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For
those who would like more of the technical history about the Career Fitter
Test ... please read on... The body of the Career Fitter assessment is a mixture of personality testing and occupational research that dates back to the early findings of Psychologist Carl Jung. During World War II, Myers and Briggs further developed this work. Since that time, there have been countless authors and researchers that have utilized and built upon these early findings. Career Fitter started to add to this development and research in 1998. Refining and focusing the career oriented details of these earlier works to develop the Career Fitter career assessment. The initial focus groups of the Career Fitter assessment began with various organizations, employees and citizens throughout the United States. The organizational goals were to decrease turnover and establish a baseline of desirable and definable employee attributes. In order to do this Career Fitter employed the assistance of corporate managers, supervisors, team leaders, and top-performers in their respective organizations. In an effort to minimize turnover and establish more effective parameters for recruiting new employees, Career Fitter found that the assessment provided very statistically significant characteristics and traits in the employees that excelled at their respective positions. As a direct result, organizations and Human Resource departments experienced fewer turnovers and simultaneously experienced a documented increase in employee productivity and satisfaction. As a result of implementing and using the Career Fitter assessment and the profile results, organizations decreased turnover and were able to narrow the selection focus for their recruiters. Since the initial research began, Career Fitter has provided its career assessment and profiles to countless organizations and individuals worldwide. In fact, since providing the online version, the Career Fitter assessment has unpredictably crossed cultural boundaries and “first” language barriers. To date, Career Fitter has reached individuals from every continent. Research and Development In
1998 Steven Hecht conducted a disparate impact study in conjunction with
adjunct professionals with expertise in Applied Psychology. The procedure
and analysis of the study was completed following the guidelines and standards
of the American Psychological Association, as well as the principles for
validation and personnel selection as endorsed by the Society for Industrial
and Organizational Psychology. The sample used for this study was one
that closely resembles the pool of applicants who might be tested using
our method of assessment. The sample allowed analyses of several protected
groups (females and non-white minorities) as defined by current statutory
law. The results indicated that members of either protected group did
not score significantly lower on the Career Fitter instrument than other
individuals. Thus, it was concluded, the Career Fitter assessment does
not "adversely" impact members of the previously mentioned groups;
that is, there is no evidence of disparate impact against members of these
At the completion of the initial findings, immediate efforts were implemented that further supported the validation process thorough voluntary participation of individuals, corporations and organizations nationwide. These individuals, corporations and organizations were part of a regression sample that further supported the previous disparate impact study. The Instrument: Career Fitter is an occupational assessment developed and marketed as an individual employment selection and management development tool to large and small, profit and non-profit organizations. Years of research indicate that people generally tend to fail on the job because of the environment into which they are placed, not due to a lack of skills or competence. The Career Fitter assessment has proven to be valid, accurate, objective and unbiased, and is used to “put the right person in the right job.” The Method The method involved looking at each participant’s assessment results and comparing them to specific job requirements, skills and core competencies for a particular job. The requirements, skills and core competencies were determined beforehand, in an effort to avoid skewing the results. Validation A validation study was conducted to establish that the Career Fitter assessment would meet its construct and measure its intended purpose. This was established in the following ways: • Construct
validation strategies Construct validation strategies A content validation strategy requires the researcher to show a logical, or judgment-based, relationship between characteristics measured by an instrument in relation to the job requirements. Criterion-related validation strategies The criterion-related validity study required Career Fitter to establish an empirical relationship between assessment results and criterion based on job performance. This relationship is expressed as a correlation (between test scores and criterion performance). This aspect of the study demonstrated a direct relationship between test selection and job performance. Aggregate Statistics Within each grouping of variables, major statistics (e.g., validity coefficients) were aggregated by computing a weighted average and standard deviation across study results. Results are weighted by study sample size. The weighted average indicates the best estimate of the Career Fitter population value for the statistic (e.g., the relationship between test results and job performance). The weighted standard deviation was used to compute confidence intervals about the weighted average; the confidence intervals were then used for statistical significance tests on the weighted average. Results The statistic used in this analysis was the standard t-test using pooled variance techniques, which looks at the differences between the means of two groups. More sophisticated multi-variance techniques were initially considered, but due to the straightforward nature of the results these analyses were considered unnecessary and potentially confusing. For the t-test analysis, a “statistically” significant difference between two groups on a Career Fitter dimension would indicate disparate impact within the Career Fitter process. The results of this analysis are undeniably significant and reveal the following: (t = 2.01, p<.05). Discussion The purpose of the current study was to investigate the potential presence of statistically significant differences between average responses to the Career Fitter assessment by its respondents. By utilizing the t-test statistic and comparing average scores for each dimension represented by the Career Fitter instrument, there was no overall pattern of results favoring a particular group. Likewise, of all dimensions tested, there was no pattern of results favoring one particular subgroup. Based on these findings, no consistent pattern of disparate impact emerged in this study, indicating that the Career Fitter instrument is sound, and disparate impact in the employment setting is unlikely.
Copyright
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