There are thousands of (psychological) assessment tools used in business. Benefiting from the full power of an assessment tool is as crucial to the bottom line as getting the most out of any other tool. It takes as much expertise and care as selecting the right software, fork lift, or ad campaign. This article will discuss the most widely used assessment tools and their intended use in business.

The overwhelming majority of business assessment tools are designed to measure either personality, motivation (attitudes, values), or competence (skill). The first of these, personality assessment, has a long tradition in the field of psychology. Despite this tradition, there is little consensus about how exactly to measure or, in fact, define personality. Two widely used assessment tools illustrate the range of approaches to assessing personality.

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is based on a theory of personality developed by the Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung. In brief, Jung asserted that all people can be categorized by where they fall along each of four scales: attitude , perception, judgment, and style of dealing with the world.

While there are many ways the MBTI has been used in companies around the world, its authors clearly intended to help identify “fit” between an individual and a specific career or role. Determining fit has the potential to increase job satisfaction, improve job performance, and improve employee retention.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Hogan Personality Inventory (HPI) is based on observations of how people behave and how these behaviors differ among individuals. In other words, the HPI focuses less on what personality characteristics determine or drive behavior (a theory of personality) and more on what behavior is observable to self and others.

The HPI has seven scales: adjustment, ambition, sociability, interpersonal sensitivity, prudence, inquisitiveness, and learning approach. Individuals who score high on the ambition scale, for example, tend to be leader-like, energetic, driven, etc. while individuals who score low tend to prefer tasks assigned to them and following rather than leading.

The HPI is intended to be used for personnel selection, individualized assessment, and career-related decision making. It is designed to predict suitability for a particular role, satisfaction of a particular career, and leadership potential.

Other widely used measures of personality include the Dominance Influence Steadiness Submission (DiSC) assessment and the Neuroticism-Extroversion-Openness Personality Inventory – Revised (NEO-PI-R).

At this point, an analogy might be helpful. If personality is the APPROACH we use to get to where we are going, then motivation is the goal of our journey-WHERE we want to go. So, if you really want to understand someone, it is important to know both their APPROACH to getting there (their personality) and WHERE they want to go (their motivation).

Motivation assessment includes measures of attitudes, values, needs, interests, goals, and, of course, motivation. Like personality assessment, motivation assessment includes a broad variety of techniques for measuring “motivation”. Most of the measure are based on one or more theories of motivation.

In general, theories of motivation propose explanations of behavior based on individuals trying to avoid something or, alternatively, individuals trying to achieve something. In other words, motivation is seen as inspiring activity toward some end that is not yet realized (including “ends” that are never achievable like absolute power, perfection, and universal harmony).

One widely used measure of motivation is the Motivation Insights Assessment® (MIA). The MIA is based on the writings and research of Eduard Spranger, a German psychologist, as well on as contributions to the study of values by Gordon Allport, Philip Vernon, and Gardner Lindzey.

The MIA has six scales: theoretical, utilitarian/economic, aesthetic, social/altruistic, individualistic/political, and traditional/regulatory. It is designed to be used for employee selection and feedback. The feedback includes a description of what “drives” the person and how an individual’s drives compare to the drives of others in business settings.

Another approach to assessing motivation is based on the projective technique popularized in the business world by the American psychologist, David McClelland. Projective techniques require that the examinee tell a story about an ambiguous stimulus like a picture or an inkblot. McClelland used the Thematic Apperception Test as his source for pictures. He then coded examinee responses to discern and identify motivational themes.

The advantage of a projective test is that it is harder to “fake” or deceive because the potential answers are unlimited. The disadvantage of the technique is that its scoring is more subjective than a test with a limited answer set.

The projective technique is probably most powerful when used in conjunction with another motivation assessment tool-significantly enhancing the understanding of an individual’s motivation based on his or her combined results. The IBA Motivation Assessment (IBA-MA) tool is an example of a readily available projective measure of motivation.

Another widely used measures of motivation is the Motives, Values, Preferences Inventory (MVPI).

To continue with the analogy started above, if you know WHERE someone wants to go and their APPROACH to getting there, it is also helpful to know HOW SKILLED they are at implementing their approach. HOW SKILLED they are is, of course, about competence.

Assessing competence has many meanings because there are numerous types of competence. For example, there are assessments for competence in math, writing, sales, foreign languages, emotional intelligence, and thinking ability. The focus here is on assessments geared toward executives-assessments that attempt to quantify the intellectual ability and leadership skills needed to succeed as an executive.

One of the most widely used competence assessment tools is the Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal® (WGCTA). The WGCTA is designed to assess examinee’s ability to use inference, deduction, and judgment when making decisions.

The WGCTA is intend to help with hiring, promotion, development, and succession planning decisions. It identifies competence in using business information to answer questions, determine strategy, reduce risk, and maximize organizational performance.

Other competence measures that assess thinking ability include the Core Abilities Assessment (CAA), the Hogan Business Reasoning Inventory (HBRI), and Raven’s Progressive Matrices (RPM). All of these assessment tools correlate positively with success in business settings.

The goal of any assessment tool is to accurately measure the ability or characteristics it is designed to measure. If a particular attribute is accurately measured it is possible to predict future performance with reasonable confidence.

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