Right Person, Right Role: How Do We Get There?

You've heard the buzz: "Select for talent; right person, right role." But how do you do that? How do you transfer this concept into practical application? How do you uncover talents and strengths during the selection process and as part of a career-development program? Part of the answer lies in using a valid and reliable personality assessment system.

What is a Personality Assessment?

As far back as Hippocrates in the fifth century, behavioral scientists have been intrigued by human behavior and have analyzed behavior in an attempt to understand people better. Today, we have the benefit of a significant body of research that has identified five primary personality traits: dominance, extroversion, patience, conformity and conscientiousness.

Individuals higher in dominance are authoritative and prefer being in control. They are highly competitive and like to keep score. They are motivated by daily challenges and tangible results.

Individuals higher in extroversion are highly persuasive, outgoing, and enthusiastic. They are creative and tend to think in terms of the big picture. They are motivated by visibility and public recognition and are good at promoting their product, services, organization, and so forth.

Individuals higher in patience are paced and persistent. They tend to be relationship focused and take time to develop others. They are motivated by harmony and consensus. They are support specialists, good listeners, and promote teambuilding.

Individuals higher in conformity are disciplined, committed to excellence, and precise. They are motivated by doing things by the book and will have an eye on quality, systems, and processes.

Individuals higher in conscientiousness are purposeful, determined, scrupulous, and reliable. They are goal directed and highly motivated. The consensus among psychological researchers is that highly significant correlations exist between higher conscientiousness and superior job performance.

A personality assessment measures an individual's preferences in these five behavioral traits. Try this quick exercise. Find a blank sheet of paper and sign your name. How did it feel? Natural, comfortable, you didn't have to think about it, right? Now, use your non-preferred hand and sign your name. How did that feel? Awkward, uncomfortable? A personality assessment identifies the behavioral tendencies or natural preferences of each person, when they feel more natural, energized, and competent. By understanding an individual's tendencies in these five personality traits, you will have a better sense of their natural strengths and talents that could best support job success, as well as potential liabilities that could hinder their success.

How Does it Work?

There are three main components to using a personality assessment.

1. The Communication Profile measures the relative strength of the five personality factors within the individual. While there is a wide variety of personality assessments in the marketplace, additional components that give powerful insight include Emotional Intelligence factors (personal insight, self-discipline, drive, interpersonal insight, social agility), as well as tendencies in motivation, leadership style, decision-making style, energy, stress level, proactivity, and self-monitoring.
2. The Job Profile identifies key success factors of your existing top performers, the personality traits and behavioral tendencies most closely tied to success within each position. Capturing the behaviors that your top performers demonstrate on the job allows you to build a unique success template for each position. If you don't have top performers in the position, an effective assessment system uses a job profile survey based on the perceptions of key associates and managers who can define what top performance looks like.
3. The Matching Report compares and contrasts an individual to the Job Profile. During the selection process, this report shows how much flexibility the candidate would need to exert in order to perform the essential duties of the position. The more flexibility used, the more energy the person needs to expend. If a person needs to flex too far away from their natural tendencies and personality preferences, it can be exhausting. The candidate would not use their greatest strengths to perform their job. Used in career development, this objective report supports a meaningful coaching discussion, how strengths can be leveraged and areas where strength needs to be developed.

An additional component that is critical during the selection process is an Interview Guide that focuses on the job's core competencies. It provides interviewers with targeted, behavior-based interview questions to confirm strengths and probe likely challenges based on past behaviors during specific on-the-job experiences. It also creates consistency, an apples-to-apples comparison, when evaluating the best candidate for the position.

Does a personality assessment tell me all I need to know about an individual? Let's return to our earlier handwriting example. Imagine you broke your preferred hand and had to use your non-preferred hand for some time. What would happen? The more you write with your non-preferred hand, the better you'd get, perhaps even proficient. While a personality assessment gives insight into natural talents and strengths, a behavior-based interview reveals areas of additional skill that may have been developed through challenging work assignments or a good coach.

Organizations that use a personality assessment as a knock-out tool do not get the whole story and overlook good candidates who have developed additional skills and success strategies based on their life experiences.

While a personality assessment provides insight into individual talents, the interview will reveal how much the candidate likes using particular strengths and talents and if the way the talents are demonstrated is a good fit for the job and your company.

Leveraging insights from a personality assessment to conduct a targeted and meaningful interview or career-development discussion will give you better information to ensure the right person in the right role. A better career fit translates into increased employee retention and productivity, ultimately, leading to improved bottom line results. In the next issue of Measurement, Evaluation, & ROI News, we will explore how to identify the right assessment system for your organization.