TALENT OPTIMIZATION AND PI FAQ

TALENT OPTIMIZATION AND PI FAQ

Talent Optimization - The Top 11 Questions

Teamwork written on chalkboard. Better teamwork is a result of using The Predictive Index and talent optimization.

Talent optimization is a four-part discipline that details what’s required for aligning your business strategy and your talent strategy so you can achieve your desired business results. At the core of talent optimization is the collection, analysis, and application of people data. The discipline is very data-driven and grounded in science, yet highly scalable and a practical solution for helping organizations achieve their talent initiatives. The Predictive Index is a premium talent optimization solution that provides rich people data, which I can utilize to help organizations improve employee engagement and achieve business goals and objectives. The discipline of talent optimization can help with the majority of an organization’s talent management initiatives.

Companies create a business strategy and determine what business results they want to achieve—but then they glaze over the critical “people work” that drives the results. They fail to intentionally, consistently, and strategically design high-performing teams and company culture. They fail to manage people in a way that pushes them to be their best. And they fail to make intelligent human capital investments despite proof that employees must be invested in and developed to maximize ROI. Talent optimization provides a comprehensive data-driven and science-based approach to talent management.

Yes. We can use the discipline of talent optimization to motivate your teams in many ways:

  • Take a look at your organizational structure—and change it if you need to
  • Communicate a vision that employees can get behind
  • Evaluate and ensure your leadership team fit
  • Establish—and reinforce—your culture
  • Base hiring decisions on people data
  • Understand what makes your employees tick—and use it to motivate them
  • Encourage employees to understand what makes them tick
  • Predict team dynamics before adding new employees to a team

HR professionals are generally tasked with anything related to talent management. However, strategic business leader also need to step up and take responsibility for putting talent in the optimal position to achieve business results. When the organization keeps making the same hiring mistakes, you can’t blame HR. Doing so will only cause friction to bubble up. Instead, business leaders should put themselves in the driver’s seat and be a change agent for the good of the organization. 

Arm yourself with talent optimization tools that provide you with people data insights. This way, you can take a data-driven approach to hiring the right people, designing your culture, diagnosing engagement levels, and managing employees effectively. Want to close the talent gap once and for all? With talent optimization, you finally can.

The strategic discipline of talent optimization is grounded in four essential truths. Before you attempt to roll out talent optimization within your company, take the time to understand the following:

  • Business context frames talent optimization: Talent optimization is informed by business strategy, producing desired business results. In this way, business context “wraps” talent optimization. It provides essential context that will guide everything you do, from designing your organization’s structure to evaluating the abilities of your senior leadership team. 
  • People data drive talent optimization: When business leaders put people analytics front and center, they can make informed, objective decisions (and reduce unconscious bias). People data helps leaders to predict workplace behavior, so they can hire the appropriate candidates, design goal-crushing teams, cultivate an award-winning culture, and manage employees according to their unique preferences.
  • Everyone in the organization must embrace talent optimization: As powerful as talent optimization is, it won’t be effective if it’s only used by HR or the C-Suite. It must be rolled out to and adopted by every employee across the organization. When you do grant people access to people data, you’re giving them the gift of self-awareness and a healthier workplace.
  • Talent optimization protects against the four forces of disengagement. When people are engaged, they go above and beyond. When people are disengaged, they do the bare minimum. In this way, disengagement and productivity go hand-in-hand.

As a talent optimization consultant, I can help you with the most significant business strategy component, which is people. I can help you better understand the strengths of your employees as individuals and as a collective team. This knowledge allows us to identify the most appropriate business strategies and objectives for the team to pursue. We can also determine gaps between the team’s capabilities and any new strategies and goals the organization may want to pursue. If there are gaps, we can help with the team design and show you how to utilize behavioral and cognitive data to land additional team members that best fill those gaps. My talent optimization services won’t answer all of your business strategy questions, such as entering new markets, deploying new technology, or acquiring a competitor. Still, I can help you put the best team on the field, identify the strategy that is a best fit, and set the team up for success.  

I offer several talent optimization workshops that can help take your organization to the next level. The workshops vary in length and subject matter complexity. A talent optimization workshop can be conducted virtually or on-site. Below is a list and a short description of each one.

