Are Assessments Doing Damage?

Many of us have taken behavior assessments, personality assessments or leadership assessments.?We have the same trepidation as we sit down to take the assessment.?"What will the assessment show me??Oh no, are they going to find out I don’t have the strength they think I need to have for my job?"?The thoughts race through the participant’s mind as they begin answering questions that are seemingly set to confuse them.?We may feel like we are being set up for failure.?When we are done, we get up and might think “I hated that”.?Then, there is the next step: reviewing the results.?This is where assessments can do some damage. ?

Some assessments are open source (i.e free and open to the public).?This means we can search for the assessment, take it and see our results without support from the test administrators or a credentialed facilitator.?We are hardwired to validate what we think.?It’s called confirmation bias, and when we take an assessment and feel inadequate, we look for the data in the results that prove our thoughts.?Or, we dismiss the results as being inaccurate.?When the results are delivered in an open source environment, free for us to take anytime, the results can be harmful.?

We might already feel bad about ourselves, validate that and then feel we now have solid proof that we aren’t good.?This is not a safe nor healthy place to be. ?

Our employers can ask us to take assessments too.?It’s beneficial for employees to have access to expensive assessments when they aren’t paying for it (which is why some are open source).?At least with this option, it’s not off the shelf without any support.?Typically the company has a facilitator who may be certified in that particular assessment so that they can debrief participants.?But that doesn’t mean psychological safety is present when the employee gets their results. ?

I once took a battery of assessments at work.?Ten assessments with a facilitator debriefing 20 or so of us at the same time.?He was giving general feedback like “If your results say you are ABC type of person, then it means the following…” The challenge here is that the participants have questions that pertain to their results.?In a room full of colleagues, the environment isn’t safe for authentic learning and development.?In my experience, the facilitator debriefed 7 of the 10 assessments.?While doing so he spent 45 minutes talking about the result he had and 15 minutes on the other three possible outcomes the rest of us had.?For another assessment, he told the women in the room that we all looked tired and that it was because the results in our assessments said so.?To top it off, the facilitator stated to everyone “If you are ABC type, then you won’t last long here.”?The story line here is that the facilitator did some real damage to an already anxious set of assessment participants in front of their colleagues and ended his assessment facilitation with threatening workplace tenure.

The next place damage is done is between the manager and the employee.?When assessment results are not held in confidence, the manager can learn how the employee scored.?

For example, if the employee scored low in leadership skills and the manager knows this, they may not promote the employee.?Another example is for the employee that scores higher in extroversion, the manager may advise the employee not to speak up in meetings.?The manager can weaponize assessment results to push behaviors onto the employee that ultimately eliminates motivation and thwarts employee engagement.

Assessments can empower each individual to align more fully in their strengths and values so that the organization has a lower turn-over rate, an increase in employee engagement and better yet, we land a role we really love.

~Carrie Geyer

It's not all bad news for assessments. They can make a positive impact and can be very empowering. There are ways to take assessments and to facilitate assessment results safely.?As a participant know these three things:

1. Assessments are a snapshot in time.?All of the external, environmental factors are at play in your answers.?If you are hungry and the assessment is analyzing desires, you might result in a strong desire to eat.?That makes complete sense, but what does that mean for the results??You may not be feasting all day so take the result and engage in some introspective work.?The result may or may not align with how you see yourself.?Which leads to the next point.
2. Be cautious to take the assessment results so seriously. The results are not for us to go into a tailspin of negative thoughts about ourselves.?One assessment told me I probably didn’t have anything yellow in my closet.?This suggestion lead me into this chaotic thought pattern because it was actually true.?"Did I need to have yellow in my wardrobe??Should I be wearing yellow more often??Do I even look good in yellow??Why don’t I have yellow??I don’t think I look good in yellow??What kind of yellow??Corn yellow? Sunshine yellow?" …you get the idea here.?Spiraling, really. Imagine if we were already full of self-doubt about our performance at work.?This is a bad place to linger.?Know that the assessment is not to point out our flaws.?Consider how you might grow in areas that aren’t as strong, or ask for training, or find a colleague good at those things to partner with.
3. Be cautious as to what you share with your manager when you have a confidential assessment.?Your manager is human and has biases they aren’t aware of.?Even in the most safe relationships, there is no way to prevent your manager from using the results for or against you. ?

If you are on the employer side of giving assessments, follow this guide to maximize the growth opportunity for employees during and after assessments:

1. Use an assessment that requires certification to deliver results.?Hiring a consultant who is well-versed in the data architecture of the assessments and is well-skilled in facilitating the results of the assessment in a safe manor is key to the insight an employee can take from the assessment.
2. Commit to the sharing of the assessment results only through the use of a certified facilitator who is credentialed in that specific assessment.?Only the certified facilitator and the employee should see their results, and only presented with the facilitator present.
3. Create and practice and maintain a culture of psychological safety.?Often the results may broaden one’s view of their skills or desires and that may cause the employee to seek new opportunities.?The space needs to be created for them to have conversations based on the tools you’ve just provided them. ?

Assessments are very powerful tools that can be weaponized by managers, mis-interpreted in a silo, and could cause an increase in insecurities.?They can also empower each individual to align more fully in their strengths and values so that the organization has a lower turn-over rate, an increase in employee engagement and better yet, we land a role we really love.?Done safely, assessments can make a positive impact on employee performance and self-esteem.

Carrie Geyer is a Career & Executive Coach certified in assessments such as PointLeader that align job competencies and authentic human values with careers people love. As the CEO of Marea Organizational Consulting, Carrie serves as a development partner for organizational & professional career transformation.