Assessment Information for Apprentice Roles for BAE Systems
As part of the selection process for an Apprentice role in BAE Systems you have been invited to complete six online
assessments:
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An assessment of your skills working with technical numerical information
An assessment of your skills in understanding instructions
An assessment of your understanding of mechanical principles
An assessment of your skills in identifying patterns
An assessment of your spatial reasoning skills
An assessment of your judgement and decision-making
We use these assessments because people who do well in them tend to well in Apprentice Roles.
This leaflet will help you prepare to take the assessments. It provides you with information about the assessments
and some practice questions. Further detailed instructions and practice questions will be provided when you take
the assessments. Note that the examples in this leaflet are not exactly the same as the assessments that you will
take, but they will help to prepare you for what you have to do.
Please read through this information carefully and ensure you understand what you’ll be asked to do when you take
the assessments.
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Working with Technical Numerical Information
This assessment measures your ability to understand and evaluate numerical data in an applied technical context. In
this assessment you will be presented with several different types of task, including:
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converting units
calculating percentages
calculating volumes and areas
In all cases you must identify the correct answer from the options given. For example:
1. A barrel contains 22.8 litres of oil. The oil is poured equally into 300 identical bottles. What is the volume of
oil in one bottle?
A.
B.
C.
D.
760ml
7.6ml
7,600ml
76ml
2. A rectangular box tank with a base of 80cm x 60cm is one quarter filled with water. The height of the water
in the tank is 3cm. How much water is needed to fill the tank to the brim in its current state?
A.
B.
C.
D.
57,600 cm3
43,200 cm3
28,800 cm3
21,600 cm3
The answer to example 1 is D.
The answer to example 2 is B.
Key Information
 The actual assessment will have 20 questions in total, in four sections, each section with 5 questions
 Each section is timed for between 3 and 5 minutes; the time available for each section will be clearly
indicated at the start of the section
 Try to work quickly and accurately when completing the assessment
 There will be full instructions and a further example provided as part of the assessment
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Understanding Instructions
This assessment measures your ability to understand and evaluate written information from texts. In this assessment
you will be presented with passages of text, for example:
You will then be asked to determine whether statements about these passages of text are ‘True’ or ‘False’. It is
important when making your judgement that you use only the information presented.
Consider the following two statements about the passage above and try to determine if each one is ‘True’ or ‘False’.
1. Staff have individual login details
2. Staff make the final decision about their own requests for time-off
The answer to statement 1 is ‘True’. Based on the information provided, staff must have individual login details in
order to be able to fulfil the requirement to log their hours.
The answer to statement 2 is ‘False’. The passage states that Line Managers make the final decision about time-off.
Key Information
 The actual assessment will have 24 questions and you will have 8 minutes in which to attempt them
 Try to work quickly and accurately when completing the assessment
 There will be full instructions and a further example provided as part of the assessment
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Understanding Mechanical Principles
This assessment measures your ability to understand how simple mechanical systems work. In this assessment you
will be presented with figures depicting various types of mechanical systems about which you will be asked
questions. For example:
1.
If bar Y moves at a constant speed to the left. How does bar X move?
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
To the left, faster than bar Y
To the right, at the same speed as bar Y
To the left, slower than bar Y
To the left, at the same speed as bar Y
To the right, slower than bar Y
2.
Gear X is exactly half the diameter of gear Y. If gear X turns clockwise at a constant speed of 10 rpm, how does gear Y
turn?
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
Anti-clockwise at 5 rpm
Clockwise at 10 rpm
Clockwise at 5 rpm
Anti-clockwise at 10 rpm
Clockwise at 20 rpm
The answer to example 1 is D.
The answer to example 2 is C.
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Understanding Mechanical Principles (continued)
Key Information
 The actual assessment will have 24 questions and you will have 15 minutes in which to attempt them
 Try to work quickly and accurately when completing the assessment
 There will be full instructions and a further example provided as part of the assessment
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Identifying Patterns
This assessment measures your ability to make sense of new information by identifying patterns in sequences of
symbols. In this assessment you will be presented with sequences of symbols, for example:
Your task is to consider the sequence of symbols and identify the logical pattern than governs the sequence. You
must then identify a missing symbol in the sequence. In the example above, the final symbol in the sequence is
missing (denoted by a question mark – ‘?’). You must select the missing symbol from the options given. For the
example above, the options are:
Here is another example. Again, the last symbol in the sequence is missing:
In this example, the options are:
The answer to the first example is ‘C’. The sequence adheres to logical rules whereby the circle moves in a clockwise
direction around each corner of the symbol. The square in the centre appears on every third symbol. So the missing
symbol has the circle in the bottom right corner and the square in the middle.
The answer to the second example is ‘A’. In this case, the sum of the sides of all the shapes in each symbol is equal to
10, so the correct answer must contain shapes with sides that add up to 10 in total.
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Identifying Patterns (continued)
Key Information
 The actual assessment will have 20 questions and you will have 5 minutes in which to attempt them
 Try to work quickly and accurately when completing the assessment
 There will be full instructions and a further example provided as part of the assessment
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Spatial Reasoning
This assessment measures your ability to comprehend and manipulate objects in three dimensions. The assessment
requires you to work with three dimensional shapes, constructing these from the correct set of elements. For
example:
Consider the following three-dimensional shape:
Which of the following patterns, when folded, makes this shape:
A.
B.
C.
D
The answer to this example is A.
In the actual assessment you will be able to manipulate the figures on screen to help you arrive at your answer.
Key Information
 The actual assessment will have 12 questions and you will have 10 minutes in which to attempt them
 Try to work quickly and accurately when completing the assessment
 There will be full instructions and a further example provided as part of the assessment
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Judgement and Decision Making
This assessment considers your decision making style. In this assessment you are presented with various job
situations that are based on real situations encountered by Apprentices working in BAE. Your task is to decide how
effective you think are different courses of action presented with each situation. You do this by allocating six points
across three options presented. You can allocate the points however you wish, but you must allocate all six points
for each situation.
For example:
Situation
You have reached the end of an important project that has taken up all of your time and attention for the last few
months. It has been hard but you have really enjoyed working on the project. Your supervisor gives you the choice
of which project you can do next. As with the previous project, your next one will require a lot of effort over a long
period of time. How do you make your decision?
Options
A Choose a project that is similar to the one I have just completed
B Choose a project that is very different from the one I have just completed
C Ask my supervisor which project will be best for my personal development
In this example, if you thought that option A was the most appropriate thing to do, and that none of the other
options were appropriate, you could allocate all six points to option A, for example:
Options
A Choose a project that is similar to the one I have just completed
B Choose a project that is very different from the one I have just completed
C Ask my supervisor which project will be best for my personal development
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However if you thought option A was appropriate, but not as appropriate as option C, with option B not being
appropriate at all, you could assign four points to option C and 2 points to option A, for example:
Options
A Choose a project that is similar to the one I have just completed
B Choose a project that is very different from the one I have just completed
C Ask my supervisor which project will be best for my personal development
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You may allocate points however you wish, but you must assign all six points in every situation.
This assessment is not timed, though you should try to complete it at a reasonable pace without spending too long
‘over-analysing’ any one situation. Often your initial response to a situation is your most natural preference.
Key Information
 The actual assessment will have 24 questions and is not timed
 There will be full instructions and a further example provided as part of the assessment
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