  • 1:1 Talent Strategy Session – structured for executives looking to gain clarity into the connections between themselves, their teams, and the work to be done
  • Discovering Your Team type – this is a team workshop that helps build cohesive teams that appreciate working together and resolve conflicts in a constructive manner
  • Designing for Strategic Action – this is a team workshop that helps teams leverage individual and collective strengths and recognize the risks to achieving objectives
  • Drive Results with Talent – designed for executives and HR professionals that want to learn how to utilize talent data insights to understand what drives employees
  • Inspire People to Perform – geared for people managers who want to communicate with employees and entire teams more effectively
  • Hire the Right Talent – tailored especially for hiring managers and HR professionals that want to learn, understand, interpret, and integrate people data into hiring practices
  • Create Awareness with People Data – targeted for people leaders who want to learn how to apply the principles of talent optimization to manage and develop their teams
  • Take Action on Engagement – intended for leaders that are looking to develop action plans based on employee experience results

Many companies cobble together employees without considering team dynamics, and they appoint leaders who might be excellent individual contributors but who lack the self-awareness and/or motivation needed to inspire employees effectively. When teams and leaders are designed ad hoc like this, results suffer. But when the design of the organization, its leadership, its culture, and its team dynamics are approached intentionally and strategically—supported by people data—companies have a much better chance of achieving their desired business objectives. Effective team design is an important element of any successful talent management strategy.

Team design is composed of five activities:

  1. Recognize each team member’s strengths
  2. Understand team dynamics
  3. View the team’s strategic intent through a talent lens
  4. Compare team capabilities and the work to be done
  5. Establish your culture

We also can work together on team discovery, which allows you to assess a team’s strategic goals and its collective behavioral identity (or “team type”) side-by-side – so you can visualize where the team is suited to succeed and where they may need to stretch.

As a talent optimization specialist, I can help your organization overcome its most significant talent management challenges. I meet with you to learn about your organization’s business objectives and strategies, and we also discuss your talent management goals. Depending on your needs, I can help in four primary areas:

  • Work with you to design teams and structure them for success
  • Help you improve your success rate in hiring talent that is the best fit for the job, team, and organization
  • Provide actionable guidance for inspiring and developing leaders and their team members to improve employee retention and engagement
  • Assist you with deploying measurements to help you keep a pulse on the effectiveness of your talent optimization initiatives and employee engagement

The size of your talent optimization investment depends on your specific needs. Most organizations realize a return-on-investment (ROI) that far exceeds their talent optimization investment. I provide a no-cost initial consultation, which will help give you some clarity on how talent optimization fits with your talent management strategy. If you would like to learn more, please give me a call at 1-833-4-E2EWINS (1.833.432-3946) or email me at barry.elliott@end2endwins.com.

Learn more about The Predictive Index (PI)

The Predictive Index (PI) offers talent optimization software, workshops, and expert consulting. End2End Wins, LLC is a certified partner of The Predictive Index (PI) and works with organizations to help them design winning teams, have higher success rates in hiring, develop talent, and improve engagement. The result is optimal results for the organization.

First of all, there are no PI “tests.” The word test implies you can pass or fail, and that’s not the case with any of PI’s workplace assessments. The Predictive Index measures behavioral drives (Dominance, Extraversion, Patience, and Formality) as well as cognitive ability. 

PI assessments help business leaders:

  • Understand the needs of a specific role, team, project, or business strategy
  • Collect candidate or employee “people data”  
  • Use that data to make more informed—and more objective—decisions

These decisions include who to hire, how to manage, when to add a new executive or team member, and more.

There are multiple Predictive Index assessments. The PI Job Assessment pinpoints the behavioral traits and cognitive ability someone would need to succeed in a given role. The PI Behavioral Assessment helps you determine if someone has the right personality for the job. And the PI Cognitive Assessment enables you to understand the speed at which someone learns new information. Together, these PI hiring assessment tools increase your ability to predict candidate success.

Of all our workplace assessments, the most well-known is The Predictive Index Behavioral Assessment. That’s because it’s been around for a long time! PI’s founder, the late Arnold Daniels, created it in the 1950s. Since then, the BA has been updated—and thousands of companies worldwide have used it.

Unlike other personality tests, the Predictive Index Behavioral Assessment is scientifically validated for workplace use. This is true for almost any job, almost any work environment, and almost any industry worldwide. In 2018, it was certified by the DNV GL; this means the BA meets the strict guidelines of leading psychology experts at the EFPA. 

While the Predictive Index BA began as a hiring tool, companies now use PI BA data for many purposes. These include promoting employees, improving team dynamics, boosting productivity, and more.

