Its main assessment package is the Skyrise City game. To date, more than 350,000 Skyrise City assessments have been completed in 35 countries, and that number is ever increasing. Skyrise City tests are becoming more popular and are often used for internships or graduate recruitment and as early screening assessments for many different types of job role because they blend neuroscience, psychometrics and game technology. They provide a data-driven and unbiased way to assess 30 aspects of personality, decision making and cognitive ability to make screening candidates simple. According to Arctic Shores, more than 91% of candidates say that they enjoyed the assessments, and 88% said that it made them more excited to work for the company they had applied for – which is why companies like PwC, Siemens, Deloitte, Coca Cola and KPMG use Skyrise City as part of their recruitment process.
What Is a Game-Based Assessment?
Game-based assessments are often used in the early stages of a recruitment process to effectively screen candidates – much like the more traditional aptitude or psychometric tests. Skyrise City has up to 9 levels that collect more than 5,000 data points relating to the natural abilities, strengths and personality traits that are needed to perform a specific task. By combining neuroscience and psychometrics with HD graphics, reward systems and sounds in a game-like interface, gamified assessments reduce bias, increase engagement (and enjoyment), and provide data through task performance, not answers to questions. Similar to more traditional personality and aptitude tests, the results from gamified assessments are compared to a framework based on the company’s values, desired behaviours and required skills and aptitudes – so, no particular game score guarantees a job offer, and there are no right or wrong answers. The gamified assessments are not meant to be used in isolation when deciding about a new hire; they are meant to inform the process and allow a recruitment team or hiring manager to see beyond a resume.
What Are the Benefits of a Game-Based Assessment?
Game-based assessments are a relatively new addition to pre-employment screening, but they have a host of benefits that make them comparable to, if not better than, standard psychometric testing.
Fair Application
While this criterion is the same for both traditional psychometric testing and gamified assessments, fair application of tests is an important factor in recruitment to remove or negate unconscious biases. For example, after using Skyrise City, Siemens doubled its intake of female candidates. Gamified assessments are applied in the same way to every candidate, so they remove the possibility of any adverse impact regarding sex, ethnicity or any other factor in recruiting.
Cannot Beat the System
It is an ongoing concern with traditional psychometric or personality tests that answers might not reflect the candidate truthfully – whether they are selecting answers based on how they think the recruitment team might want them to, or whether they just do not know themselves well enough to answer honestly. Self-reporting tests can be the most problematic here, and even tests that seek to ‘disguise’ what they are looking for are subject to faking issues. In gamified tests, there are no ways for users to ‘cheat’ and give the answers they think the recruiter wants – candidates are performing tasks, which means that their natural responses are being measured against a hidden standard not clear in the levels played or actions taken. In Skyrise City, one of the more well-known levels is the balloon-popping round, where candidates have to blow up a balloon in order to win money. The bigger the balloon, the more money – but too much and it will pop. Most people recognize this as a measurement of risk-taking behaviour, but that is not all that is being measured – and there is no way to know exactly when the best time to stop pumping up the balloon is.
Based Upon Well-Established, Scientific Data
Gamified assessments, like traditional psychometric tests, must be reliable and consistent. They need to be based on neuroscience and psychology to be relevant and useful in the recruitment process. Arctic Shores works with the best academic and scientific research to produce its tests, and Skyrise City is a new application of the British Psychological Society (BPS) standards in pre-employment screening. Tests are consistently being validated, with dozens of studies conducted every year to ensure they are valid and reliable.
Candidate Experience Is Improved
Sitting a test in any environment is nerve-wracking and knowing that the answers you give to a psychometric or aptitude assessment could negatively affect your chances at scoring your dream job understandably causes anxiety. Gamified tests allow candidates to be less anxious because they provide a more interesting and immersive experience – which is beneficial to not only the applicant but also the business. If you are not overwhelmed with anxiety when you are completing an assessment, you are more likely to perform naturally and make better decisions; you can give the best example of your personality and natural cognitive ability. For employers, a less stressful assessment experience is likely to mean that when potential candidates discuss the application process, they will be more positive and more likely to be excited to work for the business.
How Does Skyrise City Assess Candidates?
Skyrise City is a multi-level game, where points are earned depending on performance at each level. Unlike a traditional psychometric assessment, there are no multiple-choice questions to answer; instead, candidates are measured on their natural responses to fun and challenging games.
