LEARN & BE THE PSYCHOMETRIC INTERPRETER / ANALYST

BEST: International Journal of Humanities, Arts, Medicine and Sciences (BEST: IJHAMS) ISSN (P): 2348-0521, ISSN (E): 2454-4728 Vol. 5, Issue 04, Apr 2017, 7-14 © BEST Journals BENEFITS OF LEARNING PSYCHOMETRICS INTERPRETATION SREENIDHI S K1, TAY CHINYI HELENA2, GOPAL SUBRAMANIAN3 & PRIYANKA4 1 Managing Director, Oscar Murphy Life Strategists, Karnataka, India 2 3 Executive Director, Oscar Murphy Life Strategists, Karnataka, India Head Psychometrics, Oscar Murphy Life Strategists, Karnataka, India 4 Content Developer, Oscar Murphy Life Strategists, Karnataka, India ABSTRACT This article throws light on the importance of different kinds of psychometric assessments and their wide application across fields to different population as well as the emerging significance of a new profession – “Psychometric Interpreter”. It also becomes evident in the article that this field has huge scope in the future and is advancing on a quick pace. “Psychometric Interpreter” as coined by the authors in the following article are a breed of specialists, known for skills and knowledge in the tools of Psychometrics and are adept at using them to diagnose and break down challenging situations that involve people. The Psychometric Interpreter can identify the less than obvious behaviours and communication that impact performance, thus bringing in a laser like focus to the most pressing issues in any scenario. They see team dynamics as a function of individual member characteristics and attitudes, and bring in solutions to improve cohesiveness, trust and synergy. ‘Psychometric Interpreters’ are in demand worldwide in the fields of Management, HR and Socio-Behavioural science. They could be counsellors, coaches, behavioural modification consultants, trainers, teachers, psychologists, change agents, human resource professionals, people developers, recruiters and others. Whatever the channel, their value lies undoubtedly in transforming ‘limiting mindsets’ to ‘enabling mindsets’, leading to enhanced self-confidence, academic performance, career growth, rewarding interpersonal relationships, work-life balance and leadership outlook. This article also explains the role of Psychometric interpreters in areas such as Training, Coaching, team building, recruitment, organisational development, education – teaching, parenting and the list goes on… This article is one of its kinds and needs further research as its application and use is humongous to all the areas of life. KEYWORDS: Psychometric Interpreter, Psychometric Assessments, HR, Counsellors, Change Agents, Recruitment, Education, Organisation Development, Training, Coaching INTRODUCTION Psychometrics is the emerging science adding immense value in measuring the mind of all its complexity. People from different walks of life from across the globe are resorting to gains from Psychometrics Assessment, and interpretation. It is extremely useful in understanding the different personalities, thinking attitudes, communication styles, behaviour patterns, inner motivations, likes & dislikes, conflicting choices, career preferences, leadership profiles, performance gaps, academic achievements, relationship challenges and more. Impact Factor (JCC): 2.8973 - This article can be downloaded from www.bestjournals.in 8 Sreenidhi S K, Tay Chinyi Helena, Gopal Subramanian & Priyanka ‘Psychometrics Interpreters’ are in demand worldwide owing to its wide application from across the population. Psychometrics assessments and interpretation is of paramount importance in enabling and empowering individual children as well as working adults. Psychometrics is essential STRENGTH FINDERS. They help you identify the core strengths to build on and seize innumerable opportunities in life and career. They also help in overcoming the threats posed by the inherent weaknesses by using style-flexing techniques. ‘Psychometric Interpreters’ could be counsellors, coaches, behavioural modification consultants, trainers, teachers, psychologists, change agents, human resource professionals, people developers, recruiters and others. They operate at different levels like: • Individual Adult: Behaviour, Attitude & Thinking in terms of career progression, interpersonal relationships, behavioural competency, enhancing performance and more • Individual Student: Behaviour, Attitude & Thinking in terms of academic performance, self-confidence, subject choices, and in starting right careers • Team or Group: Composition and character of members that lead to enabling or hindering performance on projects, ownership, attrition, cooperation as well collaboration • Organisation: Impact and influence on environment, culture, optimism, growth, climate, leadership vision, mission & values ‘Psychometric Interpreters’ are knowledgeable resources to enable individuals, couples, teams as well as organisations. They are well-aware of host of tools and techniques used in moving people from ‘limiting mindsets’ to ‘enabling mindsets’. They are a dependable in every people situation to enhance productivity and performance. The learning’s in Psychometrics Interpretation enable them with seamless connectivity to grasp and understand the complex human mind. The human mind is influenced since young by heredity as well as upbringing environment. The conditioning or programming that happens since young takes its toll as one grows and matures. The impact and influence affect self-confidence, academic performance, differences in behaviours, positive or negative habits, career choice, career growth, interpersonal relationships, work-life balance and leadership outlook. Study of Psychometrics assessments and Interpretation will help you learn to go beyond the automated psychometric reports. You will learn to customise every