CVs, interviews, reference checks – do they tell you who your candidate really is? Managing director Peter Berry discusses the importance of personality assessments to hiring and talent development.

When organisations hire, most will fall back on their tried and tested method: post a job ad, select candidates, conduct an interview and contact referees. However, this process skips over potentially the most important indicator of a person’s ability to do a job – the core aspects of their personality.

Why assess personality when hiring?

Your airline pilot candidate might have the required number of flight hours, but are they conscientious and resilient under pressure? Your banking candidate may have the right qualifications, but are they commercially minded and good with people? These things are difficult to gauge from a formal interview, or by checking references selected by the candidate. However, they can be evaluated very effectively with a tool that’s being increasingly used in recruitment worldwide – the personality assessment.

Considered the ‘gold standard’ in assessment tools globally, Hogan Personality Assessments and the Hogan 360 are among the most popular methods of evaluating key personality traits. Peter Berry, managing director of Peter Berry Consultancy, has been using Hogan Assessment tools for over 20 years, and he says the science and rigour behind them have made them an invaluable tool for talent acquisition and development.

“There is tremendous validity and reliability in Hogan Personality Assessments, and they’re used very substantially for recruitment to determine if you’re hiring or promoting the right person,” Berry tells HRD.

Hogan Personality Assessments: Global stats

“The assessment is comprised of three parts. The Hogan Personality Inventory (HPI] looks at emotional intelligence. which is a person’s ability to be positive and socially skilled; leadership, which is a person’s ability to step up and take a supervisor or general manager role; and conscientiousness – their ability to do a job in a professional, rule-compliant manner.

“The Hogan Development Survey (HDS) is colloquially called ‘the dark side·:· Berry adds. “High scores reflect day-to-day strengths, but if you’re stressed, tired or not coping, it will show dysfunctional dispositions or derailing tendencies. For example, an excitable person might have passion and energy but get temperamental and volatile. A diligent person might be perfectionistic and organised but also controlling and micromanaging.”

The third key profile used by Hogan Assessments is the MVPI (Motives. Values, Preferences, Inventory). This focuses on what you want out of life and is often used to see if there’s congruence around values – for example, by a non-profit that might be looking for someone with high levels of altruism.

Berry says that when it comes to hiring, the best thing to do is to look at intelligence, experience and qualifications, and then add in the personality dimension.

“Dr Hogan has a great quote: ‘The MVPI is what you want out of life, the HPI is how you go about it. and the HDS is how you blow it.” The Hogan Personality Assessment is unique in terms of being able to triangulate those three and put the whole jigsaw together,” Berry says.

“When you’re doing the selection, we actually think the interview and reference checking is the weakest aspect of hiring. Most of us can present ourselves well in an interview, or nominate referees that will say good things about us. The personality assessment is the most science-based and insightful, and if you’re going to get the right people on the bus and get the wrong people off the bus, then you need to have a robust recruitment process.”

Using personality assessments to develop talent

While Hogan Assessments can tell you a candidate’s key strengths, they will also identify potential areas of weakness. This makes them a great starting point for coaching and talent development – particularly for people in leadership roles.

In Peter Berry’s recent white paper, Competencies of Great Leaders he uses the Hogan 360 to evaluate the key strengths of Australia’s best leaders. The research found that their top strengths were being achievement focused, strategic and inspiring, and having high emotional intelligence.

With leadership having a direct influence on engagement, turnover and productivity, Berry says investing in leadership development should be a no-brainer for any business looking to boost its bottom line. “The international engagement surveys show that only two-thirds of people are engaged, and that reflects on retention, performance and discretionary effort.” Berry explains.

“One-third of people are disengaged and would take a job elsewhere. It’s a huge challenge for businesses. because the cost of someone quitting is about $60k. If you have 10-20% turnover. it’s killing your business. That’s where we know that leadership and team culture are critical, so it’s important to hire the right person to get that engagement up

We know from our research that the leader of a team has the biggest impact on engagement, motivation, performance and retention, and the best companies are paying a lot of attention to developing their leadership.” Berry adds.

“You can’t just throw a good employee into a dysfunctional team, or give them a leader that has no EQ. You have to create the right culture, and that’s the bigger picture of how you make individuals highly successful.”

When it comes to leadership coaching, Berry notes that there’s been a lot of focus on teaching executive presence, influencing skills. emotional intelligence. and being visionary and strategic – all of which are vital to driving business results.

Leadership also impacts heavily on company culture, and using Hogan 360 assessments is a great way to determine how a leader’s strengths and weaknesses are impacting their team. If a leader doesn’t have the right levels of resilience, emotional intelligence or influencing skills, the good news is that these can all be taught – and your company’s engagement, culture and bottom line will be all the better for it.

“People only sink or swim in the culture we’re given, and we’re lucky to work with some great companies that do this really well, but also companies that are struggling with poor leadership and toxic cultures.” Berry says.

Hogan 360: Global stats

“We use the personality and 360 assessments in our coaching and development programs, where you’re assessed by your colleagues at work. When you assess below and above the waterline – that is, the private person and their public reputation – there’s nowhere to hide.

“We have very strong competency models, and the three meta-competencies of good managers are resilience, social skills and professionalism,” he explains. “If they don’t come naturally, they can be taught. Leaders are all going to have different personalities and capabilities, but we can always agree on what we’re trying to do – and that’s to achieve better outcomes through employee experiences.”

To those who haven’t tried personality assessments yet. Berry says: “You don’t know what you’re missing out on!”

“It’s got enormous global validity, best practice companies have had great success with it. and it gives you a strong ROI. It also brings science to what is otherwise a completely intuitive and flawed model. If you’re serious about bottom-line results, you’ve got to invest into leadership, people, culture and assessments.”