Methods for studying competence in communication(based on the book " psychological tests" edited byA.A. Karelina, 2001)
1. Evaluation of the level of sociability (test by V.F. Ryakhovsky).
AT ability to determine the level of communicationyou person. Three options fromvetov- yes, sometimes, and no. Answer quickly, unequivocally, write down the answer options (“1 yes”, “2 no”, “3 sometimes”, etc.).
You have an ordinary or business meeting. Does it knock you outwaiting out of a rut?
Do you feel confused and dissatisfied when asked to speakwith a report, message, information at any meeting, withscolding or the like?
Are you postponing a visit to the doctor until the last moment?
You are offered to go on a business trip to a city where you will neverhave been. Do you make every effort to avoid thisbusiness trips?
Do you like to share your experiences with anyone?
Do you get angry if stranger turn on the streetto you with a request (show the way, name the time, answer somequestion)?
Do you believe that there is a problem of "fathers and sons" and thatdyam different generations difficult to understand each other?
Are you embarrassed to remind a friend that he has forgotten youwithdraw the money you borrowed a few months ago?
In a restaurant or in the dining room, you were served obviously poor qualitydish. Will you keep silent, only angrily pushing the plate?
Once alone with a stranger, you will notdrink with him in conversation and you will be burdened if he speaks first. Is it so?
You are horrified by any long line, no matter where it is(in the store, library, cinema box office). Do you prefer rejectionget away from your intention or stand behind and languish inwaiting?
Are you afraid to participate in any review committeenyu conflict situations?
You have your own purely individual evaluation criteriaworks of literature, art, culture and you do not accept any other people's opinions on this matter. This is true?
Having heard somewhere on the sidelines an obviously erroneous point of view on a question well known to you, do you prefer to be silent and not engage in conversation?
Do you get frustrated when someone asks you to help sort outthis or that service issue or educational topic?
Are you more willing to express your point of view (opinion, assessment) inwritten than orally?
Response score:
"yes" - 2 points, "sometimes" - 1 point, "no" - 0 points.
The points received are summed up, and the classifier determinesWhich category does the subject belong to?
test classifier.
30-31 points. You are clearly uncommunicative, and this is your misfortune, since you yourself suffer the most from this. But it is not easy for people close to you. You are difficult to rely on in a matter that requires group effort. Try to be more sociable, control yourself.
25-29 points. You are closed, taciturn, prefer aloneso you don't have many friends. New job and the need for new contacts, if they don’t plunge you into a panic, then they unbalance for a long time. You know this feature of your character and sometimes free of themselves. But do not limit yourself to such dissatisfaction - inyour power to reverse these character traits. Doesn't it happenthat with any strong enthusiasm, you suddenly acquire sexnew communication skills? It just takes a shake.
19-24 points. Are you in to some extent sociable and unfamiliar feel quite confident in the environment. New challenges don't scare you. And yet, with new people, converge with caution, in disputes and disputes. you are reluctant to participate. There is too much in your statements sometimessarcasm for no reason. These shortcomings are correctable.
14-18 points. You have good communication skills. you are inquisitiveattentive, willing to listen interesting interlocutor enough be patientLivs in communication, defend your point of view without irascibility.Withoutunpleasant experiences go to meet new people. At thattime do not like noisy companies; extravagant antics and manywords make you angry.
9 - 13 points. You are very sociable (sometimes, perhaps even beyondmeasures). Curious, talkative, like to speak out on different questionsdew, which sometimes irritates others. Willingly familiarhang out with new people. Love to be the center of attentionrefuse requests, although you can not always fulfill them. It happens,flare up, but back away quickly. What you lack is perseverance,patience and courage when faced with serious problems.AtIf you wish, however, you can force yourself not to back down.
4-8 points. You must be the shirt guy. Sociability beats outyou with the key. You are always aware of everything. Do you like to take part inall discussions, although serious topics may give you a migraine or even blues. Willingly take the floor on any issue, even if you have a superficial idea about it. Everywhere you feel at ease. You take on any business, although you can not always successfully bring it to end. For this very reason, managers and colleagues treat you with some apprehension and doubt. Consider these facts.
