The personality assessment industry gets a lot of criticism, and rightfully so. The vast majority of assessment providers care little about validity. At Hogan, we’ve spent 30 years building a reputation based on providing valid assessments that are proven to predict workplace performance.
One frequent question we get from skeptics is “are your assessments biased?” Although our competitors dance around this question or answer it dishonestly, we proudly admit that our assessments are biased.
First, we are biased toward data over intuition and toward data-based decision making.
Second, we are biased toward equal opportunity in hiring and promotion: if a woman or a minority is more talented than a white male candidate, then the talented person should get the job regardless of internal politics.
Third, we are biased toward revising our standard recommendations if new data shows our standard recommendations are wrong—that is, we are biased toward admitting our mistakes.
And fourth, we assume that people are fundamentally irrational and that getting them to behave rationally is a constant struggle. Specifically, people tend to choose actions that lead to short term payoffs but are contrary to their own long term best interests.
And yes, our assessments reflect these biases.