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Case studies, In-tray exercises and Role-plays
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Case studies, In-tray exercises and Role-plays
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Some exercises are actually attempts at stimulating a ‘typical' working experience. Sometimes an organisation will want to test your ability to assimilate written material and draw out the important points.
Role-play exercises
These take simulation of real-life working incidents one step further than case studies or in-tray exercises. They're a bit like group exercises but more of a solo effort with an assessor. If that makes it sound a bit unfair, remember that they don't know how you're going to react either. The main thing is to be aware of the ‘background' to the role-play, but never make up your mind in advance about what's going to happen.
Case studies
Typically you will be handed a folder containing a huge amount of material and asked to read it. You will then have to make a number of proposals or recommendations. If you were applying for a marketing job with an oil company, for example, you might be given written reports, memos, phone messages and pages of statistics all referring to the launch of a new petrol. Your task would be to sift through all the data, understand the issues and come up with a decision whether to launch the product or not.
In-tray exercises
These exercises simulate a manager's in-tray and are used to test not only your ability to understand complex written material but also how well you prioritise tasks. You will be given, in random order, documents such as a pile of letters, memos and phone messages. And then you will be told that it is Monday morning and you have 30 minutes to read through them all and decide what you do first, second, third and so on. Once again, the subject matter is usually related to the job.
How to prepare
Case studies and in-tray exercises are usually done against the clock. Don't expect to have enough time to read everything thoroughly. The trick is to decide quickly what the most important information is. It's best to glance through everything to get an overall picture before you study the contents in detail.
Don't panic. Your first thought will be that you can't possibly get through all this. And your second thought will be that it looks so complicated. Remember that you only have to read enough to be able to draw some intelligent solutions. The assessors are not testing your memory. They are testing your understanding. Nor are the assessors expecting a perfect answer. They are expecting a logical one and, critically, one that you can justify. So expect to be challenged and keep calm.
Your careers service might have some practice material for you to see but, failing that, you could try this: find a quality newspaper and cut out all the news stories on the first few pages. Give yourself 20 minutes to decide in which order a BBC local radio would run the stories in its news bulletin. Write down the reasons for your decision. Find an assertive friend to argue with you. |
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