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Hiring the right person should be simple. You shortlist the best candidates, run a few interviews, and pick the one who seems like the best fit. But too often, things don’t work out as planned.
They seemed great on paper. The interview went well. Yet a few months in, they’re underperforming, disengaged, or already planning their next move.
It’s not always a skills problem. More often, it’s a mismatch between how someone naturally works and what the role actually demands. That gap is hard to spot in a CV or a conversation, which is why many hiring decisions rely on instinct, bias, or guesswork.
That’s where assessments come in. The right assessment helps you see beyond the surface and understand whether someone has the potential to succeed in your environment. But not all assessments are designed to help you hire. Some are built for coaching. Others are better suited for team building or personal development.
The Predictive Index is different. It was created specifically to support better hiring decisions. By combining behavioural and cognitive insight with clear role alignment, it gives you the tools to make smarter choices, faster.
In this blog, we’ll explore what makes an assessment useful for hiring, and why Predictive Index stands out as one of the most effective options available.
Not every assessment is designed to help you hire the right person. Some describe behaviour in broad strokes. Others dive into personal traits or motivations without connecting that insight to job performance.
A good hiring assessment does more than generate a personality report. It helps you answer three critical questions:
To answer those questions, the assessment needs to provide more than surface-level insight. It must offer:
Job Fit, Not Just Self-Awareness
Many assessments focus on helping people understand themselves, which is useful for coaching but not for hiring. What matters most in recruitment is how someone’s natural tendencies align with the needs of the role. A good hiring assessment helps you define those needs up front, then shows how closely a candidate matches.
Predictive Value
You’re not just hiring for today. You want someone who can perform, grow, and stay. That means the tool needs to predict on-the-job success, not just describe personality. The strongest predictors of future performance are behavioural fit and cognitive ability. Together, they provide a much clearer picture of long-term potential.
Clarity and Speed
In fast-moving hiring processes, you need insights you can act on. A good assessment must be quick to complete, easy to interpret, and practical enough to support real decisions. If hiring managers don’t understand the results or need a consultant to explain them, the tool will slow things down or get ignored.
Predictive Index was built to meet these needs. It helps teams define success for each role, then provides behavioural and cognitive data that points to likely fit, performance, and learning ability. It doesn’t replace interviews or experience, but it strengthens the evidence you base decisions on and reduces the risk of costly mis-hires.
Before choosing any assessment, it’s important to understand what you’re measuring. Not all tools are designed for hiring. Some focus on communication styles or career development. Others help with coaching or building self-awareness. When you’re hiring, you need tools that link directly to performance on the job.
Most workplace assessments fall into one of four categories. Each has its place, but only some offer the depth and precision needed for confident hiring decisions.
These assessments place people into categories, such as colours or letters. They often use simple labels that are easy to remember and apply in team settings. Many businesses use them for communication training or team development.
Example tools: DiSC, MBTI, Insights Discovery
Useful for: Team workshops and awareness
Limitations in hiring: These tools group people into fixed types. They don’t compare behaviour to specific job requirements, and they lack predictive accuracy for selection.
Trait-based tools measure behaviour along a scale rather than placing people into fixed types. This allows for a more accurate picture of how someone works, communicates, makes decisions, and responds to pressure. When matched with clear job requirements, trait-based tools help identify candidates who are more likely to succeed in a specific role.
Example tools: Predictive Index Behavioural Assessment, Hogan, Caliper
Useful for: Hiring, team fit, leadership alignment
Strengths: Offers a detailed comparison between a candidate’s natural behaviour and what the role demands.
These assessments measure how quickly someone can learn, adapt, and solve problems. They are widely recognised as one of the strongest predictors of job performance. Cognitive data helps you identify candidates who can keep up with fast-paced environments or complex roles, especially when the job involves change or growth.
Example tools: Predictive Index Cognitive Assessment, SHL Verify, Ravens Matrices
Useful for: Roles with complexity or high learning demands
Strengths: High predictive value, especially when combined with behavioural data.
These tools explore what energises someone or where they feel most confident. They are often used in coaching or development to support engagement and self-awareness. However, they are not typically linked to performance benchmarks and may be too general for hiring decisions.
Example tools: CliftonStrengths, Strengthscope
Useful for: Onboarding, development planning
Limitations in hiring: These tools focus on personal insight rather than job fit.
