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Situational Judgement Test (SJTs)

Situational Judgement Tests (SJTs) provide valuable insight into candidates' values and abilities, making them an essential tool for your recruitment process. By evaluating how candidates would handle typical workplace scenarios, SJTs provide a more accurate picture of a candidate's potential performance. Here we introduce you to SJTs and explain their benefits and best practices for getting started.

Situational Judgement Tests

What is a situational judgement test?

Situational judgement tests (SJTs) are a type of psychometric assessment tool used to evaluate a candidate's judgment and decision-making skills in real workplace scenarios. These tests present a series of hypothetical situations, and the candidate is asked to choose the best and worst response from a list of options. 

They measure a candidate's ability to identify and resolve workplace challenges, ethical dilemmas, and interpersonal conflicts. The responses are then evaluated and scored based on the relevant skills and qualities desired by the employer, such as problem-solving, teamwork, communication, and leadership. 

SJTs are widely used in recruitment and employee assessment as they provide a reliable and valid measure of a candidate's ability to perform in real-life situations, making them a valuable tool for employers to make informed hiring decisions.

Situational judgement tests are designed to evaluate specific skills, values and qualities. Some of the common types of SJT include:

Workplace - these focus on the candidate's ability to handle workplace challenges and ethical dilemmas.

Interpersonal - these evaluate the candidate's communication and interpersonal skills in practical workplace scenarios.

Leadership - these assess a candidate's leadership qualities, such as decision-making, conflict resolution, and team management.

Customer Service measures a candidate's ability to handle customer service challenges and resolve customer complaints.

The purpose of all these types of test is to understand better the candidate's abilities and suitability for the role. By evaluating a candidate's decision-making and problem-solving skills when faced with the types of situations they are likely to encounter in the role, SJTs can predict their performance on the job, allowing for a more informed hiring decision.

Benefits of situational judgement tests

Situational judgement tests can bring several benefits to your recruitment process. Firstly, they help to provide a more comprehensive and accurate picture of a candidate's skills, values and abilities beyond what can be gathered from a traditional CV or application form. They allow you to see how a candidate might handle real-life, job-related situations, giving a better understanding of their problem-solving and decision-making abilities.

Additionally, they can reduce subjectivity in your recruitment process by providing a standardised evaluation of candidates rather than relying on the personal opinions of recruiters or hiring managers. This can also eliminate potential biases and increase the fairness of the recruitment process leading to greater diversity and inclusion in the workplace.

Another significant benefit of situational judgement tests is that they can help increase your recruitment process's efficiency by quickly identifying which candidates have the required competencies for a role, allowing your recruiters and hiring managers to focus on a smaller pool of qualified candidates.  In addition, introducing gamification elements to the design of your SJT can significantly improve candidate experience.

They also offer a deeper insight into a candidate's suitability for a particular role beyond just their qualifications and work experience. By assessing a candidate's ability to handle workplace challenges and interpersonal conflicts, SJTs are better at predicting how well they will perform in similar situations on the job. Furthermore, SJTs help you identify the candidate's strengths and weaknesses and match them with the qualities and skills required for the role. This ensures a more informed hiring decision, reducing the risk of hiring someone who may not be able to perform to the required standard. 

Why choose Tazio?

Tazio is a leading provider of online situational judgement tests with a wide range of SJTs available for graduate recruitment, early careers and high-volume recruitment campaigns for large employers worldwide. With Tazio, you can expect a professional and efficient process from start to finish, with tailored support and guidance to help you choose the most appropriate test, Alternatively, we can design, test and validate a bespoke SJT for your specific needs.

Tazio's user-friendly platform allows you to easily manage and administer your tests, ensuring a consistent and reliable assessment process for all candidates. The platform also provides valuable analytics and reporting capabilities, allowing you to effectively evaluate the results of your tests and make data-driven decisions about which candidates to progress in the recruitment process.

With the Tazio platform, integrating situational judgement tests with our other assessment tools is easy and can enhance the objectivity and effectiveness of your recruitment process. We regularly use SJTs with other assessment tools, such as aptitude tests, personality tests, and video interviews, to provide a more comprehensive picture of a candidate's abilities and potential for success on the job.

