Key Tips for Success in In-Tray Exercise at Assessment Centers

As part of a job application process, if you are required to attend an assessment center, you will most likely encounter an in-tray or e-tray exercise. These exercises allow evaluators and employers to observe and measure various skills and abilities in situations that closely resemble those you might encounter in a real workplace. Therefore, during an in-tray exercise, how you behave is observed to see evidence of the expected competencies and behaviors. These exercises also measure how you manage and prioritize real-world stressful issues. Most in-tray exercises are designed to test a specific set of key competencies that the employer considers important. For example, they may focus on your delegation skills, whether you can delegate some tasks to other team members, or whether you can take action while paying attention to procedures and charts. And they do all this by measuring how you demonstrate planning and organizational competence under time pressure. The sole purpose is to observe the answers to the following questions:

• Do you have the necessary knowledge for the job you are applying for?

• Can you demonstrate the required skills and competencies for the job?

• Are you compatible with the attitudes specified for the role?

How Do In-Tray Exercises Work? The basic idea of the exercise is to place you in a realistic but simulated work environment and evaluate your potential workplace behaviors and attitudes in this context. Therefore, when given an in-tray exercise, you are asked to treat it as a role-playing scenario. For example, you might be asked to imagine it's your first day on the job as a stock controller and are given a stack of documents and tasks to prioritize and take necessary actions. This role can be given to you even if the job you are applying for has nothing to do with stock control; similarly, you might be asked to imagine yourself as a teacher or a lawyer. Another common scenario is finding many pending correspondences/mails in your inbox after returning from annual leave. E-tray exercises usually present this information in the form of emails. The purpose here is that the skills and attitudes being evaluated are relevant to the job you are applying for; the issues and problems you are asked to address will be similar to those in that role.

Typically, you will be given 10-20 pending tasks to work on, along with a description of your role and responsibilities in the fictional organization. Additionally, detailed information about the organization's goals, objectives, problems, schematic structure, a list of important colleagues and third-party relationships, and a calendar of future events will also be provided. Therefore, it is certain that there will be a lot of information and material to go through within the given time.

How Are In-Tray Exercises Assessed?

• Responses to multiple-choice questions,

• Performance in an interview with an evaluator explaining the actions and decisions you took,

• Sometimes a combination of these two methods.

  
  

Note any calendar conflicts, meeting commitments, resource constraints, appointments, interactions between people, and anything else you think is important in your response. Pay attention to the timing of the exercise. You are expected to complete the task within the given time limits.

How Should I Approach In-Tray Exercises? Identify the key issues arising from the in-tray list because you need to work quickly and effectively during the exercise. While aiming to complete every task within the limited time, do not lose sight of prioritizing more important tasks. Your ability to finish tasks quickly and recognize whether some tasks are more urgent than others will be assessed. Therefore, you need to prioritize among tasks. A simple approach to this could be:

• High - Both important and urgent - will have significant consequences if not done, will lead to positive outcomes if done.

• Medium - Either important or urgent.

• Low - Neither important nor urgent. Has time and is not urgent.

The best approach is to quickly read through each item in your in-tray before answering any questions and create action plans accordingly by prioritizing.

In summary: In-tray exercises assess your ability to efficiently sort, remember, and analyze complex information within time constraints. They also evaluate your ability to identify key issues and prioritize your work accordingly. Your ability to clearly and effectively explain your decisions and actions and identify specific problems arising from the tasks and documents you are given is also assessed. Your attitude towards time pressure and your demeanor during the interview will also be decisive in the eyes of the evaluators. Are you orderly and systematic? Do you display a calm demeanor during the exercise? So, how and when should you practice this? Ideally, not just the day before an assessment center 😊 We are ready to support you with our professional team to help you feel more confident and prepared for the assessment center.

Author: Elif İlknur Tüzün