Where Predictive Index Fits
Predictive Index combines two of the most predictive types of assessment: trait-based and cognitive. This gives you a clear view of how someone works and how quickly they learn. When paired with a job target, PI shows whether a candidate is likely to succeed in a specific role and environment. It avoids the broad labels of type-based tools and goes deeper than strengths-focused assessments. For hiring, this combination makes it one of the most focused and practical tools available.
If your goal is to hire someone who can succeed in the role and stay long enough to make an impact, you need insight that links directly to performance. Out of all assessment types, trait-based and cognitive tools offer the strongest predictive value for hiring.
Here’s why they work.
Trait-Based Assessments Reveal Behaviour That Matches the Job
Trait-based assessments measure how someone naturally behaves at work. They show things like how fast-paced or detail-focused someone is, how they prefer to communicate, and how much structure they need. These traits matter because every role rewards different behaviours.
For example, a role in sales might need someone who takes initiative, enjoys interacting with others, and can handle rejection without taking it personally. A back-office finance role might reward precision, structure, and consistency.
The Predictive Index Behavioural Assessment helps you define what the role actually needs, then shows how closely each candidate matches. This makes it easier to spot people who are more likely to thrive, stay engaged, and perform well.
Cognitive Ability Predicts Learning Speed and Adaptability
Even the most experienced hire needs to learn something new when they join. That learning curve is where many new hires struggle.
Cognitive ability assessments measure how quickly someone can absorb information, solve problems, and adjust to change. This is especially important in roles that evolve over time or require people to think on their feet.
The Predictive Index Cognitive Assessment helps you understand how fast someone is likely to pick things up. This doesn’t replace experience, but it does help you spot those who will learn quickly and keep pace with the demands of the job.
The Combination Gives a Complete Picture
When used together, behavioural and cognitive assessments give you a clear, practical view of role fit. Behaviour tells you how someone will approach the work. Cognition tells you how quickly they will grasp it. The combination increases your chances of making the right hire the first time.
This is where Predictive Index stands out. It doesn’t just describe a person’s style or energy. It helps you connect that insight directly to performance, using role targets and match scoring that simplify the decision-making process for everyone involved.
When choosing an assessment for hiring, it’s easy to assume that more data means better decisions. But too much information can create confusion, especially when hiring managers are busy and need to act quickly.
A good assessment gives you the right balance. It should offer enough depth to be meaningful, without overwhelming the people using it. It should also have the breadth to support more than one decision, so the value extends beyond the initial hire.
Breadth: One Tool, Multiple Uses
Some assessments are limited to one function. They might support coaching or team-building, but offer little value in recruitment. Others are designed to work across the employee lifecycle.
The Predictive Index gives you insight you can use from day one and beyond. You can apply the same behavioural and cognitive data to:
By using one tool across multiple stages, you create consistency, reduce noise, and get more value from each data point.
Depth: Enough Insight to Make Confident Decisions
Some assessments generate long reports filled with broad observations or vague personality labels. These often sound impressive but don’t give clear answers to the questions that matter: Will this person succeed in the role? Are they likely to stay? What support will they need to thrive?
Predictive Index provides targeted insights based on what the job actually requires. You get a behavioural match score, cognitive result, and practical tools to guide interviews and onboarding. The reports are concise, actionable, and designed for hiring teams, not psychologists.
It gives you just enough to make better decisions, without slowing you down or leaving room for interpretation.
Even the most impressive CV can lead to a costly mis-hire. Discover why good hires often turn out to be a bad fit, and what you can do to stop it happening again.
From supporting the growth of leading pharma companies over the past 15 years, I have learnt that when it comes to predicting future performance, technology is key:
For me, hiring without the use of psychometric assessments is like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle with pieces missing … and no picture on the box. It’s not fun, it takes longer, and when you are almost finished, you realise you have pieces missing.
Take the assessment today and start measuring more to improve your recruitment.
If you are interested in learning more or are ready to incorporate behavioral data into your recruitment process, please contact me today, I will be happy to help.
Let’s get started!
Dave Crumby
Founder at 360 Talent Solutions
Certified Predictive Index Practitioner
360 Talent Solutions Ltd is an Associate Partner of Humanostics® , a PI Certified Partner authorised to use the science, assessment software, and curriculum of management workshops of The Predictive Index.
In partnership with Humanostics, we provide companies access to the assessment tools provided by The Predictive Index.
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