Here are 10 facts about the Predictive Index Behavioral Assessment:

  1. When used for hiring, it’s used in conjunction with the PI Job Assessment. 
  2. The BA takes only six minutes to complete (on average).
  3. It’s an untimed assessment.
  4. Assessment takers receive two lists of adjectives.
  5. The BA is a free-choice, stimulus-response assessment tool.
  6. Candidates can take it in the language of choice.
  7. It measures four behavioral drives: Dominance, Extraversion, Patience, and Formality.
  8. The BA is a good indicator of a person’s workplace behavior.
  9. After someone takes the BA, they get their unique behavioral pattern. 
  10. Assessment takers are also assigned one of 17 Reference Profiles.

The PI Cognitive Assessment (CA) is a hiring assessment. The BA predicts future job performance in terms of behavioral fit. The CA predicts future job performance in terms of how fast someone will catch on, understand complexity, and figure things out.  Cognitive ability is widely considered one of the best predictors of job performance.

Different roles and work environments require different cognitive abilities. An entry-level associate with no direct reports and basic protocols to follow won’t need to learn or process information too quickly. But a director tasked with acting on complex data and devising a multi-year strategy will need a higher cognitive score. 

For this reason, we urge clients never to use the PI platform to set one baseline cognitive target. In doing so, you could reject candidates who might be an excellent job fit simply because they didn’t meet an arbitrary target. Instead, use the PI Job Assessment to set a cognitive target based on the role and work environment.

Here are 10 facts about the Predictive Index Cognitive Assessment:

  1. It’s used in conjunction with the PI Job Assessment. 
  2. The assessment takes 12 minutes to complete. 
  3. It’s a timed assessment.
  4. Each candidate experiences a unique set of questions.
  5. We encourage assessment takers to complete practice tests in advance. 
  6. Questions span three categories: numerical, abstract, and verbal.
  7. Assessment takers have the chance to answer 50 questions.
  8. The goal is to complete as many correct answers as possible within 12 minutes.
  9. We designed the CA to minimize cheating.
  10. There are no “good” or “bad” scores; view CA results in terms of job requirements.

We encourage clients to share the results of the behavioral assessment with candidates and employees. But we discourage the sharing of cognitive scores. 

Yes. The BA data can be used to help manage teams, identify candidates for promotion, and improve team dynamics.

Many companies promote top-performing individual contributors. And then they discover they’re terrible at managing others. Typically, one of two things is happening. First, they lack the behavioral traits needed to manage well. And they aren’t willing or able to stretch beyond their comfort zone to be who the role needs them to be. Or second, they lack self-awareness of how their behavior affects their direct reports. In either case, the PI platform can help.

Here are two best practices:

  1. Follow the same protocol for promotions as you would for new hires. If you’re interested in promoting an existing employee, use the PI Job Assessment to pinpoint the behavioral traits needed for the role. Then see if the employee’s behavioral pattern is a match. Probe into any behavioral gaps with the provided customized structured interview questions. This will help the employee understand how and where they’d need to stretch—and if they even want to.
  2. All managers can use the PI platform to access the PI Inspire solution. Within PI Inspire, managers can leverage the Relationship Guide, Manager Strategy Guide to:
      • Help two teammates work more effectively together
      • Learn how to accommodate employees’ individual preferences
      • Uncover why employees are working together but not reaching their goals

As long as the manager and their direct reports have completed the behavioral assessment, their data is in the software. This means it can be used to build self-awareness, communicate better, etc.

Every person who takes a BA and CA has their own unique behavioral pattern. For the sake of hiring fit, The Predictive Index has established 17 different Reference Profiles to help put names to similar patterns. This is not to say that every Analyzer is the same or that you can expect everyone with a Venturer profile to act identically.

The groupings are rooted in science, but a Reference Profile is only as useful as the other data applied like any behavioral data point. With great power comes great responsibility. My role as a talent optimization consultant is to help you and your organization learn PI and maximize your talent optimization investment.

The size of your Predictive Index investment depends on your specific needs. Most organizations realize a return-on-investment (ROI) that far exceeds their Predictive Index investment. I provide a no-cost initial consultation, which will help give you some clarity on how The Predictive Index fits with your talent management initiatives. If you would like to learn more, please give me a call at 1-833-4-E2EWINS (1.833.432-3946) or email me at barry.elliott@end2endwins.com.

Predictive Index neon logo with Better Work & Better World statement. The Predictive Index is the premier talent optimization provider.
Predictive Index neon logo with Better Work & Better World statement. The Predictive Index is the premier talent optimization provider.

The Predictive Index (PI) offers talent optimization software, workshops, and expert consulting. End2End Wins, LLC is a certified partner of The Predictive Index (PI) and works with organizations to help them design winning teams, have higher success rates in hiring, develop talent, and improve engagement. The result is optimal results for the organization.

