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California Psychological Inventory™

“The CPI 260® instrument provides a comprehensive view of an individual forming a strong basis for in-depth coaching discussions. We have seen many people benefit from self-reflection of their leadership strengths, as well as areas to develop further. The CPI 260® helps us to create an environment where coaching conversations can be focused on self-reflection and personal growth.”

- Jayne Cobham, Organisational Psychologist, Positive Performance Limited, Auckland, New Zealand

 

How do you develop great leaders? How do you motivate employees to give you their very best? And do you really know the strengths and developmental opportunities of your team?

For more than 55 years, the California Psychological Inventory™ (CPI™) instrument has provided a highly accurate and in-depth portrait not only of individuals’ professional and personal styles, but also of their potential.

Two forms of the instrument are available - the CPI 260® and the CPI™ 434 - each geared toward a different professional usage. The CPI™ instruments are trusted and powerful tools for use in leadership development and selection. By describing individuals as others see them, and through the generation of highly intuitive reports, they can help your clients gain a clearer picture of their personal and work-related characteristics, motivations and thinking styles - as well as how they manage themselves and deal with others.

Building on the CPI™, the CPI 260® instrument can help you hone in on your organisation’s strengths and discover new opportunities for development. Introduced in 2002, this leadership coaching and development tool is based on successful real-time applications, all empirically derived and research validated. It contains 260 carefully selected items used to measure an individual’s interpersonal approach, intrapersonal values and level of satisfaction. In addition, it provides results on more than two dozen scales covering five broad categories: dealing with others, self-management, motivations and thinking style, personal characteristics and work related characteristics.

The CPI 260® instrument has an established research database of nearly 2,000 citations and compares an individual’s responses to those of a normative sample of 6,000 individuals.

Please take a moment to explore the 4 lifestyles of the CPI™ model.

 


Explore the CPI™ Model

Hover over the graphics below for descriptions of the four lifestyles.



 

Certification in the CPI™ Instrument

The CPI™ instrument is what we call ‘Restricted’ and you need to be trained and certified to access and use it. This ensures that the instrument is used for the purpose for which it was designed and that it is being administered and interpreted correctly.

We offer a Certification Program that will qualify you in the professional and ethical administration of the CPI™ instrument and upon successful completion of the program, you will gain a certificate of qualification to purchase and use both the instrument and its reports.

 

Key Benefits
  • Offers practical insights and real life applications for organisational development, coaching, human resource and training and development professionals in a business or organisational context
  • Is more business focused and generates leadership development reports that can function as developmental plans and coaching aids
  • Develops leadership abilities by helping individuals better understand themselves and how they interact with others
  • Enhances your existing leadership development, succession planning and selection programs
  • Complements existing performance improvement initiatives and other organisational development programs
  • Helps organisations identify talent by measuring results relating to occupational issues, creativity, leadership, amicability and tough-mindedness

 

Instrument Features
  • Short, easy-to-use form of the acclaimed CPI™ instrument (requires 40 percent less time to complete)
  • Results on 29 CPI™ scales: 20 folk scales, 3 structural scales and 6 special-purpose scales
  • Results on a range of personal scales including: interpersonal aspects, internal values and normative expectations, achievement needs and cognitive tendencies and stylistic preferences
  • Defined personality model underlying the instrument via structural scales
  • Additional scoring via special-purpose scales and discrimination for specific applications

 

Applications
  • Leadership Development
  • Executive Coaching
  • Performance Improvement
  • Succession Planning
  • Selection
  • Talent Retention

 

Please note that translations are available for selected CPI™ products in the following languages:

Danish, French, French (Canadian)

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