IQ and EQ have existed for as long as the human mind. IQ is short for intelligence quotient, and EQ is short for emotional quotient, more commonly called emotional intelligence. Though the concepts are well established, the specific terms have been in use only since the 1900s. Since then, many psychologists have researched how different types of intelligence develop and how to measure them.

Recently on The Science of Personality, cohosts Ryne Sherman, PhD, and Blake Loepp discussed the definition, measurement, and impact of IQ and EQ.

Can we improve IQ or EQ? Read on to find out.

What Are IQ and EQ?

IQ is a long-studied topic built on the assumption that individual differences in intelligence are measurable. Early measurement was based on dividing a numeric test score by age, resulting in a quotient. This was intended to show how smart someone was relative to their age. “Modern IQ tests don’t have that quotient part to them,” Ryne said. “They are standardized to score on a normal distribution.” Broadly, scores between 85 and 115 are average, with 100 as the mean.

Intelligence tests differ in what they measure. Verbal knowledge, mathematical knowledge, spatial reasoning, logical reasoning, abstract problem-solving, and other metrics all contribute to a general factor of intelligence. Scores on intelligence tests are related to many different outcomes, such as longevity, social status, income, identity, and learning ability. (Not all IQ tests are equitable or scientifically validated, however. More on this later.)

Emotional intelligence is our ability to identify and manage our own and others’ emotions. Just as intelligence test scores are related to different outcomes, emotional intelligence test scores can predict many outcomes as well. EQ relates to longevity, academic achievement, career advancement, job performance, mental well-being, and leadership effectiveness.

What Factors Influence IQ and EQ?

Where does IQ come from? IQ develops during childhood and eventually stabilizes, similar to how our personalities develop. Intelligence is influenced by genetics, as well as childhood environmental factors that affect brain development. Environmental factors include our needs for physical well-being, safety, and attachment and belonging. Yet researchers haven’t identified exactly how intelligence develops or what causes individual differences in intelligence.

Where does EQ come from? As with most matters of personality, EQ has a genetic component. Second, a nurturing and structured environment during childhood also helps EQ develop. Finally, we learn emotional intelligence from feedback we receive in our social interactions. “We spend a huge amount of our lives in interpersonal situations trying to deal with interpersonal problems, understanding and evaluating other people’s emotions and motivations,” Ryne said. “All of that is putting EQ into practice.”

How Is Intelligence Measured?

Many different IQ tests were developed throughout the 20th and late 19th centuries. Among the best known are the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale, Raven’s Progressive Matrices, and the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale. Unlike personality assessments, which have no right or wrong responses, problems on IQ tests usually have only one right answer out of multiple options.

Although intelligence itself can relate to job outcomes, IQ tests tend to show group differences across ethnicity, race, and gender. “Depending on the test that you use, certain groups tend to score higher than others,” Ryne explained. “What you’re faced with as an employer is the potential for adverse impact, the potential that you will be selecting one group unfairly over another group in a selection context.”

Tests to measure EQ tend to be based on either personality or behavior. On personality tests, test takers respond to statements with agreement or disagreement. For example, they might strongly agree that they try to see others’ points of view. Using scales from the Hogan Personality Inventory (HPI), we could describe someone with higher Adjustment and higher Interpersonal Sensitivity scores as likely to have higher emotional intelligence. In terms of the five-factor model (FFM), higher emotional stability and higher agreeableness would correspond to higher emotional intelligence.

On behavior-based EQ tests, test takers might identify emotions on a series of faces or in a video clip. They would be tested on which expression showed the most happiness or frustration. Although behavioral EQ tests can show positive prediction, this type of test might just tend to measure the degree to which people are good at taking tests, Ryne quipped. “With these behaviorally based measures of emotional intelligence, because they tend to be correlated with IQ, you often see adverse impact,” he added.

A Note on Adverse Impact

Local validation is necessary to ensure that an IQ test is predictive in its intended setting or context. Ryne explained the importance of local validity this way: “You need to do a local validation study, otherwise you run the risk of having adverse impact, which itself is not illegal. But if you have adverse impact and you can’t justify the test you’re using to make those selections, then that is illegal.”

Can You Improve IQ or EQ?

Whether it’s possible to improve IQ is a loaded question. You can certainly learn to perform better on an IQ test, but that may just mean you got a better score. It doesn’t necessarily mean you have become more intelligent.

Fortunately, people can improve EQ. “You can develop specific behavioral strategies for using your emotions, but it comes through practice, feedback, and coaching,” Ryne said. A leader who may mismanage their emotions during a meeting can get feedback, learn how to respond differently in the future, and try again.

Listen to this conversation in full on episode 103 of The Science of Personality. Never miss an episode by following us anywhere you get podcasts. Cheers, everybody!

Humans just don’t excel at surviving in the wild alone. We have no claws, horns, fangs, shells, or spikes. What we do have is each other—and a far higher chance of survival when we practice cooperation in groups. Our instincts for cooperation at work and elsewhere stems from our group-living ancestors who passed down their cooperative genes. To be a successful group member, we need to get along with our fellow group members, at least to some degree. This viewpoint from evolutionary theory helps explain the importance of getting along at work.

Nearly all meaningful work is accomplished in teams, which are three or more people who share a common goal.¹ Cooperation is a choice to contribute individual effort toward mutual benefit. It involves committing time, skills, and expertise toward group goals. An example would be a software development team that builds an app for a demographic sector they don’t belong to, such as healthcare providers. The app doesn’t intrinsically benefit the developers. Instead, their earnings depend on the product they create via team cooperation.

This article will cover why we cooperate, as well as the benefits of cooperation at work, including status, acceptance, engagement, and performance.

Why We Cooperate

The reasons why we cooperate with each other—our drive to get along—are addressed in socioanalytic theory. Socioanalytic theory claims that three universal motives lie at the root of human behavior: (1) getting along, (2) getting ahead, and (3) finding meaning. Getting along, or cooperation, relates to our desire to gain attention, approval, and acceptance.³ Social acceptance is so central to human affairs that people will live or die in pursuit of it.

Humans cooperate because we are inherently social beings. We live in groups; therefore, we are motivated to get along with others. Other people provide the in-group belonging that we all seek in the form of social approval. Being able to cooperate successfully means being aware of our performance in the context of other people’s performance. The work we do and the way we do it affect the work of others on our team and whether the team achieves its goals.

Getting along well requires a certain degree of socioemotional skills, including self-awareness and emotional intelligence.

Self-Awareness and Reputation

We have two ways to view personality—from the inside and the outside. The inside view is called identity, which is someone’s perception of themselves. The outside view is called reputation, which is made of everyone else’s perception of that person. Reputation is formed during social exchange, when we evaluate each other’s behavior.²

How we seem to others affects how likely we are to get along in a group, and being aware of how others perceive us can help us manage our behavior to improve our ability to get along. Personality assessment can help us build this awareness. At Hogan, we use personality assessment to measure the degree to which a person seems considerate, perceptive, and socially sensitive. Interpersonal Sensitivity, the scale that assesses these characteristics, is one of seven scales on the Hogan Personality Inventory (HPI), which provides insights about everyday personality strengths.

