or fail candidates against that. Doing
so creates 'profile-ism' where employers are effectively limited to a character-clone that will add no depth or variety to the working environment. There may even be the temptation to short-list candidates from a CV and Personality Profiling, without an initial interview. This is fine,
if you are the type of person that would decorate a house before putting the roof on. My advice to employers and candidates is not to participate in Personality Profiling unless you are comfortable with the context in which it is being used. Remember, there should be no 'right' or 'wrong' answers in a Personality Profiling test and one major advantage of it is in the post-hire phase; it can help an employer understand how to best manage the successful candidate. RDL makes limited use of Personality Profiling but never before an interview.
www.rdl.net
Top recruiter warns against personality profiling - 04/2001
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