A psychometric test is an assessment tool to objectively assess the traits, aptitude, behavioral style, mental ability, cognitive skills, and other aspects of applicants’ personalities. It helps a person to understand their individual differences or their psychological abilities, which are not measurable by any other means. These abilities are Intelligence, Aptitude, Interest, Personality, Motivation, etc.

Career counselors help the individual to identify the area of work where they are most satisfied and productive. To identify these areas where the job satisfaction and productivity are highest one should be able to identify their area of interest, their strengths and weaknesses, should be able to enhance their skills required for the job, manage the stress related to work effectively, and resolve the conflict that can arise within the organization.

Once the person can develop this deep insight about oneself, they can work efficiently. Psychometric tools help the individual to gain a better insight into their own selves, as they can analyze their observable as well as their non-observable traits.

Psychometric tools can help the individual identify their area of interest that can be developed into a productive career. It helps the person to understand their innate potential, to understand their personality traits to determine which environment will be best suitable for them, to determine how well they will be able to resolve the conflict within the organization and to determine their areas of strengths and weaknesses.

As per the Indian education system, a child is made to study all the subjects till the 10th standard. After the Board exams in class 10th, the student is made to choose between the various streams of his/her interest. The available streams are science (with or without biology), commerce (with/without maths), and Arts. These days there is an ample number of options available for the combination of subjects.

Usually, students at this age take up a stream due to parental pressure or peer pressure, or sometimes because they are influenced by popular perceptions of a certain profession.

For example: Vijay, a student who just gave his 10th board opted for the science stream because he wanted to be a pilot and was attracted by the lifestyle of pilots. But, as he entered 11th, he realized that he does not possess the aptitude for science and started to score really low, ruining his 12th boards.

Based on the above example, one should understand that it is necessary to assess potential and intellect, and not just base this important decision based on the interest one possesses at that age.

Thus, a student who is about to decide to select a stream and is in class 10th should definitely go for the psychometric test as it is the first step towards career-making, and if that decision is made correctly then further goals can be set and attained easily.

However, the students from the age of 8 years and above can very well take up the Psychometric Test which will enable their parents to decide on the career options of their choice.

We usually feel that we are very much similar to our friends. It may be possible that you and your friends possess similar interests and similar personalities and it may also be possible that you both may score somewhat similarly in your exams, but this does not mean that the two of you are completely identical to each other.

When we try to determine the best career for the individual we need to keep in mind various factors that influence an individual such as the interest of the person in various fields, the personality, the aptitude that the person holds towards work or the subject, the intellectual ability of the individual.

When we try to compare ourselves with our friends we only take into consideration the traits that are overt and are observable and we tend to ignore the covert traits or the unobservable characteristics.

Psychometric tools are one such source that helps us identify the covert traits or the behavioral characteristics that an individual possesses. They help us to identify the individual difference that exists between the two individuals. Research has proved that even identical twins are not similar to each other in all aspects. No two people are similar to each other in all possible ways.

Therefore, it is recommended that one should not go by the results of his/her friend even though you both appear to be very much similar to each other. One should definitely go for their own test to analyze themselves well and make an informed career decision.

As we know, career counseling is a lifelong process and in the Indian scenario, it begins by the 10th standard as that is the time when the child is enrolled into their respective streams.

If the student is about to enter class 10th and is confused about which stream he/she should opt for, the test that can be taken by the student. This test will help you assess your aptitude and personality and will let you determine which stream is best suitable for you after class 10th.

We know that while making a career choice one should not focus only on one aspect. When it comes to deciding the career of an individual, we need to consider various factors that influence a career choice. For example, Mr. X is interested in being a cricketer. He has a keen interest in that sport and has always dreamt of being a cricketer, but he knows that he does not have the potential to excel in that profession or cannot take it up as a profession. Thus, we can see that in this example a career is not solely decided by just one factor. If he had taken up cricket just because he loves to play cricket and is inclined towards that sport, he might not have done well, and therefore, he would have never been able to derive satisfaction out of his career.