All levels of Interpersonal Sensitivity have benefits and drawbacks depending on social context:

• Low Interpersonal Sensitivity – A communication style that tends to appear direct, candid, and straightforward, yet might also be perceived as abrasive and argumentative
• Average Interpersonal Sensitivity – A communication style that typically seems cooperative and friendly with a tactful approach to conflict, yet might also appear impatient with others’ shortcomings
• High Interpersonal Sensitivity – A communication style that seems diplomatic, friendly, and warm, yet might also be perceived as conflict avoidant and overly sensitive

Personality data can help us excel at cooperation at work. We work together best when we recognize when and how to use our own behavioral tendencies to achieve outcomes for the group.

Emotional Intelligence

Nearly every job in the world requires workers to interact with other people, whether they work in a coffeehouse, courthouse, or even lighthouse. Being considerate of others is a keystone of successful cooperation.⁴ People who are positive, predictable, and sensitive toward others tend to perform very well at the job of getting along.⁴

Robert Hogan, PhD, founder and president at Hogan Assessments, rightly observed, “Career success depends on the ability to successfully interact with others, build and maintain relationships, and manage one’s social environment.” In other words, successful workplace cooperation depends on emotional intelligence, which consists of socioemotional skills related to identifying and managing one’s own and others’ emotions. Emotional intelligence matters because emotion influences how we act and are perceived at work.

Getting along helps your group to get ahead—and, by definition, you get ahead too. Cooperation also provides additional organizational benefits, aside from merely achieving shared goals.

Benefits of Cooperation at Work

Among the many benefits of cooperation at work are individual status, acceptance by others, employee engagement, and team performance. We’ll look at how getting along relates to each benefit using our software development team example.

Status

All groups have social hierarchies. In a team’s hierarchy, a person’s status is determined not only by job title but also by reputation. The director of technology may be nominally in charge of the software development team, but the project manager might actually be more effective at facilitating team cooperation, thus making them a more effective leader. Effective leaders persuade others to set aside their individual goals for the good of the team and are evaluated according to the team’s performance.² That is the Hogan definition of a leader—one who builds and maintains a high-performing team. A leader must leverage their reputation to achieve goals by means of a team’s work.

Successful leadership, then, depends on the ability to get along—to convince others to share goals and succeed or fail as a team. These critical socioemotional skills, including negotiation, affect whether someone attains a leadership role or leads effectively. To someone seeking power, status, and the control of resources (the universal motive we call “getting ahead”), cooperation also serves the pursuit of leadership. According to Dr. Hogan, “You can’t get ahead unless you can get along.”

Acceptance

Fulfilling our core human motivation for acceptance by others is one of the benefits of cooperation at work. Social acceptance leads to feelings of belonging and trust. Social exclusion causes pain and distress.⁵ (Yes, it actually hurts.) When the senior software architects are getting along at work, each is more satisfied with their work life.

A sense of belonging at work built on mutual acceptance among group members is an important metric in the financial outcomes of organizations. Employees who feel accepted at work tend to perform better, stay employed longer, take fewer sick days, and recommend their company to others.⁶ A company of 10,000 employees with a strong sense of belonging could save $52,000,000 per year through productivity and talent retention.⁶

Engagement

Cooperation also builds employee engagement, which is an attitude of enjoyment and interest toward work. Decades of engagement research prove that employee engagement raises quality and profitability, while reducing accidents, theft, and absenteeism.⁷ Suppose a junior developer is struggling to get along with the other members of the software development team. That person could be counted among the 77% of global workers who aren’t engaged.⁷ They would be much less likely to do their best work.

Performance

Groups that cooperate to achieve their goals succeed; groups that don’t can fracture and fail. In prehistoric warfare, the very survival of the group members depended on getting along. The software development team’s lives probably aren’t dependent on their ability to cooperate, but their livelihoods probably are. If they utterly fail to produce expected business outcomes, their organization’s survival could also be at risk. It’s not too much of an exaggeration to say that team productivity affects group survival.

As you may recall, effective leaders create teams of individuals who are committed to shared goals. Team performance, then, is incumbent on good leadership. And good leadership, in turn, relies on the ability to get along with others.

Personality Predicts Performance

The benefits of cooperation at work are many for individuals, teams, and organizations. Cooperation originates in human genetic history and continues to have a wide influence on global business outcomes. Organizations truly cannot survive without it. Lacking teeth and claws, we instead have social status, teamwork, and leadership to help us succeed.

So, how can we gain more understanding about how we tend to cooperate at work? The nature of human nature shows our innate impulse for cooperation in groups. “At a very deep level, people need social acceptance and respect,” Dr. Hogan said. “It is biologically mandated that you try to recruit people to support you.” Within our teams, our personalities indicate what behaviors we are likely to use to get along at work. Being calm, charming, compliant, curious, and more all contribute to our reputations and thus our prospects for getting along in any given group. That’s why we say at Hogan that personality predicts performance. Who we are determines how we cooperate.  

References

1. Hogan, R. (2006). Personality and the Fate of Organizations. Routledge.
2. Hogan, R., & Sherman, R. A. (2020). Personality Theory and the Nature of Human Nature. Personality and Individual Differences, 152, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.10956
3. Hogan, R., & Blickle, G. (2018). Socioanalytic Theory: Basic Concepts, Supporting Evidence and Practical Implications. In V. Zeigler-Hill & T. K. Shackelford (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of Personality and Individual Differences.Sage Reference, 110–129. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781526451163.n5
4. Hogan, J., & Holland, B. (2003). Using Theory to Evaluate Personality and Job-Performance Relations: A Socioanalytic Perspective. The Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(1), 100–112. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.88.1.100f
5. Williams K. D. (2007). Ostracism. Annual Review of Psychology, 58, 425–52. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.58.110405.085641
6. Carr, E. W., Reece, A., Kellerman, G. R., & Robichaux, A. (2019, December 16). The Value of Belonging at Work. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2019/12/the-value-of-belonging-at-work
7. Gallup Workplace. (2024). What Is Employee Engagement and How Do You Improve It? Gallup. https://www.gallup.com/workplace/285674/improve-employee-engagement-workplace.aspx

A personality test isn’t quite like other job-related tests. There’s no such thing as passing or failing, for one. And it’s not even truly a test—it’s an assessment, which is more like a measurement. Because of that, we have a few important tips for how to take a personality test.

Recently on The Science of Personality, cohosts Ryne Sherman, PhD, and Blake Loepp discussed Ryne’s recent blog post about taking getting assessment advice from ChatGPT.