3 points or less. Your communication skills are painfulter. You are talkative, verbose, intervene in matters that do not havehave nothing to do with you. Take on the challenge of judgingcompletely incompetent. Willingly or unwittingly, you often visitrank different kind conflicts in your environment. Hot-tempered, offendedChevy, you are often biased. Serious work is not for you. Liu dyam - both at work and at home, and in general everywhere - it is difficult with you. Yes, you need to work on yourself and your character! First of all, educated develop patience and restraint in yourself, respectfully treatpeople, finally, think about your health - this lifestyle is notpasses without a trace.
Test to assess self-control in communication. Test 2
(The test was developed by the American psychologist M. Snyder)
Read carefully ten sentences describing reactions to certain situations. You must evaluate each of them as correct. or incorrect in relation to itself. If the offer seems to younym or predominantly true, put next to the ordinal butmeasure the letter "B", if incorrect or mostly incorrect -the letter "N".
It seems to me difficult the art of imitating the habits of others.dey.
I could probably play the fool to get attention oramuse those around you.
I could make a good actor.
Other people sometimes think that I am experiencing something deeper.boko than it really is.
In a company, I rarely find myself in the spotlight.
AT different situations and in dealing with different people I often leadyourself in completely different ways.
I can only defend what I sincerely believe.
To succeed in business and in relationships with people, I try to bethe way they expect me to be.
Ryakhovsky test
The test for assessing the level of sociability, communication contains the ability to determine the level of sociability of a person. The questions should be answered using three response options - "yes", "sometimes" and "no".Instruction: "Your attention is invited to several simple questions. Answer quickly, unequivocally: "yes", "no", "sometimes".
Response score;
"yes" - 2 points, "sometimes" - 1 point, "no" - 0 points.
The points obtained are summed up, and the classifier determines which category the subject belongs to.
Test classifier
30-31 points. You are clearly uncommunicative, and this is your misfortune, since you yourself suffer the most from this. But it is not easy for people close to you. You are difficult to rely on in a matter that requires group effort. Try to be more sociable, control yourself.
25-29 points. You are closed, taciturn, prefer solitude, so you have few friends. A new job and the need for new contacts, if they do not plunge you into a panic, then they unbalance you for a long time. You know this feature of your character and are dissatisfied with yourself. But do not limit yourself to such discontent only - it is in your power to reverse these character traits. Doesn't it happen that with some strong enthusiasm you suddenly acquire complete sociability? It just takes a shake.
19-24 points. You are sociable to a certain extent and feel quite confident in unfamiliar surroundings. New challenges don't scare you. And yet, with new people, converge with caution; they are reluctant to participate in disputes and disputes. There is sometimes too much sarcasm in your statements, without any basis. These shortcomings are correctable.
14-18 points. You have good communication skills. You are inquisitive, willingly listen to an interesting interlocutor, patient enough in communication, defend your point of view without irascibility. Feel free to meet new people. At the same time, do not like noisy companies; extravagant antics and verbosity irritate you.
9-13 points. You are very sociable (sometimes, perhaps even beyond measure). Curious, talkative, love to speak out various issues which sometimes irritates others. Willingly meet new people. Love to be the center of attention, do not refuse requests to anyone, although you cannot always fulfill them. It happens, flare up, but quickly move away. What you lack is perseverance, patience and courage when faced with serious problems. If you wish, however, you can force yourself not to back down. 4-8 points. You must be the shirt guy. Sociability beats out of you. You are always aware of everything. You love to take part in all discussions, although serious topics can cause you a migraine or even a blues. Willingly take the floor on any issue, even if you have a superficial idea about it. Everywhere you feel at ease. You take on any business, although you can not always successfully bring it to the end. For this very reason, managers and colleagues treat you with some apprehension and doubts. Consider these facts. 3 points or less. Questionnaire text
Tells HR specialists and support managers how to identify a suitable employee to work with clients during an interview. Inside useful links on psychological tests that will help measure the immeasurable and help you make the right choice.
To bookmarks
The ideal search for a new support team member looks like this: you like him, he likes you, he starts working, works great, everyone is happy. Real search often resembles Dante's journey: do a test task and take into account all the nuances in it (this is impossible, but you will try), choose the most worthy from dozens, conduct interviews with them and finish them off with a “here and now” test, hire and train , understand that in the field a person works very badly, get upset and look further.
