Beyond Personality: Choose Assessments That Actually Predict Success

Business leaders rely on dashboards filled with data – revenue, expenses, margins, customer satisfaction, etc. But when it comes to the most important driver of success, people, many organizations operate on guesswork. This is where high-quality assessments change the game. The right tools provide a clear picture of both current capacity and future potential, revealing not just whether someone can do the job, but how they will contribute to culture, leadership, and long-term success.

Why Most Assessments Fall Short

The market is flooded with personality and behavior assessments – 300 or more by some counts. While many are accurate at describing how an individual may come across to others, they leave critical questions unanswered. For example:

• Can this candidate thrive in a remote or hybrid environment?
• Do they have the emotional intelligence to lead others?
• Do they have the strategic thinking capacity you need to help you move your business forward?
• Do they have the energy and drive to hit the ground running and strive for success?

Too often, personality tools are too easy to “game”, producing results that tell you what the candidate wants you to hear rather than what you really need to know.

The Risks of Using the Wrong Assessments

• Bias in selection: Without realizing it, we are naturally drawn to people who are like us – extroverts hiring extroverts, introverts favoring introverts – which limits diversity of thought and communication styles. Any behavior style can be successful in any job; they just approach it differently.
• Benchmarking mistakes: Assessments without clear alignment to your organization’s culture, management style, and values risk measuring against generic standards.
• Candidate fatigue: Leadership assessments that take hours to complete undermine the candidate experience. After 90 minutes, accuracy drops.
• Weak measurements: Overreliance on Likert scales (1-5 ratings) can skew results and reinforce bias by avoiding extremes and a tendency to favor “agree” responses.
• Legal exposure: Using the wrong tool for the wrong purpose or inconsistently applying assessments can create significant risk. Proprietary assessments managed and validated by a reputable provider and used in the way for which they were intended are the best option.

What Effective Assessments Should Do

Assessments should never stand alone and should contribute to only about one third of a hiring or promotion decision. They should be one piece of a holistic decision-making process that also considers interviews, experience, turnover history, and career trajectory. When used correctly, research shows:

• 4x improvement in quality of hire
• 3x increase in retention
• 42% lift in the candidate experience

Source: Aptitude Research Partners, 2019

That’s impact that leaders can measure.

The STM Difference

At Strategic Talent Management, we help you avoid common pitfalls. Our assessments give you 97 unique data points providing deep, reliable insight into candidates and current employees. More importantly, we help you use those insights effectively and support you through interviews, development planning, and decision-making. The real goal isn’t just an assessment; it’s building a stronger and more capable organization.