Assessment and development centres
Tried and tested measurement of interpersonal, managerial and leadership ability and job 'fit'.

Talent International Development Ltd. specialises in creating, validating and managing development and assessment centres for client companies around the Asia-Pacific region.

 What is a development centre?
A development centre is not a place but a process. Development centres are designed around observed exercises that asses the strengths and development needs of participants when measured against their organisation's competencies. Once identified, these needs can be addressed through training, self development, mentoring or other means.

What is an assessment centre?
An assessment centre works in a similar way to a development centre, but its outcome is different; as the name implies, assessment centres are designed to assess a participant's suitability for employment, internal promotion or reassignment in the assessing company.

Assessment centres were devised in 1942 to provide a more accurate means of testing the leadership ability of army officers in the United Kingdom. The first business use was for management selection for AT&T in the United States. Development and assessment centres are now in extensive use in multinational companies for recruitment, promotion, succession planning and general appraisal of development needs.

How do development and assessment centres work?
There are several models, although we are most frequently asked to apply a 'themed' or case-based approach in which a participant adopts a job role in a fictional company and in that role, undertakes a series of exercises. For an overview of the types of exercises that might be used in this context, please click here.

Exercises are watched by trained observers who assess participants' behaviours against a set of competencies. These competencies may be generic or (preferably) specifically identified for the company that is running the centre. 

One key element of development centres is the comprehensive written and/or oral feedback given to each participant.

We offer complete flexibility in design; while we have set out the model we most typically use, we are creative and will adapt to fit your needs.

Our specialty
Talent International Development Ltd fills a unique niche in development and assessment management in Asia-Pacific; many organisations offering similar centres will make use of off-the-shelf case studies and exercises, often written for use in the US or Europe and therefore not truly representative of the Asian working environment. Our cases are built around Asia-Pacific businesses and are tailored to suit the needs of your company. This means that Asia-based participants do not have to imagine themselves in unlikely business scenarios in unfamiliar countries, nor do the cases suffer from the artificiality that often appears when a business scenario is transposed from one part of the world to another, losing its contextual and cultural validity in the process.

What does a typical development centre look like?
To view a typical centre model as used by Talent International Development Ltd, please click here.

To see the steps involved in creating your company's development centre please click here.

A basic model of a development centre

There is no one model for the design of development centres; however, guidelines for best practice have been laid down by the British Psychological Society's Psychological Testing Centre to ensure consistent and ethical use. Talent International Development Ltd is committed to following these guidelines with whatever model is adopted.

A typical centre model
In a typical development centre of the type offered by Talent International Development Ltd, participants, usually managers or executives, are put into a fictional role one or two promotion steps above their present positions and in that role are asked to carry out various exercises that would reflect a typical working day at their new level of responsibility.

For example: a participant - a manager - might be asked to adopt the role of managing director of a multinational company involved in construction, retail, insurance, or B to B plastics manufacturing. The nature of the industry is chosen in discussion with the client. For recruitment assessment centres, the industry will usually be the client's own business, but for development centres a similar but unrelated business is often preferred; this removes the tendency to fall back on job technicalities and allows the observers to focus on managerial behaviours.

The participant is provided with background information about the fictional company, such as company structure, details of operations, financials, information on the market in which the company operates and perhaps the company's mission and vision for the future. This helps the participant to put the exercises in context. The background information might be provided to the participant a few days beforehand or on the day of the centre itself.

On the day of the centre, several participants (8-12 is the optimum range) would take part together. All will be given a series of group and individual exercises to undertake in their fictional role throughout the day. For example, participants might be asked to look through a predecessor's in-tray and prioritise, classify and take action on various items found there. The next exercise might be a meeting with a potential JV partner; others might be a performance management interview with a subordinate, a group discussion to decide on the launch of a new retail product and/or a presentation on a new business initiative. To view an outline of some typical centre exercises, please click here.

As participants go through these exercises, they are watched by one or more of a team of trained observers. Observers might participate directly in some exercises by playing roles such as customers, managers, board members, etc. The role of the observers is to watch and record evidence of participants' behaviours, i.e. what participants actually do and say in each exercise. At the end of each exercise, these behaviours are classified according to the competency they portray and are rated (usually numerically) against the desired behaviours for that competency.
(In some centres, participants are given feedback directly after each exercise. In others, feedback on all exercises is provided after the centre, usually in a one- on-one meeting followed up with a formal written report.)

Integration (or wash-up) session
Shortly after the development centre exercises are run (usually the same evening or the following day), the observers get together for an integration session. In these sessions, each participant's performance against each competency in each exercise is discussed. The observers will agree on an overall rating in each competency for each participant, paying particular attention to the participants' strengths and development needs.

Feedback session
On day three, each participant attends a one-on-one feedback session in which their strengths and development needs are discussed at length and they are advised on steps for further development.

Participants also receive a detailed written feedback report a few weeks after a development centre. Participants are encouraged to discuss the report and development steps with their managers.   

Workshop

A valuable optional feature offered with Talent International Development Ltd's development centres is the inclusion of an integrated workshop. The workshop is typically run on days two and three of a three-day centre and takes participants through a series of activities designed to reinforce and enhance the behaviours in the competency model. On day three, the workshop is arranged to fit around the feedback sessions and includes guidelines to participants on creating a development plan.

As an alternative, the workshop can be arranged shortly after the development centre and focused on the specific behaviours that arose in feedback.

Who are observers and how are they trained?
Observers can be consultants and/or senior managers of the client organisation. Ideally, there should be a mix of consultants and line managers to bring a balance of experience to the process. We can, however offer a 'build, operate, transfer' method whereby the client company takes over the entire management of the process on payment of a licence fee.

To comply with the British Psychological Society's Guidelines, observers must be trained in centre assessment methods. Training consists of an appreciation of the ORCE model for observation, guidelines on making objective assessments and giving verbal and written feedback.

Centre-specific training is included, in which trainee observers gain hands-on experience by conducting, watching and assessing role-players who perform the actual exercises to be used in the organisation's development or assessment centre.

Talent International Development Ltd offers observer training for client organisations and in addition, can call on a pool of experienced external observers to assist in running centres. 

Observers at development centres designed by Talent International Development Ltd will be supported by a comprehensive Observers' Manual that includes full details of each exercise, including 'points to watch' for observers and rating guides. Manual sections on exercises that use role-players will include a full script.

Administrative support is also offered, whereby Talent International Development Ltd's own administrator(s) work alongside those of the commissioning company to provide logistical support for the centre.