Thursday 14 November 2013

Psychometric testing?

We are watching more TV than usual right now....and as David sleeps through most of them the diet of strange programs is growing. On one of them and I can't remember which someone is being sent somewhere for Psychometric testing.

This jolted me right back to the years when , newly arrived in the city, in fact in the ill fated Nat West tower, the first David who started as personnel , subsequently changed to human resources.

This involved more than just a name change....he was sent off all over the place for training! One of these was a week somewhere to be trained in psychometric training......this was then the very latest thing and considered to be a basic tool employed on any person applying for a job. At a glance over the figures they could see whether the candidate was suitable, emotionally as well as intellectually.

After a week away David arrived home with a brief case full of paper. Flushed with success he decided that I should be the guinea pig. He gave me a psychometric test!

It took about an hour of quick fire questions. You had to answer straight away giving no thought to the answer.....this way they could see the real you!

At the end of my test David sifted through the results and looked at me critically.

"Well I'd never employ you" he declared...."most unsuitable" I laughed. This was a relief.....working in an office had never been an ambition!

After gazing at my results for some time, shaking his head from side to side, he finally spoke again.

"Well it can't be really accurate" he said easily. "Because according to this you have a much higher IQ than me which is clearly nonsense!"

I stifled a laugh and substituted a groan! After that every factor was analysed in detail....I was quite pleased! I was thoughtful, creative, argumentative and had very high ethical standards. These last were rare in the banking community!

I am not sure how often this test was used back in those days. I was surprised to hear it mentioned this week. We have moved from paper and pencil to digital competence in the fifteen years since I was tested!

But the very words, psychometric testing have power.....to make me roar with laughter and then to remember with some vainglorious pride that I was unsuitable for employment in the bank....Yeah!

1 comment:

UKViewer said...

These days the Church seems to favour Myers-Briggs or Eneagram type personality testing - I had to undergo training and identifying personality types from both systems during discernment. So, from an ENFP have a great weekend :)