Types Of Personnel Selection Tests And Questionnaires
Recruiters and personnel selection experts use different tests and questionnaires to select suitable candidates for the jobs they offer.
The job interview can be a good tool to get to know the applicant and to decide, ultimately, whether or not they are qualified to perform the functions that the position requires. But applying only the interview to determine whether or not the candidate is the person you are looking for may not be entirely reliable.
Nowadays, many selection processes include carrying out different tests (for example, role-playing games) or psychotechnical tests to, in this way, determine the professional aptitude of the candidates, know their personality and evaluate their motivation. The combination of these tools is the best option if we want the selection process to be as precise as possible.
The origin of these tests is found in the concept of competencewhich arises from the need to value not only the set of knowledge, skills and abilities that a person can possess, but also appreciate your ability to use them in specific situations and solve problems that may arise in a specific work environment. Likewise, the concept of competence refers to the attitude, motivation and conditions of the individual and their behavior.
The different tests or questionnaires used in personnel selection processes have the mission of assessing as a whole the four different dimensions present in the concept of competence These are:
Types of personnel selection tests and questionnaires
But, What are the tests or questionnaires used by personnel selection experts? What do these tools aim to measure? Below we explain it to you
Professional or knowledge tests
Professional tests simulate real situations and conditions that can be found in a specific job Therefore, these tests aim to know the degree of mastery of an applicant to perform the job for which they aspire and are used to obtain information about the applicant’s specific training, experience and knowledge.
There are two types of professional tests: knowledge tests, which evaluate the contents related to the occupation; and the skills tests, which evaluate specific skills related to the occupation. Among these tests, we can find: language tests, typing tests, computer tools mastery tests, tests to repair or assemble a device, etc.
Personality questionnaires
Personality questionnaires attempt to extract, through different items, the main character traits of an individual to be able to deduce the suitability and adaptability to the job to which the individual aspires. For example, if a subject participates in a selection process for a sales position, one of the personality traits that recruiters will value is extraversion.
Recruiters can use different personality tests, but two of the most used are: the Big Five questionnaire, which measures sociability, responsibility, openness, kindness and neuroticism; or the EPQ-R questionnaire, based on Eysenck’s PEN model. Regarding these questionnaires, the answers are neither bad nor good, They simply reflect the personality of the candidate or their way of thinking and acting in certain situations
In addition, for some jobs it is an essential requirement to pass some personality tests related to mental health. For example, one of the most used tests is the MMPI-2 (Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory). Its use is focused on identifying the personality profile and detecting psychopathologies, so it can be used, for example, in police personnel selection processes.
Psychotechnical questionnaires
Psychotechnical questionnaires are intelligence tests or aptitude tests which usually come with a time limit to complete them. They are tests that evaluate the intellectual abilities of applicants for the correct performance of certain jobs, and allow the person’s cognitive abilities to be assessed, such as general intelligence, memory, perception or attention.
This type of questionnaire is also used to find out more specific aspects of the applicant’s intelligence, for example, verbal aptitude, numerical aptitude, spatial aptitude, capacity for abstraction or concentration.
Situational tests
Situational tests are also known as group dynamics, and allow the competencies and abilities of candidates to be evaluated , as well as predict your performance in a given job. During the performance of this type of test, a situation is recreated that simulates the conditions and demands posed by the position, which the subjects will have to face by putting into practice a series of skills necessary to carry out the task efficiently.
Situational tests are increasingly used because have proven to be one of the most useful and precise tools for the evaluation of competencies since during its completion the candidates put into practice the knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary to solve the situation-problem or specific task.
