Development Skills

Power Skills– Better Skills, Better Decisions, Better Outcomes.
Build a stronger organization with our new employee development assessment: Development Skills

The Development Skills assessment is an online or paper-based behavioral and personality test designed to evaluate an individual’s “power skills”—human-centered soft skills like communication, collaboration, and adaptability. Taking approximately 30 minutes to complete in an unproctored format, this test profiles candidates across 15 core dimensions (including goal achievement, stress tolerance, and rule compliance) to uncover team strengths and isolate training gaps. It is built with sophisticated anti-cheating technology to prevent applicants from trying to “fake” their answers to look overly favorable.

Power skills – such as communication, collaboration and adaptability – are essential in the modern workplace because they enable people to work effectively in diverse, fast-changing environments. While technical skills may get someone hired, power skills help them thrive by fostering teamwork, problem-solving, and leadership. As automation and technology evolve, these human-centered abilities are what set individuals apart, driving innovation, trust, and long-term success within organizations.

The Development Skills Assessment measures a comprehensive range of critical workplace skills, providing you with crucial insight into your workforce’s strengths, and to help you identify skill gaps and areas for development focus.

Primary Use: Selection/Development
Assessment Type: Behavioural & Personality
Job Level: All
Job Type: Any
Estimated Time: 30 minutes
Administration Format: Unproctored
Norms: General Population

Available Languages

• English

Benefits

• Short – Approximately 30 minutes
• Measures power skills critical to organizational success
• Reliable, predictive scores
• Sophisticated technology mitigates faking and cheating behaviors
• One test suitable for a wide range of jobs and ability levels
• Enables informed talent development decisions

What The Development Skills Measures

1. Achieves Goals – Setting and achieving challenging goals; working hard; persisting in the face of significant obstacles; striving to produce high quality work.
2. Adapts to Change – Easily and effectively handling change; adapting behavior in response to new information, changing conditions, unexpected obstacles, or specific norms; working effectively with many different types of people, situations, and constraints.
3. Complies with Rules and Regulations – Demonstrating honesty and trustworthiness; trying to do what is right and ethical; following rules, laws, regulations, policies, and procedures; accepting authority.
4. Cooperates with Others – Valuing agreement, consensus, and cohesiveness in interpersonal interactions; being responsive to others’ needs, providing information and assistance to meet those needs.
5. Demonstrates Confidence – Feeling competent in multiple areas; believing in own abilities and skills
6. Demonstrates Creativity and Innovation – Displaying creativity in problem-solving; being open to multiple ideas and new approaches to work.
7. Demonstrates Resourcefulness – Exercising responsible autonomy; being willing to make decisions independently; avoiding becoming dependent on others to complete tasks.
8. Develops Rapport with Others – Seeking out a variety of social situations, including those requiring tact and/or discretion; being sociable, warm, likable, and cooperative; being easy to work with.
9. Improves Performance – Demonstrating a desire to increase knowledge; seeking out opportunities for self-development; taking advantage of learning opportunities.
10. Leads Others – Demonstrating willingness to lead; being confident, forceful and decisive; being able to mobilize others to act.
11. Pays Attention to Detail – Being thorough, precise, and organized while working; establishing and tracking details; spotting minor imperfections or errors and taking action to correct them.
12. Takes Responsibility for Actions – Being reliable, well organized, orderly, and planful; holding self accountable for results and deadlines, accepting responsibility for mistakes.
13. Tolerates Stress and Criticism – Maintaining composure in stressful situations; maintaining a positive outlook when criticized.
14. Understands Others – Recognizing and understanding others’ states of mind or emotions; demonstrating compassion toward others; taking care of others in need.
15. Works with Information – Demonstrating intellectual curiosity; demonstrating a tendency to organize, abstract and evaluate information.

What It’s Best Used For

• Pinpointing workforce skill gaps: Auditing current staff teams to find exactly where soft-skill deficiencies are dragging down operational morale or workflow efficiency.
• Vetting general applicant suitability: Screening external candidates across any job tier or industry level to ensure they possess the baseline human qualities to thrive in fast-changing workplaces.
• Informing corporate development tracks: Helping HR managers and corporate coaches build highly targeted training blueprints using reliable, predictive personality metrics.
• Evaluating adaptability and change readiness: Measuring how effectively an individual pivots when confronted with sudden operational shifts, procedural alterations, or unexpected project roadblocks.
• Auditing rule adherence and ethics: Assessing an employee’s natural inclination toward honest behavior, transparency, authority acceptance, and workplace regulatory compliance.

© Pearson Assessment, Inc.