Personality testing: enhancing in-service selection of mid-career soldiers

Noncognitive attributes - notably personality - consistently predict important job-related outcomes for the Army (e.g., attrition, performance, disciplinary incidents) during Soldiers' first term of enlistment. Recently, the U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences (ARI) has conducted research suggesting that personality measures can be used to improve person-job match and enhance performance beyond first term of enlistment. This paper summarizes recent research on the relationship between personality assessments and in-service job performance. This research is important because the duties of many Army in-service job assignments (e.g., Recruiter, Drill Sergeant, non-commissioned officer [NCO] Instructor, Special Operations) differ substantially from the type of work performed by the NCOs prior to such assignments, which renders moot the truism "the best predictor of future performance is past performance." The paper also offers a conceptual framework for future research, which can add value to multiple types of in-service assignment decisions.