How Does Skyrise City Work?
As with other gamified assessments, the tasks on each level of Skyrise City are designed to create data points that measure 30 different aspects of decision-making, personality and cognitive ability. While there are points to be scored, the data gathered is from your responses to the tasks and how you complete them. Contrary to popular opinion, the tasks on Skyrise City have nothing to do with measuring hand-eye coordination or dexterity – there are gamified assessments that do this, such as some spatial awareness tests, but Skyrise City measures psychometrics rather than physical abilities.
How Is the Five-Factor Model Relevant?
Arctic Shores has designed the Skyline City assessment to assess candidates based on the Five Factor Personality Model, which measures:
Openness Conscientiousness Extraversion Agreeableness Neuroticism
These are well-used criteria in recruitment as employers are able to create a ‘job fit’ profile based on a combination of these factors that represents their ideal employee in terms of personality traits (rather than required skills, work experience or qualifications). The data gathered from each level work together to form a picture of the candidate in relation to these factors. The hardware must meet the following criteria:
Desktop – Windows 8 or higher; latest versions of Chrome, Firefox or Edge browser Mac – Yosemite or higher; latest versions of Safari, Chrome or Firefox browser iPhone – iOS: 12 or higher; latest versions of Safari, Chrome or Firefox browser Android – 6 or higher; latest versions of Chrome or Firefox browser
To prepare, make sure that your hardware is new enough to operate the app or borrow something from a friend or a family member.
To use the Skyrise City app, you need to be invited with an email from Arctic Shores (rather than the company you have applied for) and this email will include:
A download link for a practice assessment (one level) A download link for the full assessment Login details (a seven-digit username and a password) A deadline date, which is the latest the assessment can be completed; after this time, your username will no longer work.
When you have received this email, you need to download and install the app.
Assessment
The assessment itself is not timed, although some individual levels are. Nevertheless, Arctic Shores recommends that you complete the whole test in one sitting to ensure that you get into the flow of the games. There will be up to nine levels to complete, depending on the employer, and plenty of instructions so that you know how to complete each level and what tasks you need to do.
Feedback
Feedback is provided according to the employer, but usually consists of a description of your natural behaviours on a spectrum of 1–10. This is compared to a framework that reflects their ideal candidate profile and will be used to take applicants forward to the next stage of the recruitment process.
What Is the Scoring System?
As this is a game, part of the experience is to achieve a high score – but this is not actually part of the feedback that is used to determine your job fit. Before the test is constructed and sent to candidates, the employer will have created a job fit profile of desirable personality traits, work behaviours and cognitive abilities, and your performance through the game will be compared to this job fit profile in order to assess your suitability. These results help the recruitment team to see past the CV to how you make decisions and where you lie on the Five-Factor Model. This helps them to get a picture of how you will behave at work and as a prediction as to whether you will be successful in the role. It is important to remember that early pre-employment screening assessments like Skyrise City are used to form a bias-free additional data point alongside minimum education requirements, skills and experience. Every employer is looking for something different in their applicants, so their job fit profiles will all be different too.
How to Pass a Game-Based Assessment
However, when you receive your invitation, there is a separate download for a practice game and it will benefit you greatly to try this first before you get started on the actual assessment. The instructions will let you know what the point of each game is and how to complete the level’s tasks. Before you send in your application form, you will have completed research about the company and the role – and this is a good time to keep in mind any information you have found about what your employer is looking for in their employees. You can usually find this on their careers site, but if not, the information might be in the job description. As a general rule, if your device is less than four years old you should be alright – any older and it might be a good idea to borrow something more appropriate from a friend or family member. You will also need a good, stable Wi-Fi connection. If you have any issues with connectivity, freezing or any other technical hitch, you can contact the support team at Arctic Shores who will help you find a solution. Make sure that you are in a distraction-free environment, turn off notifications and get into the right headspace to complete the assessment in one sitting. Skyline City is designed to get candidates into a flow – much like they would be when completing tasks in a workplace – so to recreate that effectively, it is beneficial to do the whole assessment at once. There is no time limit for the assessment, although some levels are timed. For candidates, gamified assessments are less stressful and almost fun – a test without the nerves is usually one that you will perform better in. As the science of recruitment catches up with gamified psychometric assessments, it can be safely assumed that Skyrise City and similar tests will be a more mainstream part of graduate assessments in a number of industries.