In a large team with streamlined HR processes, all this is smoothed out and does not become a disaster, because it is a flow and everything is provided for by the procedures, but for a small team, where the head of the support department often handles recruitment (or takes very Active participation), it can be a nightmare. Training a new employee and wasted investment in him is insulting, unfair and exhausting. We wondered what the catch was and where to put the straw at the stage of testing the candidate. That's what came out of it.
Problems
The test task is performed well (correct answers, correct approach to the client, literacy, and so on), but when it comes to working with real clients, the employee quickly stalls:
1. Poor application previous experience: if a few minutes ago he processed a ticket, and then a couple of hours later he received a similar one, the parallel is not drawn, the solution is not extrapolated.
2. "Does not feel" a real client: when performing test task there was time to think and rewrite, there is no second chance in battle, and time is limited, as a result - he communicates dryly, does not distinguish slight dissatisfaction from strong irritation, does not read user signals about which direction the dialogue is about to go.
3. Gets lost and confused in decisions: “I don’t know what to write/say to him”, “I don’t know how to solve this”, and so on. When stressed, he loses control and begins to slip instead of looking for and sorting out options.
These nuances, when using only one test task, cannot be checked before the candidate starts the real work.
The first and last points can be solved mechanically - just describe the algorithms for the most popular tickets, saving the beginner from the pangs of improvisation and thinking. With practice comes confidence and experience.
The second point can either be forgiven, or wait until experience is gained and a "feel" is developed.
However, all these decisions require time and patience, and some candidates do not turn into beautiful smart swans even after several months of practice. Moreover, when we give the employee clear instructions and describe all the algorithms, this is good and organized, but as soon as communication with the client deviates from the given pattern, the work stops, and the employee breaks down, so the task of the manager is to understand at the interview stage whether he has a candidate base suitable for the requirements of the team.
We talked to several psychologists and HR specialists to understand in which direction we can try to move, and we invite you to join these searches and trials.
Important: this is a theory and we will write about the practice of application later, when there is enough material, and now you have outlines and ideas on how you can test weak spots candidate before you welcome them into the support or customer service fold.
empathy
The ability to sympathize, empathize, put yourself in the place of another person - all this is empathy, without which you would not work in support (well, you should not). You can also go too far - if the level of empathy is too high, the employee will not withstand the load and stress. Bottom line: we need a golden mean.
How to check:
Mehrabian and Epstein's Empathy Test: http://psytests.org/emotional/eets.html
Boyko's empathic ability test:
Baron-Cohen's Empathy Quotient (EQ) Questionnaire, Wheelwright
Sociability
The simplest skill that can also be tested. The ability to communicate cannot be overestimated when it comes to customer service, it's all about it. Is it easy for the candidate to make contact, does communication bother him, does the client become a burden for him, and is he prone to displaying aggression in communication.
How to check:
Assessment of the level of sociability of Ryakhovsky:
Boyko's method of diagnosing communicative tolerance:
Boyko's method of diagnosing communicative aggressiveness:
Emotional intellect
Recognizing emotions, managing them, slowing down in time - this is all emotional intelligence, very necessary in work, indispensable for customer service.
Test for emotional intellect Hall:
Speed of response and application of knowledge in practice
These are difficult indicators, but worth a try. You can measure anxiety and self-control, which together will give a simple result: the higher the anxiety and the lower the self-control, the worse the employee will behave under stress, in situations where he is required to make a quick decision (preferably the right one).
Spielberger Anxiety Test (Khanin's adaptation):
Taylor's Anxiety Measurement Method (Norakidze's adaptation):
Snyder Social Self-Control Test:
Intelligence, thinking
One of the most important skills of a support employee is to think. To do this effectively, quickly and for two (for yourself and for the client), therefore, you can test your thinking skills, the ability to build reliable logical connections both in a test task and in separate tests. It certainly won't be redundant.
How to check:
Test by standard progressive matrices Raven:
Intellectual lability (offline testing to check the assimilation of new material when changing activities):
Eysenck tests for measuring intelligence quotient:
Clue
Without specialized education and experience correctly interpreting the results of each test can be more difficult than it seems, so if you want to start testing applicants, but do not understand what is considered normal, take a closer look at existing subordinates and colleagues whose work you like (and yourself). Ask them to take tests and study the results, with a sufficient sample, they can be taken for your personal norm.
