Author: RHogan

People in the world of finance tend not to be very thoughtful about personality—and there are overwhelming data to support this generalization. But personality affects the decisions of financial managers just like everyone else. In addition, the success or failure of every organization is the sum of the decisions that the leaders make on a… Read more »

In this cover story from Canadian publication Advisor’s Edge, Dr. Robert Hogan discusses the validity of personality assessment in the selection process, as well as his pioneering role in the history of personality testing. Dr. Robert Hogan, an international authority on personality assessment, recalls facing stiff resistance from academics and lawyers when he and his… Read more »

For test developers and test users, validity is the most fundamental concept in psychological assessment. It is also a surprisingly vexed notion. A review of the literature on validity composed by the “great minds” (e.g., Lee Cronbach, Jane Loevinger, Paul Meehl) will give you a case of vertigo. The definition of validity found in the… Read more »

Business literature typically characterizes the people at the top of organizations in remarkably positive terms. Senior executives are described as visionary, acute, charismatic, decisive, creative, etc.—i.e., as being substantially more talented than the average person. They are also usually described as being well motivated, as caring about their staff, their colleagues, their organizations, and their… Read more »

We’ve enjoyed a lot of positive feedback lately regarding our Hogan Development Survey marketing campaign, which features a number of different animals that “personify” the 11 derailer scales measured by the assessment. These potentially-derailing characteristics aren’t necessarily bad (in fact, they can be very *good* depending on your line of work), so we developed a… Read more »

  Why is it that bad management seems such a universal issue? It seems that anyone who’s knocked around any number of “underling” positions in any industry can relate to tales of incompetent, inefficient and often sadistic management. And if this is indeed the case, why does poor management continue to be such a pervasive… Read more »

The following Robert Hogan commentary appeared on the Hogan Assessments Website in March 2007. It’s a good summary of of why we (Hogan) do what we do, and I’d be curious to know the perception of the relationship between personality and career success from people *outside* the realm of I/O psychology. If you’re currently searching… Read more »

Welcome to “The Science of Personality,” an informal repository of information and commentary related to industrial/occupational psychology. Much of the content is the work of Dr. Robert Hogan, founder of Hogan Assessment Systems and an international authority on personality assessment, leadership, and organizational effectiveness. As such, Dr. Hogan offers keen insight into the goings-on within… Read more »