Dave D.

I design, build, and validate assessments, and I evaluate the AI tools that are starting to do the assessing. Most of my Upwork clients are companies building an assessment product or platform, and founders or HR teams who need an existing assessment validated, defended, or rebuilt. If you need a validation study, a custom test built (cognitive, personality, SJT), a scoring framework, or an expert read on whether an AI hiring tool measures what it claims, that is my lane. I'm an I/O psychologist (PhD) with 15 years in assessment. My work has been deployed millions of times across 30+ countries, for global brands (McDonald's, Coinbase, Coca-Cola) and for startups shipping their first product. At Coinbase I ran evaluations of AI hiring and assessment vendors: pressure-testing claims, running the analyses, and delivering plain-English go/no-go decisions. Recent projects: - Built and validated a situational judgment test (SJT) for a hiring platform - IRT and DIF analysis to optimize item banks - Scalable leadership assessments for executive coaching firms - AI hiring-tool evaluations and vendor claim reviews - Structured interview design and interviewer training - Commercialization support for assessment products sold to HR buyers What clients say: "Dave demonstrates an expert-level command over statistics and delivers results ahead of schedule. He is also quite adept at communicating, especially when translating technical content to a lay audience." (Jessica Brown, Ph.D., Amazon) "Across all of these engagements, Dave consistently and fluidly drew from his exceptionally deep level of statistical, psychometric and legal expertise to help devise solutions to demanding and challenging situations." (John Capman, Ph.D., Amazon) "Dave is reliable, responsive, and did an excellent job of completing requested contract work around assessment building and scoring for my hiring software... well received and shown promising results." (Clint Smith, CareerPlug) Services: - Custom assessment design and development - Validation studies and adverse impact analysis - Psychometrics: IRT, CAT, CFA, DIF, scoring frameworks - AI hiring tool evaluation (go, no-go, or what to test before you commit) - Structured interview systems and interviewer training - Expert review of assessment content and structure If you're building an assessment, fixing one, or deciding whether to trust one, let's talk.