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New way to fail a recruitment interview: Digital lie detector
Mr Nyaga Thagichu, the principal consultant at Train, Grow and Inspire company that sells IntegrityMeter in Africa.
Lie detectors are common in crime-based films, but no one imagined they could interact with such technology in everyday work environments until now.
Train, Grow and Inspire (TGI), a human resource consulting firm, is championing the use of an internet-based innovation called IntegrityMeter for employers to gauge the credibility of their workers and also pre-qualified job applicants.
Mr Nyaga Thagichu, principal consultant at TGI, says their primary motivation was to make it possible for employers to hire and retain reliable employees while rooting out corruption and restoring integrity in the Kenyan workforce.
“IntegrityMeter validates people’s reliability by picking out past, present and likely behaviours through a series of well-aligned questions where the test can verify the answers and highlight a pattern,” says Mr Nyaga.
The website that hosts the software, www.integritymeter.com , was initially developed more than 10 years ago in Israel by Shazaro Ltd, an international firm that now partners with TGI, the face of the project in Africa.
Already, IntegrityMeter is used to arrest integrity issues in countries including Israel, Brazil and Ghana while Kenya is slowly adopting the idea.
With that technology, job interviews will not be the same again. Besides “tell us about yourself”, Kenyans would face questions like “have you ever stolen from your employer?” or “have you ever gone into debt due to money lost in gambling?”
Questions touch on both personal and professional ethics, including corruption, use of drugs and awareness of the law.
And depending on where your faultlines lie, your responses will expose culpability in accordance with psychology studies. The magnitude of the result would determine whether you lose your job or opportunity for employment.
The innovator says the foolproof system could be used in government circles to vet the suitability of officers and also in the police service and other institutions with rampant cases of corruption.
Cumulatively, the public and private sectors have approximately 2.7 million formal employees.
The use of traditional polygraphs in occupational settings has been challenged for a number of reasons, one being that they create unintended consequences of interviewees feeling as though they’re under investigation.
Mr Nyaga says that IntegrityMeter, as a computerised system, is efficient with alternative examination techniques that efficiently address the shortfalls of the traditional lie detector.
“The system is based on principles of advanced interrogation methods and draws on the experience of polygraph examiners, human resource managers and psychologists who have more than 35 years of accumulated work experience in numerous countries,” explains the manuscript. “It is an efficient and low-cost substitute to the traditional polygraph examinations.”
Why is the integrity test of employees important to any organisation?
“For any business organisation, hiring the right talent remains a fundamental factor for success. The need to attract, on-board and retain the right talent is more prevalent now than ever, thanks to evolution in the field,” the human resource expert says.
With poor recruitment systems and the high level of unemployment comes the pressure to obtain jobs through any means possible.
Mr Nyaga believes individuals with high integrity levels are better decision makers at any level of management.
Under the tagline “recruit right”, the Integrity Meter primarily conducts two major tests; overt integrity and personality-based tests.
Locally, the software costs an upwards of Sh2,500 per test for organisations testing a minimum of 10 people. The fee includes the administration of the test and the interpretation of the results.
The overt integrity test assesses a person’s views and potential involvement in various detrimental behaviours. Conversely, personality-based integrity tests check personality traits, which could trigger detrimental behaviours.
“The system is easy to operate and provides a detailed report as soon as the test is completed. The report comes in a narrative and graphical format with a percentage score showing the employee’s integrity ratings,” reads the innovation literature.
“In the fight against corruption it’s evident that most of the corrupt dealings today are decisions being made by employees for personal financial gains or to the benefit of competitors. Therefore, it’s becoming a must for every business to invest greatly on transparency, accountability, integrity and the quest for professionalism at all levels,” it adds.
According to Mr Nyaga, a culture of using lie detectors will guard against involvement in criminal acts like theft from employers, bribery, economic espionage, financial liabilities, illegal gambling use of drugs, among other vices.
The reliability test is broad, robust and versatile, it allows testing of individuals at different levels in the employment structures, selection of job types and levels making it easy to test at any level
Locally, the software costs an upwards of Sh2, 500 ($20) per test for organisations testing a minimum of 10 people. The fee includes administration of the test and interpretation of the results.
