Looking for an alternative to assessment centres? If you are used to using assessment centres but are looking to save a bit of money, then you could use PeopleMaps personality profiling tools.
Save yourself a small fortune and enhance the service you receive at the same time.
Using the PeopleMaps online questionnaire you can discover the personality profile of your candidates in a matter of minutes. Candidates can complete the questionnaire from home or from your office. The questionnaire takes only 7 minutes but is incredibly accurate and the reports are extremely detailed.
You could process 100 candidates in less time than it takes an assessment centre to process one.
Once a candidate has completed the questionnaire, you decide you want to read about them. There are about forty different topics, each one dealing with a particular issues; such as work environment, leadership, communication etc
Reports cost from as little as £5 and volume discounts are available. It is also possible to have all your reports for free if you take a license, particularly useful for larger employers.
Is this really an alternative to Assessment Centres?
Well of course assessment centres assess a lot of things including skills testing.
However PeopleMaps has a simple philosophy when it comes to placing the right candidate in the right job.
To enjoy maximum performance and low staff turnover, you need to provide the employee with a work environment that is compatible with their core personality needs.
If you don’t do this then it doesn’t matter if they score 100% in every other test or assessment, it’s unlikely to work out in the long run.
And if you are one of life’s great optimists and live in the hope that the candidate will change to suit the environment you do have, then I hate to burst your bubble.
Matching the work environment you offer to the personality of the person you employ is a deal breaker. Get this wrong and it’s all wrong.
This is why we see this as an alternative to assessment centres.
Example
Let’s say you were offering a telesales role. The work environment can be described as repetitive. The staff member will see each day being very similar to the previous day. They will have to deal with the same problems day in day out. It’s a sales role dealing with incoming inquiries.
Now lets say you decide to try and hire more natural sales people. You want people who have the gift of the gab and can persuade people to order. This is not an unreasonable ambition.
However if you offer them a repetitive environment then the chances are they will become bored. Your environment is simply not conducive to their personality and they will be unable to stick it.
You will see your staff turnover increase and results will soon drop off, even though they started so well.
You have probably experienced this and may have tried to get the staff member to change. But even if they try really hard, they cannot change who they really are.
Summary
It’s easier to change the work environment you offer. You have no chance of changing the personality of the person you hire. This is why we see this as an alternative to assessment centres.
I would just like to comment on Jason Lee comments as an idependent person. I have used peoplemaps for anumber of years in the transport industry, and using there system I have managed to half the number of vehicle accidents by half saving the company 3 millions pounds in cost. and as for not being used over seas my sister uses peoplemaps in Perth Western Austrila for her letting agency, and my brother uses it in Germany. keep up the good work peoplemaps
Interesting that you think truth will bore your readers. In my part of the world people are very astute and love to ask questions. Marketing hype such as “we’ve tested x number of people in x number of countries” means little to intelligent, astute people. We know that you can test millions of people in an invalid way. Same as saying I have 20 years experience – it could simply be incompetent experience. So you say you make personality profiling accessible and affordable to everyone…such a shame that these people will never understand the irony of using tests based on untested models or those with little or no evidence. The British Psych Society also made personality profiling available and accessible to everyone with their qualifications in psychometrics. Interestingly as I said before, PeopleMaps has not submitted this test that has been used on so many in so many countries to the peer review process! Best of luck in your misguided process of misguiding others. Thankfully I believe in Karma 🙂
Thanks for bringing up some good points. I want to avoid boring our readers so I will keep this short. It has taken us seven years to create the PeopleMaps system and we have processed over 1.2 million people through it from 182 countries. Although designed by an experienced business psychologist, we write in plain English so that anyone can make use of the reports. It upsets a lot of consultants but the customers love it. We are making personality profiling accessible and affordable to everyone.
Martin…I wouldn’t know where to start if i were to provide a sensible response. There’s no way that your test could even start to be compared with assessment centres let alone well designed “psychometric” tests.
I guess I could start with the inherent wrongs in your test – things like a test based on an outdated and widely unaccepted theory. In fact you say the test is used all over the world but have you actually validated it all over the world – we know the theory doesn’t hold up, so the likelihood of the test holding up is low. I’ve certainly not come across any such articles in peer review journals. Not even seen your test subject to BPS review to be honest. What else…how about the fact that you are suggesting and advocating the use of an ipsative test for selection. Or the fact that zero training is required….so things like internal consistency, test retest, construct and criterion validity i guess mean little to you guys – what about standard error of measurement…not important i guess! I think i might go off and run off a quick test design right now seems anyone can get away with it nowadays!
Hi Jason, Not quite sure what your point is. I would like to clarify that PeopleMaps provides personality profiling and does not provide other technical or skills testing. However if it’s personality an employer is trying to grasp then PeopleMaps will hold it’s own against any Assessment Centre. I’m not looking to rubbish Assessment Centres as they have a role to fill, but when it comes to time and money, PeopleMaps will process 100 candidates significantly cheaper and faster than any assessment centre.
i can’t believe how irresponsible these low level testing companies are these days…to suggest that psychometric tests are an alternative to assessment centres shows you know nothing about either or the research out there.