Psychometric Profiling – What is it and Why Could it Help?

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One of the benefits of sales recruitment agencies is that they can help with expert interviewing techniques which you might otherwise not have at your disposal, such as psychometric profiling.

What is it?

Psychometrics – the theory and technique of psychological assessment and measurement – originated from two streams of thought; one from Darwin, Galton and Cattrell looking at the differences between individuals, and another from Herbart, Weber, Fechner and Wundt’s psychophysical measurements of different people – the latter of which led to experimental psychology and related tests.

In recruitment, psychometric profiling gives employers the chance to probe more into candidates’ personalities. A successful salesperson will need to be a real business chameleon with the charisma and social awareness to gauge and deliver pitches suitable to each and every individual client – personality is therefore of the utmost importance in the sales industry.

It can be relatively straightforward to find out professional credentials about potential sales candidates – the facts and figures from previous experience tend to speak for themselves. However, psychometric profiling enables employers to see, for example, how likely a candidate will fit into the working environment of a certain company, how they may react to a certain situation (such as a sales rejection) and so on.

Quite simply, combined with competency-based interviews, it enables those hiring sales staff to make a far more informed decision about which individual(s) would be most suitable for the vacancy based on more than just their degree or previous sales experience.

Despite the technical name, psychometric profiling is in fact extremely simple and you don’t need to be qualified in order to read the results. Click here to see an example of an agency which offers it as a service.

The sorts of qualities that it can test for include assertiveness, drive, extroversion, openness to change, social sensitivity, flexibility and working attitude.

Why might I benefit from it?

It goes without saying that adding this component to the interview process will give a more comprehensive overview of each and every candidate, thereby improving the efficiency of the whole recruitment process and enabling employers to make better decisions.

While much of the recruitment process may be somewhat retrospective – “What have you done to show…”; “Give me an example of when you…” – psychometric profiling also draws on the potential of candidates for the future, as opposed to merely what they have achieved up to that point. Doing so provides a far bigger – and arguably better – picture of a jobseeker’s likelihood to suit the position.

Psychometric profiling can also be tailored to the ethos and culture of a particular company, meaning that a firm is far more likely to end up hiring a candidate that is completely aligned with its unique qualities, missions and goals.

Furthermore, this technique should also help to eliminate a lot of the ‘getting to know the newbie’ when they start, as you should already have an idea in your mind of the sort of person they are. It can thereby help you to avoid hiring mistakes if you suddenly realise on a candidate’s first working day that they are in fact a bit of an introvert, when you needed someone far more outgoing.