First of all, there are no PI “tests.” The word test implies you can pass or fail, and that’s not the case with any of PI’s workplace assessments. The Predictive Index measures behavioral drives (Dominance, Extraversion, Patience, and Formality) as well as cognitive ability. 

PI assessments help business leaders:

  • Understand the needs of a specific role, team, project, or business strategy
  • Collect candidate or employee “people data”  
  • Use that data to make more informed—and more objective—decisions

These decisions include who to hire, how to manage, when to add a new executive or team member, and more.

There are multiple Predictive Index assessments. The PI Job Assessment pinpoints the behavioral traits and cognitive ability someone would need to succeed in a given role. The PI Behavioral Assessment helps you determine if someone has the right personality for the job. And the PI Cognitive Assessment enables you to understand the speed at which someone learns new information. Together, these PI hiring assessment tools increase your ability to predict candidate success.

Of all our workplace assessments, the most well-known is The Predictive Index Behavioral Assessment. That’s because it’s been around for a long time! PI’s founder, the late Arnold Daniels, created it in the 1950s. Since then, the BA has been updated—and thousands of companies worldwide have used it.

Unlike other personality tests, the Predictive Index Behavioral Assessment is scientifically validated for workplace use. This is true for almost any job, almost any work environment, and almost any industry worldwide. In 2018, it was certified by the DNV GL; this means the BA meets the strict guidelines of leading psychology experts at the EFPA. 

While the Predictive Index BA began as a hiring tool, companies now use PI BA data for many purposes. These include promoting employees, improving team dynamics, boosting productivity, and more.

Here are 10 facts about the Predictive Index Behavioral Assessment:

  1. When used for hiring, it’s used in conjunction with the PI Job Assessment. 
  2. The BA takes only six minutes to complete (on average).
  3. It’s an untimed assessment.
  4. Assessment takers receive two lists of adjectives.
  5. The BA is a free-choice, stimulus-response assessment tool.
  6. Candidates can take it in the language of choice.
  7. It measures four behavioral drives: Dominance, Extraversion, Patience, and Formality.
  8. The BA is a good indicator of a person’s workplace behavior.
  9. After someone takes the BA, they get their unique behavioral pattern. 
  10. Assessment takers are also assigned one of 17 Reference Profiles.

The PI Cognitive Assessment (CA) is a hiring assessment. The BA predicts future job performance in terms of behavioral fit. The CA predicts future job performance in terms of how fast someone will catch on, understand complexity, and figure things out.  Cognitive ability is widely considered one of the best predictors of job performance.

Different roles and work environments require different cognitive abilities. An entry-level associate with no direct reports and basic protocols to follow won’t need to learn or process information too quickly. But a director tasked with acting on complex data and devising a multi-year strategy will need a higher cognitive score. 

For this reason, we urge clients never to use the PI platform to set one baseline cognitive target. In doing so, you could reject candidates who might be an excellent job fit simply because they didn’t meet an arbitrary target. Instead, use the PI Job Assessment to set a cognitive target based on the role and work environment.

Here are 10 facts about the Predictive Index Cognitive Assessment:

  1. It’s used in conjunction with the PI Job Assessment. 
  2. The assessment takes 12 minutes to complete. 
  3. It’s a timed assessment.
  4. Each candidate experiences a unique set of questions.
  5. We encourage assessment takers to complete practice tests in advance. 
  6. Questions span three categories: numerical, abstract, and verbal.
  7. Assessment takers have the chance to answer 50 questions.
  8. The goal is to complete as many correct answers as possible within 12 minutes.
  9. We designed the CA to minimize cheating.
  10. There are no “good” or “bad” scores; view CA results in terms of job requirements.

We encourage clients to share the results of the behavioral assessment with candidates and employees. But we discourage the sharing of cognitive scores. 

Yes. The BA data can be used to help manage teams, identify candidates for promotion, and improve team dynamics.

Many companies promote top-performing individual contributors. And then they discover they’re terrible at managing others. Typically, one of two things is happening. First, they lack the behavioral traits needed to manage well. And they aren’t willing or able to stretch beyond their comfort zone to be who the role needs them to be. Or second, they lack self-awareness of how their behavior affects their direct reports. In either case, the PI platform can help.

