Reinforcing interviews with psychometric tests

Tony Baxter, Associate Director at Action Planning, explains how the chances of a successful appointment can be dramatically increased by using a series of exercises, including psychometric tests. Tony has worked extensively in the public, commercial and charitable sectors and is a renowned expert in fundraising, strategy and communications. He is also a qualified psychometrician accredited by the British Psychological Society.

The third sector has to date been relatively cautious about investing in psychometric testing of job candidates, but the practice is becoming more widely adopted as charities count the cost of failed appointments.

We all have experience of applicants who perform brilliantly at interview but who subsequently disappoint in post. A well structured interview, with carefully structured questions to test experience and skills, can improve the success rate, but cannot fully substitute for the insights into personality, performance and impact on a team which psychometric tests can produce.

Research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), reproduced in the graph below, reveals marked differences between the reliability of different forms of selection.


Interviews will always remain an important part of the selection process, not least since they ‘feel right’ to candidates and give the process ‘face validity’ but should ideally be combined with a broad range of other measures and exercises within an assessment centre. If professionally delivered to reflect the organisation's ethos and precise skills requirements, reliability levels of up to 80% can be expected (CIPD research in 800 organisations).

Typically an assessment centre will bring together 3 to 5 shortlisted candidates for a day or more of exercises and interviews. These might include: role play, group exercises, problem solving, one-to-one and panel interviews, presentations, personality assessments and work based ability tests.

To have validity, assessment centres must always be administered by trained and qualified personnel, a minimum requirement being British Psychological Society Level A & B.

There are many different tests and measures available but most have been developed for a North American audience then adapted for the UK. I believe that many of these are culturally flawed so recommend using at least one instrument developed for our own home market. I recommend:

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The ‘Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal’ that measures higher level verbal reasoning ability. ‘W-GCTA’ norms were produced from a UK sample of over 1500.

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The ‘Rust Advanced Numerical Reasoning Appraisal’ used in conjunction with the ‘W-GCTA’ gives a seamless and demanding appraisal of the high level skills needed by managerial and professional staff.

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‘Orpheus’ provides a comprehensive measure of a candidate’s personality, how they might fit into the team, how they will cope with stress and whether they can think for themselves.

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‘Giotto’ was developed in the UK alongside ‘Orpheus’. It is one of the best known and respected measures of integrity.

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‘Intrinsic’ measures motivation. As well as providing a very useful tool in the recruitment process, Intrinsic is also excellent for use in career counselling or team building situations.

Third sector recruitment budgets are inevitably limited, and this has doubtless inhibited the use of some of these tools, but a package of tests can be put together at reasonable cost, and might prove to be one of your best investments.