New Study Tips for a New Year, Part 2: Answering Situational Judgment Items

In our quest to provide support to candidates preparing to take the SHRM-CP or SHRM-SCP exams, we often engage the SHRM Certification team directly to get answers to challenging or perplexing questions. We’re now passing this sage advice on to certification providers to incorporate into your interactions and teachings to students. Part 1 of this series addressed common myths about studying for the exams. This article specifically addresses myths about Situational Judgment Items (SJIs) and how to debunk them.

Myth 1. Consider your own individual methods for handling situations.

How to respond to SJIs?  As with HR in practice, the keyed response to an SJI, the one for which an examinee earns a point toward their score, depends on what is happening in the situation coupled with the examinee’s understanding of the SHRM BASK definitions of the behavioral competencies, subcompetencies and proficiency indicators that define what an HR professional should do to resolve an issue. In fact, when the SHRM Certification team talks with candidates about navigating SJIs, they often advise considering SJIs to be an extension of what occurs every single day at work: something happens; you have to figure out what’s going on and then you have to make some decisions to solve the problems that result from what happened, based on what you should do according to the SHRM BASK.

The SHRM Certification team often hears that candidates are frustrated because the response options are all courses of action one could or would do, and sometimes, they do not align with what would be done in their organization or according to their own way of doing things. 

But SHRM is not asking about an individual HR professional’s way of doing things, nor is SHRM asking about an organization’s way of doing things. We ask what should be done, and guidance for this is found only in a firm understanding of the definition of competent practice in action—the SHRM BASK.  In opposition to discrete Knowledge Items (KIs) for which the correct response is based on a verifiable and valid reference (derived from an HR textbook, well-known theory, established law, etc.), SJIs are based on the effectiveness of the responses. In essence, examinees should select the response that reflects the most effective course of action to take in response to the question being asked.

HR professionals all around the world codified the contents of the SHRM BASK as “the definition of the practice of HR—what you should know, know how to do and how you should behave to solve workplace problems, make decisions or make a judgment about a situation.”

Solution to debunk this myth: Become very familiar with the definition of best practices, as presented in the SHRM BASK. Examinees will never see, verbatim, the content of the SHRM BASK in any question or response option, but a strong familiarity with its contents and definitions of the subcompetencies and proficiency indicators for the nine behavioral competencies will equip examinees to understand which is the best or most effective thing an HR professional should do to resolve the challenge presented in the question. Please advise students to approach SJIs this way.

Myth 2: Approach SJIs as if anything were possible.

Candidates often provide SHRM with feedback about the advice they were given throughout their preparation journey, sometimes by colleagues and sometimes by teachers. In fact, the SHRM Certification team has received many complaints from candidates stating that they failed because they were given bad advice on how to approach answering SJIs. We know that’s an overstatement, but how should we respond?  Read on.

These pieces of advice are ones candidates have told us were provided by teachers about how to approach responding to SJIs—and SHRM would like to engage your help to change the narrative away from these pieces of advice because they are bad advice and, simply stated, wrong: “You have all the resources you need (financially, etc.).” “Every idea you present to leadership will be accepted.” “You are the CEO of the company.” All of these are completely wrong. 

None are valid contexts to use for responding to an SJI. How can you help SHRM change the narrative on how to approach and respond to SJIs?  Feel free to use what SHRM Certification advises candidates. to think about SJIs:

“SJIs are nothing more or less than what happens every day at work. Something happens; you have to figure out what the story is, then you have to make decisions or solve problems that result from the situation based on what you know and use what you know to solve problems by taking action. That’s it in simplest terms. You do this every single day.”

How do you do that in the case of responding to exam questions?  Become very familiar with the definition of best-practice problem-solving and decision-making: A candidate will never see the content of the SHRM BASK verbatim in test questions or response options, but if the candidate is familiar with the definition of best-practice behavior contained in the SHRM BASK, selecting the best or most effective course of action based on that knowledge is what should be done.

Solution to debunk this myth: Encourage candidates to become very familiar with the behavioral competencies, subcompetencies and proficiency indicators in the SHRM BASK so they will recognize the response options provided as being in alignment with best practice to varying degrees.  Yes, there will be a range of effective to ineffective things an HR professional should do.  Advise test takers to choose the one that is the best or most effective course of action based on the definitions of best-practice behavior in the SHRM BASK.

Myth 3: Pick the response that best reflects what you do in your organization.

Simply put, the exams are designed to reflect HR best practices. Candidates should not infuse themselves into any items. SHRM exam guidelines dictate strict rules about omitting personal details such as individuals’ names, specific countries and other contexts that could lead examinees to have a biased reaction and select a response based on personal feelings toward the characters in the content.

If a candidate sees an item about an “international manufacturing company” or a “large health care organization,” it should not be misconstrued to suggest that the problem should be solved how the candidate’s peers or leaders would have solved the problem from their experience.  The exam content is developed to reflect HR best practices as stated in the SHRM BASK—no more, no less.

Solution to debunk this myth: As noted above, guide examinees to take the questions at face value.  Encourage candidates to become very familiar with the nine behavioral competencies along with the subcompetencies and proficiency indicators in the SHRM BASK so they will recognize the response options provided as being in alignment with best practices to varying degrees.

Myth 4. When in doubt, look for the longest response option or just pick “C.”

Candidates may enter the test to try to beat the test, instead of preparing. This will not lead to success. SHRM has very detailed exam guidelines that dictate elements such as response option length, complexity and language, so that each response option appears as indiscernible as possible from the others.

Furthermore, SHRM Certification maintains a strict balance across response options to ensure that each of the four response options is equally used throughout the exam—meaning that “A,” “B,” “C” and “D” each appear approximately one-quarter of the time. If a candidate does not know the answer, “picking C” will not lead to success. Don’t gamble with answers. Know the content and answer the questions.

Solution to debunk this myth: Guide examinees to put in the time and effort to prepare for the exam. SHRM Certification research has shown that SHRM-CP examinees required 40 to 80 hours of preparation time, while SHRM-SCP examinees required 80 to 120 hours of preparation time. The exam is designed specifically in such a way to prevent savvy test takers from being successful if they do not know the content. The tests’ writers have access to SHRM exam guidelines at all times during the content creation and review processes. SHRM staff also review items to ensure the content is free from clues or other tip-offs to the keyed response (the one that gets awarded a point toward the score). Please also advise examinees to not count up how many of their answers are “A,” “B,” “C” or “D.” This is a complete waste of time.

These are the most common myths that SHRM Certification hears directly from candidates. It’s also helpful to keep in mind that 95 percent of candidates never contact SHRM at all.  And, it is safe to say SHRM hardly ever hears from candidates who pass. SHRM provides the solutions suggested in this article to candidates when they do complain as a way to facilitate and support their success the next time they take the exam. 

Thank you for all you do to help prepare candidates to take the SHRM-CP and SHRM-SCP exams. You do good and very important work! Keep it up! We hope you find these myth debunkings helpful and are able to use them as you help prepare the next generation of SHRM Certification testing candidates.

Nancy A. Woolever, SHRM-SCP, is SHRM’s vice president, academically-aligned/certification programs, and Charles Glover is SHRM’s manager, exam development and accreditation.