Here are two best practices:

  1. Follow the same protocol for promotions as you would for new hires. If you’re interested in promoting an existing employee, use the PI Job Assessment to pinpoint the behavioral traits needed for the role. Then see if the employee’s behavioral pattern is a match. Probe into any behavioral gaps with the provided customized structured interview questions. This will help the employee understand how and where they’d need to stretch—and if they even want to.
  2. All managers can use the PI platform to access the PI Inspire solution. Within PI Inspire, managers can leverage the Relationship Guide, Manager Strategy Guide to:
      • Help two teammates work more effectively together
      • Learn how to accommodate employees’ individual preferences
      • Uncover why employees are working together but not reaching their goals

As long as the manager and their direct reports have completed the behavioral assessment, their data is in the software. This means it can be used to build self-awareness, communicate better, etc.

Every person who takes a BA and CA has their own unique behavioral pattern. For the sake of hiring fit, The Predictive Index has established 17 different Reference Profiles to help put names to similar patterns. This is not to say that every Analyzer is the same or that you can expect everyone with a Venturer profile to act identically.

The groupings are rooted in science, but a Reference Profile is only as useful as the other data applied like any behavioral data point. With great power comes great responsibility. My role as a talent optimization consultant is to help you and your organization learn PI and maximize your talent optimization investment.

The size of your Predictive Index investment depends on your specific needs. Most organizations realize a return-on-investment (ROI) that far exceeds their Predictive Index investment. I provide a no-cost initial consultation, which will help give you some clarity on how The Predictive Index can benefit your organization. If you would like to learn more, please give me a call at 1-833-4-E2EWINS (1.833.432-3946) or email me at barry.elliott@end2endwins.com.

Improve Employee Engagement

Picture of two employees in a meeting.

Employee engagement refers to the relationship between an employee and the employing organization. Employee engagement can be measured both qualitatively and quantitatively. Qualitative measurements include insights derived from one-on-one meetings and exit interviews. Quantitative measurements include pulse or employee experience surveys.

Employee engagement is not synonymous with employee satisfaction or happiness, though they often go hand-in-hand. Highly engaged employees care about the work they do and put in discretionary effort. They go the extra mile to move the company’s mission forward. Employees with high levels of engagement are easy to spot. Instead of settling for the bare minimum, they offer inventive solutions to problems no one has thought of before or seem excited about exceeding monthly goals or quotas. These team members are willing to stay a little later or work overtime when needed and invest in offering value in what they do.

While most businesses keep track of key performance indicators, most are missing a critical metric to track: people data. People are a necessary component of your business strategy.

A 2017 Gallup study revealed amazing insights about engaged employees: Organizations with highly engaged employees were 21% more profitable than those with less engaged employees. Engaged teams saw a 10% boost in customer satisfaction ratings and a 20% increase in sales. The numbers paint a clear picture: Engaged employees are good for business. And it makes sense: When your team is excited about their work, they naturally work harder and want to put in that discretionary effort. 

Engaged employees are also less likely to quit. With the cost of turnover weighing between 50-200% of an employee’s salary—depending on their position in the company—retaining employees is cost-effective for businesses.

Ultimately, if you want your business strategy to succeed, you need engaged employees to execute.

A 2017 Gallup survey pinpointed four forces that disrupt employee engagement:

  1. Misalignment with the job: Employees lack the behavioral traits or cognitive ability needed for on-the-job success.
  2. Misalignment with the manager: Managers lack critical skills or tools to coach and develop employees effectively.
  3. Misalignment with the team: Teams can’t communicate or collaborate—and tension colors interactions.
  4. Misalignment with the culture: Employees have trouble connecting with company culture—or culture is toxic.

Companies that optimize their talent always consider these four factors when making any decisions that involve people. For example, organizations use behavioral assessments and cognitive assessments as part of the hiring process to ensure candidate job fit.

Employee engagement is a form of people data that indicates how your employees feel about working for you. A portion of performance on the job has been linked to how engaged an employee is. Those engaged employees will quite often outperform employees who are not engaged. Studies have shown that U.S. businesses have lost billions of dollars each year in productivity from their disengaged staff.

But just knowing that employees have to be engaged at work is not enough. There are several factors to consider. Is disengagement coming from the job itself, the people around them, or their manager? Using engagement survey tools like the PI Employee Experience Survey can show you exactly how engagement affects performance in your organization.

The engagement level an individual has with a job is very important when considering individual performance. Let’s say you’re reviewing your survey results, and the statement “The work I do makes excellent use of my talent/skills and abilities” has a very low score. A low score could mean your employees feel they aren’t in the proper role. Maybe the role was poorly defined; perhaps growing business needs caused the role to morph into something new, or the employee might not have ever been a good fit. Whatever the reason, taking a frequent pulse on how your employees feel about their job is a necessary step to ensure engagement and, ultimately, desired performance.

