KPMG Transforming Small Businesses Exercise: Pass at Your First Attempt

Congratulations on successfully submitting your registration form! Approximately 55% of applicants won’t have made it this far, so you’re already doing very well indeed! It’s time to push ahead and take it to the next level.

An Overview:

The next stage of the KPMG job application procedure is the Transforming Small Businesses assessment, it's newly introduced by KPMG in 2022 and for the upcoming 2023 year assessments. Transforming Small Businesses is inspired by the COVID 19 pandemic situation to help businesses in a professional manner. This stage would be based on a Strengths-based assessment to test your competence against KPMG core competencies criteria. It would take you 90 minutes to complete this assessment.

KPMG Transformational Small Businesses is the first online assessment post success in the application stage. You will be presented with business-related challenges affecting three businesses (fictional case studies). You'd be presented with business-related issues and then asked how you might respond to certain scenarios by ranking what you'd most likely do or least likely to do.

Your suggestion to the businesses (i.e. how to tackle their operational, financial, and management issues) will be asked to back up by numerical calculations. In essence, at this stage of Transformational Small Businesses, KPMG is testing your numerical reasoning skills, verbal reasoning skills, situational judgment skills, strength assessments, critical reasoning skills in an etray style assessment. 

KPMG Transformational Small Businesses is a work-related scenario-based assessment, a sort of most likely to least likely question-answer series (with detailed cross-reference to your workings behind each suggestion). You will be given several scenarios and choices of possible actions you can take to deal with those situations. These will be hypothetical work-related situations that you would encounter as a trainee at KPMG.

Imagine as if you'd have to prepare to run in the Olympics, to do this if you are serious then, you'd have to prepare 'backwards'. Now, this stage of the 'Transforming Small Businesses' exercise cannot be passed in a real sense unless and until you have the following skills set.

1. You'd need to know how to pass the Numerical Reasoning Tests

2. You'd need to know how to pass the Verbal Reasoning Tests

3. You'd need to know how to pass the Situational Judgement Tests

4. You'd need to know how to pass the Strengths-Based Assessment Tests

5. You'd need to know how to pass Business Etray Exercise 

Only when you combine the above five skill sets, you would then be able to reply to this stage of the 'Transforming Small Businesses' exercise confidently and the rest of the coming stages. It's not going to be a one-hit-wonder without preparation for sure! 

When we mentioned that you'd need to prepare backwards, it meant that you'd need to follow the above sequence of preparation 1-5 as stated above. Building on your skills step by step then you'd find the real test more manageable. We understand this is a big ask however, the competition is fierce and KPMG specifically offers interest-free loans upon joining which makes it more lucrative for the students to apply. Given the pandemic situation, we are passing through it would make sense to prepare in-depth.

Now let's talk more about the Transforming Small Businesses stage. Some guidance is available on the KPMG recruitment site here. You'd be handed on business-related data on three companies i.e. (it's products, prices, marketing, legal, IT, operational issues, financial issues, and growth opportunities). Then you'd be asked to analyse each company forecast ('what if' scenarios) to give suggestions on how to fix the issues. You would then use your numerical and verbal reasoning skills to back up your calculation and supporting arguments. This part of the exercise is quite similar to the KPMG Etray exercise (which KPMG used to assess the candidates at the later stages). Once you've practised the Etray exercise then you'd know how to assess the SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats), and formalise your responses to the relevant business problem.

You are expected to complete this stage of the assessment within 80-90 minutes, even though KPMG mentions that it's not a timed exercise however it's best practice to complete within the stated time, as it is most likely linked to a competency (and would impact your passing grades). 

In addition to passing this Transforming Small Businesses stage exercise, you are supposed to be remembering the responses you gave and the computations you did for passing the next stage of the recruitment process. To check whether you've given the responses yourself, KPMG would ask you similar questions to respond to in the video webcam conference (judging your facial responses and truthfulness) allowing you 60 minutes to complete.

Again preparing yourself with the above-mentioned five assessed areas namely Numerical, Verbal, SJT, Strengths Assessment, and Etray would be really helpful to pass this second stage and the next third stage. You would also find it really fruitful to book few in-person training sessions with our ex-Big Four Senior Consultants to prepare fully for these tests.   

For all the above-mentioned 5 assessments' preparation, we have set up the relevant Guidance pages as well as the product pages. Please feel free to go through each guidance page to build familiarity around the tests. Remember, it is your career choice and you must take charge with complete preparation beforehand. If you pass the real tests you'd get a lot of praises and Congrats. No one would care how you prepare for the test or how much, important thing is that you MUST prepare fully with the resources available at your disposal.

Transforming Small Businesses' exercise is something that KPMG has newly introduced, in addition to the above 5 assessment areas, you'd also need to know the basics of running a small business (basics of product development, accounting (income and expenses), marketing, advertising, legal aspects, etc). It would be ideal for you to book a personalised training session with one of our experts (ex-Big Four Senior Managers). This would really boost up your chances of success at this stage and the next.

We have designed this website to give ease of reference to compare stage-by-stage assessments with the rest of Big Fours. This was structured in this manner to eliminate any complexity among the Candidates, Parents, or Guardians. Keeping that theme intact, the rest of these sections would discuss the importance of the KPMG Aptitude Test then leading to SJT, Strengths-Based Assessment, and Etray exercise, which you'd be tested inherently within this stage of Transforming Small Businesses Exercise. As mentioned above please check out our relevant Guidance and Product pages then get in touch if you'd feel like booking your personalised session with one of our Senior Consultants. 

