Assessment 3

Learning Journal

By THOBIAS THOMAS
S00255370

People Resourcing
HRM606
Dr. Tilda Khoshaba
Australian Catholic University
2019
Introduction

This is a learning journal to understand the various concept regarding on

conducting interviews, deciding an individual’s personality traits etc. before
selecting the best candidate for an organization. Interviews are regarded as face
to face communication in a particular place. (Raymond, 2006) It’s basically
conducted by organizations or other offices to hire or employee individual to do
certain prescribed job. We are also focusing on how different types of personality
test can help to determine the attributes and qualities of an individual. In order to
determine we give emphasis on personality test, Psychometric test, Core self-
Values, Emotional intelligence and Ability test. All these have its own
importance in finding out an individual personality traits which will be helpful
for an organization. This journal also reflects on self-reflection on how it impacts
in one’s life and how it will be beneficial in coming future.

Entry1

In week 7 lecture, it was mainly focused on the topic how to select a candidate
through interviews and what are the main things as an interviewer and as an
interviewee should keep in their mind before attending or conducting an
interview. The main objective of conducting an interview is to select the best or
the accurate candidate for any type of job. Through several methods and process,
an interviewee conduct interview to find out the perfect candidate. In this lecture,
it covered all the important aspects of how to conduct an interview. It includes
which types of selection interview is needed to understand the potential
workforce. Basically, there are three types of interview which most of the
organization follows. That’s is Appraisal interview, Selection Interview and Exit
interview. Further discussions during the lecture, I came to know that, Selection
interview has the most structured characteristics compared to other two types of
interview. Appraisal interview is done in order to congratulate an employee for
their extraordinary performance and exit interview is conducted to inform the
employee that he/she can no longer work for the organization. As our lecturer
went on explaining about the topic, I was very amazed to know there are many
important factors that needs to take utmost care to conduct an interview and as an
interviewer which all part of his/her characteristics and abilities will be tested
during the process.

As we went on with our topic, our lecturer explained that as a person who is
sitting in the interview panel, what type of questions to be prepared to ask a
person to understand if he/she is fit for this job that they are seeking for. This
helped me to connect some of the events that had happened in my life before. I
have had an opportunity to be a part of an interview panel because my father was
conducting the interview to select some of the people for a vacant position in our
company. so, he insisted me to sit beside him and to listen and understand the
main essence of conducting interview. This gave me an opportunity to sit aside
my father and understand this process from both perspective i.e., as an
interviewee and interviewer. During that time, it was kind of fascinating because
I got the rarest of the opportunity to sit in a panel board without fear. And I
focused on the questions that he asked the candidate who came for the interview
to find out whether they are good/bad to do that job.

But I wasn’t sure at that time what qualities he was looking for through those
questions and the answers he got after each response. After reading through the
slides and listening what my lecturer said, I was really shocked to see that all the
points which were noted in the slides were exactly my father was looking for
from those questions. In the slides, it talked about which all type of questions that
can be asked to understand his/her qualities if they are put into certain situation
or what will be their behavior approach to certain problems that may arise in the
organization or regarding their job- related approach or how would they handle
stress during the course of the business. And by seeing few videos and
experiences of people who did extraordinary in interview during the class time
and through other researches, now I have a clear knowledge on what all
preparations is needed to be done before conducting an interview in a structured
manner or attending an interview. By this I understood that from the slides and
lecture notes and from my father experiences, how to conduct a structured
interview to get to know more of the candidate and how to give an interview
according the qualities an interviewer is looking for.
Entry 2

In week 8 class was focused on another important trait required for selection
process, that is called the Ability test. Cognitive ability test and personality traits
are interrelated. The persons that are collected personality check typically reflects
the cognitive ability and the responses collected from cognitive ability will
reflects to personality. (Patrick, & Kell, 2018). In the first part of discussion, it
was mainly about the historical part of ability test. When it originated? how was
it been used in olden days? etc. Compared to olden days, most of these kinds of
test were conducting in a standardized manner using paper and pen and which
will happen for a certain period of time.

Later on, as the development in the science and technology improved, they
figured out that these cognitive ability test can be used to measure job
performance. In this test, its mainly focused on individuals verbal, mathematical,
memory and reasoning. By answering the questions there will be scores given to
it. And at last all these scores will be added to find out ability that an individual
has. There is one thing that need to be considered is, in each set of overall scores
will result in measuring different abilities. Then we have also discussed about the
Wonderlic personality test which is also a type of personality test. It is basically
a test conducted to find out the employee’s perspective on learning and problem-
solving skills. This test is also measured by calculating all the scores which we
get after conducting this test. Nowadays this personality test is also being called
as I. Q test. This help to understand the individual’s ability to under symbols,
figures, words etc. and the ability to solve complex problem by using logics.
nowadays most of these ability test is also can be conducted using internet.
Through electronic delivery systems, company can collect data by submitting
resumes, applications etc. furthermore they can also conduct mental ability test
in online than doing it physically. And there are certain researcher saying that
cognitive ability test is useful in many fields such as academics, workplace etc.