The short version is . . . don’t.

But in that case, what is good advice for taking a personality assessment? This article covers what a personality assessment measures, how to take a personality assessment, and how not to.

What Does a Personality Test Actually Do?

A personality test is a test only in the same sense as testing someone’s height. Everyone has a distance from the ground that we can measure. It’s the same with personality.

The Hogan personality assessments measure characteristics that describe a person’s reputation. Reputation is based on observable behavior and social skills, which are what make it measurable. Our assessments are designed to predict workplace performance. Someone who tends to behave in an organized and process-oriented way will likely bring that focus and method to their work tasks. Our assessments also provide data-based personality insights. Someone with a direct, straightforward communication style will likely be seen by others as candid and perhaps even blunt. This characteristic might be helpful or unhelpful in different contexts.

Results on a personality test aren’t scored for correctness or accuracy because there are no right or wrong answers. Instead, results on the Hogan assessments are normed against a representative global sample of working adults and are given in percentiles. Getting a 17th percentile result means that 17 out of 100 global working adults are likely to score lower and 83 out of 100 are likely to score higher. Having high or low results is neither good nor bad. Personality assessment scores are simply data points that describe personality characteristics.

How to Take a Personality Test

The Hogan personality assessments don’t have questions on them. They have statements, called items. For example, “I enjoy performing in front of an audience” or “Being loyal to my boss is important to me.” Test takers can respond to items in four ways: (1) strongly agree, (2) agree, (3) disagree, and (4) strongly disagree.

Remember that your results don’t depend upon one single answer. Personality data are aggregated across a whole series of items to produce a raw score. The raw score is then compared to a norm to produce a percentile score. Even if you respond only with extreme answers, you won’t necessarily get an extreme percentile score. “One of the beauties of a personality assessment is that you can just take it,” Ryne said. “You don’t have to overthink it.”

1. Be honest and authentic.

Ryne encouraged test takers not to feel self-conscious about how they respond or worry about being inconsistent. People are naturally consistent in our responses. In general, the best way to respond to an assessment is to think about how we generally behave across many situations, relative to other people we know, he explained. Doing so will result in results that feel most accurate and genuine.

2. Respond as though you were at an interview.

In an interview, we show the best and brightest side of ourselves. We should respond to assessment items with a similar mindset of making a first impression, so to speak. On a personality test, it’s OK to describe yourself as you’d like to be seen by others because Hogan assessments measure reputation.

3. Give the assessment your attention.

Focusing on the assessment should be your priority to give consistent responses. Make sure to remove any distractions. Close your email, silence your phone, and find a comfortable and quiet space. Without spending too much time on any single item, pay attention and respond consistently to the assessment.

How Not to Take a Personality Test

Social conditioning, the stress of a job search or a potential promotion, and other factors may lead some people to believe that it’s possible to ace a personality test. Web searches for “how to pass a personality test” are incredibly common. But as we’ve noted already, passing or failing isn’t possible, and there are no right or wrong answers. For the best potential outcomes, here’s what you shouldn’t do when completing an assessment.

1. Don’t deliberately distort your responses.

“Intentionally going out of your way to say that you’re someone that you aren’t seems to backfire much more than you might expect,” Ryne cautioned. Trying to make yourself sound extremely ambitious or extremely unambitious could harm your prospects, especially if the resulting data are inaccurate. It’s fine to respond that you strongly agree or strongly disagree with an item—if it’s true. Strongly disagreeing doesn’t mean you will seem like a disagreeable person. The assessments are looking at your pattern of responses across a whole series of items. In other words, don’t try to “beat” the test.

2. Don’t use advice from AI tools or let AI tools answer for you.

It isn’t a good idea to ask an artificial intelligence for advice on a personality assessment. Not only are AI tools prone to error, but you aren’t being honest and genuine if you accept any external input on your responses. If your assessment results don’t match you, that data won’t help you and might even hurt you.

It’s probably wisest to avoid taking personal advice from artificial intelligence tools in general. “If you really want advice, you should talk to an expert,” Ryne said.

3. Don’t overthink.

Taking a personality assessment when applying for a new job or participating in a talent development initiative can feel stressful. Do your best to avoid the anxiety of trying to decipher the right answer. Remember that there isn’t one, and trust your instinct.

Listen to this conversation in full on episode 98 of The Science of Personality. Never miss an episode by following us anywhere you get podcasts. Cheers, everybody!

Hogan’s Alise Dabdoub, PhD, and Anne-Marie Paiement, PhD, were recognized last night at the 39th annual Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) conference, in Chicago. Their paper, “Equivalence of Workplace Personality Assessments Across 39 Languages and Dialects,” received the SIOP Best International Paper Award for setting the standards for best practice in international assessment processes.

Selected as the winner from an applicant pool of more than 1,000 submissions, the paper highlights the accuracy and validity of Hogan’s assessments across cultures by addressing the challenges of cross-cultural assessment in a globalized world.

A key takeaway from this study is the importance of establishing a strong foundation of standardized translation processes. It recognizes that, in practice, language and cultural nuances may sometimes make it difficult to create accurate translations.

Hogan’s solution involves leveraging the cultural and linguistic expertise of translators whose nuanced work is sense-checked through “reverse translation” and pilot testing before approval. This allows the personality constructs to be measured consistently across cultures, holding universal relevance.

Alise Dabdoub, PhD, director of product innovation and coauthor of the paper, commented: “What this means in practical terms is that if we were hiring someone for a role and the job candidates were from all different countries and took the assessments in all different languages, it would be fair to compare their scores to decide who to select for the job. The assessments are universally relevant across cultural and linguistic differences.”

Workplace competition is universal. The workplaces themselves aren’t the cause of why we compete at work, though. People are the common factor in all work environments everywhere. Something fundamental exists in human nature that motivates us to compete.

Competition in the workplace can produce outcomes that are positive, negative, or a complex mixture. The desire to get ahead of others can carry us to unparalleled heights of innovation, productivity, and success. Yet it can destroy the reputations of individuals, teams, and organizations. And it can do both simultaneously.

Robert Hogan, PhD, founder and president of Hogan Assessments, says that people have always competed for power, defined as status and the control of resources. Today, much of that competition takes place not in nomadic groups seeking subsistence but in the professional context of businesses and organizations. “The fundamental dynamic of organizational life is the individual search for power,” Dr. Hogan said. Understanding why we compete at work can help us direct our innate drive to succeed.

Read on to discover why we compete, the types of workplace competition, and what makes a competitive personality.

Why People Compete

To understand workplace competition, we need to look far backward in human history. Evolutionary theory can help explain why people compete. “The bottom line in evolutionary theory is something called fitness. Fitness is the number of progeny you leave behind,” Dr. Hogan said. Number of offspring is directly correlated to status and resources—that is, power. Our need for power, then, is associated with our very survival. Competition is created by people seeking to gain part of a limited supply of status and resources.

