Research shows that certain personality characteristics are predictive of job performance for both sales and customer services jobs. Most importantly, top-performing salespeople in all industries tend to have high levels of competitiveness, motivation, assertiveness, and outgoing personalities. The other side of the coin is that successful salespeople score lower in traits such as cooperation and patience.
There are many personality traits that can be measured, but the most common one is the "Big Five" or the "Five Factor Model. These are the five dimensions which consistently emerge in empirical studies: Agreeableness. The concept of personality traits has become quite popular. This replaces an older view of personality that was developed by Carl Jung. It centered on the idea that people could be classified into two distinct types. Types A or B were either introverts or extroverts. The growing evidence proving that the personality traits model doesn't adequately reflect the complexity of human personality is leading to more acceptance of the traits model in personality research.
Emotional intelligence testing is a recently developed category of assessments. Emotional Intelligence, also known simply as EI, is a relatively new concept. It was first made popular in the 1990s. Emotional intelligence has been a key concept in the workplace over time.
Although customer service representatives may not be able to take these personality tests, they are useful for anyone. These types are increasingly popular as organizations place an emphasis on cultivating a culture of customer care across their entire organization. Companies might find these tests useful if the applicants for managerial and/or administrative positions involve frequent interaction with customers.
A lot of customers are turning to tests to evaluate their customer service abilities. This leaves HR managers searching for ways to fix this problem. Personality tests can be particularly useful in reducing the risk of voluntary turnover. They are able to determine not whether candidates have the skills or temperament to perform the job.
Figure 2 shows that the traits model is being accepted by personality researchers. There is increasing evidence to suggest that a rigid dichotomy among two types of traits does not accurately describe the nuances and personalities of humans.
The Big Five traits can be applied to the hiring process as there is ample evidence linking these traits to job performance in a variety of roles. The measure of a person's reliability, organizational, perseverance, and responsibility has been shown not to be a reliable predictor of success for many types. This is especially true for entry-level job positions, where the importance of punctuality and reliability can outweigh creativity.