With the birth of a new decade, many strategic companies are seeking ways to remain competitive and relevant in an ever-changing workforce. Moreover, as new generations get into the workforce, many aspects of the professional world are shifting significantly.
To get a hold of top-performing candidates, organizations have had to come up with new ways of hiring. One of these is the now popular and non-conventional method of personality-based hiring.
Is it Legal to Use Personality Tests in Hiring?
Though perceived to be beneficial to many companies, personality tests have raised a few legal concerns.
The current employment laws all have requirements that employers should adhere to when administering personality tests. Title VII, for example, allows employers to carry out personality tests and act based on the results. Nevertheless, it prohibits the issuance of these tests in a manner that may discriminate against protected classes.
While the constitution upholds the practice of personality-based hiring, administering these tests has the potential of violating both the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and the Americans with Disability Act (ADA). If you can prove beyond reasonable doubt that a personality test issued to you during the hiring process was used as a discrimination mask, then you can take legal action.
Personality tests also raise privacy violation concerns. Some questions included in these tests are quite intrusive in nature and can invoke feelings of insecurity amongst candidates. Moreover, the privacy of these test results is often questionable. While privacy laws exist in some states such as Massachusetts, most states don't have any laws governing the privacy of personality tests.
Why Do Employers Use Personality Tests?
Personality tests are becoming more and more popular amongst 21st-century employers. A recent survey revealed that 40% of Fortune 100 companies use some form of psychological testing during the hiring process.
Companies want to have an idea of the opinions, preferences, attitudes, analytical thinking, fashion sense, and emotional state of a candidate before they decide to hire.
Employers have today realized that the interview process alone is not enough to judge if an applicant is cut out for a job. A personality test gives an in-depth understanding of who the company is about to hire and their ability to be in sync with the organization's culture. It shines the light on candidates who will easily fit into a company's culture and eases the shortlisting process.
Companies use different personality tests for different reasons. A sales and marketing firm can use the introversion-extroversion personality test to get the ideal candidate for a sales and marketing representative position. On the other hand, a law enforcement organization can use the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) to test the emotional and mental stability of a potential candidate.
The most used personality tests are integrity and honesty tests. These are often used when recruiting applicants for low or medium paying jobs that require handling large sums of money. The goal is to tests the candidate’s trustworthiness with the company’s resources. There’s a common belief in the workplace that a candidate’s performance in these tests determines his performance in real-life situations.
Does Personality-Based Hiring Work for 2020?
The post-modern world has witnessed an upsurge in personality-based hiring. Employers today believe that to get the right employee, you must look beyond the interview performance. A candidate can pass an interview but fail to align with an organization's culture. Hiring such a candidate may be detrimental to the overall performance of a company.
Since skills, unlike personality, can be learned, the latter takes center stage when looking for the perfect individual for the job.
Personality based hiring is likely to become even more common in 2020 and beyond. Over the last two decades, many employers seem to have acknowledged that strictly conventional hiring methods tend to leave out people who are potential workplace assets.
As the world advances, workplace hiring dynamics continue to shift towards nonconventional practices as companies seek candidates who can promote their culture and fuel productivity.
Hiring and progression of new employees are one of the biggest investments a company can make. A company that makes good hiring decisions tends to have high productivity and low turnovers. Finding employees that fit perfectly into the existing organizational culture creates employees who love their job and perform exceptionally well.
Hiring the wrong people for a job does not only affect performance levels negatively but also wastes money invested in training and development programs. In 2020 and beyond, competitive companies cannot rely on skills alone when selecting employees. They must go deeper to identify exceptional talent and behavior. The hiring process is an expensive affair, so why would you not go for a candidate whose personality will let him thrive in the culture of the company?
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- Personality-Based Hiring: Will It Work For 2020? - February 6, 2020
