Psychometric Testing

Does anyone have any experience of these.
I am told they are a way of profiling your personality, but how can you gauge it from a few random questions?

I have one coming up next week for a job vacancy and I'm told there's no way of practising for it.

[Biker Biggles]

Call me old fashioned and cynical,but I think these tests are a con.Jobs for the boys and girls and a nice little earner to boot,but absolutely no use to anyone else.They might as well employ someone to read the tea leaves,but us tea leaf readers all got made redundant when they invented the tea bag.
I'm not jealous.

I dontknow alot, so I'll get Maria to offer a decent reply. I think though they asses how the question is answered - do you appear to be nervous, hesitant, quick and alert etc etc. I assume points are given for questions, and the total is compared to a table of norms - most people are some number plus/minus a few, and the wierdos deviate from this normal or average score by a long way

Matt

It's a way of getting around discrimination law. Someone makes a spurious accusation of descrimination after not getting accepted for a job, they can just claim that the person didn't fit the required profile.

The most common test is the 16PF (personality Factor) test. The objective is measure degrees of extroversion, anxiety, attention to detail etc.. If you Google 16PF you should get some good hits. Its not an IQ test and you can't practice for it unfortunately. Also - if your answers are inconsistent, then you get a 'faking' score thrown in.
They don't hurt though!

They're easy. It's just a basic IQ test- weeding out the idiots

[G]

Lots of question asked differently. Also silly question, put these in order of importance to you....when they are all blatently rather important and you dont really want to put any of them last.

I always seem to have faired ok......never not got a job I have applied for lol

Except for a morrisons shelf stacking job when i was 16. First ever interview and all that.

[Viney]

Originally Posted by DanDare

Does anyone have any experience of these.
I am told they are a way of profiling your personality, but how can you gauge it from a few random questions?

I have one coming up next week for a job vacancy and I'm told there's no way of practising for it.

Nope you cant practice it. Its a list of questions. If its smokething like the LBAII etc, then they will ask you 'How would you deal with X situation' then further on, it will ask the same question in a slightly differnt way.

I think they are a dangerous way of employing and i know many a law firm that usues them.

All you can do is answer it truthfully, but if you dont get the job, then dont be disheartned. You just dont fit the profile they are after.

Its all bolloc*s

[Wideboy]

complete crap, i came out as sane and stable but they said i wasn't suitable for the job

[johnnyrod]

I don't have the figures to hand but testing scores a better rate of success than interviewing - but both are below about 20% and not really different from each other. People are trying to standardise everything these days, nothing you can do to prepare for them though.