Online Application
This will take around 45 minutes to complete. It requires you to fill out your personal details, education history and attach a CV and cover letter.
How to respond for success
It is important to tailor not only your cover letter, but also CV towards PRGX’s cultures, values and expected skills. PRGX do not expect relevant working experience, but it is important to show previous interest in working within the financial services sector. In Daniel’s case, he mentioned roles within University Finance societies, previous part time roles, as well as including strong exam performance in relevant university modules. The cover letter allows you to explain why you want to work at PRGX specifically- Daniel mentioned the potential to work across a number of industries in the placement role, as well as the fact that PRGX recruit a large number of placement students each year, allowing for the opportunity to build a professional network.
Expect up to a 1 week wait before progressing to the next stage.
Online Tests
You will face one online assessment, a numerical test. This should take around 30 mins, and you can do these tests at any point within a one week window.
Example task
For the numerical reasoning test, a lot of the questions focused on percentage increase and decrease, reading tables and extracting values.
How to respond for success
There are a number of practice assessments very similar to the one PRGX set. If you are comfortable with the platform and style of questions, and are well practiced, the numerical assessment shouldn't be too difficult. PRGX’s test isn’t as time pressured as others, so Daniel advises one to not rush and take time to answer correctly.
Expect a 2-3 day wait before progressing to the next stage.
Online Tests
You will face one online assessment, a numerical test. This should take around 30 mins, and you can do these tests at any point within a one week window.
Example task
For the numerical reasoning test, a lot of the questions focused on percentage increase and decrease, reading tables and extracting values.
How to respond for success
There are a number of practice assessments very similar to the one PRGX set. If you are comfortable with the platform and style of questions, and are well practiced, the numerical assessment shouldn't be too difficult. PRGX’s test isn’t as time pressured as others, so Daniel advises one to not rush and take time to answer correctly.
Expect a 2-3 day wait before progressing to the next stage.
Video Interview
The final stage is a two part video interview, conducted over Zoom (due to COVID). PRGX will send an email detailing the date and time, and will also call to confirm your availability to interview. The first part of the interview is 15-20 minutes of general competency questions, with the second part of the interview being another numerical test. The interview will be conducted with senior analysts from PRGX.
Example task
The competency questions were quite generic with the interviewers ( two senior analysts), mainly focusing on the reasons behind your desire to work in the industry generally, then more of a focus on what draws you towards PRGX. There was also a brain teaser question - in Daniel’s case “How many cups of coffee do you estimate are drunk in Manchester per day, based on a population of X?"
The numerical part of the video interview is conducted over excel, with the interviewee required to share their screen. It will be a mock spreadsheet of wholesale prices & retail prices, with you required to find certain anomalous periods, and calculate some simple ratios. In Daniel’s interview, he was asked to calculate the percentage markup of a product’s retail price vs wholesale price over three different dates.
How to respond for success
It is important to dress for the Zoom interview in the same way as you would for an in person interview. In Daniel’s case, the interviewers were very impressed to find he had spent time talking to previous placement students at PRGX - this can help give you a better idea of the firm’s culture, which you can then use to help build answers to competency questions. As always, it is important to know your CV like the back of your hand, and be able to speak for a few minutes on each experience.
In order to succeed in the mathematical part of the video interview, it is important to spend some time prior brushing up on the more important ratios in ‘audit’. If you can easily remember what each ratio entails, the numerical part of the video interview will be relatively straightforward.
