Am I stupid? (BB online assessments)
I just took an "online assessment" for a BB SA position, which included a numerical test and a verbal reasoning test. I had around 5 minutes to complete each test, and I found each one very difficult. Have others experienced this or am I just an idiot or something? I thought that there was so many graphs/readings for each one that by the time you went through them there was basically no time to complete the questions. I was expecting something more like the sat/act. Also how important are these assessments in general? Thanks
No, you aren't. They're a strange type of standardized test that only a certain type of person can nail. I know incredibly bright kids who have gone on to do very well in IB, PE and MC who failed the classic banking online assessments. Practice more and if all else fails, there's an entire industry of professional test takers out there...
What is the industry? lol
Literally people who spend their days making fake application accounts to get the online tests and memorize or copy the questions so they have a huge bank with answers. They then charge people a certain amount to take the test for them and pretty much guarantee you pass it.
Agreed. These tests, are, in general stupid and just a way for banks to narrow things down. Of course like in every highly competitive situation some cottage industry will pop up in which you can pay someone to take them for you.
In general, if you have to do it on your own (I never passed any of those, btw), practice helps as does remembering one key thing: if it takes you longer than a few seconds to see/work something out, you are probably missing the big picture or what they are getting at. A lot of it is pattern recognition and then process of elimination or something very simple (but not dressed up as such).
TLDR: you are not dumb
Good Luck
Thanks for the reassurance and I am glad to know others have struggled with these as well. For me, it was the fact that each test had six separate things to look at and only 5-6 minutes for 18 questions. However, despite others potential struggles, is it fair to say I will be dinged as a result of this?
Being dinged often infers that someone actually looked at your resume or interviewed you. These, in my opinion (happy to hear otherwise from those actually in the beast), are ways to filter people out.
The time they give you to do each question definitely shows that these are things to look for patterns or the answer is often there but tricky (think charts with different scales or numbers with changing decimal places or whatever).
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Use a VPN and fake email.
Basically these test are only used to weed out the candidates who are actually willing to put in effort to prep for them. Banks want to hire people who are so passionate about joining the firm that they will spend hours preparing for technical interviews and taking practice tests and doing whatever they can to prove their desire of becoming a banker.
So no, you're not wrong in thinking that the tests are hard, and honestly if you network hard enough you may be able to override your test score because internal referrals usually hold the most weight.
No, the opposite is true. They're an attempt to assess aptitude beyond the 'did he memorize the 400Q' rigamarole (though you're right that they're also somewhat studiable, so still an imperfect system).
How would you exactly "study" for these assessments? Also do EBs use these? From what I've heard BBs are the ones that use these tests to screen out the large quantities of applicants they get.
You can usually find problem-solving, pattern-recognition, verbal reasoning, etc. questions online that generally match the content these aptitude tests, if not specific prep materials for the exact assessment you'll be taking, if you know in advance. It's not as studiable as "walk me through a DCF" (and that's the idea – to try to seperate aptitude from preparation), but you can still improve your relative performance vs. taking them cold.
And you're right, EBs typically don't use.
JobTestPrep is a website that has just about every style of practice test, an in good number too. Personally helped me out a lot. Shared the £50p/a subscription with a friend.
some tests are designed that there is no way you can finish in time. they would give way more questions.
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