Aptitude Test for a Manager

Does the aptitude needs to be tested for being a Manager?


When I was in B.Tech, I always had this question in my mind whenever I attended a company apti. I was in a perception that aptitude test is a brutal way to shortlist candidates just to outweigh them in number and relevantly I was mostly ousted by it. But once I started working for an organization and given I had worthwhile experiences with CAT & GRE, I was amazed that every possible section of aptitude could be corresponded to be critically functional in case of a manager. I figured out a priority order for significance of each of these sections, in adjudging a manager’s candidature.

Comprehension:

This is the most important area for a manager to surge in an organization. Comprehension critically decides the capabilities of understanding, problem solving and communication effectiveness of a manager.
 Most of us mistake and expect comprehension passages to be the direct answer searching passages we had in our high school. But the test for comprehension is far more realistic.

 Relevant examples of Comprehensions:
  • As a higher level manager, when you attend a presentation of 100+ slides, and you are expected to respond to it in brief. It is analogous to the 1st question of theme/author’s voice in a comprehension passage. You would not come out with flying colours if you are habituated to skip slides or sleep through like we do while reading paragraphs.
  • When you are in a meeting representing your team, you ought to understand faster as well as precise enough the voice of your peers to answer appropriately and convincingly. Thus, guys with high comprehension ability may be more successful to operate in team meetings.

Logical Reasoning:

Logical reasoning may be a controversial aspect to most of us in terms of essentiality for the candidature of being a manager.

An efficient riddle solver can be a great asset in solving problems of an organization.

Relevance:

1) You are given 3 tasks on Monday– A is to be completed by Friday EOD , B requires minimum mandatory time of 4 hours each to be spent on Monday and Wednesday, C needs to be opted a complete day and a 7-8 hours more for completion. How many hours may be allotted to task A?
         
Such questions form part and parcel of a manager’s routine. The number of such questions and their complexity increases as managers go a level up, for which they need sound logical reasoning.

2) Assigning roles to team based on their abilities which are intersectional, in accord with their emotional stability and alignment may be intriguing as well as intricate riddles for good managers.

Quantitative Aptitude:

Though many of us feel lazy to do math, but an organization needs math to quantify finance , resources, ability and even measure performance. Thus a manager irrespective of the dept. working for, should be quantitatively sound enough to evaluate the above measures through mathematically accurate estimation.

Should I able to solve fast maths to be a good manager?

You need not, but the people with the ability to solve maths fast and accurate, are more probable to estimate and measure organizational requirements, while the people who cannot are more likely to back out / be erroneous owing to intricacy in calculations.
Exceptionally, if you are slow in math but highly confident and patient enough to come out with results without complicating situations, you are sure to be a good estimator/evaluator of a situation, in any organization.


Data Interpretation:

Data interpretation may be the most acceptable credential for a manager, given that more or less managers working in all sectors are bound to receive data and are expected to respond in a few sentences, which shall account for the whole dump of data.

You may also have observed that practice exercises for data interpretation in GRE/CAT often take up cricket, football or baseball statistics based data to instill interest among aspirants. However, those are just the stepping stones to being a manager to analyze and interpret data from client of any sector, viz, any topic with prudence, which may need a lot of practice for data interpretation.

Verbal Ability:

I realized recently that I do not know the meaning of many English words that I listen to, but I still act to have understood information based on a few assumptions, which ultimately mislead me in my actions. Sometimes we even communicate stuff we do not understand without our conscience.

I theorize that the above fact of the ignorance of our mind led to a mis-conception that if I present large and perplexing information, my information would be overlooked and I would be perceived as a highly knowledgeable individual.

However, when comes to action-forcing style of working in an organization, it is highly essential that your target audience understands critically what you present and you would be asked to wrap it up if you fail to articulate your intentions and information.

Why Engineers can be better managers?

We observe that most of the IITians and other reputed college engineers end up settling in higher level managerial positions. These may be some of the reasons for that:
1) Strong Aptitude: That makes them crack prestigious IIT-JEE//BITSAT/AIEEE etc. while most degree/ diploma holders are selected by their subjective academic performances. You cannot deny that the English serials and movies they watch in their compromisingly high leisure time in Engineering enhance their aptitude.
2) Objective-oriented approach: Engineering competitive examinations are mostly objective oriented. IIT-JEE/AIEEE Aspirants are strongly aligned to solve problems by resorting to any means (substitution, hit and trial method etc.) to get answers. In this way, such engineers maybe more mentally hardwired to getting results which companies actually require, without circumvention. While degree holders may not have such strong objective oriented approach, due to the paragraph answering style they are accustomed to.

What Engineers majorly lack?

Confidence: It emphasizes
  • Assertiveness/firmness in your thought and action.
  • Drive to make people do what you believe
Thus any individual irrespective of his/her academic background, with a good current aptitude and  an optimum level of confidence has high chances of being a great manager.

WTF is this crap? I had a bad aptitude score when I joined job but I have managed to become a manager of a higher level with work experience!

Yes, you become a good manager with work experience. But work experience essentially enhances your aptitude. Kindly test your aptitude now and you may feel the difference.


To end on an indigeneous note, the Sanskrit word “Ekasanthagrahi” refers to a man with 100% aptitude in terms of listening, which depicts the significance of aptitude in our ancient ages.

Comments

  1. good analysis bro.....Mr Ekasantagrahi :D

    ReplyDelete
  2. 1)dude i have a small doubt..i got some good marks in all most all aptitude tests with almost no practice in those apti (may be i lack in word synonyms verbal memory of many foriegn english words,although i have good command in my mother tongue language) that have been conducted in our TnP section...does that mean i have these above mentioned abilities inherently?? plz clarify DR RAMOS.

    2)regarding english..if we lack grip in english vocabulary and grammar, does that mean those humans are not eligible for good managers...once recheck & analyse our glorious indian managers,business leaders.

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    Replies
    1. 1. If you proved good aptitude ability, then you might possess then higher fractions of the above mentioned 5 abilities corresponding to aptitude. Good comprehension and reasoning ability in 1 language could sufficiently contribute to general aptitude.
      2. In systems where English is the only accepted mode of communication, people with weak English aptitude need to exhibit exceptional managerial abilities to be successful as leaders. It is true that exceptional leaders emerge now and then.

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