Technology
How Red Bull’s online personality assessment test helps reveal how smart, driven, curious and connected job candidates are.
Red Bull has always ‘given wings’ to people, athletes and musicians and their ideas. And now its Wingfinder online personality test does the same for employers and those looking to take their careers to the next level by allowing anyone to gain insights into their workplace strengths.
Best of all, Red Bull has made this scientifically-developed and accurate strengths finder available to the public and employers worldwide at no cost. Based on more than 30 years’ psychological research, Wingfinder focuses on the factors that influence a candidate's employability and success rate.
Every user gets two sets of feedback – a detailed nine-page personal report that contains an analysis of their strengths, and tailored feedback and coaching from professional athletes. They also receive a one-page 'Talent Passport' that's been designed to be sent with a CV or resume to potential employers.
You can access the 35-minute Wingfinder personality test via desktop, mobile and tablet. And, while the assessment and feedback report use innovative and engaging approaches, the psychometrics used means the results are credible, reliable and valid.
What’s more, Red Bull Wingfinder combines and upgrades many of the well-researched tools of psychometric assessment then puts them in an innovative, engaging format which delivers insight that normally cost a lot of money for free.
So, what are you waiting for? We took a look at the test and revealed how it works:
1. Wingfinder is above all functional (but still really well designed)
Most of the time candidates get little (or no) feedback from any recruitment assessment. When they do, it’s a score or a description of a behaviour rather than something they can use to develop in their job or a new role.
Wingfinder changes that. Using positive psychology, it gives an accurate personal report with a more balanced view of someone’s strengths. There is still a recognition of top strengths, but it also explores overused strengths, shortcomings or potential blind spots in:
- Connections – interpersonal and self-management skills
- Creativity – including curiosity
- Thinking – intelligence and fluid IQ
- Drive – ambition and motivation
Each of the four areas are comprised of 25 different strengths, offering millions of possible unique combinations.
The whole thing – including the reports – is designed with the user in mind. The nine-page report contains personal analysis and advice on using strengths and avoiding their dark sides, while giving practical, real-world help to drive career success. In addition, there are videos from world-class athletes who share the same strengths. The insight and advice provided in these coaching videos encourages users to put the advice into action drawing upon Dr Robert Cialdini’s principles of Social Proof, Liking and Authority.
The Talent Passport summarises a user’s strengths, and acts as something they could add to their CV. So, instead of a typical resume which says what someone has done, the Wingfinder Talent Passport explains how that person would go about being successful in the new role.
2. It’s a reliable personality test which rises above ‘strengths hype'
Red Bull Wingfinder goes way beyond mainstream strength assessments. As it’s psychometrically sound, Wingfinder can predict behaviours and real outcome (reputation), instead of what a user thinks about themselves (identity).
Red Bull developed Wingfinder with an expert team of psychometricians and psychology professors from University College, London and Columbia University, New York. It draws from the original model of employability and career success by Hogan, Chamorro-Premuzic and Kaiser. Their meta-analysis of thousands of published scientific studies identified the personality factors that most influence employability (the ability to gain and retain employment) and success (income, promotions, responsibilities, total time employed, performance ratings) in knowledge-based roles.
Wingfinder goes further by including a ‘Creativity’ measure, which has been shown to link to intra/entrepreneurialism. In the validation phases of Wingfinder’s development, more than 10,000 people provided the data which backed up these areas of strength: Thinking, Connections, Creativity and Drive.
These were confirmed using existing psychological tests, and there will be ongoing adjustments to make sure Wingfinder stays current, valid and reliable. It means the user-facing features and functions of Wingfinder will be regularly updated to be a valuable tool for people applying for roles and wanting some development feedback for years to come.
3. Picture-based Wingfinder answers are worth 1,000 words
Psychological personality tests mostly rely on text questions (even for tech-savvy employers), but as technology expands, we can start to ask questions in a more engaging, dynamic way using images as the options for answers. It makes the test richer without lowering its validity or standards in comparison to traditional, text-based test scales.
Visual questions are more intuitive, and we get a quicker reaction and answer compared to text-based questions. People are also more likely to complete a test and are prepared to answer more personal questions.
And, of course, compared to text alone, an image can convey more complex ideas or be more specific. The selection of images requires many stages of validation to reduce distraction and extraneous variables. Images need to have a similar level of abstraction so the meaning can be conveyed while not being overtly desirable compared to the other choices in the item set. Don't just take our word for it though – published research also demonstrates the validity of Wingfinder’s picture based answer format.
4. Intelligence measures use ‘Item Response’ theory and advanced adaptive testing
Many general intelligence assessments get harder and harder as the test goes on. The risk is that they disregard a test-taker’s abilities, making for a poor user experience, and potentially result. Wingfinder’s ‘Thinking’ factor measures intelligence by looking at someone’s ability to reason and solve complex problems using spatial and numerical reasoning. This is done by presenting items dynamically – essentially, the test adjusts its difficulty levels.
As it’s an online test, Wingfinder doesn’t need any supervision or an administrator. But its machine learning means the test is put together on the fly, and adapts as answers are given. Answer questions quickly? The test gets progressively harder. If you answer slowly or wrongly, the test gets (relatively) easier.
This ‘Adaptive Testing’ optimises information from each response – specifically it tells us which items are at the participant’s ability level. The resulting tool is an online cognitive ability test that is different for each test-taker and can produce good estimates of ability in the shortest amount of time.
5. Are you a team player? Let Wingfinder find out…
Wingfinder’s ‘Connections’ factor looks at how someone manages themselves and how well they will work with others. Part of this is worked out using an Implicit Association Test (IAT).
Someone asked to assess their teamwork and inter-personal skills will often aim to present themselves in the most positive light – especially when trying to make a good impression. Wingfinder’s IAT is able to cut through this and detect someone’s automatic association, via their response speed, to different pairs of images and text on strengths related to this ‘Connections’ factor. The concept is based on the idea that we can connect ideas more easily which we already associate together (as they’re well practised) but a harder time connecting ideas which we don’t necessarily link together.
Wingfinder’s IAT has users make easier (faster) behavioural responses (a key press) to concepts that are strongly associated compared to concepts that are weakly associated. These would result in slower responses.
6. Are you motivated? Let situational scenarios find out
Wingfinder’s ‘Drive’ factor measures someone’s level of ambition by using Situational Judgment (SJT) scenarios to ask the individual to identify what choices they’d make.
The ‘correct’ responses aren’t about logic or knowledge, so you can’t get better at SJT items by practising them. The SJT questions ask participants to choose different actions they’d take in a given scenario. They generally fit the Red Bull brand and are situations employees might face at work, but are also relevant for any modern company.
In one example, the user is asked to manage a ski team. You don’t need to be a winter sports expert, but you are asked to make decisions before, during and after a race.
Check out www.wingfinder.com to try Red Bull´s scientific personality test and discover what you’re really good at.