How to make mock assessment centre days meaningful

In the Oxfordshire Cornerstone Employer Group, we’re always looking for ways to shape the workforce of tomorrow. So, when skills gaps were identified in Standard 5: ‘Preparing young people for application processes’ of the Employer Standards Framework, we wanted to make a positive change.

After brainstorming, we realised that most members of the group had experience in conducting assessment days. Together, we devised an idea: what if we arranged our best practices into a Mock Assessment Centre Day, then harnessed our educational connections to deliver four annual sessions to a diverse selection of local school leavers?

Make it practical and interactive

Only so much content can be squeezed into one day, but it’s helpful to start with a round of introductions. Mainly, this is a chance for businesses to pitch their organisation to young people who might not have heard of them.

Then, we do a presentation about every application process they might encounter on their road to employment – whether that’s a video call, online test, practical demonstration or traditional interview. Every vacancy is different, so preparation and adaptability are key traits to develop. Asking students questions during any discussion like this helps to capture attention and, ultimately, gauge understanding.

Lunchtime doubles up as a casual careers fair and networking, where young people chat with employers about their options. Here, we try to signpost each young person to the employer that suits their interests most. It’s an effective way to engage each of the 30-40 attendees at each event – a number that we find preserves the bespoke workshopping aspect that’s so crucial for ensuring the learning experience is meaningful for everyone. 

Take time to practice talking self, skills and strengths

Although these sessions could be industry-specific, ours are founded upon nurturing the core employability skills that are transferable across all sectors and roles – namely, displaying a self-assured attitude. 

However, young people do naturally struggle to self-advertise their qualities with conviction. That’s why we save the actual mock scenarios for the afternoon, as we’ve found that allows young people time to gather the momentum needed for giving a more expressive account of themselves later in the day.

Empowering them to speak about their strengths is one thing, but clarifying how those self-reflections should be presented is another. It’s becoming more common to see applications that are clearly the product of AI templates – but these applications lack authenticity, so we include a CV writing workshop that advocates for injecting personality instead. 

Likewise, we’re also keen to remind this tech-native generation that their digital footprint can have real-life consequences. Employers might make judgments based on details like unprofessional email addresses or careless posts on social media, so we like to share advice for navigating the internet during that transition into adulthood.

Give the gift of feedback
 
Regardless of the outcome, assessments should be about self-learning. Feedback is embedded before and after each exercise, when we ask the attendees to implement their new knowledge. We believe you should never shy away from bettering yourself, and it’s been rewarding to see our young visitors become more accustomed to that idea by the end of each day.

Giving and receiving feedback is essential in professional teams too, which makes these sessions an ideal development opportunity for employees. It’s vital to achieve the balance between honesty and constructiveness when speaking to young people, but it’s great practice for everyone involved. 

Lastly, we also ask all attendees to fill out a feedback sheet before they leave, which forms the basis for the next session. Thankfully, the most recent response was overwhelmingly positive, which reassures us that we’re moving in the right direction!

Get involved

Employers interested in doing more educational outreach should never underestimate the impact of visibility. Contributing to events like this is a way to directly elevate your social value, so much so that it has inspired how we will support our apprenticeship candidates through the application and assessment process here at Tokamak Energy.

Additionally, our format could easily be rolled out elsewhere, because it focuses on providing essential employability advice. After all, local businesses shouldn’t need to fight over candidates, and we’re all there to help employment levels across the board. If we’re on the same page, we can help young people to find – and achieve – the professional pathway that’s right for them.