interaction depending on the specific need of the person or the role or the situation. As a ‘Psychometrics Interpreter’ you can Help and Enable Individuals / Families Faced with Challenges Like: • Lack of Self Confidence • Interpersonal issues • Inability to decide what to do in life or career • Stuck in careers they dislike • Troubled relationships or marriage • Academic underperformance Index Copernicus Value (ICV): 44.78 – Articles can be sent to editor.bestjournals@gmail.com Benefits of Learning Psychometrics Interpretation • Behaviour or Attitude issues • Lacks interest in life • Lacking in competency • Emotional Sensitivity 9 As a ‘Psychometrics Interpreter’ you can Help and Enable Organisations Faced with Challenges Like: • Lack of Ownership • Interpersonal Conflict • Lack of coordination • Collaboration Issues • Slow Decisions • Not learning from Mistakes • Inability to Anticipate • Lack Innovation • Weak leadership Skills • Poor Communication The list can be endless and every organization is no different since people are different everywhere. People think, feel, or act differently due to a variety of reasons – not one but many influences – heredity, upbringing, environment, situational, education, values, culture, competency and more. The behavioural science of Psychology has made rapid advances over the years. Today it has gifted the human kind with an objective methodology of bridging the gap between one’s potential and current performance. As a ‘Psychometrics Interpreter’ you have the benefit of knowing thing’s for sure and help individuals, teams, departments and organizations to take right decisions at the right time. You can find, answers to many challenges with respect to people and their performance now from any corner of the world due to technological advances. Learning the Science of ‘Psychometric Interpretation’ Makes you the Most Sought After Professional as it: • enables you to assess people of their true potential • is made of online scientific assessments to measure STRENGTHS & OPPORTUNITIES • helps you find the right person for the right job • gives you the power to enable people and organisations to make course correction faster • creates the edge in business and multiplies benefits many folds • is useful in Selection, training, coaching, counselling, manpower planning, & OD Impact Factor (JCC): 2.8973 - This article can be downloaded from www.bestjournals.in 10 Sreenidhi S K, Tay Chinyi Helena, Gopal Subramanian & Priyanka • further adds value in strategic management, competency mapping, & performance management • Helps build confidence, inspire people and develop healthy relationships among friends, colleagues and within families. You will be able to identify the People’s Ability in Terms of • Inherent Strengths to perform and how to leverage on Strengths • Known & Unknown Weaknesses and how to cope with Weaknesses • How to use the Strengths and Competency to open-up Opportunities • How to cope with one’s weaknesses to deal with possible Threats? • Developing one’s career growth and leadership potential • Enhancing interpersonal dynamics and building stronger team work • Enhancing productivity and performance at all levels • Learning to appraise and manage performance to boost results • Getting people to develop the right competency required for the job • Choosing the Right Person for the right job • Accomplishing results smarter, better and faster • Identifying, developing and benefiting for greater job satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS APPLICATIONS & USES Training & Psychometric Interpretation Psychometric assessments and interpretation adds immense value to the effectiveness of training programs or processes. Participants realistically connect to their individual scores and past behaviours and they are encouraged from within to reflect and introspect. The interpretation is a powerful tool to provoke the change in their thinking, attitudes as well as their behaviours. The Psychometrics assessment and interpretation acts as an enabler to lasting changes in people as you witness a clear transfer of learning from workshop to workplace. Coaching & Psychometric Interpretation Be it life coaching or executive or business coaching, Psychometric analysis and interpretation lays the firm foundation for self-realisation of one’s strengths and areas of challenge. If coaching is to be meaningful and trigger a quick change from within, Psychometrics is the right way forward. It helps the coach to enable the participant to realise one’s true innate potential and help one to find ways to bridge the gap between performance and potential. The resultant change is objective and unbiased. Great value for money coaching for long-lasting positive outcomes. Index Copernicus Value (ICV): 44.78 – Articles can be sent to editor.bestjournals@gmail.com Benefits of Learning Psychometrics Interpretation 11 Counselling & Psychometric Interpretation Counselling situations are even more demanding and the solutions are not too easy to find. To gain deeper insights into the person’s glue-like mindsets, die-hard-habits and concrete-wall-like attitudes, Psychometric assessments and interpretation plays a crucial role. To make the person discard the limiting mindset and to make one to accept the enabling mindset, you need tools that provoke the change from within. Battery of Psychometric assessments are your major weapons in making the turn around and in helping the person to be independent in solving one’s own challenges. Team Building & Psychometric Interpretation Being a team player is never easy, since most are individual performers. That’s why the most families as well as organisations face uphill challenges in their interpersonal relationships. Everyone knows that people are different, but how