Personality Tests in Recruitment and Appraisal Processes

Most Management functions like Recruitment, Training, appraisal, and personal development plans for the employees are of high costs to an organization. The process of selecting the right candidate for the right position is equally demanding. During the initial phases of selection, a candidate can be assessed for the degrees earned, skills gained, knowledge, mental abilities through aptitude tests and formal reference checks. However a person’s true personality and temperament is far harder to judge during interviewing.

Therefore, in the current scenario most organizations are becoming extremely cautious in screening out job applicants and in deciding about whether a candidate will fit into a particular organizational role. Organizations are trying to find out ways to understand beforehand, what a candidate’s natural behavior is like and deciding upon his/her contribution to the overall execution of the tasks assigned .This has led to the use of personality tests like MBTI, FIRO-B, and 16 PF etc.

Personality tests are believed to measure a wide range of attributes, including interpersonal skills, sales and leadership ability, thinking style and emotions. These tests also have relevance during Appraisal process and in establishing career direction for employees.

The personality of an individual is a combination of various personality traits such as Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Emotional Stability etc. For example, people who have higher degree of emotional stability tend to be happier than others. This characteristic relates to job satisfaction, life satisfaction and lower levels of stress. Thus, people who score high on this dimension are extroverts, optimistic, experience lesser negative emotions and are happier at their job as compared to introverts. It is also observed that extroverts tend to emerge as leaders and are assertive and dominant. Similarly, people who score high on openness are more creative in science and art. It is also observed that agreeable people are poor negotiators and are able to achieve lower levels of success as compared to disagreeable people.

The personality tests help recruiters understand the preferences, interests, personality types and behavior patterns of candidates applying for jobs. Certain characteristics and personality traits are considered important for particular job types, so the tests help to establish whether those traits exist or not.

However, there has been mixed opinions about the usage of personality tests in recruitment and appraisal processes. The extent to which the test results are an indicator of future performance has been the subject of debate for many years. There are also concerns that candidates can skew test results by choosing responses that put them in a favorable light.

It is therefore important to understand that personality tests must be conducted under the supervision of experts and it should never be relied upon as the sole tool in recruitment and appraisal decisions. A combination of interviewing, psychometric testing and reference checking must be implemented to pick out the right candidates for the right organizational positions.