Competition is just one of three fundamental human motivations. According to socioanalytic theory, which is a perspective on psychology that stems from evolutionary theory, humans are group-living beings with behavior guided by three universal motives.¹ Humans are motivated by (1) getting ahead, (2) getting along, and (3) finding meaning. These universal motives also go by the names of competition, cooperation, and worldview.

The definition of getting ahead is competition for power. Humans want the highest status and the control of the most resources. In most societies, power looks different now than it did hundreds of generations ago. Drive for status has shifted from achieving physical dominance over others to advancing in social class and interpersonal influence. Drive for control of resources has shifted from obtaining the largest portion of food for our offspring to identifying ways to manage our immediate environmental comforts. While the nature of our work and the outcomes of our competition have changed over time, they are still shaped by the same universal motives.²

Types of Workplace Competition

Workplace competition can be quite complicated. Socioanalytic theory tells us that competition occurs on individual, team, and organizational levels. Individuals compete within groups for power, and groups compete with other groups for survival. (Historically, group survival meant life or death due to warfare. In a business context today, survival typically refers to continued operations, as opposed to bankruptcy or closure.) Individual differences determine the type and degree of power we compete for and the strategies we use to seek it. Those who recognize why people compete at work can become more effective at managing their own performance and influencing others. Organizational success and survival depend on employees who harness their competitive drive for the benefit of the organization.

Internal Competition

Internal competition means competition between members of the same group. Getting ahead within a group can be productive or obstructive, depending on many factors that affect the outcome of the competition.

To put this into context, suppose a pharmaceutical company’s director of business development wants to encourage a regional team of business development representatives (BDRs) to drive for results. The leader might encourage the BDRs to compete to earn rewards for securing new opportunities for the company. Ultimately, team competitions like this can encourage initiative, incentivize creative thinking, and increase productivity.

Poor management of the team’s competitive culture could compromise productivity, however. If interpersonal problems develop among team members, the team’s competition could actually hinder their performance in comparison to other regional teams—including those employed by other pharmaceutical companies.

External Competition

External competition means competition between two or more different groups. Like internal competition, external competition can have a variety of outcomes. Our hypothetical pharmaceutical company’s regional business development team might compete for distinction with their colleagues on other regional teams. Competition between two teams at the same company could produce innovation in the form of higher quality products and services as the teams pursue excellence. It might also cause excessive tolerance of risk in the push to win, placing too much focus on short-term gains.

External competition can also take the form of organizations competing for markets, revenue, or brand reputation. A leader’s search for power often directs the success or failure of the entire group. Competition on the organizational level recalls Dr. Hogan’s thesis about the individual search for power driving organizational life. “Competition between groups is fierce,” he observed. “The most important problem in human affairs is who can put together an effective group and maintain their group’s viability over time.”

Not everyone wants the same form of power, however. And not everyone attempts to get ahead in the same way. The extent to which we seek power lies in the personality characteristic of ambition.

The Characteristics of a Competitive Personality

Ambition is a personality characteristic measured with the Hogan Personality Inventory (HPI). The HPI assesses the bright side of personality, or the everyday strengths that influence how we present ourselves at our best. Ambition refers to our energy and drive. It measures the degree to which someone seems socially self-confident, leaderlike, competitive, and energetic.

Similar to competition itself, the HPI Ambition scale is intrinsically neither good nor bad. Someone with a low score on the Ambition scale might prefer to belong on a team or lead from behind—effective in many circumstances. Someone with a high score on the Ambition scale might become overfocused on their own advancement or achieving results—ineffective in many circumstances.

Many people, even psychologists, prefer to minimize the fact of ambition. In cultures that value humility or group consensus, admitting you want to get ahead of others might seem tactless, arrogant, or embarrassing. At Hogan, we recognize that getting ahead is an integral part of human nature and can even help predict workplace performance. In roles where getting ahead is a key skill, someone with a competitive personality will tend to do a better job.³

Competition and Values

Why we compete at work is also related to our values. One way to think about the relationship between our ambitions and our values is what we are competing for.

Someone who values commerce might compete to earn a higher salary or larger bonus. A person who values aesthetics might compete to produce the highest quality or most appealing product. Another person who values security might compete to create the most structured, predictable environment. Someone who values recognition might compete to receive public accolades.

Values apply to organizations as well as individuals. An organization with a competitive culture places value on getting ahead. It can compete to achieve different outcomes depending on its overarching values, such as quality, community, or efficiency. The alignment between an individual’s values and their organization’s culture indicates whether their ambitions can be met at work. Someone who values taking risks and testing limits wouldn’t make a good commercial pilot because of the culture of safety necessary in airline transportation. Instead, they might make a successful entrepreneur.

Personality Predicts Performance

Both human nature and unique personality characteristics affect our approach to workplace competition. “It’s biologically ordained,” said Dr. Hogan. “You get hungry. You get sleepy. You want power.”

Scientifically valid personality assessment provides insight into how we are likely to behave. It can reveal how likely we are to compete, what we will likely compete for, and even tactics we are likely to use.

Dr. Hogan says that people are the most dangerous and consequential forces on earth. “Isn’t it worth knowing something about them?” he asks. His rhetorical question challenges us to acknowledge and appreciate getting ahead as a key motive in human affairs and a reason why we compete at work.

References

1. Hogan, R. (2007). Personality and the Fate of Organizations. Hogan Press.
2. Hogan, R., & Sherman, R. A. (2020.) Personality Theory and the Nature of Human Nature. Personality and Individual Differences, 152. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.109561
3. Hogan, J., & Holland, B. (2003). Using Theory to Evaluate Personality and Job-Performance Relations: A Socioanalytic Perspective. The Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(1), 100–112. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.88.1.100f

AI tools based on large language models, such as ChatGPT, are incredibly powerful and have a wide range of useful applications. They can produce rough drafts, summarize key information, and create efficiencies in the workplace. However, I offer here a word of caution about getting assessment advice from ChatGPT or other AI tools.

I recently encountered the following client case. An individual was identified as a rising star in his organization. He completed the Hogan personality assessments as part of the organization’s high potential selection process. But his assessment results were quite different from how he was described by peers. This was unusual because Hogan assessment results are designed to be consistent with peer descriptions. Our consultant asked the individual if he had received any guidance for taking the assessment, and he revealed that he had “asked ChatGPT how to respond to the assessments, in general.” According to the consultant, ChatGPT advised the candidate to “avoid extreme responses” such as “strongly agree” or “strongly disagree.” Unfortunately, this was bad advice—and the individual was not selected for the high potential program.

ChatGPT’s Advice for Responding to Personality Assessments

After hearing this story, I went to ChatGPT (4.0) and gave it the following prompt: “I am taking a personality assessment and want to get a good score for a job. It uses a ‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’ rating scale. How should I respond to the items to get a good score?”

