Americans value assertiveness, the Dutch straight talking, the French diplomacy and the Chinese self-effacement. Whatever you think of the stereotypes, multinationals have to hire global teams that can work well together.

This means that psychometric tests to measure aptitude, intelligence or personality need to be culturally relevant. No mean feat when you consider a Chinese applicant who is assessed for a global role in Britain and benchmarked against a British standard, or the black British working class applicant assessed against an upper middle class white one.

This is just one of the things that John Rust, professor of psychometrics and the director of the Psychometrics Centre at the University of Cambridge, wrangles with. Among other things, Professor Rust is kept busy translating tests for different cultures.

He admits that tests alone can’t ensure diversity but says that they can force organisations to consider diversity and equal opportunities. Team psychometric testing is the simplest illustration of this. “You can find teams made up almost entirely of decisionmakers, which is no good,” he says. “We all have our biases, which makes interviewing candidates very subjective. This is one way to inject more objectivity. We need to get around the tendency to recruit people like ourselves. If you want a good team you need a diversity of personalities.”

Personality tests measure the balance of five key traits: extroversion v introversion; emotionality v empathy; openness v conformity; strategic approach v attention to detail; and authority v agreeability. “People don’t change drastically over their lives. Your basic characteristics are laid down in childhood. The skill is to operate in (such) a way that your personality is your strength. Although we can’t change our basic personality structure we can develop different styles of working.”

However, most psychological tests used in graduate recruitment are not personality tests but numerical and verbal reasoning tests. “There is general dissatisfaction with degrees. It is not taken as a given that people with a degree have these skills any more.”

Some organisations also use situational judgment tests to weed out unsuitable applicants. “Candidates deselect themselves when they understand the situations they may have to deal with,” says Professor Rust’s colleague, Lyn Dale, an occupational psychologist.

It is difficult to fib on a psychometric test — many are made up of hundreds of questions completed in exam conditions in a short space of time. But social impression management is a problem. “To some extent, everyone manages the impression they give. So we try to put in some items that candidates can’t second guess and screen for inconsistencies,” Professor Rust says.

Generally, people don’t like the idea of integrity tests, which are seen as judgmental. These tests, which measure “passions, sentiments, values and beliefs”, are usually used to address problems such as absenteeism or lack of motivation. “They are difficult tests to design because if you ask whether people work hard, everyone automatically says ‘yes’.”

Psychometric experts have to work hard to keep tests relevant and abuse free too. Current dilemmas include the delivery of tests to global audiences online; future privacy issues resulting from test results stored on databases; and the use of neural networks.

www.cambridgeassessment.org.uk

• Next week: Can psychometrics spot leadership potential?

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