The most important role of nanny agencies is ensuring that the nannies or babysitters they provide are professional and trustworthy. This is currently done by screening nannies through interviews, reference checks and background screening. Not every agency uses all three screening methods and very few include also personality testing as part of their screening process.

Au pair agencies in the USA are required by federal regulations to use personality tests as part of the Au Pair screening process. If personality tests are important enough to be mandated by the US government for screening Au Pairs, why aren't they used as part of the standard screening process in nanny placement agencies?

Personality tests are used extensively by corporate and government organizations as a pre-employment screening tool. If personality tests are important for corporate roles, why haven't they been embraced as a mainstream screening tool in nanny placement agencies, where employees work one on one, often unsupervised caring for their employer’s most prized possession, their children?
Most parents, placement agencies and caregivers would agree that the more quality screening tools used during the pre-employment process, the better.

There is no doubt that caregiver’s screening, whether done by placement agencies or by parents, isn’t fault proof. We often learn about cases of abuse and maltreatment of kids by their nannies or babysitters and, despite current screening measures, more than 70,000 cases of abuse and neglect of kids by daycare providers have been reported in the USA in 2008.

Why don’t nanny agencies use personality tests?
The majority of nanny agencies have been founded and run by ex-nannies or parents who were frustrated by finding nanny care, not by recruitment professionals. Many placement agencies do not employ at all human resources (HR) professionals who are familiar with and trained on using a range of screening tools. Being a professional in a certain industry, such as the in-home child care industry, doesn’t necessarily qualify one to be a good interviewer or pre-employment screener. This is why screening for corporate jobs involves HR professionals and not only managers or peers. If managers of nanny agencies do not have a professional background in HR and recruitment, they may not be aware of the existence or the value of personality tests as a screening tool.

When considering the use of personality testing for pre-employment screening, cost often becomes an issue. Like any business, a nanny agency owner cares about the bottom line. Every additional screening method translates to an extra-cost, thereby reducing profit. This is especially true for online matching services, which keep costs to a minimum by limiting their screening to very basic background checks.
A quality personality test can cost as low as $15-$30 per applicant, depending on volume. Does this cost justify a compromise in the quality of screening?

Personality tests are important because no single screening method is 100% accurate and combining several tools is the only way to increase the overall accuracy of the pre-employment screening. Here's why:

• Interviews often fail to reveal important facts or problematic personality traits, and their predictive value is limited, even when conducted by properly trained interviewers. In a recent case involving an adoption scam by a nanny, the mother who has interviewed her, said: “She seemed like a great person, very articulate, very smart, she seemed so caring and so nice… she sounded like a textbook, great nanny to me. Just perfect.” The “successful interview” wasn’t the only failure point in the screening process. The nanny was hired through a national web site that matches parents with local baby sitters and nannies, had experience with infants and young children and reportedly passed a criminal background check with flying colors.
• References are highly subjective. How valuable is the opinion of someone you don’t know? What are his expectations, values, standards? Furthermore, recommendation letters are hardly being considered by professional recruiters. A proper reference check should be done through a careful interview of previous employers or acquaintances and not based on a written recommendation only. In another recent case, a live-in nanny has been arrested on child pornography charges 5 months after being hired through a well known full-service nanny agency. According to the parents, “the agency provided glowing work references.”
• Background screening is extremely important but full of loopholes. Scope, timeliness and accuracy of various databases searched may be limited. For example, a nanny was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol, with her charges, ages 2 and 8, in the car. Several months later, the nanny’s profile was still displayed on another national web site that matches parents with nannies, since her original background screening didn’t show any offence. Furthermore, every criminal has no criminal record until his first offence (or actually, first conviction). Will this first offence harm your kids?

Personality tests offer additional and valuable insight into the character and personality traits of the nanny, au pair or babysitter and can highlight issues which are very difficult to identify through an interview, such as problems performing under pressure or a tendency towards violent behavior.

Risk assessment, which highlights possible risk factors, is an extremely important component of personality tests. For example, TakeCare’s NannyTest covers the following: violent behavior, drug abuse, drinking problems, truthful reporting, respect to property and more. In addition, the test assesses personality traits such as responsibility, obedience and discipline, self control, emotional stability, coping with pressure, positive attitude and service awareness.

As with any screening tool, personality tests are not 100% accurate and should do not replace interviews, reference checks and background screening. It is also important to understand that not all personality tests are equal and one has to use the right type of test.

To protect our kids, we must ensure the screening process of caregivers is the best possible. Whether are using a nanny, babysitter or Au Pair agency, hiring a nanny on their own or sending their kids to a daycare center, parents must demand that quality personality tests are used as part of the caregivers’ screening process.

When hiring a nanny without using an agency or in cases where personality tests aren’t done by the agency, parents can easily perform such tests on their own. Relevant personality tests, such as TakeCare’s NannyTest, are now available online to all parents, are easy to use and highly affordable.

Author's Bio: 

Yossi Pinkas is CEO and Founder of TakeCare.
TakeCare provides online personality and risk assessments of Nannies, Au pairs and Babysitters. TakeCare’s NannyTest helps parents screen potential caregivers by providing a better insight into their personality and traits, as well as an assessment of possible risk factors.