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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal – Vol. 8, No. 10

Publication Date: October 25, 2021

DOI:10.14738/assrj.810.10921. Tountopoulou, M., Drosos, N., & Vlachaki, F. (2021). Assessing Refugees’, Asylum Seekers’ and Vulnerable Migrants’ Soft Skills: The

Development and Psychometric Properties of NADINE Soft Skills Test. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 8(10). 52-64.

Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom

Assessing Refugees’, Asylum Seekers’ and Vulnerable Migrants’

Soft Skills: The Development and Psychometric Properties of

NADINE Soft Skills Test

Maria Tountopoulou

Ison Psychometrica, Athens Greece

Nikos Drosos

Ison Psychometrica, Athens Greece

European University Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus

Fotini Vlachaki

Ison Psychometrica, Athens Greece

National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens Greece

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to give an overview of the development of the NADINE soft skills

test, focusing mainly on the results of the study conducted to assess the

psychometric properties of it, so as to ensure that the proposed test is suitable,

reliable and valid to assess the soft skills of migrant groups. The sample used for the

standardization of the tools consisted of 427 persons. Reliability and validity of

tools were calculated; factor analyses were conducted to ensure that each scale was

measuring only one factor and further comparative analyses were made to explore

whether there is statistical significant relation between demographic variables and

the performance in the skills under evaluation. Results of the analyses depict that

the NADINE soft skill test constitute valid and reliable instrument that can be used

by career practitioners, hosting organisations and administration bodies to

accurately assess the soft skills of vulnerable migrants, refugees and asylum

seekers and facilitate their labour market integration.

Keywords: Soft skills, Skill assessment, Refugees, Migrants, Asylum seekers

INTRODUCTION

Over the last few years, the largest displacement of refugees in modern history took place with

more than 6 million people having fled several interrelated wars in the Middle East (e.g. the

Syrian, the 2014-2017 war in Iraq etc.) [1]. The recent Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan

will create a new wave of refugees seeking a better future in Europe. The effects of this crisis

have been immense, not only in neighboring countries such as Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey,

but also in the EU countries that constitute the final destinations for many refugees. To address

this challenging situation EU countries have to facilitate the refugees’ integration into the

mainstream society in the medium to long term. This can be a very challenging process, as

refugees have to deal with the difficult and bureaucratic procedures of applying for asylum

status, while living in refugees’ camps and not knowing the culture and language of the host

country. Employment is, also, one of the most important aspects of refugees’ integration as a

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Tountopoulou, M., Drosos, N., & Vlachaki, F. (2021). Assessing Refugees’, Asylum Seekers’ and Vulnerable Migrants’ Soft Skills: The Development

and Psychometric Properties of NADINE Soft Skills Test. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 8(10). 52-64.

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.810.10921

prerequisite for addressing the immediate needs of their families and re-establishing a

livelihood [2]. Policy makers, humanitarian organizations, and NGOs have moved their focus

from just humanitarian work that addresses only people’s basic needs toward labor market

interventions aiming at work integration [3]. Refugees’ work integration has been found to

reduce welfare dependency, and enhance the educational and health outcomes amongst the

children of refugee families [4]. Employment is important not only as a means of subsistence,

but also for self-realisation and social inclusion [5]. As there are multiple factors associated

with work integration that vary from person to person and country to country (e.g. refugees’

experiences of flight, persecution, and war; the national policies for work integration; the

national labour markets) research shows that there is great variation in refugees’ readiness to

enter into employment and to be able to participate in all aspects of social life [6], [7]. Although

the importance of having effective career services assisting refugees to obtain employment, our

current knowledge regarding how career practitioners, organizations and policy makers can

effectively assist refugees enter the labour market is limited [8] and there is lack of career tests

designed and standardized for this population.