ChatGPT gave some general advice, including “The best advice is to be honest and authentic in your responses.” Then, it followed with six specific pieces of advice: (1) Understand the role and company culture, (2) consider the traits often valued across many jobs, (3) reflect on your experience, (4) avoid extreme answers unless you’re certain, (5) be consistent, and (6) practice self-reflection. Note that I’ve emphasized the fourth piece of advice here because it is similar to the client story above. (More on that shortly.)

Regarding the overall advice, I would encourage anyone to understand the role and company culture before taking an assessment—just as I would for an interview—but the rest of the advice is questionable. For example, although it seems sensible to consider traits that are valued across many jobs, most job candidates are applying for one particular job when they are asked to complete personality assessments. In many cases, a specific personality profile is optimal for that job. Trying to look like you can fit any job might mean you don’t fit the one you want.

Furthermore, the assessment advice from ChatGPT warns that many assessments check for inconsistency in responding. Although that is true, taking care to be consistent in responding to an assessment likely means overthinking it. Most people are consistent in their responses without even thinking about it. Overthinking is more likely to yield inconsistent results than simply responding naturally.

Why You Shouldn’t Avoid ‘Extreme’ Answers on Personality Assessments

I want to return to ChatGPT’s fourth piece of advice, which fully reads:

“4. Avoid Extreme Answers Unless You’re Certain: While it might be tempting to answer with “strongly agree” or “strongly disagree” to make your answers stand out, it’s often more nuanced. Unless you feel very strongly and have specific examples to back up such responses, consider whether a slightly more moderate answer might be more accurate and reflective of your true self.”

Overall, this is bad advice. First, it encourages the test taker to overthink each answer, which is a recipe for inaccuracy. Personality assessments usually advise individuals to respond in a way that feels natural to get the most accurate results. Second, personality assessments are often normed, meaning that an individual’s results reflect not only how they responded to the assessments, but how those responses compare to others’ responses. Take, for example, the Hogan Personality Inventory’s Adjustment scale, which contains 37 items, which are the statements or questions to which the test taker responds. If an individual never used the “strongly disagree”or “strongly agree” options, their minimum possible raw score would be 74, and their maximum possible raw score would be 111. Using Hogan’s global norm, these would be 0 and 62 in percentile scores, respectively. In other words, people who might avoid so-called extreme responses, as ChatGPT advises, limit their Adjustment scores to the 62nd percentile or lower.

Now, for many individuals, that may well be accurate. In fact, for some individuals it is certainly the case that they do not strongly agree or strongly disagree with many statements. That’s OK. The assessments and the norms are designed to provide accurate feedback to these individuals. Yet when an individual intentionally distorts their responses in an attempt to “beat” the assessment, it rarely works out in their favor—as the aforementioned client example shows.

This Adjustment example is just one example of how these kinds of test-taking strategies can impact assessments. How the “avoid the extremes” strategy plays out is different for each scale depending on the number of items and the norms. Nevertheless, this example should show that the advice from ChatGPT to avoid extreme responses is not optimal.

Conclusion

ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence tools based on large language models can be amazingly helpful. If you need help outlining an essay, building a resume, or summarizing some information, these tools can provide some assistance. When it comes to factual information or good advice, you are better off using a simple web search or asking an expert. At a minimum, people need to evaluate the advice they receive from an AI tool before accepting it, just as they would evaluate a draft of an email provided by ChatGPT before sending it. And in the case of personality assessments, getting assessment advice from ChatGPT seems to do more harm than good.

This blog was written by Ryne A. Sherman, PhD, Hogan’s chief science officer.

Our personality can affect our sleep, and our sleep can affect our personality. Given that we spend about one-third of our time asleep, the psychology of sleep may have a greater influence on our well-being than we tend to believe.

Recently on The Science of Personality, Zlatan Krizan, PhD, an award-winning researcher and professor of psychology at Iowa State University, spoke about the psychology of sleep and its relation to personality. How exactly does sleep deprivation affect our physical, mental, and emotional well-being, both personally and professionally?

After experiencing insomnia, Zlatan began to study the neuroscience of sleep. That inspired him to research the intersection of sleep and psychology.

The Psychological Importance of Sleep

Active and rest cycles have always been a universal part of vertebrate consciousness. “Something that perennial must be important. The question is what happens when we don’t do it or we don’t do it well enough,” Zlatan said.

Adults generally need an average of seven to nine hours of sleep per night. Within a sleep episode, we experience repeating 90-minute cycles of rapid eye movement (REM) and non-REM sleep. Sleep quality is complex—and so are sleep problems. Interrupted sleep means not getting continuous sleep. Sleep deprivation or restriction means not getting enough sleep. Total sleep deprivation means not getting any sleep.

“Not everybody’s equally sensitive to the impact of sleep disruption. People are not just different in how much and how they sleep, but they’re also different in how well they can withstand consequences of sleep loss,” he explained. Low resistance to sleeplessness can cause social and cognitive disturbances.

Effects of Sleep Disruption

Zlatan listed four aspects of our lives that are particularly sensitive to sleep quality: (1) alertness, (2) mood, (3) executive function, and (4) physical function. Alertness and attentiveness to our surroundings can suffer under sleep disruption. Motor behavior and reaction time slow down, and we may miss environmental stimuli entirely. A dangerous example would be a sleep-deprived airline pilot failing to respond to or even notice birds on the horizon.

Mood alterations are also a consequence of sleep disruption. Loss of energy or enthusiasm, increased irritability or risk tolerance, and even anger and depression can be provoked by sleep disruption. “Sleepy people, to be exact, get cranky,” Zlatan quipped. He also mentioned that sleep disruption affects executive processes, such as comprehension and memory.

Finally, sleep disruption can affect physical health. The cardiovascular system, immune system, digestive system, and many other critical functions rely on sleep to operate at an optimal level. Long-term shift workers, such as healthcare providers, may become chronically sleep deprived. This places them at greater risk of negative health outcomes, including diabetes, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular difficulties, and more.

Personality and Sleep

Sleep is dynamic—arguably more so than personality itself. When we consider how personality impacts sleep, we must think about both sleep quality and sleep pressure. Sleep pressure refers to the perceived need to sleep. For example, the night before an important presentation would come with more sleep pressure than an ordinary night. Ironically, excessive sleep pressure can damage sleep quality.

“The logical connection between personality and how people sleep is their emotional functioning,” Zlatan said. “Emotions can impact and undermine sleep.” When people experience stress and negative emotions before bed, they take longer to fall asleep and sleep for a shorter time. But that’s just the tip of the proverbial iceberg when it comes to personality and sleep. Research suggests that specific dimensions of the five-factor model—emotional stability, extraversion, and conscientiousness—affect sleep.