On December 5 at 11:00 a.m., we will organize a Customer Service Business Meeting, where Zoya Volkova, ex-training project manager at Yandex, will tell you more about how to hire, fire and work with support staff. Come:)
For each of the 16 questions below, give one of three answers:- Yes, — No, — sometimes.
For every answer "yes" - 2 points, for each answer "sometimes" - 1 point, for each answer "no" - 0 points.
- You have an ordinary business meeting. Are you unsettled by her anticipation?
- Do you put off a visit to the doctor until the moment when it becomes unbearable?
- Does the need to make a report, message, information at a meeting, meeting or conference cause you confusion and displeasure?
- You are offered to go on a business trip to where you have never been. Will you make every effort to avoid this business trip?
- Do you like to share your experiences?
- Do you get annoyed when a stranger asks you to show him something, to answer a question?
- Do you believe that there is a problem of "mutual understanding of people of different generations"?
- Are you embarrassed to remind a friend that he owes you money that he borrowed a few days ago?
- In a cafe or dining room, you were served an obviously missing dish. Will you keep silent, only pushing the plate aside?
- When you are alone with a stranger, are you usually the first to start a conversation with him?
- Are you horrified by any long line, no matter where it is: at the bank, in the store, at the cinema box office? To avoid this, are you ready to give up your intention, rather than languish in anticipation?
- Are you afraid to participate in any commission to review conflict situations?
- Do you have purely individual criteria for evaluating works of literature, culture, and do you not accept any other people's opinions?
- Having heard somewhere a clearly erroneous statement on a question well known to you, would you prefer to enter into an argument?
- Do you get frustrated when someone asks you to look into a particular issue or topic?
- Are you more willing to express your point of view in writing than oral?
Calculate your points that you typed when answering the questions:
- If you scored 30-32 points - You are clearly uncommunicative, and this is your misfortune, since you yourself suffer the most from this, and it is very difficult for those close to you. It is difficult to rely on you in a case that requires joint efforts. Advice: try to develop communication skills, learn to be sociable.
- If you scored 25-29 points - You are taciturn, closed, prefer loneliness, so you probably have few friends. New job and need to contact strangers if it does not throw you into a panic, then it certainly unbalances you. You know the peculiarity of your character, for which you are often dissatisfied with yourself. Advice: do not despair, work on yourself as much as possible.
- If you scored 24-20 points - You are sociable, in an unknown environment you feel quite confident. New challenges don't scare you. But nevertheless, you converge with strangers with caution, rarely and reluctantly enter into disputes and discussions, and if you have a chance to argue, then there is a lot of sarcasm in your statements. Advice: These shortcomings are quite correctable, consider your conclusions, analyze such situations.
- If you scored 14-19 points - You sociable person, You are inquisitive, ready to listen to the interlocutor, tolerant in communication with other people, defend your point of view without irascibility. Without unpleasant unrest, go to meet new people. At the same time, do not like noisy companies, extravagant antics and verbosity, it annoys you. Advice: in the various behaviors of people look for positive sides, be more condescending, because every person is an extraordinary person.
- If you scored 9-13 points - You are very sociable, sometimes even beyond measure. They are curious, talkative, like to express their point of view on various issues, which sometimes causes irritation among others. Willingly get acquainted with other people, like to be in the spotlight, do not refuse requests to anyone, although you can not always fulfill them. Sometimes quick-tempered, but move away quickly. Advice: Work on perseverance, patience and courage when faced with serious problems. A little effort on yourself and you will force yourself not to retreat.
- If you scored 4-8 points - You are a “grunt guy” - sociability is in full swing out of you. You are always up to date on all matters, you like to take part in disputes, discussions, although ordinary topics can make you feel blue. Willingly speak out on any issue, even if you have a superficial idea about it. You get down to business, although you can not always bring the work you have started to the end. Advice: Fight this ailment, think over every word or decision, because for this reason managers and colleagues treat you with some apprehension and doubt.
- If you scored 0-3 points Your communication skills are painful. You are talkative, verbose, interfering in matters that have nothing to do with you. Willingly or unwittingly, you become the cause different conflicts in your environment. Quick-tempered, touchy, often biased. Serious work is not for you! Both at work and at home - people everywhere have a hard time with you. Advice: Cultivate in yourself tolerance, restraint, respectful attitude to other people. Beware of judging problems in which you are completely incompetent.