In most countries pubic employments services and career services offered by non- governmental organizations have undertaken the difficult task to assist migrants and refugees

in finding employment. It is important to empower them to take responsibility for their

integration process and for increasing their employability [9], a task which requires a reliable

and accurate measurement of their current skills to identify which skills should be further

developed. The term “skills” refers both to “hard” skills, which are specific to individual

professions and “soft” skills, which include a vast range of personal attributes that are desirable

for all professions ( e.g. critical thinking, problem solving, public speaking, teamwork, time

management, leadership, professional attitude, work ethic, career management, etc.). Soft skills

are considered as a cluster of productive personality traits have raised much attention over the

past decades. Employers tend to consider soft skills extremely important in hiring new

personnel, and, although, hard skills still represent an essential aspect, soft skills have become

equally significant. More and more businesses worldwide are investing in the training and

development of soft skills among their staff, while the European Commission recognized this

tendency by launching the program Agenda for new skills and jobs in 2012 in order to train and

explain to young adults this new set of skills [10].

The need for valid soft skills’ tests and even more for tests adapted to migrant population’s

unique and complex characteristics is obvious. Therefore, the development of skill assessment

tools that are designed specifically for migrant population is crucial in order to provide career

counselling services to vulnerable migrants, asylum seekers and refugees. The NADINE project

addresses the aforementioned issue by creating a series of tests designed to assess soft [11]

and hard skills [12] for migrants, refugees and asylum seekers in the framework of the broader

scope to facilitate their labour market integration. Though, in order to provide a valid and

reliable tool, the standardisation process of the tool plays an important role, along with its

psychometric properties. This paper will focus on the psychometric characteristics of the Soft

Skills Test and the relation with background variables, such as migration group, as an attempt

to shed light in possible differences in skills performance depending on those variables, which

is a valuable information in career counselling sessions.

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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal (ASSRJ) Vol. 8, Issue 10, October-2021

Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom

THE NADINE SOFT SKILLS TEST

The NADINE Skill Tests’ scope is to facilitate the production of concrete and realistic profiling

results on the specific soft skills of each migrant/ refugee/asylum seeker. As previously

mentioned, soft skills, which are non-job specific, are cross-cutting across jobs and sectors,

closely connected with intangible personal attitudes and competences and social competences

[13].

Regarding the construct definitions of the soft skills, the constructs’ operationalization was

based on thorough literature review and focus groups with employers and migrant groups.

European and national frameworks on skills were used, such as ESCO skills classification, OECD

competency frameworks, definitions and descriptions used at the Survey of Adult Skills (OECD

PIAAC), the OECD Learning Framework 2030 [14], [15], [16], [17], ILO competency standards

[18], [19], the EU Key Competencies Framework [20], [21], the EU Skills Profile Tool for Third

Country Nationals, as well as international surveys and studies on skills needed to enable

migrants labour market integration in the host countries [22], [24], [25].

The NADINE Soft Skill Test consists of 4 scales aiming to evaluate the 19 specific soft skills:

§ Interpersonal skills: Social interaction, Team working, Intercultural competence, Coping

with Authority, Conscientiousness, Extraversion (item examples: “I believe it is always

better to cooperate with others rather than to compete with them”, “I can easily resolve

arguments with others”, “I find it enjoyable to team up with others and help them” etc.)

§ Organizational skills: Work efficiency, Time management, Independent Work,

Organization (item examples: “I dedicate a substantial amount of time to checking a

project, before I consider it completed”, “I leave things to last minute”, “When carrying

out a task, I always try to stick to the deadlines” etc.)

§ Personal skills: Adaptability, Reliability, Willingness to learn, Stress tolerance (item

examples: “I tend to feel uneasy when things change around me”, “I can manage to

control the way I reach, even when I am emotionally tense”, “I do not usually lose my

patience” etc.

§ Entrepreneurial skills: Creativity, Managerial skills, Initiative, Risk tolerance,

Leadership (Item examples: “I tend to come up with new ideas and proposals”, “I am in

constant search for new incentives”, “You can’t win if you don’t risk” etc.).

The NADINE Soft Skills Test’s development methodology followed the relevant and

internationally used scientific statistical and analytical psychometric procedures for

psychological testing [26], [27], [28], so as to minimize measurement errors and guarantee the

quality, suitability, and usefulness of the tool to be developed.

The development of the test consisted of several stages that were implemented in 3 phases, as

they are depicted in figure 1.