Aptitude test
The IBM Kenexa Assessments
IBM Kenexa is a long-standing suite of aptitude tests, numerical, verbal and logical reasoning, paired with a work-styles questionnaire that profiles how you operate at work. It is a familiar early screen at US bulge-bracket banks, including Bank of America, and appears in graduate hiring on both sides of the Atlantic. Here is how each part works and how to prepare.
In short
IBM Kenexa is a suite of online assessments that combines numerical, verbal and logical (inductive) reasoning tests with a work-styles, or behavioural, questionnaire. The reasoning tests are multiple choice and tightly timed, often around a minute per question, with some versions delivered in an adaptive format that adjusts difficulty as you answer. It is used as an early screen by several US bulge brackets, including Bank of America. You pass it by drilling the three reasoning formats under the clock and answering the work-styles questions honestly and consistently against the behaviours the role rewards.
The basics
What it is
Kenexa was a talent-assessment publisher that IBM acquired in 2012, and its tests are now delivered through the IBM Kenexa platform (sometimes branded Kenexa Assess on Cloud). The suite sits early in the recruitment process, usually straight after the online application, and is used to sift a large applicant pool down to the candidates worth interviewing. Like SHL and Aon, Kenexa is a generalist publisher, so the same building blocks turn up across banking, consulting and professional services.
The core of the suite is a trio of reasoning tests. Numerical reasoning gives you data in tables and charts and asks you to calculate answers such as percentage changes, ratios and proportions. Verbal reasoning gives you a short business-style passage and asks you to judge statements as true, false or cannot say based only on the text. Logical, or inductive, reasoning shows you a sequence of shapes or symbols that change by a hidden rule and asks what comes next. The maths and reading involved are rarely advanced; the difficulty is doing them quickly and accurately against a strict clock.
Alongside the ability tests, Kenexa runs a work-styles questionnaire, sometimes called the behavioural or personality assessment. It presents statements about how you prefer to work and asks you to rate or rank them, building a profile of traits such as drive, structure, collaboration and resilience. There are no right answers in the usual sense, but employers screen for a profile that fits the role, so consistency and self-awareness matter more than trying to guess an ideal type.
A notable feature of Kenexa is that several modules can be delivered in an adaptive (computer-adaptive) format. In adaptive mode the difficulty of the next question depends on whether you answered the last one correctly, which lets a short test pin down your level precisely and means you usually cannot go back to change an answer. Kenexa is a particularly common screen across US bulge-bracket banks, including Bank of America, and the same formats appear in UK graduate and internship hiring, so preparation transfers directly between markets.
In practice, the questions look a lot like the SHL and Aon families that candidates may already know, but the interface, instructions and the exact mix of items differ enough that going in cold costs you. Because the suite blends pure ability with a behavioural profile, a strong application is not just about clearing the reasoning cut-off; it is about presenting a coherent picture, sharp numeracy and reading on the ability tests, and a steady, role-appropriate profile on the work-styles questionnaire, so that nothing in your results contradicts the rest. That is why the most useful preparation pairs timed reasoning practice with a clear sense of how the role you are targeting actually wants people to work.
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What it measures
The dimensions under test
Numerical reasoning
How quickly and accurately you read data in tables and charts and turn it into answers, using percentages, percentage change, ratios, proportions and simple multi-step calculations rather than advanced maths.
Verbal reasoning
Disciplined comprehension: whether you can judge statements as true, false or cannot say strictly from a passage, without leaning on outside knowledge or what merely sounds plausible.
Logical and inductive reasoning
Fluid pattern recognition: spotting the rule behind a sequence of shapes or symbols (rotation, reflection, movement, changes in number or shading) and applying it to find what comes next.
Work styles and behaviour
How you typically operate at work across traits such as drive, structure, collaboration, influence and resilience, captured by the work-styles questionnaire rather than an ability score.
Speed and accuracy under pressure
Because almost everything is tightly timed, the suite measures your ability to stay accurate at pace, not just whether you can reach the right answer with unlimited time. This is the trait most candidates underestimate, since untimed practice feels comfortable while the real clock does not.
Fit to the role
The behavioural profile and the reasoning percentiles together are read against the demands of the specific role, so the suite is as much about fit as it is about raw ability. A strong reasoning score with a profile that clashes with the role is a weaker signal than two results that point the same way.
The format
What to expect
See it in action
A worked example
Here is a typical Kenexa numerical reasoning item so you can see how the format feels in practice.
- 01
Read the exhibit, not every row
The table shows a company total revenue rising from GBP 1,200 million (about USD 1,560 million) in Year 1 to GBP 1,500 million (about USD 1,950 million) in Year 2, broken down by region. The question asks only for the growth in total revenue, so the regional rows are distractors.
- 02
Pull out the two figures you need
Year 1 total is 1,200 and Year 2 total is 1,500. Ignore the regional split entirely; reaching for it is the most common way candidates waste their minute.
- 03
Calculate the change
Subtract to find the increase: 1,500 minus 1,200 is 300. This is the absolute growth in the total.
- 04
Convert to a percentage
Divide the change by the original figure: 300 divided by 1,200 is 0.25, which is 25 percent. Match that to the answer option, here 25 percent.
The takeaway
The arithmetic is GCSE level. The test is really about reading the right figures quickly, ignoring the distractor data, and keeping a steady pace so the easy questions never cost you time you need for the harder ones. On the day, decide what the question is actually asking before you touch the calculator, and you will avoid most of the traps Kenexa builds in.
The scoring
How it is marked
Kenexa reasoning tests are scored against a norm group, so what matters is your percentile rather than your raw number correct. Firms set their own cut-off, commonly somewhere between the 50th and 70th percentile depending on the role and the strength of the applicant pool. The work-styles questionnaire is read separately as a fit profile, not a pass mark.
Raw score to percentile
Your number of correct answers is converted to a percentile by comparing it with a relevant norm group, for example other graduates or other finance applicants. The same raw score can land at a different percentile against a tougher comparison group.
Typical cut-off
Many graduate screens pass candidates at roughly the 50th to 70th percentile. Bulge brackets and heavily oversubscribed schemes tend to set the bar at the higher end of that range.
Adaptive scoring
In adaptive mode your score reflects the difficulty of the questions you reached, not just how many you got right, so steady accuracy on the early items pushes you toward higher-value questions.
Work-styles profile
The questionnaire is not pass or fail in the usual sense. Your profile is compared with the behaviours the role calls for, so consistency and genuine fit count for more than any single answer.
The variants
Versions you might be sent
Kenexa reasoning trio
The numerical, verbal and logical (inductive) reasoning tests, usually taken together as one battery. This is the core ability screen and the part most firms weight most heavily.
Adaptive (computer-adaptive) versions
Shorter, difficulty-adjusting versions of the reasoning tests. They feel faster and more individual, weight your early accuracy, and generally do not let you go back to change an answer.
Work-styles questionnaire
The behavioural assessment that profiles how you prefer to work. Sometimes delivered as rating scales and sometimes as forced-choice rankings, where you pick what is most and least like you.
Kenexa Assess platform
The IBM delivery platform (sometimes branded Kenexa Assess on Cloud) that hosts the tests and can also carry job-specific or situational modules a firm bolts on for a particular role.
Who uses it
Firms that screen with this test
Each links to a dedicated firm guide: the application process, the interview stages, and what they look for.
The prep
How to prepare
Drill all three reasoning formats
Practise numerical (percentages, percentage change, ratios and proportions), verbal (true, false, cannot say) and logical sequences separately until each method is automatic. The suite tests three distinct skills, and a weak module can sink an otherwise strong result.
Practise under a strict clock
Kenexa is tightly timed, often around a minute per question. Always time your practice so accuracy at speed becomes natural, and build the habit of committing to an answer and moving on rather than agonising over one item.
Prepare for the adaptive format
If your test is adaptive, your early answers carry extra weight and you usually cannot revisit them. Start carefully and accurately rather than racing, since correct early answers steer you toward higher-scoring questions, while a careless slip near the start can pull the whole test down to easier, lower-value items.
Master the verbal cannot say rule
On verbal reasoning, answer only from the passage. Cannot say means the text does not give enough information to decide, even when a statement seems likely or is true in the real world. Getting this distinction right is the single biggest verbal score lift.
Get efficient with your calculator
Use the calculator you will use on the day, learn its memory functions, and read each exhibit units (thousands or millions, the right axis) before calculating. Most numerical errors come from misreading data, not from the arithmetic.
Answer the work-styles questions consistently
Picture the role, then answer the behavioural questionnaire as your genuine working self. Wild swings or trying to game an ideal profile show up as inconsistency, which is exactly what the questionnaire is built to catch.
Practise on the real format
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FAQ
Common questions
IBM Kenexa is a suite of online assessments combining numerical, verbal and logical (inductive) reasoning tests with a work-styles, or behavioural, questionnaire. Kenexa was acquired by IBM in 2012, and the tests are used early in hiring to screen a large applicant pool down to the candidates worth interviewing.
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