Employees are, without a doubt, a business’s most important assets. Poor hiring decisions can cost companies tens of thousands of dollars every year not to mention some hidden costs like loss of morale and productivity. That’s why companies across the country have started to invest in numerical reasoning tests.
A manager would much rather spend $100 finding a great employee now than spend 3 months training someone who will leave a few months later. While it’s very difficult to know for sure whether a certain individual is a good fit, psychometric tests do help to narrow down the choices considerably.
As a qualified, talented job-seeker, you want to make sure you convey your skills and accomplishments to prospective employers. However, most hiring managers don’t even look at profiles before they’ve passed the screening exams. So, it’s in your best interest to take the assessments seriously.
Below, we’ll discuss numerical reasoning tests further and talk a little bit about what kind of questions you can expect and how you can best prepare for the test.
What Is a Numerical Reasoning Test?
Numerical reasoning seems like a fairly ambiguous term, but very simply, it refers to mathematical ability in general. Many companies look to see whether prospective new employees can prove a basic competence since staff members usually need to manipulate figures in some capacity while in the office.
Pre-employment numerical reasoning tests are timed multiple-choice tests, which are, more often than not, taken online. If hiring managers are worried about cheating, they might ask you to take the test in a proctored assessment centre. Usually the tests don’t take longer than about an hour, and in most cases, a high school level of math is more than sufficient.
You won’t have to deal with abstract matrices or derivatives here. On a numerical reasoning test, you’ll come across problems you might encounter when grappling with personal finance, data analysis, and business management. If you’ve forgotten your quadratic equations and trigonometric functions, then take a deep breath. Here, we’re dealing with concrete concepts and real-world problems involving graphs, tables, averages, and, probability. Take a look at some of our sample questions if you want a better of idea what to expect.
How to Prepare for a Numerical Reasoning Aptitude Test?
If you haven’t looked at algebra since you were a fresh graduate, your skills may be rusty, and looking over a few formulas before the exam certainly won’t cut it.
The best way to prepare for a numerical reasoning test is to practice as much as you can. You could crack open your old geometry textbook, if you still have it, but you wouldn’t be using your time efficiently. Practice questions will give you a better idea of what you know and what you need to review.
Try your hand at some of our free job-seekers’ numerical reasoning test questions and answers to practice. The more you do, the more you’ll become familiar with the type of questions you’ll encounter on the test. After all, practice makes perfect!
Final Thoughts on Numerical Reasoning Tests
You shouldn’t stress endlessly over numerical reasoning tests. Most of them are fairly straightforward and few of them are truly difficult. On the other hand, you shouldn’t take them too lightly.
A failing score is still a failing score. Make sure you take some time to prepare with some practice questions to brush up on some concepts you might have forgotten and familiarise yourself a bit with the structure of the test so you’re not surprised on the big day.
