Online Tests
What is a Situational Judgement Test?
The Situational Judgement test is the most accurate predictor of which GP doctor trainees will successfully graduate training i.e those who fail the situational judgement assessment usually fail their two years training.
Although there are controversies surrounding situational judgement tests, that it introduces bias and compounds a companies culture, it is also very effective and has paved the way for other psychometric assessments such as online games. Most of the top graduate employers include a situational judgement assessment in their online tests so it is an assessment you need to be aware of as an applicant.
Situational judgement tests are designed to extract personality traits, and in turn build a corresponding personality profile of the applicant. This helps the employer understand how an applicant may act in certain situations.
The first thing to know about situational judgement tests is that hiring companies often dictate which traits they are looking for so the "correct" answers can vary between employers. It is a chance for them to present you with a relevant scenario to the job you would be doing and see how you may act. The kind of traits they are looking for are:
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Honesty & integrity
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Communication
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Teamwork
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Problem solving
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Relationship building
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Analytical thinking
All situational judgement tests are different; some companies will provide a scenario by video (literally an employee wearing a GoPro), others will present scenarios by written descriptions and there are companies that will ask you directly about your personality.
Situational judgement tests are designed to be good discriminators, this is to tease out clear personality traits. They do this by asking you to either select your response to the situation or rank the given responses in order.
There is a good incentive to simply be yourself and answer the questions honestly, especially if the "right" answers were determined by running the test on current employees. It is an indicator of your fit within a team and if you aren't honest you could end up working in a team that you don't get on with.
Practising situational judgement tests is a good thing to do as it gives you a good idea of the types of questions you may be asked preventing any unexpected surprises. If you are comfortable taking the test then you are more likely to be yourself. There are a couple of free tests that you can practice with online:
