Your manager asks you to finalise a client deliverable by end of day. Halfway through, you realise the dataset you've been working from contains an error — one that will materially affect the conclusion. Your manager is in back-to-back meetings. The client expects the document in two hours.
This is a situational judgement test. Four options appear on screen. You have to pick the most effective response and the least effective — and what you choose tells the firm a great deal about how you'd actually behave in the job.
Here's how the Big 4 SJT works, what each firm looks for, and how to make sure you're picking the right answers — not just the comfortable ones.
What is a situational judgement test?
An SJT presents you with a realistic workplace scenario and a set of 4–6 possible responses. Your task is usually to identify the most effective response and the least effective — the middle options are typically unscored. Some formats ask you to rank all options or rate each response on a scale; EY uses a ranking or rating format rather than straight most/least selection.
The test is designed to simulate the actual judgement calls you'd make in your first year. Expect scenarios involving client deliverables, team conflicts, missed deadlines, and ethical tensions — exactly the situations a new hire at a Big 4 firm navigates regularly.
What the SJT is actually measuring
Every scenario is mapped to a competency. The framework varies slightly by firm, but the core set is consistent across Deloitte, KPMG, EY, and PwC:
Client focus — prioritising client needs without cutting corners
Teamwork — collaborating effectively and supporting colleagues
Communication — sharing information clearly and at the right time
Ethical decision-making — acting with integrity when shortcuts are available
Initiative — exercising independent judgement rather than deferring everything upward
Conflict resolution — addressing disagreements directly and professionally
The competencies themselves aren't a secret. What's harder to game is the level at which you're expected to demonstrate them. The SJT doesn't just want to know that you value teamwork — it wants to see how you navigate teamwork when it conflicts with a deadline, or when a colleague is falling behind and the clock is running.
How each firm runs the SJT
PwC presents the SJT as short video clips — you watch a realistic workplace interaction, then choose the best and worst response from four to six options. The test is untimed, and most candidates finish in 20–30 minutes. The scenarios lean heavily on client interaction and professional ethics.
KPMG runs one of the most involved SJT formats: 12–20 scenarios delivered through a mix of video clips, emails, podcasts, and written passages — all set inside a simulated firm environment. It's not timed, but KPMG recommends completing it in roughly 90 minutes in a single sitting. Scores are graded 1–5 per scenario; hitting a consistent 5 across the competency framework is what KPMG describes as a perfect match for the role.
Deloitte's SJT appears inside the Cappfinity Immersive Assessment — the same session that includes personality-style profiling questions. The immersive element means the scenarios are framed as tasks inside a simulated workday rather than standalone questions. The SJT portion involves roughly two questions out of six in the full assessment, which shapes how much weight to put on it versus the overall session.
EY uses a format more focused on the firm's specific values and leadership behaviours. Rather than a straight most/least effective selection, EY typically asks candidates to rank or rate multiple responses — a format that rewards nuanced thinking over binary choices. Candidates applying to Tax or Law-adjacent roles at EY may encounter the Watson Glaser Critical Thinking test alongside or instead of a standard SJT; check your invitation carefully.
Example scenario: what the right answer actually looks like
Returning to the opening scenario: dataset error, two hours to deadline, manager unavailable. Here's how the response options might look:
Send the document as is — one error won't significantly change the overall conclusion
Leave a message for your manager and wait for a callback before doing anything
Correct the error yourself, flag the change briefly to your manager via message, and deliver on time
Email the client to delay the deadline, explaining that the data needs to be rechecked
Option 3 is typically most effective. It demonstrates initiative, ownership, and professional communication — you didn't ignore the problem, defer it, or blow up the client timeline. Option 1 is typically least effective — sending incorrect work is an ethical failure, not a judgment call. Option 2 (wait passively) and Option 4 (escalate to the client immediately) both sit in the middle: they avoid the error but handle it in ways that signal a lack of independent judgement or professional confidence.
The pattern holds across SJTs: the most effective answer addresses the problem directly and professionally; the least effective avoids, ignores, or escalates it in a way that damages relationships or credibility. The middle options usually avoid the worst outcome — but they share a flaw: they pass the decision upward or delay action when neither is necessary.
The mistakes that cost candidates the most
Two traps show up consistently in SJT performance, and both are avoidable once you know what to watch for.
Choosing the comfortable option. The response that feels safest — tell the manager, wait for guidance, avoid confrontation — almost always scores in the bottom half. Big 4 firms are testing for professional maturity, not compliance. If the scenario has a clear right action, take it. Don't reach for the middle option because it feels cautious.
Always escalating. The mirror image of the first trap. Immediately involving a manager at the first sign of difficulty is also wrong — graduate employers want candidates who can exercise independent judgement, not reflexive escalators. Reserve escalation for situations that genuinely require it: significant ethical breaches, decisions above your authority, or issues with wider project impact.
There's a third, subtler mistake: trying to game the test by reverse-engineering a model personality. SJTs are specifically designed to detect inconsistency across scenarios. Answer as a competent, professional, ethically grounded person who takes initiative — that's the only persona the test is looking for, and it's also the right one to bring to the job.
How to prepare — and when to stop
The SJT is a different animal from numerical or verbal reasoning. There are no formulas to memorise, no accuracy percentiles to benchmark against. The preparation that actually helps:
Read the firm's values and competencies before you sit. Each firm publishes them openly on their graduate recruitment pages. Internalise the specific language they use — KPMG's five qualities, EY's leadership behaviours, PwC's professional attributes. The SJT scenarios are written to test those exact frameworks.
Work through an SJT question bank. The specific scenarios won't match what you see on the day, but the decision-making pattern will. After each practice question, read the explanation for every option — including the ones you didn't choose. Understanding why option 2 scores higher than option 3 builds the judgement the test is actually assessing.
Stay consistent across scenarios. If you answer one scenario by escalating immediately and the next by acting independently without informing anyone, the algorithm will flag the inconsistency. You don't need to be perfect — but you need to be coherent.
Know when to stop. Unlike aptitude tests, there's a ceiling on how much SJT practice helps. Two to three focused hours, combined with a close read of the firm's values, is enough for most candidates. The rest is authenticity — and that can't be drilled.
Once you've cleared the online assessment, the SJT is usually the last hurdle before the assessment centre. For what comes next — group exercises, case studies, partner interviews — the Big 4 assessment centre guide covers the full day in detail.