they are different can be better understood through an objective evaluation of team members with Psychometric assessments and invaluable interpretation that helps in bonding people together for enhanced team performance. They also benefit from learning how to flex their communication style to suit specific differences and needs of different team members. After-all ‘One-size-fits-all’ approach does not work in dealing with varying team players. Recruiting & Psychometric Interpretation ‘Right person for the right job or role’ will only remain a distant dream as-long as the selection processes remain subjective. To make it objective you need multiple Psychometric tools that provide insights into person’s hidden attitudes. Today, the worlds over people are hired for their knowledge and skills. But later managers and colleagues struggle with the attitudes of new hires at all levels. Hence the watch words now are to ‘HIRE for ATTITUDES, & then Train them for Knowledge and Skills. Psychometrics assessment and interpretation, gives you a holistic and objective view of the candidate’s suitability with respect to the job description, performance outcomes, competency and more. Organisation Development & Psychometric Interpretation People are the bedrock of any organisation. Yes, the 4 M’s are important – Money, Machines, Materials and Methods. But Manpower Management the 5th M is always elusive. Multiple battery of Psychometric assessments provides rock solid objective unbiased data insights into the hot buttons for course correction and change for the better. It provides you with measurements of strengths - team wise, department wise, region wise as well as the overall organisation. Psychometric analysis is a huge asset in organisational health and development. Since it’s scientific, easy to convince those who matter. Teaching & Psychometric Interpretation: It’s a Teacher’s passion to enable academic performance of every student in one’s class. But this rarely happens despite best teaching efforts. Since every student is different, it is important to let the student know one’s true learning style, learning methods or learning preferences and their unique multiple intelligence. It is a fact that if a teacher’s teaching style clashes with the learning personality style of the student, then the student will not be able to learn to one’s full potential. Hence the student will under-perform. Psychometric assessments and interpretation brings out the right understanding and appreciation of each student’s strengths in their learning and intelligence. Hence invaluable tools for a teacher to give one’s best. Impact Factor (JCC): 2.8973 - This article can be downloaded from www.bestjournals.in 12 Sreenidhi S K, Tay Chinyi Helena, Gopal Subramanian & Priyanka Parenting & Psychometric Interpretation: One of the biggest responsibility of a parent is to move their children from a dependency relationship to one of independence. It is here it becomes an absolute necessity for a parent to help bring out the innate talents from within their children. Psychometric assessments and interpretation is highly recommended in students above the age of 10 years. It brings out their uniqueness, their gifts, their strengths, their likely behaviours and attitudes along with thought processes. It becomes a healthy foundation in nurturing children to be better adults. It enables them to devise right study strategies, chose right subjects and map appropriate careers. INSIGHT INTO PSYCHOMETRIC ASSESSMENTS • A Comprehensive assessment tool based on Carl Jung Personality Types – Feeler, Intuitors, Thinkers & Feelers, measures the personalities types of individuals. According to his theory, Personalities are formed by environmental and hereditary influences. Each of these influences creates distinctive personality types that constitute unique attributes, strengths and drawbacks. This potent Personality Style Assessment helps discover the individual’s inherent personality style and assists in developing oneself by using the right steps to enhance the strengths. In addition, also provides valuable tips for recognizing personality types of others. • William Marston has does extensive research on motivational drives, emotional responses and behaviour patterns of individuals, like: Controlling, Convincing, Conforming and Consistent emotional responses of people. He says these emotional responses and behaviours are largely influenced by upbringing from the individuals’ environment and these in turn are essential to assess various aspects like drive to overcome barriers, ability to persuade etc. It throws light on individuals as people oriented or task oriented, reflecting the style by which they will get work done. It also helps find out if an individual is ‘Active or Passive’ in their approach to work and life. It also shows whether an individual would lead by providing a vision of future possibilities or by making best possible use of available opportunities. • Communication Pattern Analysis based on Eric Berne’s Transactional Analysis would evaluate the way a person interacts, which is learnt from the environment and his/her upbringing. This assessment assesses the impact of various factors like upbringing, environmental influences etc. that establishes certain communication habits of the individual. Since, effective communication is an essential component of organizational success whether it is at the interpersonal, inter-group, intra-group, organizational, or external levels, this assessment would help individuals deal and communicate with others at work and off work in an effective manner • The Behaviour Pattern Analysis based on B F Skinner’s theory illustrates environmental influences on an individual by identifying and comparing behaviour patterns in variable