Even though cognitive ability test has many advantages but it also has got certain
disadvantage. There are many people who thinks that cognitive ability test does
not help in job performance. Even if it plays a role in hiring technique for some
organizations but there are people who things that this type of test can make them
less motivated and at the end their performance goes down gradually. And there
was situation that had occurred in hiring, a lot a white man were hired than black
men because of the respondents scores received were higher for white people.
Before attending these lectures, I didn’t have any idea about Ability test and its
uses in hiring an employee and how it can improve job performance of an
organization. But now I am sure that these types of tests will definitely impact on
individuals to improvise their inter and intra personal skills. Since it’s an age of
technology, I would prefer to conduct these tests online because compared to the
olden method this comparatively easier and one can do this sitting anywhere at
any time.

Entry3

In week 9 lecture, we were following what we have started in our previous week
lectures. We talk about the different process and methods that need to be
considered while in the selection process of an individual. In this week, we
covered about a test that will measure the fundamental abilities of a person called
as Personality test. These tests are mainly conducted to understand who exactly
are we dealing in the organization. It is basically being a set of measures to
understand the thoughts, emotions, character and their psychological behavioral
pattern. (Dibra, 2013) In the class, we have also look into the past history of these
testing started. According to records it shows that from late 1960’s this had started
and from there onwards there have been more than 17000 types of personality
testing being proposed over time. But in our class, we also discussed some of the
test which widely being used by the organizations and other institute to
understand individual personality. That was big five model and psychometric
tests. Big five models are personality traits model will help to find out the
leadership qualities one possesses.

As the name suggests, by using five factors we can determine their qualities. I
still remember that when I was doing my undergraduate degree, my professors
did some test using this five models by numbering from 1 to 10. And that exercise
helped me to understand that I am an introvert person. And further through the
readings given in the unit outline I came across this test called psychometric test.
This is being an additional information for me and I heard that for the first time.
This test is widely used in the field of assessing personality. (Lundgren, Kroon,
& Poell, 2017). After that we talk about few other tests that will also help to
understand personality traits. That are Core self-evaluation, Emotional
Intelligence etc. Core self-evaluation is related to work family conflict and other
things. (Hanies, Harvey, Durand, & Marchand, 2013) This study frequently
studied under these 4 traits such as self-esteem, generalized efficacy, locus of
control and emotional stability. According to study it says person who are
confident, believe in themselves, and could control anxiety are said be productive
at work place. This is one of the main area that I need to give complete focus to
improve my Core Self-Value. Because I am a person who will get tensed easily
when I do something wrong or if I’m if not able to complete something. And I
will lose my confidence in myself and will definitely reduce my productivity in
work place. Therefore, I need to develop in my Core Self value to gain more value
in personal skills as well as in work life.

Conclusion

To conclude, interview can be considered as effective method to find out the

qualities of a candidate. (Michael & Daniel, 2012). In order to conduct it
effectively the first step that need to consider is that to structure the interview
process accurately. By doing so the people in the interview panel board will have
a clear idea on asking questions and selecting the perfect individual for the job.
During the selection process, in order to find the best people certain test will be
conducted. Among that, Ability test and personality test has more impact on
finalizing the selection of an employee. Followed by Core self-value and
emotional intelligence also have significant role in finding out personality traits.
This learning journal gave me a chance to go back to earlier my days and reflect
on myself when I did this paper. It also helped me to understand the importance
of conducting these personality tests and also gave me clear idea on which all
areas of myself that needed to be improved in order to improvise my performance.
References

Dibra, S, 2013, “Psychometric tests applications by Albanian HR managers”,

Romanian Economic and Business Review, Vol. 8, no. 4, pp. 106-121.

Lundgren, H, Kroon, P & Poell, RF, 2017, “Personality testing and workplace
training”, European Journal of Training and Development, Vol. 41, no. 3, pp.
198-221.

Hanies, V, Harvey, S, Durand, P & Marchand, A, 2013, “Core Self-Evaluations,

Work-Family Conflict, and Burnout”, Journal of marriage and family, Vol. 75,
no. 3, pp. 778-793.

Patrick, KC & Kell, H, 2018, “Ability Tests Measure Personality, Personality

Tests Measure Ability: Disentangling construct and method in Evaluating the
Relationship between Personality and Ability”, Journal of Intelligence, Vol. 6,
no. 3, pp. 64-68.

Michael, P & Daniel, F, 2012, “Evalution of an Interview Process for Admission

Into a School of Pharmacy”, American Journal of Pharmaceutical, Vol. 76, no.
2, pp. 22.

Raymond, O, 2006, “Advantages and Disadvantages of Four Interview

Techniques in Qualitative Research”, Forum: Qualitative Social Research, Vol.
7, no. 4.