Assessment Centre Guide
Job simulation: in-tray / e-tray exercise
You will likely face a job simulation exercise where you play the role of a junior member of the team in a fictitious business carrying out a number of tasks that have been set for you under time pressure. The scenario will often be in an industry where you are not expected to have the benefit of any prior knowledge, but where the skills required are relatable to the industry that the company you have applied to operates within. This is a written exercise and will be in one of the following formats:
In-tray exercise
This is the traditional format where you are given a pack of papers which are prints of memos, letters, emails, reports and potentially other reference documents. A number of different requests are made of you from various sources including colleagues and clients with varying levels of importance and complexity. Your responses are written by hand on paper.
E-tray exercise
This is very similar to the in-tray exercise but is done on a computer rather than on paper, and your task is to respond to tasks set in emails within a simulated work email system. This allows for the simulation to be more involved where time deadlines can be set and checked for certain tasks and new requests can come into the email inbox at any time causing you to have to revise your approach.
Whichever format is used, you will likely be asked to record your judgement of the importance and urgency of tasks, and how you decide to prioritise them.
Key factors for success
These exercises can feel stressful where you are required to understand instructions and tasks, and to produce responses that are high quality, appropriate and professional. The tasks require you to give great attention to detail, follow instructions accurately and read and interpret a mix of background information that is given to you within reference material.
Time management is also key to this exercise and you should avoid the temptation to spend too long on an individual task. Some job simulations may include instructions that permit you to delegate tasks to others so watch out for this as it can save significant time.
Stay composed
It is all too easy for the wheels to start to come off in a job simulation exercise – indeed they are often designed to deliberately give you that feeling! The sorts of things that can be included to throw you off may be the inclusion of reference material (reports, diagrams, statistics) which actually have no relevance to any task and should be ignored. Also, for e-tray exercises there will often be an email that comes in which is super urgent and is designed to derail your plans and adapt.
Staying composed is therefore essential to enabling you to stay focused on the tasks at hand. Panic causes you to lose time in a paralysed state where you become confused, cannot think effectively and perhaps give up on certain tasks. Just remember that all the information you need is given to you, and the instructions set out exactly what you need to do. Expect the unexpected and remember that is all part of the game.
Lastly, know that the company wants to see that you can perform effectively in a highly pressured situation. It does not require that your output is all flawless and a perfect textbook response, so if you know your response to an individual task is on the weak side don’t let that play on your mind and damage the rest of the exercise.
Assessment centre masterclass video course
In our video course we focus more closely on the in-tray exercise and its variants and cover:
The specific attributes you will be scored on
The types of tasks and requests you might be set
Tips for scoring well
Lessons from past candidates who have succeeded and failed
A sample in-tray exercise for you to practice with
Given by an experienced assessor, the video course and accompanying sample exercises, interview question bank and assessment scoring sheets are the most comprehensive package available to you.
The course is designed with the single minded goal – to equip you to succeed at your assessment centre.