KPMG Transforming Small Businesses Assessment Preparation:

After you choose a convenient date from the options offered by KPMG, you will have roughly one week to prepare. As we all know, job tests can be daunting and how can you be fully confident of putting in a perfect performance if you lack Big Four experience? As long as you can show sufficient drive and enthusiasm, we will give you the support you need to land the job of your dreams.

KPMG Transforming Small Businesses Assessment Competency Criteria:

KPMG has created the Transforming Small Businesses Assessment test to judge you against their key strengths competencies criteria. We believe that the test will be time-restricted (90 minutes), so you must be able to cope with intense pressure. Our training will ensure that you are fully confident and ready to deal with any eventuality. Imagine the embarrassment and panic caused by ‘freezing up’ during the KPMG Transforming Small Businesses test and you’ll realise just how important this is.

Although KPMG do list key competencies criteria on their website, they don’t provide many details on the initial and follow-up questions you can expect to face. However, you can draw on the experience of our experts, who have previously worked for Big Four firms, to give you a major advantage in this area.

KPMG Transforming Small Businesses Test Details:

The relevant software has been developed for the company by Cubiks, a renowned global HR consultancy that publishes various psychometric tests for KPMG worldwide. As KPMG mentioned on their website, you'd be asked to follow up situational questions in stage three based on your earlier responses at this stage! To prepare for KPMG Transforming Small Businesses assessment, you'd need to know the specific methodology of KPMG testing of Aptitude tests (Numerical and Verbal reasoning) which comes in two parts. Below is a list of assessments that are merged and tested at this stage. 

1. KPMG APTITUDE TEST - NUMERICAL REASONING TEST - The numerical reasoning tests are based on data presented in formats such as graphs and charts. There will be four questions per scenario, leading to a total of 24 questions (6x4) that must all be answered within 20 minutes. You are expected to demonstrate your ability with figures, your analytical skills, and sensible time management at the Transforming Small Businesses assessment stage. You can read more details on the KPMG Numerical test methodology here.

2. KPMG APTITUDE TEST - VERBAL REASONING TEST - The verbal reasoning tests are usually taken after the numerical reasoning tests and comprise a series of statements that you must determine as true, false, or ‘cannot say. There will be four questions per scenario, leading to a total of 40 questions (10x4) that must all be answered within 20 minutes. You are expected to demonstrate your business judgement and problem-solving skills at the Transforming Small Businesses assessment stage. You can read more details on the KPMG Verbal test methodology here.

3. KPMG SITUATIONAL JUDGEMENT TEST - Please refer to the relevant guidance page here to understand the nature of and details of competencies assessed here.

4. KPMG STRENGTH BASED ASSESSMENT TEST - Please refer to the relevant guidance page here to understand the nature of and details of competencies assessed here.

5. KPMG ETRAY EXERCISE TEST - Please refer to the relevant guidance page here to understand the nature of and details of competencies assessed here.

KPMG will not provide you with any informational booklet upfront to prepare for this stage, so you must have the relevant information and guidance well in advance. Do not think that you can guess your way through the Transforming Small Businesses stage, as that way results in a failure. 

KPMG Transforming Small Businesses Results:

Your performance during the Transformational Small Businesses test will remain on record and is used in KPMG’s final deliberations to determine whether or not your application has been a success. It’s fully possible to successfully get through this stage by scoring a passing mark, yet fail to secure employment when KPMG recruiters take a look at your performances over the application process in its entirety. One such practical example is listed by KPMG under the Stage 3 Delivering Outcomes section.

KPMG grade your ability on each stage between 1 point and 5. It is assumed by KPMG that if an applicant can demonstrate ‘Strengths core capabilities’ and attain the full 5 marks during the aptitude test process then they automatically become a perfect match for the firm.

This means you need to score the maximum 5 points on every single stage to set yourself apart from rival jobseekers and cannot afford to take a job test without having been properly prepared by Green Turn.

The Green Turn Preparation Packs:

Green Turn's research results show that three-fifth of applicants fail KPMG’s Transforming Small Businesses test, combined with Stage 3 results, which in practice means that they have basically ruined their chances of ever securing a job with the firm. Time is your enemy here – vacancies are quickly filled due to the salary and status benefits provided by Big Four firms. Give your chances a serious boost by preparing with GreenTurn's qualified staff. You will find the below preparation packs extremely beneficial in your self-preparation: 

• Specific six total mock exams containing practise questions and answers bundle to prepare you for doing your Numerical and Verbal reasoning computations at the Transforming Small Business stage here
• Specific 3 mock exams containing practise questions and answers bundle to prepare you for doing your Situational Judgement Assessment computations at Transforming Small Business stage here
• Specific 2 mock exams containing practise questions and answers bundle to prepare you for doing your Strengths-Based Assessment computations at Transforming Small Business stage here
• Specific 2 mock exams containing practise questions and answers bundle to prepare you for doing your Etray Transforming Small Businesses Assessment computations at Transforming Small Business stage here
• Full information and guidance on pass and fail criteria, with a detailed marking scheme 
• 24/7 online access to our personalised simulation programs, so you can practice for the real test at your convenience.
• Advanced and detailed performance reports, so you can check how you’re progressing at any time.

We also offer totally free online practice tests. Click here to practice numerical reasoning and here to practice verbal reasoning. 

In Conclusion:

Green Turn is the market leader and the only specialist company worldwide that offers specific training on how to secure a Big Four job delivered by former employees of the companies in question. We have fifteen years' experience of successfully fast-tracking people like you into positions with the top companies and regularly receive positive feedback on our training methods. By purchasing our preparation packs, you are gaining access to an invaluable network of former Big Four employees who have the required knowledge and desire to advance you into a dream job. We pride ourselves on our clients’ 90-to-100% pass rates and it’s in our interests that you achieve employment so that the retention level stays high.