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Inconsistency in Assessment Centre Performance:
Measurement Error or Something More?

Assessment center researchers and practitioners are well aware of the debate regarding whether candidates should be expected to behave consistently or inconsistently across exercises. Research in the personality domain and evidence from the first assessment centers suggests that consistency may, to some extent, reflect an individual difference. While such differences have been considered before in the assessment center literature, the difficulty of measuring consistency at the individual level has largely precluded empirical research in this area. Yet such differences, if they exist, may have important implications for performance and development. As a preliminary investigation, we propose a quantitative index of individual consistency and a corresponding index of differentiation across dimensions, derived from each participant's dimension x exercise matrix. Using computer simulation methods, we explore the reliability and utility of these indices across a variety of conditions. We then apply the indices to archival data from two operational assessment centers. The challenge of separating inconsistency from assessor error is discussed. 

PDF of Gibbons/Rupp Presentation

 

Alyssa Mitchell Gibbons, MA, is completing her doctoral dissertation in Industrial/Organizational Psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her work on developmental assessment centers has been sponsored by the SIOP Foundation Douglas W. Bray and Ann Howard Award and will be featured in an upcoming special issue of the Psychologist-Manager Journal. She has served for three years as the Research Director of the Illinois Managerial Development Program, a research-focused developmental assessment center for mid-level managers. Ms. Gibbons is a recipient of the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and the Robert P. Larsen Career Development Grant from the University of Illinois Career Center. She is presently actively seeking an academic position in a research university for the fall of 2007.

 

Deborah E. Rupp, Ph.D., holds faculty positions in both the Institute of Labor and Industrial Relations and the Department of Psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She received her Ph.D. in Industrial-Organizational Psychology from Colorado State University. Rupp conducts research on the use of developmental assessment centers, and is the director of the Laboratory for the Study of Developmental Assessment Centers (DACLab), a multinational and multidisciplinary group of researchers and practitioners conducting many projects in this area. She is the co-authored the new edition of Assessment Centers in Human Resource Management with George C. Thornton, and was the first ever recipient of the Douglas W. Bray and Ann Howard Award (for research on leadership assessment and development), Rupp also conducts research in the areas of organizational justice and workplace bias. Her work has appeared in outlets such as Journal of Applied Psychology, Academy of Management Review, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Journal of Vocational Behavior, Research in Personnel and Human Resource Management, Research in Multilevel Issues, and the Psychologist Manager Journal. Her research is supported by funding from the SIOP Foundation, the State Farm Companies Foundation, the Korean Psychological Testing Institute, the Center for Human Resource Management, and the Center for International Business Education and Research. Rupp serves on the editorial boards of Journal of Management and Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, and has consulted for groups such as the State University Civil Service System, the Korean Civil Service Commission, the SK Corporation, Virginia Department of Corrections, Sun Microsystems, Colorado Department of Human Services, CIB Marine Bancshares, Rockwell Automation and Solutia (formerly Monsanto).