This Assessment Optimizes Workflow, Reduces Employee Burnout, and More
How long should it take a manager to get to know their employees?
A few months? Years?
If you oversee a team, you’re probably already doing many of the getting-to-know-you things most managers do: one-on-one meetings, observing work performance, team-building exercises, and casual interactions at the office.
To speed the process along, you may have even had your employees take a personality or career aptitude test. Although this data is certainly helpful, it focuses on how your employees think, feel, and their personal preferences, not how they engage with work or projects.
As a manager, you want to know your employees as people. More importantly, you want to know how to maximize their workplace potential.
The Kolbe A™ Index achieves that, focusing on how employees instinctively problem-solve and engage with projects, also known as conative behavior. Contact E3 Discovery to schedule your company’s assessment.
Keep reading to explore how you can leverage the Kolbe A™ Index to discover the aptitudes of your workforce on a shortened timeline.
What Is a Career Aptitude Test?
Job aptitude tests evaluate a person’s cognitive abilities, personality traits, and acquired skills to suggest potential career paths. Most aptitude tests for jobs focus on:
- Skills and knowledge: What a person already knows and how well they apply it.
- Interests and preferences: What subjects, industries, or activities a person enjoys.
- Personality traits: Behavioral tendencies that align with certain roles.
- Cognitive abilities: Logical reasoning, problem-solving, and memory.
Although career aptitude tests can provide valuable guidance, they primarily focus on what a person can do rather than how they naturally take action.
Not Your Typical Career Aptitude Test: An Overview Of the Kolbe A™ Index
Unlike traditional job aptitude tests, the Kolbe A™ Index doesn’t measure skills, intelligence, or personality. Instead, it focuses on a person’s natural way of taking action.
The Kolbe A™ Index uses a series of questions to identify an individual’s instinctive strengths in four key areas, known as the Action Modes®:
- Fact Finder: How a person gathers and shares information.
- Follow Thru: How a person organizes and designs tasks.
- Quick Start: How a person deals with risk and uncertainty.
- Implementor: How a person handles physical space and tangible objects.
By understanding these instinctive Action Modes®, managers can choose projects and work environments that best align with how their employees naturally operate, leading to greater job satisfaction and productivity.
For example, if you need a report about recent customer feedback for a product or service, a Fact Finder is best equipped to compile relevant data because they are naturally strong researchers.
Contact E3 Discovery to learn more about the Kolbe A™ Index and its Action Modes®. Continue reading to explore the main ways the Kolbe A™ Index benefits managers and employers.
It Helps You Hire the Right Person For the Right Role
A candidate may have the right skills and experience for a job, but if they don’t instinctively approach work in a way that fits the role, they may struggle or become disengaged. The Kolbe A™ Index helps you:
- Ensure alignment between a candidate’s instincts and the job’s requirements.
- Reduce turnover by hiring employees who are naturally suited for the role.
- Identify a candidate’s natural strengths in problem-solving, decision-making, and execution.
It Improves Team Productivity and Collaboration
Even when employees have strong individual skills, team success depends on how well they work together. The Kolbe A™ Index provides insights into how each team member naturally approaches tasks, allowing you to:
- Balance team dynamics by ensuring diverse work styles complement each other.
- Reduce workplace friction by understanding how employees instinctively take action.
- Optimize project assignments based on employees’ unique strengths.
It Reduces Workplace Stress and Burnout
One of the biggest reasons employees experience burnout is being forced to work against their natural instincts for extended periods. When employees are in roles that don’t align with their strengths, they struggle with stress, frustration, and decreased job satisfaction. When leveraging the Kolbe A™ Index as a career aptitude test, you can:
- Ensure your employees are working in ways that feel natural to them.
- Minimize frustration by structuring workflows around instinctive strengths.
- Reduce job dissatisfaction and disengagement by respecting individual work styles.
It Enhances Employee Development and Retention
Many companies heavily invest in training, development, and career aptitude tests, but standard programs don’t always cater to the unique ways people learn and grow. The Kolbe A™ Index provides valuable insights into how each employee best absorbs information and tackles new challenges, allowing you to:
- Customize training programs to match different instinctive strengths.
- Provide career growth opportunities that align with employees’ natural work styles.
- Retain top talent by ensuring employees feel engaged and valued.
It Helps Resolve Conflict and Improve Workplace Communication
Miscommunication and misunderstandings are common in any workplace, often because employees approach tasks and decisions in fundamentally different ways. The Kolbe A™ Index provides objective insights into each employee’s working style, helping you:
- Mediate conflicts by recognizing instinctual differences.
- Encourage better collaboration by explaining different work styles.
- Improve communication by ensuring messages are tailored to how people process information.
Contact E3 Discovery to Schedule Your Kolbe A™ Index Assessment
The Kolbe A™ Index isn’t a run-of-the-mill career aptitude test. When correctly leveraged, it’s a powerful tool for hiring, team development, and workplace optimization.
Employers and managers looking for a fresh approach to job aptitude tests will find that the Kolbe A™ Index enables them to make more informed staffing decisions, enhance team collaboration by balancing work styles, reduce stress and burnout, and improve training and development through personalized learning approaches.
Contact our Kolbe-certified consultants at E3 Discovery today to see how this assessment can transform the way you hire, lead, and develop talent. Call (913) 292-9997 to get started.
