How to Prepare For Employment Tests

How to Prepare For Employment Tests

Many companies are testing their potential future employees. What can do you do to be sure you ace those tests? It helps if there is a way to find out what type of test they will be administering. If you know someone who works for the company, they may be able to tell you. When I was applying to be a pharmaceutical representative in the 80s, they gave me a personality test where I had to chose from groups of words that I would use to describe me and from words I would think others would use to describe me. Today, there are a lot more tests out there and it can be a challenge to find out which ones are being used.

The Washington Post had some advice for the job applicant faced with taking a test. Some of the advice they gave were to find out details about the test, search online for practice tests to try ahead of time, try not to over-analyze the questions, don’t get freaked out if you just simply can’t remember something, and ask for your results so that you can improve on areas where you didn’t do as well.

It is important to realize that testing is becoming part of the norm.  According to Forbes, “Psychological scrutiny and rigorous simulations are fast becoming a requisite part of the interview process. Gone are the days when a clutch golf swing or well-schmoozed dinner might score you a spot in the C-suite. The downturn has shed a decidedly unflattering light on subjective hiring practices. Even the standard application-interview-résumé-and-reference-check formula has come under fire for being too soft and unreliable.” 

To try out some free aptitude and employment tests, check out:

http://www.jobtestprep.co.uk/jtpsite/content/en-GB/3/chooseTrial.aspx

http://www.careerpath.com/

http://sjlibrary.org/research%5Cweb/iguide_subjectList.htm?t=36&catID=1095

Facial Recognition and Emotional Intelligence

I have quite a few of my doctoral students who are working on their dissertation on emotional intelligence.  In our book, It’s Not You It’s Your Personality, Toni Rothpletz and I include a chapter about emotional intelligence.  When I wrote my dissertation on the relationship between emotional intelligence and sales performance, I found one book to be particularly useful in explaining the different models.  If you are researching emotional intelligence, I would suggest reading:  Emotional Intelligence:  Key Readings on the Mayer and  Salovey Model.   I think another very interesting and useful thing to read on the topic is this article by Mayer, et al,  Human Abilities: Emotional Intelligence.  It has some very comprehensive information about emotional intelligence, the difference approaches and measurement techniques, as well as what it does and does not predict. No list of important reading in the area of emotional intelligence would be complete without mentioning Daniel Goleman’s book as well . . . See: Emotional Intelligence:  Why it Can Matter More than IQ.

One of my students is looking into adding the facial recognition aspect to her studies.  If you missed my blog about taking facial recognition quizzes, click here.   For those of you who have seen the TV show Lie to Me, they have some interesting research they tie into that show about facial recognition.  Dr. Paul Ekman’s work  was the inspiration for this show.  On his site, he discusses whether you can be like the show’s character Cal Lightman.  Ekman does a review of the show on a blog where he points out what is based on truth and what is not.   Eckman has produced some courses for facial recognition called the Microexpression Training Tool or METT and the Subtle Training Expression Tool SETT.  Click here for more information.  To find out more about Dr. Ekman’s books, including one he wrote with the Dalai Lama, click here.

In our book It’s Not You It’s Your Per…

In our book It’s Not You It’s Your Personality, Toni Rothpletz and I write about the needs and preferences unique that the millennial generation.  I recently found a millennial marketing site.  It includes an interesting compilation of articles based on that group’s attitudes and values.  Anyone looking for some good information about how to target this unique group, should check it out.  This site is set up as a Wiki.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with Wiki’s, click here to find out more.  I have taught some courses on a Wiki and see some great uses for such a platform.  To see specific information about millennials and their special needs in the workplace, click here. To add information to the discussion of NewGens, the term coined by my Toni Rothpletz and me to refer to post boomer generations, please click here.

Millennial Women – What Millennial Women Think

via womensissues.about.com

Millennial women – born between 1980 and 1995 – are part of a generation that’s bigger than the baby boomers and more influential. Studies indicate that millennial women believe work-life balance is achievable and don’t see gender bias as an issue. They’re entering a workforce that is 50% women and will soon dominate the workplace. If you’re a millennial woman, how do you see yourself as different from previous generations, and what are your expectations for the future? Share Your Opinions

Working Millennials

If you have not already seen it, I would recommend watching the 60 Minutes show “The Millennials are Coming”. It is an interesting look at the expectations of post-boomer generations. Dr. Twenge has also done some important research in this area. She has been cited as saying, “today’s employees are prepared to take greater risks and are encouraged and rewarded for thinking outside of the box rather than sticking to the traditional ways of doing things.” This can be advantageous, because it steers the organization away from group-think and promotes more of an entrepreneurial atmosphere. I think today’s women are much more open to new challenges. I believe understanding personalities and making adjustments based on having emotional intelligence is going to be a big factor in success and that is why my daughter, Toni Rothpletz, and I wrote our book about understanding personalities in the workplace where we address this issue in the post-boomer generation workforce. www.drdianehamilton.com

—DrDianeHamilton

Learning Styles and Personality Tests

Understanding personality preferences and learning styles has always interested me. My daughter, Toni Rothpletz, and I wrote about personality assessments in our book It’s Not You It’s Your Personality.  However, in that book, we discussed more personality-related tests rather than learning style tests.  In my book for online students, I do discuss styles of learning to some extent.  Here are just a few of the learning style sites that you might find interesting to see where you fit with your learning preferences:

OVERVIEW OF LEARNING STYLES:

The site http://www.learning-styles-online.com/overview/ offers a nice overview of their breakdown of learning styles including:

• Visual (spatial). You prefer using pictures, images, and spatial understanding.
• Aural (auditory-musical). You prefer using sound and music.
• Verbal (linguistic). You prefer using words, both in speech and writing.
• Physical (kinesthetic). You prefer using your body, hands and sense of touch.
• Logical (mathematical). You prefer using logic, reasoning and systems.
• Social (interpersonal). You prefer to learn in groups or with other people.
• Solitary (intrapersonal). You prefer to work alone and use self-study.

VARK:  (Visual, Aural, Read/Write, Kinesthetic)

I currently teach for several online universities where they administer different personality and learning style tests.  One of those tests is the VARK questionnaire.  The creators of VARK claim “This questionnaire is designed to tell you something about your preferences for the way you work with information.”  This test is copyrighted. To receive information about it, you can email flemingn@ihug.co.nz.  The results of this test suggest that you adjust your studying to be more like your style.  These styles include:

• Visual
• Aural
• Read/Write
• Kinesthetic

KOLB’s Experiential Learning Theory ELT

Another important learning styles test is David Kolb’s KOLB  Learning Style.  Kolb also 4 styles or preferences.  They base these preferences on a four-stage learning cycle.  These four stages include:

Stage 1: Concrete Experience (CE)

Stage 2: Reflective Observation (RO)

Stage 3: Abstract Conceptualization (AC)

Stage 4: Active Experimentation (AE)

There are two levels to this model . . .after going through the above stages of experience, reflection, conceptualization and experimentation, there are four styles of learning that a person may prefer:

• Diverging (CE/RO) – ability to see things from different perspectives – like brainstorming, interested in people and work well in groups.
• Assimilating (AC/RO) – logical, like concepts – like clear explanations, do well in science-related careers.
• Converging (AC/AE) – problem solvers – practical – like technical tasks, do well in technology-related careers.
• Accommodating (CE/AE) – hands-on person, likes a good challenge – rely on gut instinct, do well in teams requiring action.

To find out more about KOLB learning styles click here.

To learn more about learning styles for the online student, check out The Online Student’s User Manual .  To learn more about personality styles and understanding personality assessments check out It’s Not You It’s Your Personality.