Want to build a more engaged workforce? I can help you utilize The Predictive Index to improve employee engagement. I can also provide workshops and consulting sessions to help you identify what impacts engagement and create a plan to increase employee engagement.

The PI Employee Experience Survey uncovers what’s driving engagement and disengagement in your organization. It then generates an action plan and employee engagement survey questions to help you bolster strengths and mitigate weaknesses. 

As a PI Certified Partner and expert consultant in talent optimization, I can guide you in administering your engagement survey, sharing out results, and implementing the next steps. Many companies find the objective guidance of an external consultant immensely valuable when addressing engagement issues.

I also can provide talent optimization workshops that support people managers in reviewing their results with their team members. These workshops empower managers and their employees to take action on what exactly impacts engagement within their team.

The PI Employee Experience Survey measures five main areas of employee experience: experience on the Job, with the Manager, with the Team, and with the Organization overall, as well as a section on Engagement.

Any organization interested in understanding – in detail – the work experience of their team members and is committed to making that experience the best that it can be.

The act of conducting a survey will not automatically increase employee engagement at your organization. To truly have an impact, managers and leaders need to take action based on the feedback provided through the survey. Taking action is vital to moving the needle on engagement. Administering a survey and doing nothing with the results can actually decrease engagement.

Talent Optimization Yields Better Hires

Here is an example. You’re a health care organization, and you need to hire a registered nurse. Obviously, there will be some primary education and skill requirements that must be met. But beyond that, a resume doesn’t tell you much about a person’s personality traits or learning speed. To predict whether someone’s a good fit for the RN role, you’d need to answer questions like:

  • Will the candidate be assertive enough to speak up for patient safety? 
  • Is the person wired to enjoy working with and through others?
  • Can they keep up with all the new technology, procedures, and treatments? 

The PI Job Assessment pinpoints the behavioral traits and cognitive ability someone would need to succeed in a given role. The PI Behavioral Assessment helps you determine if someone has the right personality for the job. And the PI Cognitive Assessment enables you to understand the speed at which someone learns new information. Together, these PI hiring assessment tools increase your ability to predict candidate success.

Often, hiring managers choose the candidate with the most experience. That person might also have the right personality and the required cognitive ability. But unless you collect these candidate data points, you have no idea. You’re trusting your gut and making a guess.

Predicting job performance is perhaps the most compelling argument to use assessments for hiring! It has been well-established in the scientific literature that a variety of assessments are valid predictors of performance on the job. Cognitive ability tests, in particular, are powerful predictors of future performance. One of the principal tenets of talent optimization is using people data to make better decisions. Using well-developed and validated assessments in a responsible manner is an example of gaining and using people data to make more informed people decisions.

Assessments serve several purposes, serving both the candidate and the employer. For the candidate, assessments can reduce bias in the hiring process and help them land roles for which they’re best suited. Good job fit allows employees to feel engaged and satisfied at work. For employers, assessments allow companies to make better hires, reducing turnover and its costly effects.

It’s not uncommon to receive many applications in response to a job posting—and it can be challenging to sort through who is actually qualified and would best suit the position. By adding assessments into the hiring process, organizations can screen out those who aren’t qualified or fit the requirements and zero in on those who are likely to succeed in the role.

Utilizing PI assessments has even more benefits…..

Anyone who has been part of the hiring process knows how time-consuming rounds and rounds of interviews can be. It is a tremendous load on the part of the candidate to put aside hours, and even days, for interviews, particularly when they have to take time off from an existing job. Many of today’s assessments are online and on-demand, so candidates can get assessed on their schedule without having to take time off work. If some rounds of interviews can be replaced with assessments, it saves time for both the candidate and the hiring organization.

When using interviews alone, hiring panels can gain valuable information about knowledge, skills, and abilities. Still, they may miss out on crucial areas of learning speed, personality, cultural fit, and soft skills. The use of assessments can provide this information, helping hiring panels make better decisions and providing valuable data for onboarding and managing the employee as well. Assessments also can yield hires that are better job fits which ultimately can translate into higher employee engagement.

It’s no secret there are biases present in the hiring process. There are numerous ways to reduce bias in hiring, including the use of assessments, such as structured interviewing and work sample tests. Using well-developed assessments adds a degree of objectivity to the hiring process that simply isn’t present by using resume screening and unstructured interviews alone.

While not everyone loves interviews, they are a necessary part of the hiring process, so it’s important to make them as valuable as possible. By using the results from assessments, such as personality tests, hiring managers and interviewers can zero in on areas where they think the candidate might bring a particular strength—or where the candidate might have an area of opportunity. The use of assessments provides context for structured interviews, furthering the predictive power of the hiring process.

