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Why LAB Profile is not a personality inventory
Why the LAB Profile is not a psychometric personality inventory, and why you may be glad it isn’t. A small but growing band of British employers has discovered the LAB Profile to be a highly effective aid to selection of candidates, as well as an invaluable tool for training and career development. They can be forgiven for grouping LAB Profile with the more traditional ‘self-reporting’ questionnaire-based psychometric personality inventories. It is true that the LAB Profile can be used in similar ways and circumstances, but there are fundamental differences in its basis, its design and its methods of application.
There is a good argument that LAB (Language And Behaviour) Profile is easier to use and interpret, less daunting for the subject of the ‘test’ and that it does not pigeon-hole people with personality labels. LAB Profile provides corroborated evidence of the preferred or natural behaviours of people in specific contexts which is, after all, the most valuable information for assessing a person’s likely fit to a job or task.
The following comparison of the two approaches may help you conclude that you should investigate the LAB Profile for use in your own organisation.
Personality inventories are based on observed behaviour. These are typically categorised into parameters, each having extremes defined in terms of statistical distribution. People with personalities at either end of each continuum may well be considered to be abnormal, indeed, many of these instruments were initially developed for clinical psychology.
The LAB Profile is based on the ‘filters’ that we all use in everyday speech to keep our descriptions of things, emotions and events to an acceptable length (I could, for example, talk for hours on the shape, colour, texture, scent and taste of a single orange but you may not be prepared to listen that long).
Developers of personality inventories invent multiple choice questions, the answers to which may indicate personality; e.g. “I would rather read a book than go to a party” might indicate introversion. The responses to questions need then to be proved both predictive and reliable. This calls for a large sample of people who need also to be tested by some other means to see if they are, indeed, introverted.
The development of the LAB Profile came from the self-evident observation that, for example, a person who talks in short generalisations (in the context of work, say) is probably more comfortable with the generalities than with the detail in that context. Since this is plainly not rocket science it requires no leap of faith. Precise statistical data plays little part in this analysis but the ‘listener’ needs to be aware of the prevailing cultural norms (the US constitution enshrines the pursuit of happiness as a human right whereas, by contrast, people in Japan would probably talk more about discharging their obligations).
Once labelled with a ‘Personality Type’ the subject of MBTI, 16PF, OPQ and the like will be expected to behave accordingly in different situations.
By contrast the LAB Profile is entirely a contextual predictor of behaviour. It has no problem with a driving, controlling executive at work who is happy to leave all holiday decisions to her spouse.
Subjects who are told their personality profile, following psychometric analysis, often perpetuate unhelpful behaviours and attitudes, safe in the knowledge that “That’s just the way I am”!
When their own LAB profile is explained to people, they are talked through their preferred behaviours in the specific scenario in plain, jargon-free language. There is no value judgement attached to any behaviour and every opportunity is given for them to understand and subsequently change inappropriate habits.
Personality inventories are a black art to all but a handful of ‘expert’ psychologists. The findings are the findings. There is no way to question a particular ‘score’ that does not match the subject’s own view of himself. There is also an implied precision for an individual person which is not necessarily warranted by the statistical validation of these psychometric instruments. To illustrate the questionable perception of personality test, the writer was once asked by an HR director to take “the ‘Would you rather be a prostitute or a bishop? ’ test” as part of a job selection!
The basis of the design and the logic of the LAB Profile is freely available. Its findings are fed back to the subject, as part of the assessment process, and any differences of perception discussed and resolved. The experience is typically enjoyable and helpful for the subject, who can easily understand the relevance of both the questions and the findings to the matching of job and candidate.
Despite the inclusion of ‘consistency test’ questions, it is not too difficult to nudge a personality inventory result in a desired direction, since the implications of the words of the questions are often clear to the conscious mind.
You’d have to be a fantastically skilled orator to disguise your underlying language patterns, however. And, even if you could ‘fake’ a LAB Profile, there are few people who want a job that mismatches the way they prefer to work.
The LAB Profile is much more than a selection tool but users have proved it to be measurably more effective than their previous tools. Controlled tests indicate large savings can be made where high population job groups are experiencing abnormal turnover. For a single appointment there are the additional benefits of guidance from the LAB results in the integration and initial development of the new appointee.
There are many certificated LAB Profile consultants in the UK and beyond, and the skills of LAB-based assessment for selection can be easily and quickly trained. David Woolf is a certificated consultant and trainer of the LAB Profile. His early background in HR led to highly successful career in all aspects of the recruitment business. David’s network of associates enables him to provide solutions at any scale.
david@wordly-wise.com
01424 220348
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Contributor's Note
LAB Profile is a very powerful tool for understanding people's preferred behaviour patterns from their use of language. The other side of the coin is that people readily receive their own 'natural language', so communication can be honed to fit their behaviour – a superb marketing advantage! Please talk to me about the ways in which you could apply these valuable insights.
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