For example, aptitude tests measure a candidate's cognitive abilities and potential for learning, while psychometric tests assess their personality, strengths and preferences. When these results are combined with an SJT, you will gain a deeper understanding of a candidate's strengths and weaknesses, helping you to better determine their suitability for the role.

Furthermore, we can use the data from your SJT to create a structured interview, allowing you to validate the test's assessment of a candidate's communication skills and ability to perform under pressure. By integrating SJTs with other selection tools, you will make more informed hiring decisions and are more likely to select the right candidate for the role.


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Best practices for implementing an SJT

When implementing situational judgement tests in your recruitment process, Tazio will help you to follow best practices to ensure the validity and reliability of the results.

Validity: To ensure the validity of the results, your test should be designed to reflect the realities of the job, including the tasks, responsibilities, and challenges candidates are likely to face. The scenarios presented in the SJT should be relevant to the role and assess the skills and qualities essential for job success.

Reliability: To ensure the reliability of the results, your test needs to be designed to be fair and consistent for all candidates. We will ensure all questions are clear and unbiased and the response options are carefully crafted to ensure they are not leading or ambiguous.

Standardisation: Using Tazio ensures that all candidates are given the same test under the same conditions and that the scoring process is consistent and objective.

Training: To ensure your tests are used effectively and appropriately, we will provide comprehensive training for your recruiters and hiring managers so they are correctly interpreting the results.

Integration with Other Tools: To ensure the validity and reliability of the results, SJTs should be integrated with other selection tools, such as aptitude tests, personality tests, and video interviews, to provide a more comprehensive picture of a candidate's abilities.

In conclusion, by following best practices for implementing SJTs, employers can ensure the validity and reliability of the results, making it easier to make informed hiring decisions and select the right candidate for the role.

Benefits of situational judgement tests

  • Insight into a candidates work-based behaviours
  • Provides a clear idea of candidates' priorities
  • Assess for the qualities most important for the role
  • Created bespoke to your needs
  • Reflect role-specific challenges
  • Tests problem-solving abilities
  • Compare data from different candidates

Features of situational judgement tests

  • Scenarios created around your roles
  • Create yourself and host with us OR
  • Work with our team of occupational psychologists
  • Scenarios presented in text, animation, video, or audio format
  • Numerous answer formats
  • Automatically calculated scores
  • Individual and comparative scoring and reporting

FAQs about situational judgement tests

What are situational judgement tests? 

Situational judgement tests are a type of assessment tool used to evaluate a candidate's abilities and potential for success in a particular role or job family. They present candidates with realistic scenarios they are likely to face in the role. They must respond to these by selecting their most and least preferred response. This allows employers to assess their problem-solving, decision-making, and interpersonal skills.

Why are SJTs useful in recruitment? 

SJTs provide a better insight into a candidate's abilities and potential for success on the job. This helps employers to make more informed hiring decisions and select the right candidate for the role.

How do situational judgement tests work? 

They present candidates with a series of workplace scenarios either as text or, better still, as a video. The candidate has to choose the best and worst response to the scenario, and their answers are then evaluated based on pre-determined criteria. 

Are there different types of SJTs, and what are they used for? 

There are several types of SJTs; each has a different purpose and is used to assess specific skills and abilities. For example, traditional SJTs are used to assess problem-solving and decision-making skills. In contrast, personality SJTs are used to determine personality traits.

What are the advantages of using SJTs in recruitment? 

There are many benefits of using situational judgement tests in recruitment, including assessing candidates' problem-solving, decision-making, and interpersonal skills at scale. They also provide a cost-effective way of making informed hiring decisions and selecting the right candidate for the role when you have many applications.

Can SJTs be used in the pre-employment stage? 

Situational judgement tests are ideal for pre-employment screening, as they can efficiently assess high numbers of candidates' problem-solving, decision-making, and interpersonal skills.

What are the primary considerations to take into account when designing SJTs? 

Considerations include ensuring the SJT is aligned with the job's requirements, ensuring that the SJT is measuring the skills, knowledge, and abilities essential for success in the role, and ensuring that the results from the SJT are fair, valid, and reliable.

Interested in SJTs?

Speak with one of our consultants about using situational judgement tests and find out how Tazio can support you in unleashing your organisation's potential.

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