Absolutely! Not only is it appropriate to use assessments in the hiring process—when they’re properly developed and validated, of course—but implementing assessments is advantageous for both the employer and the candidate. By using assessments and tests to identify the best candidates, an organization can optimize its talent management practices, bringing in the best people to promote a skilled and engaged workforce.

Picture of manager and team welcoming a new employee to work. The Predictive Index and talent optimization discipline can improve hiring success rates.
Picture of manager and team welcoming a new employee to work. The Predictive Index and talent optimization discipline can improve hiring success rates.

Here is an example. You’re a health care organization, and you need to hire a registered nurse. Obviously, there will be some primary education and skill requirements that must be met. But beyond that, a resume doesn’t tell you much about a person’s personality traits or learning speed. To predict whether someone’s a good fit for the RN role, you’d need to answer questions like:

  • Will the candidate be assertive enough to speak up for patient safety? 
  • Is the person wired to enjoy working with and through others?
  • Can they keep up with all the new technology, procedures, and treatments? 

The PI Job Assessment pinpoints the behavioral traits and cognitive ability someone would need to succeed in a given role. The PI Behavioral Assessment helps you determine if someone has the right personality for the job. And the PI Cognitive Assessment enables you to understand the speed at which someone learns new information. Together, these PI hiring assessment tools increase your ability to predict candidate success.

Often, hiring managers choose the candidate with the most experience. That person might also have the right personality and the required cognitive ability. But unless you collect these candidate data points, you have no idea. You’re trusting your gut and making a guess.

Predicting job performance is perhaps the most compelling argument to use assessments for hiring! It has been well-established in the scientific literature that a variety of assessments are valid predictors of performance on the job. Cognitive ability tests, in particular, are powerful predictors of future performance. One of the principal tenets of talent optimization is using people data to make better decisions. Using well-developed and validated assessments in a responsible manner is an example of gaining and using people data to make more informed people decisions.

Assessments serve several purposes, serving both the candidate and the employer. For the candidate, assessments can reduce bias in the hiring process and help them land roles for which they’re best suited. Good job fit allows employees to feel engaged and satisfied at work. For employers, assessments allow companies to make better hires, reducing turnover and its costly effects.

It’s not uncommon to receive many applications in response to a job posting—and it can be challenging to sort through who is actually qualified and would best suit the position. By adding assessments into the hiring process, organizations can screen out those who aren’t qualified or fit the requirements and zero in on those who are likely to succeed in the role.

Utilizing PI assessments has even more benefits…..

Anyone who has been part of the hiring process knows how time-consuming rounds and rounds of interviews can be. It is a tremendous load on the part of the candidate to put aside hours, and even days, for interviews, particularly when they have to take time off from an existing job. Many of today’s assessments are online and on-demand, so candidates can get assessed on their schedule without having to take time off work. If some rounds of interviews can be replaced with assessments, it saves time for both the candidate and the hiring organization.

When using interviews alone, hiring panels can gain valuable information about knowledge, skills, and abilities. Still, they may miss out on crucial areas of learning speed, personality, cultural fit, and soft skills. The use of assessments can provide this information, helping hiring panels make better decisions and providing valuable data for onboarding and managing the employee as well.

It’s no secret there are biases present in the hiring process. There are numerous ways to reduce bias in hiring, including the use of assessments, such as structured interviewing and work sample tests. Using well-developed assessments adds a degree of objectivity to the hiring process that simply isn’t present by using resume screening and unstructured interviews alone.

While not everyone loves interviews, they are a necessary part of the hiring process, so it’s important to make them as valuable as possible. By using the results from assessments, such as personality tests, hiring managers and interviewers can zero in on areas where they think the candidate might bring a particular strength—or where the candidate might have an area of opportunity. The use of assessments provides context for structured interviews, furthering the predictive power of the hiring process.

Absolutely! Not only is it appropriate to use assessments in the hiring process—when they’re properly developed and validated, of course—but implementing assessments is advantageous for both the employer and the candidate. By using assessments and tests to identify the best candidates, an organization can optimize its talent practices, bringing in the best people to promote a skilled and engaged workforce.

Miscellaneous Talent Optimization & PI FAQs

Close up image of someone typing questions on a keyboard.

As a talent optimization consultant, I am an expert at helping businesses improve performance and solve problems. I am a  certified partner of The Predictive Index (PI) and have expertise in all aspects of the discipline of talent optimization and Predictive Index consulting. I have been through extensive training and attend regular update sessions to stay abreast of new features and capabilities of the PI platform. Much of my work is centered around assisting organizational leadership with improving overall operations, but I am flexible and can work with all levels of the organization. My talent optimization consulting services include 1:1 sessions and talent optimization workshops for the entire team.

