Personality and behavioral assessments help
evaluate job
candidates, build teams and resolve workplace
conflicts.
I'm sure you'll find this interesting. While recently
wrapping up
a CEO search for a leading consumer catalog and
web
company, nearly all the candidates who made
our
client's short
list had the same personality. Interesting, yes! But
not peculiar.
The finalist candidates — four men and a
woman
— a talented mix of seasoned dm execs from
across the
country, were representing career backgrounds in a
variety of
product categories and company size.
In fact, after 12 years of assessment testing
hundreds of men
and women — senior-level direct marketing
candidates
for positions as CEO, President — for
leadership roles in
Finance, Marketing, Merchandising, IT, Operations,
I've noticed
the same thing. Over 75% of these individuals have
the same
personality and temperament type. So for me,
testing this
most recent group came as no surprise.
Why Can't We All Just Get Along?
The direct marketing executive personality type I'm
referring to
— and the one you may not be aware of
— is
shared by only 12% to 15% of the American
population,
according to the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
(MBTI). This is
the standard-bearer of all personality
assessments. In
fact, it identifies sixteen distinctly different, universal
personality types.
According to its publishers, Myers-Briggs is used by
roughly
nine out of 10 Fortune 100 companies and is
administered to
more than 2.5 million employees a year. The MBTI
was
developed 60 years ago based on the theories of
psychoanalyst
Carl Jung. It endures, because it does a great job of
improving
team relations by pointing out differences between
how
personality "types" perceive and process information.
The Right Fit
A Harvard University study found that for every
dismissal
based on failure to perform, there are two dismissals
due to
personality and communication problems. With the
high costs
of employee turnover, it's no surprise more and more
direct
marketing organizations are turning to personality
and
behavioral assessments to help evaluate job
candidates, build
teams and resolve workplace conflicts.
Think about it. You’re already testing offers, testing
copy, testing merchandise, and testing creative. So
why not your people?
If your business is not doing so, you ought to
consider using
testing (and there are numerous pre-hire assessment
options
to choose from) to fine-tune your hiring process and
bring in
top talent. It may help you get a handle on which
candidates
are most likely to succeed — evaluating
candidates
before they are hired. And give you some kind of idea
of what
makes them tick.
This raises the question: Are certain people
genetically bred to
go into direct marketing? Or does the very nature of
the
business effect personality and temperament? Take
your pick.
In my judgment, it's a bit of both. "We want to learn
more
about candidates as individuals," says Andy Katz,
President &
CEO of pet supplies direct marketer, PetEdge. "Once
a
candidate is hired, this same information helps us
understand
and maximize their talents specific to the role they
have," Katz
adds. "And we continue to work on developing
employees' self-awareness throughout their careers
to help create an
environment that ensures success."
You Can't Study For It
In taking a personality assessment, experts advise
candidates
to answer the questions truthfully, not the way they
think the
company wants them to respond. There is often a
validity
factor built in where many questions are asked solely
to
determine whether the subject is answering truthfully
and
consistently.
Even if the candidate does fool the test, he or she
will only
wind up in a job or assignment that doesn't fit or will
make you
— and those around you — miserable.
According
to Bonnie Bass, a vice president of a professional
dynametric
programs testing organization, "When people feel the
need to
act unnaturally, they waste energy, experience
stress and
become unhappy and less productive. People are at
their best
when they're doing work that draws on their natural
strengths
and allows them to be themselves."
Executive Search International