Visited an assessment centre in London. Before that I made a research and seen a lot of negative reviews, therefore I just decided to go "just to see it from the inside".
In the beginning, a representative tells you how cool is the company and how much they care about employees. As I was able to read between the lines, phrase "It is our goal to find a placement for you as soon as possible", which they promoted like "we really care about you and will help you", I've seen as "it is in our interest to place you asap, as if we don't find a place for you within 3 months, you will be free to go without any pay" (if you decide to leave before 2 years contract expires, you will be asked to pay up to 20k.
P.S. we've been told that AC will start at 8:30am and asked to come in advance (15-20min). So we arrived before 8.30, waited for 10-20min till "it's time!" moment, but... waited for 30 more minutes till 9.00am, when AC finally started. I got tired just because of waiting and doing nothing while sleepy on the early morning...
Okay...
First - introduction. Second - three tests: 1- Set notation and venn diagrams test (1hr), 2- IT aptitude test (1hr) and 3- Numeracy Assessment (20 minutes).
We had around 1hr break for lunch and the good point - we were given a 5GBP vouchers for lunch in one of the cafes.
Interviews:
The interview round consists of 3 interviews with three separate interviewers. Each interview last around 10 minutes. The questions are all strength based and they assess following strengths:
- Drive
- Growth
- Resilience
- Collaboration
- Strategic awareness
- Flexibility
- Logical mind set
- Social adaptability
Interviewers all were nice and smily, that was easy to talk to them. Some questions were structured slightly complicated/tricky, but interviewers are not allowed to paraphrase the questions, so you have to deal with it.
Overall, they can send you everywhere and you are expected to go wherever they tell you. And if you are placed to some other town, they provide you help - give you a contact that will tell you were is the best place to have accommodation, the accommodation is not provided. So if you have 1year contract signed in London, be ready to pay fees for its early breakage and grab all your staff with you. Plus you never know, how long the placement will last. Some project can be few months and then you will be placed to another one, some of them can be 1-2 years, so if you wanted to stay in London, be ready to be disappointed. No doubts, there are projects in London, but competition is very high as no-one wants to leave and most likely your placement will be somewhere outside, closer to the North of UK.
Moreover, you don't have your voice, you are not asked where do you want to work (I asked about that one of the interviewers). If you go for lets say 5 interviews and 3 of them want to have you in their project, you will not choose where to go, they will send you to the one that replies first (as "customer is the first, we satisfy customer's needs" etc).
Finally I didn't get an invitation. I've been told that my tests results are very good but I didn't pass the interviews. Said that some answers were not good enough as probably I didn't get the questions.. well, I don't know what cam be understood wrong in questions like "If your group is failing in following the deadline and all tasks are divided, you are fine, but colleague is running late, what would you do in this situation? Would you help or do you think that each person is responsible only for their task?".. or "Why do you think it is important to support the team?"... I don't know. There were only 2 questions I asked to repeat, these were that "tricky" questions that they can not paraphrase... well..that's totally fine...
I was not upset as after AC I made my final decision that I will not accept it if they ask. Main reason - didn't like the attitude; second - I have relationships and I am not ready to leave for no-one knows how long to another city (also even if 1 project is 1-2 months that is acceptable, you second, third etc project most probably will also be out of London, so.. 2 years of travel and living apart the groom.. not for me).
I would say, this is a good opportunity for fresh graduates (bachelors, masters usually are more attached to place,relations etc due to being a bit older and demanding). If graduate is ready to move around the UK for 2 years and build career - thats a great opportunity. If not, better look for something else.
If you want to go there and get your placement, good luck with it! Prepare more for the interviews rather than for tests as tests are pretty easy.