The Assessment Center Process and Content Validity: A Reply to Dreher and Sackett

The content validity of the managerial assessment center approach is founded on the resemblance of the process as a whole to the job of a manager as a whole. Therefore, the primary threats to the content validity of the assessment center process are poor design and poor implementation, not a lack of sophisticated job analysis or of a close match between job activities and assessment dimensions or exercises. Dreher and Sackett's review of court cases regarding paper-and-pencil tests for police officers and firefighters does not provide a persuasive argument for concluding that managerial assessment center procedures lack content validity.