What Are the On-Demand Assessments And How to Prepare for It?

Criteria offers assessment tests but in a different manner to how other assessment companies offer their products. If a prospective employer who wishes to test your skills directs you to the Criteria testing platform, you will be doing online tests but on the platform.

When you log in to the platform, you will be asked to submit your details and give the unique PIN code which the employer sent you. You can then log in and do the tests the employer selected for you.

The employer, in turn, will use their PIN code to log in and access your results.

Essentially you are doing the tests in the way you might do them for an employer who does not use Criteria. But in the case of these tests, Criteria is the middle-man working between you and the employer.

On-Demand Assessments

What Are the On-Demand Assessments?

Criteria’s on-demand administration platform includes a variety of tests. Like all pre-employment assessments, they check if you have the skills and aptitudes required for the job you applied for.

Tests offered include:

  • Cognitive Aptitude Tests
  • Personality Tests
  • Emotional Intelligence Tests
  • Skills Assessments
  • Risk Tests

Cognitive Aptitude Tests

CCAT The Criteria Cognitive Aptitude Tests assess your verbal, numerical, and logical reasoning skills as well as your spatial orientation.

You will be required to do 50 questions in 15 minutes. To ace this test, you will have to work quickly and accurately during the 15 minutes allowed meaning that solid preparation is called for.

To get a headstart on that preparation, try the following numerical reasoning question.

53 is 25% of what number?

A. 13.25
B. 92.75
C. 159
D. 141.5
E. 212

Working on this question, you will probably have found it relatively easy to do in the comfort of your own home. However, in the real test, you will not be allowed to use a calculator and will be working under time pressure.

Personality Tests

Why Written Assessments are Hard

Personality tests meet with conflicting opinions.

Some candidates maintain you cannot prepare for them and that you are who you are. On the contrary, these tests assess the personality you are likely to display in the workplace. Employers use them to test if you are a good fit for their workplace and the type of work you will be doing.

If asked to take a personality test, your first task is to find out as much as you can about the personality type favored by the workplace you have applied for. This information may be found on the company website, or a careful reading of the job advertisement may yield information.

An employer, for example, may be looking for applicants who display an interest in working with a team or who seem to prefer a position that requires leadership skills.

Criteria has a range of personality tests, including:

EPP Employee Personality Profile You will be presented with a statement and asked to rank the extent to which it applies to you.

For example;

State the extent to which the following statement applies to you.”I am satisfied with who I am.”
Is it Always True/True/ Neutral/False/Always False?

Try playing with your answers. Select each answer in turn and assess what it is saying about you. For example, if you select “Always True,” could that be suggesting you have no ambition to learn more, change, move forward?

Imagine the job description stated, “Ambitious person required.” Stating that you are always satisfied with yourself might make you unlikely to be a good fit for this job!

Doing 140 of these questions in 10 minutes will require a lot of preparation if you are to present the ideal personality in the assessment.

Give yourself a headstart by trying the following free sample personality test.

Skills Assessments

Skills assessments check if you have the skills required to do the job. Revise the material you learned while training for the position, and more importantly, learn how to apply that information to the questions.

You may, for example, be asked to do the CBST Criteria Basic Skills Test or a test geared to a specific job where you may be working with Microsoft Word or need to have computer literacy.

Risk Assessment

These tests assess your workplace safety profile and decide how likely you are to engage in unsafe practices while at work. Another particular test, WPP, Workplace Productivity Profile, assesses your likely productivity in the workplace.

Emotional Intelligence Tests

Business Woman working on laptop

Emotify is the newest test in the Criteria range of assessments. This test measures how well you are able to identify and respond to emotions and to what extent you are able to control your own emotions.

In this test, you may be given a picture of a person. Your task will be to identify the emotion the person is experiencing. You may also be presented with scenarios and have to identify the emotions a scenario may give rise to.

You may wonder why your emotional intelligence is being tested as part of the recruitment process. Most jobs require us to work with colleagues or the general public, and being able to “read” emotions can have a significant impact on how we carry out our work.

Being able to control our emotions is essential, especially when dealing with demanding situations. For example, if we are working in customer service, we will at some point come across a difficult customer or an uncooperative work colleague.

How Can I Prepare for On-Demand Assessments?

Again following on the theme of treating these assessments just as you would others, thorough preparation is essential.

You will need to discover the format of the precise test you have to do as well as the style of questioning and the time limitations on doing the assessment.

A job test preparation company will be your best source for this information and for the preparation resources that will help you ace the assessment.

For this, we recommend using Job Test Prep, a company with thirty years of experience in preparing applicants for pre-employment testing.

They will provide you with a test prep pack containing:

  • All the information you need about the assessment
  • Sample test papers modeled on the real tests
  • A scoring system for you to monitor your progress as you work through the tests
  • Detailed explanations of questions and answers
  • Helpful study guides

To get an idea of the type of tests they give you, try your hand at this free sample verbal reasoning test.

How Do I Get My Results?

A report on your results is furnished to your prospective employer immediately after you have done the assessments.

When reading the report, the employer will decide if you have got what it takes to work in their company and will invite you to the further stages in the hiring process.

Are Criteria On-Demand Tests Hard?

Young girl doing test preparation on laptop

Yes, they very often are. In fact, you can expect them to be as hard as other pre-employment tests offered directly by the employer.

However, compared to some pre-employment assessments where you have to attend an assessment center or wait for a specific assessment to arrive in your inbox, the system used for Criteria’s on-demand assessments feels deceptively simple.

After all, you are not engaging with the employer you want to impress directly. You are dealing with their middle man who could make you feel the employer is at some distance from the assessment process.

Don’t allow that to lull you into a false of security!

The employer has chosen the assessment they want you to do. The assessment, in all cases, matches the skills level the employer wants future employees to have. And like all employers, they are using the assessment to whittle down the list of applicants to the best of the bunch.

Treat on-demand assessments as seriously as you would treat other more regular forms of assessment.

Acing the assessment will open the door for you to progress further in the recruitment process. But to get to that stage, you have to outshine other test-takers and prove you are a good fit for the position and the company.

Study Tips for Criteria Tests

You need to begin your preparation immediately after you get notification of an upcoming test. Taking an organized approach to your preparation will make the process more manageable.

The following tips should help you to prepare thoroughly:

  • Work to a timetable
  • Ensure you leave the day before doing the test free for last-minute recaps and to get a rest before facing the real tests.
  • Try to work in 50-minute blocks followed by a 10-minute break

Use Your Sample Papers

Using your sample papers in every preparation session will help you to:

  • Become familiar with the style of questioning
  • Hone your answering skills
  • Learn how to manage the time limitations of the test
  • Monitor your progress by checking your results on every test
  • Identify areas you need to devote more time to

Doing the Tests

Ensure you are rested and clear-headed when doing the tests.
Approach the tests knowing you have done the work and put yourself in a good position to ace this!

If you have been asked to do a Criteria test, go here for the resources you need to ace it.

Written by Elizabeth O Mahony

With 25+ years’ experience as a teacher and state examinations corrector, Elizabeth now writes for the education and careers industry. Her experience preparing students for examinations and running an academy for supplementary education give her invaluable insights into what it takes for job seekers and graduates to succeed in assessments.