SCS - Overview of the November Examiner's Report

During the build up to the February exam, we thought we'd take this opportunity to share with you some vital comments from the November SCS Examiner's Report.

This will give you a valuable insight as it will help you to understand what the Examiner will be looking out for in your own exam.

It will also help you to identify where to focus your revision during these last few days and give you some important tips for when you sit the exam.

Overall, the performance in the November exam was generally to a lower standard than the August exam, but that is not to say that there is nothing useful to take away from it to help future students. If anything, this emphasises the need for you to listen to what the examiner has said.

"Performance overall was reasonably good and in some cases excellent, with the usual handful of poor scripts. Performance was, however, not as good as it was in August. There were several weak areas on which candidates must improve in the future."

Here is what we consider to be the most useful points from the full report:

1. Application to the pre-seen - Applying the theory to the pre-seen is absolutely critical to score well in the exam. The Examiners emphasised that there are no marks for just pure knowledge - it needs to be applied in a relevant way to the case study.

2. Relevance of theory - The examiners stressed the importance of ensuring that theory used in your answers is relevant to the question. There is no point in reciting a paragraph of text that you have memorised and trying to shoe-horn it into your answer when it isn't relevant.

3. Awareness of the Industry and Company - Students that have an understanding of the context of the company and bring wider issues into their answers will stand out. The examiners were disappointed that the basic knowledge of the pre-seen was not very good, given the amount of time that students have to familiarise themselves with it. So make sure you know the pre-seen!

4. Revise all areas of the syllabus - The examiners commented that students need to have a good knowledge of all areas of the syllabus. Remember, any area of the management syllabus can be assessed!

5. Answer all elements of the question - Failure to give a complete answer is the easiest way to lose marks. Make sure you read the question carefully and identify all of the requirements.

6. Knowledge of ethics - Ethics has been present in the majority of SCS exams so far, therefore your knowledge of ethics and ethical principles should be to a high standard. Being able to identify and apply ethical issues and principles respectively when necessary will allow you to gain the top marks.

7. Manage your time - There was evidence that students had not had enough time to really go into depth and develop some answers. Being able to plan your time accordingly will give you the ability to create a balance between answering all of the sections and answering each section in the required amount of detail.

You can get full details on the Examiner's Report below:

SCS November 2015 Examiner's Report