Emotional Stability

Individuals who have higher intensity or higher frequency of negative emotions may have sleep that is more disrupted. Emotional stability, also called neuroticism, concerns feelings that are volatile, anxious, or depressive. People with low emotional stability who experience negative emotions before bed tend to fall asleep later and wake up more during the night, Zlatan pointed out. They may also feel dissatisfied with their sleep, adding to their sleep pressure.

Zlatan shared his own experience with insomnia. While unable to fall asleep, he worried about sleeping enough to be sharp the next day. The additional anxiety about sleep added to his difficulty in sleeping.

Extraversion

People who are high in extraversion report having better sleep. This trend seems to contradict the stereotype of someone with ambition and drive who prides themselves on sleeping very little. It may be that extraverted people tend to exhibit optimism and simply recall sleeping well. Even if this is the case, the positive affect could help lower sleep pressure, which may actually improve sleep. In fact, Zlatan’s next research project focuses on extraversion and sleep quality association.

Zlatan called sleeping less to improve performance a trade-off. Accomplishing additional tasks instead of sleeping can be good, but eventually performance will suffer. Electing to forgo sleep over a long period of time is rarely the best option from a well-being perspective.

Conscientiousness

Having high conscientiousness, which refers to the tendency to be organized and hardworking, indirectly affects sleep. Conscientious individuals tend to be better at building structure, habit, and routine into their lifestyles, which can provide benefits to sleep. “Conscientious people have much more stable sleep time and wake time,” Zlatan said.

As well as having more consistent sleep, people high in conscientiousness tend to avoid things that harm sleep, such as late-night screen time or alcohol use. “Those indirect pathways in some ways are the most fascinating to explore,” he added.

How to Improve Sleep

Genetics, personality, and other factors largely outside of individual control all affect sleep quality. However, some techniques will help us increase the likelihood of a good night’s sleep. These originate in understanding the circadian rhythm, a 24-hour-long cycle of waking and sleeping.

Consistency in sleep hours, sleep duration, and even mealtimes can support the circadian rhythm and help to prepare the body for sleep many hours before night. Even during sleep deprivation, the circadian rhythm of the body will trigger the wake maintenance zone, which is a brief period in the evening when we feel alert and normal. After we experience this “second wind,” we “crash,” or feel even more tired. Strategic use of wakeful periods can help maximize productivity throughout the day.

Shift workers can protect their circadian rhythms by maintaining consistent habits at intervals of six, 12, or 24 hours whenever possible. Travelers can anticipate and lessen jet lag by deliberately adjusting their circadian rhythms in advance of a time zone change. Insomniacs can lower sleep pressure by tracking their circadian rhythms and compensating for fatigue in healthy ways.

In addition to these higher-level strategies, Zlatan listed some tips that can help people have a better sleep.

• Breathing – Heart rate and breathing rate are connected; breathing exercises that elongate the exhalation will also slow down the heartbeat and lower stress.
• Positivity – Practicing gratitude interventions can help to generate positive emotions before sleeping.
• Planning – A mind dump in the form of a to-do list for tomorrow can address some of the short-term anxieties that can interrupt our attempts to fall asleep.

Oh, and avoiding screens before bed almost goes without saying. “The first thing is to do is to not engage with the algorithms whose sole purpose is to have you not go to sleep,” Zlatan said.

Listen to this conversation in full on episode 95 of The Science of Personality. Never miss an episode by following us anywhere you get podcasts. Cheers, everybody!

Who is likely to invest in the stock market? Who is likely to invest most successfully? Investor personality can provide insight about what kind of investments a person is likely to make.

World-renowned psychologist Adrian Furnham, PhD, professor at BI Norwegian Business School, recently joined our podcast, The Science of Personality, to speak about his latest research on investor personality.¹

“Does personality influence partaking in the stock market? Yes,” Adrian said. “Is it mediated through a number of other factors? That will help us unpack when and why and how personality has an impact on stock market participation.”

Read on to learn more about how investor personality affects investment decisions, the personality characteristics of successful and unsuccessful investors, and who makes an ideal financial advisor.

How Investor Personality Affects Investment Decisions

Adrian has a longstanding research interest in people’s attitudes about money and use of money. Personality characteristics can affect financial literacy, which is the knowledge and skill associated with managing money.

While propensity for risk is an important psychological variable, financial literacy has many other factors. Recently, Adrian asked this research question: what are the demographic and personality variables that predict if people make stock market investments?

The Demographics of Stock Market Investors

Data from approximately 1,500 adults indicate four demographic variables that describe people who invest in the stock market: (1) sex, (2) age, (3) education, and (4) wealth. “A very large percentage of those who took part in the stock market were men,” Adrian said.

“It’s a big bias towards this particular group of educated, middle-aged, slightly wealthy, predominantly male people,” Adrian observed. From the perspective of evolutionary psychology, the prevalence of men among those who play the stock market could be explained by the exciting and addictive nature of investment. Whether they regard investing exclusively as recreation or a form of fun to grow their wealth, they probably choose to invest because they enjoy it.

The Personality of Stock Market Investors

Adrian’s research also yielded personality correlates of playing the stock market. Using Hogan Personality Inventory (HPI) terms, he described the profile of an investor personality:

• High Adjustment – confident and likely to tolerate failure
• High Ambition – motivated to compete against others
• Low Interpersonal Sensitivity – direct and tough
• High Prudence – likely to make organized, careful plans
• High Inquisitive – curious and interested in research

“When you put these variables together, you could come up with a reasonable prediction of the people who will take part in the stock market and, in fact, the people who are more likely to succeed,” Adrian explained.

Characteristics of Successful Investors

The more financial literacy, capability, and knowledge someone has, the better they tend to perform in the stock market. Yet random chance and luck are part of investment. Unpredictable events can and do occur. Thus, a successful investor personality will also have a high tolerance for ambiguity.

Another characteristic beneficial to investors is a moderate sense of caution. Someone who is highly cautious might decide that stock market investment carries too much risk. Someone who is not cautious might seek a different form of investment, such as one with quicker rewards.

In the same way, a moderate amount of conscientiousness can predict how someone might invest in the stock market. Somewhat more conscientious people may opt for index funds, while somewhat less conscientious people might prefer to select their own stocks or trade more frequently.

Values and Investor Personality

Values affect whether we are likely to invest. Personality predicts attitudes toward money, and attitudes toward money are moderator variables for investments in the stock market. “If I see money as security, I’m less likely to take part in the stock market,” Adrian said. “If I see money as a way to power, I’m more so.”

Values also affect what stocks we are likely to invest in. Many people choose to invest in companies whose mission they simply want to support. Predictions about which products and companies are going to succeed will seem more persuasive to someone who already agrees with the brand’s values. “You’ve got not only whether this company is going to make money in the short term or the long term but also to what extent it fulfills your personal definition of ethics,” Adrian pointed out.