situations. Since, human behaviour is the collection of behaviours exhibited by human beings and influenced by culture, attitudes, emotions, values, ethics, authority, rapport, hypnosis, persuasion, coercion and/or genetics, this tool brings to light the manner of behaviour across situations. It provides a balanced view of behaviour of an individual. Index Copernicus Value (ICV): 44.78 – Articles can be sent to editor.bestjournals@gmail.com Benefits of Learning Psychometrics Interpretation • 13 People Performance Competency Model based on the work of well recognized psychologists & management specialists like Richard Boyatzis, Michael John Kirton, Henry Mintzberg assesses 5 Meta Performance Competencies namely; Managing Change, Planning and Organizing, Interpersonal Dynamics, Result Orientation and Leadership, which are further subdivided into 20 core competencies such as Analytical thinking, Decision making, Planning, Quality Focus, Initiative, Risk Taking, Innovation, Flexibility, Authority Presence, Motivating Others, Developing People, Resilience, Achievement Orientation, Customer Focus, Business Awareness, Learning Orientation, Oral Communication, Sensitivity, Relationships and Teamwork. This tool helps individuals to identify their competency and gives a broader view of one’s strengths, job that suits the best, areas of improvement etc. Its applications are many. It is widely used by organisations in performance management, succession mapping, performance appraisal etc. • The Visual-Auditory-Kinesthetic learning styles model developed by Fernald, Keller, Orton, Gillingham, Stillman, Montessori and Neil D Fleming, provides a simple way to explain and understand one’s own learning style (and learning styles of others) to assess your preferred learning styles, and most importantly, to incorporate learning methods and experiences that match one’s strengths and preferences. There is no right or wrong learning style. The fact is that there are different types of learning styles that suit different people. This assessment is widely applicable to different kinds of population from students to adults. It gives insight into strengths, weaknesses and learning habits, increases self-confidence and improves self-image, helps improve cooperation among colleagues fostering team work and Improves persuasive and sales skills in meeting the needs of different people or customers. • Concrete, Abstract, Random and Sequential model developed byAnthony F. Gregorc, provides amazing insight into how individual’s gather and assimilate information. It is of immense value to individuals, as awareness into these can be utilized towards building on their natural learning preferences. Knowing how you learn and how you relate to the world can help you make smarter choices; better chance of avoiding problematic situations and helps understand as to how different people learn differently and hence one style of teaching or learning does not fit all. • Participating, Reflecting, Structuring and Experimenting Learning model developed by David Kolb, assesses the approach (Participating, Reflecting, Structuring and Experimenting) an individual takes to organize and internalize information. This provides an objective analysis to understand the means by which one organizes new learning. It helps to understand the Strengths and weaknesses in learning, to discover how to learn best and facilitates best performance and boosts confidence. • The theory of “Multiple Intelligence” developed by Howard Gardner provides nine different potential pathways to learning. It gives a whole new way of looking at lives, suggesting several ways in which effective learning can be facilitated in view of individual strengths and potential. • Leaders Effective Aptitude Profile based on the different leadership styles provides awareness of personal leadership style and its implications to develop leadership skills and flex leadership techniques according to Impact Factor (JCC): 2.8973 - This article can be downloaded from www.bestjournals.in 14 Sreenidhi S K, Tay Chinyi Helena, Gopal Subramanian & Priyanka situational demands. The insight provided by this assessment acts as an underpinning for comprehensive and balanced leadership effectiveness. This tool is extensively used as a prelude to leadership skill development. It determines if leaders actively provide feedback to develop subordinates, lead by providing a vision of future opportunities or by defining systems and procedures to minimize wastages and maximize predictability etc. • Change Response Profile Assessment aims to determine concerns people have when a change is implemented in their environment. It facilitates in identifying and responding accordingly to the worries, attitudes, and perceptions of people as they deal with the challenges of changing the way they work. It also, provides early indication of reasons for resistance within the organisation, offers insight into what exactly concerns an individual regarding the change, facilitates the management’s understanding of apprehensions and challenges faced by their workforce to deal with change effectively. REFERENCES 1. TAW Manual, Oscar Murphy Life Strategists, (2011) 2. MAPP Manual, Oscar Murphy Life Strategists, (2012) 3. http://www.personalityexplorer.com/freeresources/personalitytype.aspx 4. http://study.com/academy/lesson/carl-jungs-theories-lesson-quiz.html 5. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2755377/ 6. http://www.ericberne.com/ 7. http://www.businessballs.com/transact.htm 8. http://vark-learn.com/introduction-to-vark/the-vark-modalities/ 9. http://www.tecweb.org/styles/gardner.html 10. http://www.businessballs.com/kolblearningstyles.htm Index Copernicus Value (ICV): 44.78 – Articles can be sent to editor.bestjournals@gmail.com