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How Can Personality Assessments Promote Diversity and Inclusion?

Personality Assessments Increase Diversity in Companies: How personality assessments can help hire and promote a diverse work force.

Christian Montoya
Christian Montoya

Oct 17, 2022

Diverse organizations are better prepared for the challenges of a changing business environment. However, it is challenging to recruit and retain employees who bring different backgrounds and thought processes into an organization. Some people may be looking for innovative ways to attract talent from diverse backgrounds. Personality assessments can help in building diversity and inclusion within an organization by providing insights into candidates’ personality traits that relate to workplace performance or organizational culture fit. 

Meeting the Challenge of Recruiting and Retaining a Diverse Work Force

When you look at the current state of diversity in our nation, it is clear that we have a long way to go before reaching true parity between men and women, or any other demographic groups. For this reason, organizations need to take proactive measures to ensure they are hiring from as broad a pool as possible.

Most companies have some kind of diversity initiative in place, but these initiatives can fall short when it comes to hiring new employees because they focus too heavily on hiring people who fit into specific categories (i.e., women) rather than those who possess certain skillsets (i.e., tech savvy).

One way companies can improve their diversity recruitment efforts is by using personality assessments during the interview process because they give employers more objective data with which they can make informed decisions about who should be hired based on specific attributes such as leadership skills or communication style rather than attributes like gender or race alone

Diversity and Inclusion Examples and Benefits to the Organization

The idea that diversity and inclusion is important in business is not exactly new. But why should you care?

  • Diversity of background and thought can provide great value to organizational goals and long-term sustainability. Companies with diverse work forces are more likely to solve problems better than those without them, learn new things faster and make better decisions based on multiple perspectives.
  • It's important for organizations to hire people who are different from each other because they bring unique skills and experience along with their individual perspectives into the mix of ideas. This will help any organization grow by expanding its knowledge base, which allows it to maximize its potential as an entity focused on achieving its goals through innovation or problem solving.
  • Diverse workforces also help companies avoid groupthink, which is when a group of people with similar backgrounds and experiences come together to solve a problem and end up making decisions based on their own perspectives rather than considering other options. When this happens, those involved can miss out on valuable input from others who might have better ideas.

Personality Assessments Help in Building Diversity and Inclusion Within the Organization.

Personality assessments, when used as a tool can help in building diversity within the organization. For example, personality assessments can be used to identify the right candidate for a job, promotion, and termination. This will result in hiring employees who are competent enough to perform well at their respective roles. In addition, interviews are also conducted after personality assessments so that employers can find out more about an individual’s strengths and weaknesses.

Personality assessments not only help identify your potential but also provide valuable insight into how they might react in various situations at work or home life (depending on what type of assessment you choose). This knowledge enables you to make better decisions about whether someone would be suitable for a promotion based on their ability level and personality type rather than just focusing on one aspect alone like grade point average (GPA) or test scores

A Good Assessment Can Be One Factor in a Multi-variable Hiring Decision

Personality assessments are not a replacement for interviews, but they can be used as one factor in a multi-variable hiring decision. They can also be used in conjunction with other hiring criteria, such as background checks and reference checks.

Assessments can provide additional information after an interview. For example, if someone has been successful at a previous job, their resume may appear to be impressive until you discover that they were fired or forced to resign due to poor performance. A personality assessment could shed light on the reasons why this happened and give you more confidence in your decision to hire them.

Personality assessments are also helpful when considering candidates who do not have traditional work experience but have never-the-less achieved success in another area of their lives (e.g., being an entrepreneur). In these cases, it can be useful for companies looking for diverse talent pools because it allows them access into less traditional recruitment channels such as social media platforms like LinkedIn where people share their interests rather than just listing jobs which may not be relevant anymore.

Remember, a personality assessment is not a replacement for an interview. It’s important to note that even with the most rigorous selection process, there is no guarantee that you will hire the best candidate. People can be amazing at interviews but completely different in person than they are on paper.

Good Personality Assessment Programs are Standardized for All Candidates

Good personality assessments are standardized for all job candidates and legally defensible if used in hiring and promotion decisions. For example, there are many companies that use personality assessments to help them with hiring decisions. However, it is important to know that the tests must be standardized so that they can be applied fairly across all candidates regardless of their race, gender, age, or other factors. If the test does not meet this standard of fairness and objectivity, then it could end up being discriminatory and could potentially get you sued for discrimination if you fired someone based on their results from such a test.

If you are looking to improve diversity within your organization, it is important that the process be transparent and standardized. The use of personality assessments as part of a hiring decision can help organizations move toward this goal.

 

 

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Christian Montoya

Principal at TalentUI. I am a talent strategist and toolmaker who works with enterprise, private equity, and enterprise family clients.

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