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How do you attract millennials and tech talent to Neenah-Appleton, Wisconsin?
Manufacturing giant Kimberly-Clark launched a new BuzzFeed-style career personality test and dedicated a new company career site called Welcome Original Thinkers.
The test begins by challenging the candidate on what type of “Original Thinker” they think they are (with 8 potential choices (dreamer, analyzer, disruptor, etc.).
This type of personality test is similar to Myers-Briggs or The Enneagram but Kimberly-Clark made theirs much shorter and added visuals.
Before the candidate takes the test, there is a clever thing Kimberly-Clark does on their home page — they mention products developed by employees with those personality types. For example (below), you see that their Impressa bladder support product was developed by employees with an Analyzer and a Maker personality type.
For the quiz itself, they ask the candidate 9 questions with 6 multiple choice answers (each with a pic).
Here are the 9 questions:
Question 1
Question 2
Question 3
Question 4
Question 5
Question 6
Question 7
Question 8
Question 9
The test takes a few minutes and after the final answer the candidate gets to see which of the 8 personality types they are (I took the test and it showed I’m an “Analyzer” (see below)). Kimberly-Clark also includes a brief blurb elaborating on the personality type you receive.
Kimberly-Clark’s Global Marketing Director of People Strategy Frans Mahieu shared with SHRM a few key items about this career personality test:
- The Quiz is not a screening tool
“It’s meant to show potential candidates that the company is looking for different kinds of people. It’s also a good conversation-starter between the company’s recruiters and candidates. Instead of an awkward conversation where recruiters move into their sales pitch, the ice is broken when candidates bring up their quiz results.”
- Employees took the quiz first and then shared it through social networks.
- The company used the quiz during the 2016 fall college campus recruiting drive and is advertising on LinkedIn and Facebook.
- Approximately 10,000 people took the quiz in its first three months. About half of those who have taken the quiz have shared it with friends and family, Mahieu said. About 20 percent have clicked onto the Kimberly-Clark careers site and browsed jobs.
- “We don’t have the hard data yet, but our number of applications are way up since we launched the rebranded site and quiz.”
My Additional Analysis
This type of career personality test can be a great way to connect with your audience. There are a couple of benefits:
- You can communicate your employer brand through the questions
- You can engage the candidate — In psychology they call this “Commitment Theory” which means that if you can get the candidate to commit a little (e.g. answering questions) then they will be that much more likely to follow-through (e.g. apply).
To take it to the next level, to truly help candidates find job opportunities with you, you could try mapping out/listing your job descriptions to the best personality type for the job. For example, a candidate who got the Analyzer personality type should be able to see jobs that are most likely a good fit for their type.
I’ve studied Myers-Briggs and created TopTypes.com where you can see 16 personality types and which careers are best for them. This data exists (in fact, I welcome you borrowing the TopTypes career-related content as long as you attribute it with — you would then need to map that content to your job postings.
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