Unlike other consultants, I am a former CEO and CFO of a global enterprise with operations in six countries, and I have a deep business understanding and years of executive experience. I am a servant-leader and get great satisfaction from helping clients succeed.

After leaving corporate America as a former CEO and CFO, I knew I wanted to do something different. My passion is helping others develop their leadership and communication skills. I also like helping individuals and organizations achieve their goals.

I invested months researching various tools that could support my mission and passions. I focused on four areas: talent management, talent development, communication, and leadership development. I did my own research and read numerous reports and studies from independent and authoritative sources such as Deloitte.

I researched and considered other “big name” solutions, including Myers Briggs (MBTI), DISC, Hogan, Wonderlic, and many more. They all had some unique features that interested me, but none of them could match the holistic solution that I found with The Predictive Index (PI). The PI solution checked all of the boxes for me. As a talent optimization consultant, PI allows me to help organizations:

  • design winning teams
  • attract and retain top talent
  • develop effective and inspiring leaders
  • increase employee engagement and fulfillment

The solution has numerous use cases, and it is very practical and easy for organizations to use. Best of all, the solution is highly customizable, scalable, cost-efficient, and a tremendous value-add to organizations. Before formalizing my LLC, I knew that many of my clients likely would include some of my lifetime colleagues and friends, so finding an optimal solution with a high ROI was a top priority. I have seen the value that organizations have gained from The Predictive Index (PI) and the discipline of talent optimization, so I jumped at the opportunity to learn the tool and discipline to help others succeed.     

As a servant-leader, my mission is to be a true business partner to your organization. I will work closely with you and your designees to understand the organization’s needs, recommend solutions that are most appropriate for the organization, and work diligently to help you realize an optimal return on investment (ROI).

My work ethic is stellar, and as a specialist in talent optimization, you can count on my work to be thorough and any follow-up actions to be performed quickly. All meetings will have an agreed-upon agenda and recaps following the meeting.

The services I provide can help organizations overcome their most significant talent management challenges. Leveraging the discipline of talent optimization, we focus on four key areas:

  • Design teams that are best structured for success and staff the teams with the appropriate talent
  • Be intentional about job design and sync the role’s attributes with the needs of the team and the organization. We also focus on hiring the talent that best fits the needs of the position. 
  • Develop effective leaders that inspire high levels of employee engagement and improve retention of key talent. 
  • Implement appropriate measurements to determine the effectiveness of our talent optimization initiatives and the impact on employee engagement.

Organizational culture represents your business’s core values, rewarded behaviors, and, ultimately, performance drivers. Culture is a result of deliberate, intentional action, so you’ll need to make sure you take calculated measures to build your culture in a way that benefits your organization. But what does it mean to have a culture that promotes high performance? Four characteristics can classify a high-performance culture: strong leaders, empowered employees, employee development, and an openness to change.

Yes. Successfully leading a hybrid team requires leaders to:

Let’s look at an example. Captains are dominant and extraverted. With an innate need to make an impact and influence the work to be done, Captains often use body language to command a room and get their opinions heard. When interacting virtually, it’s harder for them to do this. And it takes a toll: Captains are 23% less likely to feel heard at virtual meetings compared to in-person meetings. 

Communication, decision-making, and conflict resolution can easily go awry when co-workers are in different locations—especially when behavioral needs aren’t being met due to the work environment. Through self-awareness and empathy, your team members’ ability to embrace different work styles can set the stage for top-notch team dynamics, regardless of where each individual is located.

“Blue Mooning” is an emerging trend in some companies.

The term Blue Moon describes the occurrence of a second full moon in a calendar month. The historically infrequent nature of such an event is where we get the idiom “once in a blue moon.”

“Blue Mooning” is a phenomenon where an employee quits a new job within a month of being hired, but was in the job long enough to establish some semblance of regular attendance. 

Here is scenario… The employee accepts the job offer, shows up on day one, and works through the first pay period, typically two weeks. In some cases, the employee works through two pay periods, approximately one month. The second repeated occurrence, be it the end of two weeks or two pay periods, establishes a pattern that the company presumes will continue going forward. Therefore, the company is somewhat bewildered when the employee doesn’t come to work for a third week (or third pay period). I liken the two occurrences to the appearance of two full moons in a month. Hence, the term “Blue Mooning.”

More information can be found here.

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