Characteristics of Unsuccessful Investors

Some variables in investor personality might make someone likely to participate in the stock market but also likely to be unsuccessful. One such characteristic is naïve optimism, or gullibility. Someone who believes they have special insight or luck might invest, continue to invest, or be persuaded to invest poorly.

Another attribute that can cause an investor to fail at the stock market is having a view that is too short-term. The stock market tends to reward delayed gratification. “It’s a long game. There can be ups and downs. You look for trends over time,” Adrian pointed out, joking that he considers himself too impulsive and impatient to be successful at taking part in the stock market.

Regarding the HPI Adjustment scale, attitudes toward success and failure also influence whether someone is likely to persist in investing. Adjustment measures resilience, the degree to which a person seems confident, self-accepting, and stable under pressure. Someone with a lower Adjustment score may become frustrated with failure and seek a less challenging endeavor. Someone with a higher Adjustment score is more likely to maintain effort during setbacks and remain self-confident. They tend to forget mistakes and remember victories.

Personality Characteristics of Financial Advisors

To those considering investing in the stock market for the first time, Adrian suggested focusing on certain personality characteristics when choosing a financial advisor. He offered key considerations in terms of HPI scales: Adjustment can indicate how people tolerate stress. Interpersonal Sensitivity can indicate how well they work with others and perform on a team. Prudence can indicate how methodically they approach making financial plans. Inquisitive can indicate whether they are curious and make informed decisions.

“You want people who react well to success and failure,” he said. “They’re prepared to put in the hard work and the analysis. They are inquisitive and open to all sorts of new opportunities and changes in this world. They have the ability to deal with others who they use for their decision-making.”

Listen to this conversation in full on episode 94 of The Science of Personality. Never miss an episode by following us anywhere you get podcasts. Cheers, everybody!

Reference

1. Furnham, A., Cuppello, S., & Fenton-O’Creevy, M. (2024). Correlates of Stock Market Investment. Journal of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Economics. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1037/npe0000189

The entrepreneurial economy may feel like a new frontier, but it may have a dark side.

Peter Harms, PhD, professor of management at the University of Alabama’s Culverhouse College of Business, was a recent guest on the Science of Personality podcast. He spoke about two trends: (1) the shift toward an entrepreneurial economy and (2) the increase in mental health disorders. Peter discussed some of his recent research about how the entrepreneurial economy may have a dark side for mental health, particularly for younger generations.¹

“Are there generational changes that might intersect with dark personality to predict how future generations are going to interact with the workforce?” Peter asked.

Keep reading to learn about the characteristics of the entrepreneurial economy, how it might bring out dark personality, and potential effects on talent and organizations.

The Growth of the Entrepreneurial Economy

As technology causes the economy to shift and evolve, business scholars have observed that the world of work is becoming more entrepreneurial. The characteristics that help entrepreneurs succeed are also increasing in nontraditional work settings, such as the digital environment.

Peter brought his longstanding interest in dark-side traits to the entrepreneurial economy to explore the organizational effects of mental health disorders in our new global workplaces. But first, he acknowledged that so-called “gig” workers are a huge group of people with many different motivations and reasons for holding gig jobs.

A Catalyst for the Entrepreneurial Economy

The COVID-19 pandemic catalyzed the emergence of the entrepreneurial economy. Some people actively sought remote work, while others seemed to be forced into it. The rising prevalence of workplace alternatives since 2020 has made both workers and organizations reconsider where and how work should take place.

That evolution had negative effects on mental health, however. The pandemic has been associated with stress and trauma for many: loneliness, isolation, grief, and thoughts of suicide.

A Definition of the Entrepreneurial Economy

According to Peter, the entrepreneurial economy breaks conventional expectations of what makes a workplace in four ways:

1. Remote or hybrid work
2. Freelance employment
3. Digital settings
4. Cryptocurrency

The entrepreneurial economy includes content creation, social media influencer work, crowdfunding, cryptocurrency, gig work, and many other forms of self-employment or independent employment. Working with tech assistance from the office, home, coffee shop, lobby, vehicle, or a combination of locations also characterizes this category of work.

“People who are using the digital space like a new work environment . . . it’s like being an entrepreneur in the digital space,” Peter said.

Dark Personality and the Entrepreneurial Economy

Mental health issues and personality disorders seem to be on the rise. Self-reports of mental health disorders have recently increased, particularly among younger people. Younger people appear to be more willing to seek therapy or other mental health support, compared to older people.

In Hogan terms, dark-side behaviors originate from strengths that can become overused when a person is not self-regulating. These behaviors can negatively impact work performance. In an entrepreneurial economy, where work tends to be self-directed or discretionary, dark-side behaviors can manifest. Shifts in technology have increased workers’ autonomy, which means that the dark side may have even more influence on the behaviors we see at work.

Peter observed that increased power and autonomy don’t change someone’s personality, but discretion can help to reveal the dark side of it.² “With less constraints, less filters on you, who you are tends to emerge,” he added.

What Is Dark Personality?

Dark personality traits aren’t limited to the Dark Triad‘s narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. The Hogan Development Survey (HDS) is a nonclinical measure of the dark side of personality, which consists of 11 characteristics that tend to emerge when people are under stress or pressure. These behaviors are called derailers because they can impede workplace success.

Peter emphasized the importance of nuance in exploring how dark-side behaviors can affect workers in the entrepreneurial economy. Someone who enjoys taking risks (i.e., someone who scores high on the HDS Mischievous scale) might want to become involved in crypto or blockchain. Someone who is privately passive-resistant (i.e., scoring high on HDS Leisurely) might be attracted to roles with little supervision or pressure for productivity.

“The technology is opening the door, and it’s the dark personality that’ll help us understand how people react,” Peter said.

Generational Differences in Dark Personality

Some dark traits seem to be more prevalent among younger generations. Young people are medicated for mental health disorders at a much higher rate than in the past. However, it’s unclear whether the symptoms themselves are more prevalent or whether young people are more likely to seek out treatment.

Peter mentioned some possible contributing factors to derailing behavior in younger people. One is increased awareness and acceptance of mental health disorders. Social media often presents mental illness as being commonplace.

Another is that younger people demonstrate a greater likelihood of taking risks, including creative or innovative risks that characterize entrepreneurship. While older people tend to develop a more conservative attitude toward risk, younger people can be willing to stake their livelihoods on an idea or suddenly pivot into a new career.

Finally, younger people have higher scores on the HDS on average. As people age, their derailers tend to become somewhat more moderate; their derailers become tempered by experience. On average, most working adults tend to have one or two elevated scores across the 11 scales.

How the Entrepreneurial Economy Impacts Organizations

The pandemic made many organizations realize the need for flexibility and adaptability. The convergence of the growing entrepreneurial economy and the rise in mental health issues have also challenged organizations to rethink what the workplace looks like.

