Employment Personality Tests Decoded

At least 30 percent of American companies, from American Express and Bank of America and IBM to Marriott, Procter & Gamble, Time Warner, and a host of smaller firms, subject their employees to one or more personality tests each year. Why do they do it? Employers want to hire and retain employees who are qualified, confident, resilient, even-tempered, and loya. Personality assessments, like coaches, help them identify potential problems. The corporate world is intense. Employers need to know how their staff will deal with the inevitable pull of priorities between a regimented corporate life and family responsibilities. Under normal conditions--and under stress--how do you deal with conflicts, solve problems, and arrive at results? Will you overlook important details? Find it difficult to interact with you colleagues? Disrupt a team? Threaten your supervisor? Employers care how you make sense of the world because they want you to be reliable-as reliable as the test they're subjecting you to. You will be hired--or retained--because the test shows you will pose the least financial risk to your employer. Can these tests be "beaten"? The short answer is no. But you can certainly learn more about them and, based on that knowledge, have a better idea of the answers each test is looking for.Hart, Anne is the author of 'Employment Personality Tests Decoded ', published 2007 under ISBN 9781564149466 and ISBN 1564149463.