It's tempting to think that it must be ridiculous for companies to have graduates and professionals to go through stupid numerical reasoning / critical reasoning / business judgment and other quantitative aptitude tests especially when in all such jobs (management consulting, banking, accounting) the use of Excel is so widespread.
While it is true that everyone is armed with Excel, it is also important to be strong and quick with numbers. It's not because someone will ask you to calculate "what is 57% of 295" but it's because in many discussions, reviews and presentations you will often need to quickly understand charts and figures and make observations. You cannot sit in a consulting review and say 'what? the market share..wait let me go check out my Excel.' Not only that, when you review someone else's output - say final results, or powerpoint graphs, it is very useful to be able to 'spot' problem areas and cross check accuracy without having to whip out a calculator every single time (and we can say this from personal experience in management consulting). Many companies look for such comfort with numbers and that's why the numerical and business judgment tests. It doesn't matter whether you agree with the approach or not, but it is looked for. Those who are inherently very weak and not comfortable dealing with a lot of numbers in their jobs will find it very hard and hate it - so perhaps it makes sense to 'weed out' (however error prone the approach) such people.
But comfort and speed with numbers does not come naturally to a lot of people, which is why systematic practice is key. The next post will focus on time for preparation and how to 'peak' for the tests.
use tips & tools to do well in numerical assessments & management consulting case interviews