“The fact that these two things are crashing together—the changes brought about by technology and the pandemic with the trauma associated with it—it’s making organizations rethink the way that they are going to conduct business,” Peter said.

Changes in employee attitudes have also affected organizations. “It’s given us time to think about what work is, what work should be, and how we want to work,” Peter said. As early-career employees explore their values and assert their expectations for well-being, organizations are showing more concern with investment in psychological resources. Peter’s university, for example, announced it would provide a mental health therapist as a dedicated resource for business school faculty, staff, and students. This emphasis on individual needs and preferences as a consideration in recruitment and retention is likely to continue.

The Wild West

Peter used the metaphor of the Wild West to describe the emerging entrepreneurial economy.¹ He suggested that dark personality traits will continue to attract young people to nontraditional workplaces. “This new dynamic, this adaptable, open, unregulated, high-autonomy, high-discretion workplace, is going to attract people with dark traits,” he said.

People with certain dark traits might believe they are better suited to roles such as social media influencer or settings that allow them to work anywhere and anytime. However, their dark-side behaviors could still affect their performance at work. “Whether they’re going to be more successful in an unregulated environment? They might be, or they might not,” Peter said.

Listen to this conversation in full on episode 93 of The Science of Personality. Never miss an episode by following us anywhere you get podcasts. Cheers, everybody!

References

1. Harms, P. D., White, J. V., & Fezzey, T. (2024, January). Dark Clouds on the Horizon: Dark Personality Traits and the Frontiers of the Entrepreneurial Economy. Journal of Business Research, 171. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2023.114364
2. Kaiser, R. B., & Hogan, R. (2007). The Dark Side of Discretion: Leader Personality and Organizational Decline. In Hooijberg, R., Hunt, J. G., Antonakis, J., Boal, K. B., & Lane, N. (Eds.) Being There Even When You Are Not (pp. 173-193). Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1479-3571(07)04009-6

Many global executives understand how crucial it is to have a skills-based hiring strategy grounded in data to thrive in this digital world. However, most organizations don’t have the right data required to make well-informed skills-based talent decisions.

Erin Lazarus, MS, senior director of business development at Hogan Assessments, recently appeared as a guest on The Science of Personality to speak about skills-based hiring. “If you’re not leaning into a skills-based hiring method, you’re missing the opportunity to maximize your talent. You’re missing the opportunity to hire the best people,” she said.

Continue reading to learn why skills-based hiring is so important and what steps organizations can take to implement a more robust talent strategy.

The Importance of Skills-Based Hiring

“Simply put, skills-based hiring is a selection process that matches an applicant’s skills to the skills required for the role,” Erin said.

Among the many effects that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the workforce, a positive outcome is that applicant pools are looking different these days. Hiring managers are moving away from educational qualifications and prior employment experience to evaluate candidates during the talent acquisition process. They are more interested in being able to match a person’s potential to what a role requires.

The most effective and equitable way to address the highly varied backgrounds among candidates is to focus on skills. “In the world of talent, we had to start thinking more flexibly and more broadly about skills this person has displayed on the job previously, agnostic of the context in which they worked,” Erin explained.

Prioritizing Potential in Talent Acquisition

Many workers benefit from skills-based hiring. Early-career workers may not have work experience but do have transferable skills from education. Likewise, people changing industries, people with criminal convictions, and people who have employment history gaps all benefit from emphasizing their skills. (A full-time parent almost certainly has exceptional project management skills, for instance.) Workers with roles shifting because of AI technology are another group whose skills will likely need new application.

A hiring strategy focused on job-relevant skills is more equitable than one focused exclusively on education and experience. Thinking differently about a candidate’s talents and capabilities acknowledges that people have different ways to contribute to success. “There’s an equalizing component of skills that helps us get beyond this bias that has sat in selection for so long. There’s so much more potential to be had there,” Erin added.

How to Improve Your Skills-Based Hiring Strategy

Erin shared three things that organizations can do to improve their skills-based hiring strategy: (1) choose a comprehensive taxonomy, (2) select the right skills for the role, and (3) evaluate skills with good tools.

A Comprehensive Taxonomy

What kind of skills infrastructure will your organization leverage? “When we think about skills-based taxonomies, there are many out there in the talent space,” Erin observed. Some provide huge datasets of thousands of skills, which can be nuanced . . . yet unwieldy.

The best taxonomy is one that helps categorize talent cross-functionally and catalogs skills that underlie multiple jobs. It should also flex or adapt easily as skills needed for roles continue to evolve.

Select a taxonomy that has captured a comprehensive domain of all the skills that might be relevant for your organization’s needs. Ensure the taxonomy is backed with research and built using scientific processes such as factor analysis and criterion validation. The taxonomy should also match the intended purpose, whether that’s talent acquisition or talent development. Ask the right questions to verify that you have the right skills and the right reporting at individual and aggregate levels to help you achieve your goal.

Reliable Job Profiling

Using an effective job analysis or profiling method will help your organization select the right skills for the right role.

The level of rigor you use to create job profiles should match your selection goals. A high-stakes hiring decision will likely demand a different degree of job analysis than a high-volume role. “Maybe you’re working with a partner who has validation research for certain profiles already, and you can leverage those,” Erin pointed out.

Validated Measurement Tools

Aside from verifying that the skills in a profile are job relevant, it’s also important to ensure candidates can actually exercise those skills. Validated psychometric assessments allow your organization to evaluate people by their skills.

Degree of rigor comes into play here too. For a high-volume role, one psychometric measure is likely to provide sufficient detail, while hiring a CEO might call for multiple measures. “This is classic IO psychology best practice,” Erin said. “Strong basics are critical.”

Technology can enhance any skills-based hiring strategy. Tech assistance might be as simple as online assessment or as complex as AI modeling. “The most common ways we’re starting to see technology related to skills-based hiring is to help create a talent marketplace,” Erin said. People can assess or self-identify their skills, and organizations can share job opportunities with required skills. A platform like this enables people to search for opportunities as well as identify development goals.

Using Skills-Based Data for Talent Development

The link between skills and talent development is a big opportunity for technology—and for talent. Skills-based data can help current employees identify the critical skills for the next job they want to pursue. Erin identified these areas where skills data can shine internally:

• Awareness – understanding the alignment between your skills and the skills required for a particular job
• Differentiation – crafting a development plan based on your specific career or personal goals
• Growth – demonstrating measurable progress on actionable behaviors

Skills-based data can guide talent along different career paths internally. Two individual contributors in business development with different skill sets could have different long-term career objectives. One with strengths in data analytics and measurement could become a business analyst. One with strengths in building strategic relationships could become a senior consultant. “These skills frameworks help create more visibility into what those pathways might be,” Erin said. “It helps us get outside of this idea that the only place to go is up.”

Listen to this conversation in full on episode 92 of The Science of Personality. Never miss an episode by following us anywhere you get podcasts. Cheers, everybody!