Many HR leaders think psychometrics only have one use: to help them make better senior hiring decisions.
Yet, there are, at least, four other ways you can use the right psychometric assessments for the benefit of your business
- recruitment at every level in the organisation
- individual/team development
- internal promotion
- outplacement support during redundancy.
When you want to get the best from your people, it can be easy to forget the tools you have available. Psychometric assessments can often be close to the bottom of your list. But, with a better idea of just how versatile they can be, you can improve your business by playing to people’s strengths. Let’s consider four additional ways your business can benefit from using them.
1. Recruiting at all levels within the organisation
Psychometric assessments usually form part of a senior management recruitment process these days. They’re used much less often for more junior roles. Why is this?
Too many assessments are viewed as being too long, too complex and too expensive for use in more junior roles. That’s because they’re pre-determined packages of measure (usually pre-determined by the provider) and not tailored to the specific requirement of the roles being filled. Shop around. An increasing number of providers will provide shorter, simpler, cheaper assessments, (validated for recruitment and with the same scientific rigour as the longer ones) that are perfect for less senior roles.
Given the pyramid shape of most organisations, they spend far more on the lower levels of staff, overall, and yet invest far less in making sure they get the right people when they recruit. And then they wonder why they have high (expensive) turnover. Go figure!
Psychometrics don’t just provide a significant level of recruitment information, the right assessments can help you identify strengths and understand gaps. After you hire someone, you’ll often look at their initial development needs. You’ll focus on what they need to ‘get up to speed’ in the new role.
2. Developing your people for the future
But what about a year or two on? How has their development affected their overall competencies, and where should you, and they, focus next? It’s important to re-assess your employees’ development.
It’s no secret that opportunities for personal development and growth are high on the agenda for many employees and often provide a reason why they stay with you, or leave. It’s a critical part of employee retention.
Getting updated psychometric reports allows you to take into account the latest comparison data. You can benchmark against your current top performers, who are excelling in the current market, and look for ways to develop more individuals with similar strengths.
3. Psychometrics and promotions
Many businesses try to promote internally, but relatively few use psychometric assessments when they do it. That action (or inaction) is usually supported by statements such as “Why would we use assessments? We already know him/her/them and what they’re capable of.” Really?
By the time you’re considering promoting someone, they’ve already proved themselves as a valuable member of the team. But the skill set they’ll need for the new role could be very different from the one they use in their current role.
It will probably need different competencies and behaviours. Perhaps the need to influence, rather than do, is higher, or the ability to manage people increases, or becomes important for the first time.
Assessing candidates for promotion, using a psychometric assessment, helps you identify the areas they’ll do well – but also where they’ll struggle. This shows you where they’ll need support and training – but may make you decide they are simply not the right person for the job. How many times have we heard, when a promotion hasn’t worked out, that someone “was promoted beyond the level of their incompetence”?
The problem is, this is bad for the individual, their team and the organisation as a whole. Worse still, it’s 100% avoidable. If the new role isn’t just ‘more of the same’ (and promotions rarely are) don’t promote someone without assessing them against the new requirements.
4. Understanding competencies during redundancy
Organisations spend huge amounts of money developing their employer brand and yet, how they respond to the need to make some roles redundant could enhance, or severely damage, that brand at a stroke.
Historically, the only possible responses to the need to declare redundancies have been:
1. Do nothing
2. Offer traditional Outplacement for departing employees
When redundancies are looming, most organisations want to do SOMETHING to help loyal employees – but simply don’t have the finances to afford hugely expensive Outplacement Services. Assessments that have been designed to provide Career Counselling options can provide a middle ground.
Put simply, they can take the profile of the individual via a psychometric assessment and, instead of comparing it with a single role, compare it with a large and comprehensive database of career options. It will then provide a comprehensive report offering options for the person whose role is redundant, if they don’t want to, or are unable to, continue the career they’re in.
And, assessments will do it at a fraction of the cost of a traditional outplacement package, enhancing your employer brand both for the people leaving the organisation but, more importantly, for the people staying who know you’ll provide them with a safety net if things get worse.
Using psychometrics more widely in your business
There’s more to life than recruitment (apologies to our TA and Recruitment readers) if you choose the right psychometric assessment provider. Great assessments can help you recruit, develop, promote and outplace your workforce more effectively allowing you to focus on how your people can deliver more effectively for the business.
