How to pass SHL tests

hey here are shl tests http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEFOlz_38w0

this video is not working any more ;-) hope some one can help on this ;-(

Today I tried the SHL practice tests. They are REALLY stupid. The "logic" of their "reasoning" tests is NOT logic.
As for the numerical "reasoning" test, SHL's strategy is to give you questions involving A LOT of numbers to solve in a very short time. The numerical questions are NOT hard but are practically IMPOSSIBLE to solve within the alloted time.

Even I can make questions like that.
For example: John buys everyday 4% tomatoes, 6% cucumbers, 50% apples, 20% radishes, 15% lemons and 5% oranges. If the quantity of tomatoes bought yesterday is 7% more than the quantity of radishes bought the day before yesterday, which is 3% less than the quantity of cucumbers bought today, which is 5 kilograms, what is the quantity of apples bought by John yesterday?

How much time do you think you have for such a question? Well, (take a deep breath), AT MOST one minute!

Is this SHL's idea of "intelligence" or "hard work"????
Is this the result of SHL "30 years of experience" (as they brag on their website) ?????

As far as I am concerned, this is PURE STUPIDITY. Nevertheless, I'll do what I can to become better at such tests, as many companies (banks, accountancy firms) use SHL-like tests.

Has anyone had problems with this kind of tests?
Has anyone completed these kind of tests correctly and on time?

I'd really like to have some feedback from you guys on such tests.

Whishing you a very good year,
Astro

Apart from efinancial careers and the SHL website what OTHER websites/practice tests are there online??!?!

IBM do something very similar they call IPATO.

I think is possible to finish, if you are a calculatorman!

But the SHL is not a kind of test that is possible to finish in short time, We must skip some and do others. They want to know your reactions "in the front", they mix simples with hard ones. They want evaluate our way to think and how We can go over the humps. I know the first impression that we got after do the test. I am really fast thinker, and after all I was just tired, and had been more 8 to be finished.

We don't need judge ourselves after the test. We can study and understand something really important, We were bad educated! We need to start think in another way, there are many situations that we can't figure out with simple mathematic rules. There are many situations that we have to figure out estimating or understanding the behavior of the things.

Here in Brazil they changed the way to get in to a university, and I can tell "what you are thinking"! They gave to us a kind off SHL test!

I did a test at IBM and was the same. We must change our way o think. That is the deal. It's just practice.

We don't need calculate how far is the step over a puddle of water.

Best Regards.
Thiago

Hi,

I was hopeless at these questions and found them really difficult. However practice really does makes perfect. I founds lots of questions on assessmentday.co.uk (I think). Yes, it's £5 but they have verbal, numerical and abstract reasoning questions. You can do them as often as you like, they give you the answers in a pdf and they will rank you in terms of a percentile relative to others who have taken the test (which is a good indicator). Having the answers is particularly good for the verbal test because they justify why an answer is "true", "false" and "cannot say". Sometimes the difference between the latter two is not always clear.

Don't worry about running out of time. Work fast but do not make mistakes. I didn't complete the numeracy test for PwC strategy consulting but still made the assessment centre. KPMG's test was RIDICULOUSLY hard and I finished about 75% of it, but likewise I made it through.

Get used to shortcuts for typical questions (e.g. using 4 instead of 4,000,000; knowing that to calculate what % 45 is of 56 all you do is 45/56; using the Xy function for compound growth). Practice using a calculator at speed and functions on the calculator which will make workings outs more efficient.

Lastly, companies use these tests as assessment tools because they measure basic numerical and logical competency. If you struggle (after practice) with these and don't make it through, then it could be a clear indicator that you may not be suitible for the job you are applying for.

GOOD LUCK!

Thank you Cam_Tor and thiagoborn for encouragement and tips, I guess you are right: practice makes perfect.

Thank you Cam_Tor and thiagoborn for encouragement and tips, I guess you are right: practice makes perfect.

Thank you Cam_Tor and thiagoborn for encouragement and tips, I guess you are right: practice makes perfect.

hey, just a quick question. If you do the SHL tests for the verbal are you meant to answer all the questions in 15mins or just the ones you can do, and skip the one's you cant??

much help will be great!

what are the percent of question we are suppose to answer in psycho tests in order to make through it. I mean sort of cut offs

@stealth: I would try and answer all questions rather than miss them out, but be extra careful if there is a strong hint that you could be negatively marked (i.e. wrong answers = -1), often you can't go back to previous questions. The general rule of thumb is work shiftly and accurately but if you really can't answer then make an educated guess.

@varun5: Depends on the company and the job (and sometimes the competition)

It is quite possible to finish the numerical reasoning test within the given time frame. I finish with 1 to 3 minutes to spare and I never need to guess on any of the problems. And I have passed all of them and been invited to telephone interviews/assessment centers. For some of the questions, you are not actually expected to calculate it, you are suppose to do rough estimation of the percentages, conversion, averages, etc. It is actually very easy if you just use a little common sense (ie. this number is bigger than that number, this one is only bigger by a little, must be this). On average, I use the calculator for about 5 questions, everything else is with brain and/or pen and paper.

Tnks aburambo 4 d tips.pls hint d house on d nature of d assessment centre wen u scale thru.,gud luck

Astro,

I thought I could re-assure about these kind of tests as I have been trained to administer and score them. Rest assured you are not meant to be able to complete the tests and very few people do. The idea is that they are difficult to a point that you are unable to complete them as this creates a better range of scores rather than everyone getting 100% correct. What happens once you are finished is you are scored and then this score is converted into something called a percentile, which can then be used to compare you against other people. This percentile is between 1 and 100 and is adjusted based on your particular characteristics. So for example, if you are a graduate job seeker, you will be compared with other graduates (a norm group), not rocket scientists with masters degrees in maths! That wouldn't be fair. So you see a test with 20 - 30 questions can have a massive range of percentiles, and it's quite likely that with half of them right you will still fall somewhere in the 50th percentile plus!

Anyway, most people will be around the 50th to the 75th percentile which means they performed better than 50% or 75% of their norm group, basically, they are meant to be tough but companies using them tend to have low cut off points as its not about being a genius but it's about working with numbers. Also, it doesn't reflect your general intelligence so you might do badly on one test but excel on another!

SHL is just one test publisher, there are loads out there and they are all different, but the tried and tested method of timed testing does tend to predict job performance, so unfortunately you are right in saying that you are stuck with psychometric testing.

Try Saville Consulting at http://www.savilleconsulting.com/products/aptitude_preparationguides.aspx . These guys design a wide range of psychometric assessments so you can have a go at many different things. Its a shame that major companies tend to go for SHL as their tests are quite dated, but they hold the market share unfortunately.

Mainly though, practice practice practice! There is evidence that you can improve to a certain level and chances are you aren't there yet, as you become more familiar with the test structure you will find your own technique for analysing the data quickly.

I hope this helps

The thing is, the practise tests are always easier than the real tests. And even the real tests online are easier then the ones in the office. You can prepare for those online, but I don't know how to prepare for the written ones which are definitely tougher. These tests are stupid anyway, I doubt they really tell something about applicant's brain power ;-)