ASSESSING people at work is important for many reasons. Assessment may be used in selection, promotion or deciding on postings. It may be conducted in an amateurish, commonsense sort of way, or by using the insights of psychometric psychology.
The question for assessors is what to assess, who is best suited to do it, when to do it and why. To some extent the “what” can neatly be divided into three areas.
■ What a person can do. This refers to their ability. It is about their capacity to complete various tasks efficiently.
■ What a person will do. This refers to someone’s motivation.
■ What a person wants to do — their preferences for certain activities over others.
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There are, in essence, five different ways to collect data on people. Of these, the first three are most commonly used.
Self-report
This is, in essence, what people say about themselves in interviews,CVs, personal statements and application forms.
Most applicants expect and indeed want an interview, partly because it is an “inter view” in the sense that both parties can see and talk to each other. Many have become experienced interviewees and have read books on how to answer difficult questions.
There are, however, two big problems with self-reporting. The first is people giving false or embellished information about themselves. This behaviour has been broken down by psychologists into two types. Impression management is where people attempt to create a good impression by leaving out information, adding untrue information or giving answers that are not strictly correct but, they hope, create a good impression in the interviewer’s mind. Next is self-deception, which occurs when people, in their own view, answer honestly, but what they say is untrue because they lack self-awareness. Therefore, someone might honestly believe he is a “good listener”, whereas all the evidence is that this is not true.
The second problem with self-reporting concerns self-insight. This is primarily what people can’t say about themselves even if they wanted to. It is best seen with questions of motivation, where people cannot give honest answers about the extent to which they are motivated by power or security.
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Observation data
This is what other people say about an individual, in references and appraisals. There are also problems with this type of information. The first is the “data bank” of the observer or reference provider . A boss will have different information to a colleague or a subordinate. A teacher or university lecturer will have different data to an employer. The question is what they know — the quality and quantity of data on a person’s ability, motivation, work style and so on. The second issue is the extent to which observers are prepared to tell the truth about an individual. Some organisations refuse to give references for fear of litigation.
Test performance
This refers to how well people do in a range of different tests. “Power”, “timed” and “ability” tests measure maximum performance. “Preference”, “untimed” and “personality” tests measure typical performance. Behavioural tests (often in groups) are also used.
There are thousands of tests of many types. Most professionals are familiar with only a smaller number. They are also often not clear about why one test may be better than another. The issue nearly always concerns evidence of the psychometric properties of the test.
Physiological evidence
This is probably the newest and most disputed of all measures. For some jobs, employees have to go through a “check-up” that may be repeated on an annual basis. Blood tests and saliva samples can be used for various diagnoses, including drug taking and stress levels. Every day, it seems, new simple physical measures are being devised that claim to be able to detect such things as whether a person is more likely to get a debilitating mental or physical disease.
Personal history
This refers, for instance, to where applicants were born and educated; the family from which they came and their present family and circumstances. Certain types of information are thought by some to be very important, such as: the social class of the parents; membership of particular groups; how many siblings they have and their place in the birth order; and what their schooling was like. Clearly, educational attainment may be most important. There are, however, various legal and ethical issues on what sort of things you can ask about.
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Adrian Furnham is professor of psychology at University College London