Assessment Center

The assessment center is a skills evaluation process that has been used historically in selection and placement decision making, in employee skill development, and more broadly in career development and organizational succession planning. The process was developed in the 1930s by the German military for the primary purpose of officer selection. The methodology was adopted, based on familiarity with the German model, shortly thereafter by the British military for similar purposes, and subsequently by the Australian and Canadian militaries.

The assessment center process was first used in the United States by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during the middle to late years of America’s involvement in World War II (1943 to 1945), to help in the selection of operatives for spy missions. The personality theorist ...