Now that we know that a career is decided by many other factors such as personality, aptitude, interest, and intelligence of the individual, a person who is taking a career test, be it online or offline, should go for a test that is taking into account all the various aspects. A test that takes into account only one factor will not prove to be a good test as it will not give a comprehensive report on all the factors that influence the career decision of the individual.

Secondly, a career test report should be in an easy and understandable language that can be easily interpreted by the parents or the students. A report should have graphics and charts, which make it easy to understand and will enable the client to have an insight into the interpretation even when the counselor is not present.

Thirdly, a career test report should be able to provide all the specific details such as which stream should be chosen, which skill should a person work on, it should provide a detailed explanation on what should be the next step that a person should focus on.

Therefore, a student/professional who wants his queries regarding the career to be resolved should consider these three basic aspects before choosing the test.

An offline test means that the test will be conducted using pen-paper and as the client gives the answers on the test, their scores are calculated using the Manual and the interpretation of the scores is also done using the manual. It is a conventional process and is very time- consuming, as it requires the interpreter to be completely engrossed in the scoring.

Paper-pen assessment just provides the basic information that is required for the simple analysis. Also, it may become difficult for a person to take this test due to geographical barriers. Lots of time is devoted to formulating the result and usually, results are formulated for one person at a given time.

On the other hand, when we talk about online tests, they are now being practiced more than the paper-pen tests. The various advantages that an online test holds over an offline test are:

They can be conducted at any time of the day and are not affected by any geographical barrier.
The number of answers that can be chosen in an online test is limited. This might not be possible in a paper-pen test, where a person can select multiple answers and that can affect the interpretation of results.

The report that is generated provides a wealth of information that cannot be evaluated otherwise, as an online test takes into account the wealth of information that can go unnoticed in an offline test.

As the results are generated online, the result can be generated really quickly within no time and is more accurate.Therefore, going in for the online Psychometric Test is advisable.

This is one of the important questions that a client is most worried about. When a person goes for a psychometric assessment, they need to be sure that the result they get is reliable. There should not be a case where if the person takes a test and a re-test after a period of time there comes out to be a huge difference in the results as there will no worth of using such tests.

Thus, to keep this problem sorted the psychometric tests are made with some standardized procedure which makes sure that the tests are reliable i.e. the result will come out to be similar if the test is taken after an interval. The tests are proved to be internally as well as externally consistent which means that there will not be any difference in the result obtained even if the client takes a re-test.

But, some other factors can lead to change in results that should be taken care of such as Health, Environmental factors, and age can alter the results obtained by the individual.
Health includes both physical and psychological health. If their person is not feeling well during the test but this factor changes during the re-test then there are possibilities that the result will change.

Environmental factors such as noise, light conditions, weather can also prove to be responsible for the change in results obtained at different intervals of time.

Also, age plays an important role as the person grows, they mature and develop both physically and mentally. Therefore, there can be a possibility that the result can change due to the age factor of the individual. For example A child in class 8th scores low in an intelligence test but as he matures can prove the results wrong within the gap of at least 6 months.

The psychometric test provides an excellent way for recruiters to glean insights on candidate’s skills and personality that one cannot retrieve from CVs alone. Many recruiters worldwide use psychometric tests to predict a candidate’s culture fitment. These tests can help recruiters filter and shortlist applicants who are ideal for the role and organization’s needs regarding their aptitude, traits, competencies, intelligence, drive, etc. By including psychometric testing in the hiring process, recruiters can make the recruitment process objective and more effective.

The answer is yes! Psychometric personality test helps measure negative personality constructs in potential hires (during the hiring process) and existing employees.

Psychometric tests are very reliable in predicting the test-taker’s performance. Therefore, these tests are an effective filtration tool because they can objectively evaluate applicants and help narrow down the talent pool. However, a test would not be very reliable if it produces inconsistent and different results under similar circumstances.