Study to Learn, Not Just to Pass the Certification Exam

​Are you a SHRM-CP planning to take the SHRM-SCP exam? Are any of your colleagues considering taking either level of exam? If so, you might have the same question that my students ask in every SHRM certification prep class: "What score do I need to pass the exam?" It's a good question, and I know someone will ask it in each class I teach, so I have prepared the following three answers.

Never Mind the Score. Focus on Learning.

I want my students to constantly aim for improvement. That includes better knowledge of the terms, a greater ability to carefully consider each question and more effective exam-taking techniques. Students who aim just to pass the exam may stop studying once they believe they can achieve that passing score.

(You can imagine it, can't you? If I'm aiming to score 80 percent on the actual exam, and I score 85 percent on two mock exams, I'm likely to think I have it in the bag—that I'm ready to take the test and can stop studying.)

The content of the SHRM Body of Competency and Knowledge™ (SHRM BoCK™), however, is so inclusive, so broad, that it cannot be fully represented within a single 160-question exam (or even in two mock 160-question exams). So even if you achieve passing scores on a couple of mock exams, you may still have blind spots—SHRM BoCK content with which you are unfamiliar—that can show up as questions on the exam you actually take.

Consider Question Weight and Distribution

SHRM's answer to the "passing score" question never satisfies. It comes straight out of the SHRM Certification Handbook: "The range of possible scores is 120 to 200; all candidates who pass the exam receive the maximum score of 200."

What does this mean to exam takers? How will it change their behavior? How will it impact their study plans? SHRM's answer is frustrating for the many students who want to shoot for a number, or at least some level, as they prepare. They want to use their experiences and results with sample questions and mock exams to help them predict their performance on the actual exam.

The "120 to 200" answer makes more sense when you consider the following details:

• Exam questions vary in weight. Some questions are worth more than others. You won't know the weighting.
• Your official exam score and information on your performance will be organized by knowledge domain and competency cluster, not by question. You won't know if you answered any particular question correctly or incorrectly.
• Each exam includes approximately 30 field-test questions that are not scored. SHRM tries out items before they are actually used as questions on future exams. You won't know which items are being field-tested.

Implement Test-Preparation Best Practices

My advice is to not sweat the passing grade from SHRM. Instead, focus on your study plan:

• Design, commit to and execute your study plan.
• Approach studying as a plan to constantly improve your knowledge and skills, not just to pass a test.
• Evaluate your results on sample questions and mock exams against the SHRM BoCK, to identify areas of strength and weakness. Focus subsequent study efforts on the weak areas.
• Move beyond selecting the correct answer to a question. See if you can determine why the incorrect answers are incorrect.
• When completing a mock exam, do so in conditions as similar as possible to the actual testing conditions. Few of us live in a world in which we can sit down to focus on one task for 40 minutes, let alone for four hours. It helps to practice staying focused, without drinks or snacks or other distractions.

Working some of these approaches into your prep plan should help you pass the exam and secure your SHRM certification, which includes a commitment to lifetime learning. Good luck!

Paul Young, SHRM-SCP, is HR manager for the American Association of Endodontists, an adjunct instructor at Northwestern University, andcertification committee chair for Chicago SHRM. This article originally appeared as a post on the Chicago SHRM Blog.