The Met's online assessment gives you one minute to prepare each answer. Know the three exercises

The Met's police constable process includes a written task in which you take the role of a constable and complete an urgent piece of writing for a line manager. Reading a passage closely and answering only from it, which the verbal half of our reasoning test trains, helps with the reading side of that task.

The Met's tests are a situational judgement test, a behavioural styles questionnaire, a recorded competency interview, a written task and a briefing exercise. None is a reasoning test, and our practice test does not cover any of them. Treat it as light reading practice only.

After your application and a basic security check, the Met sends the National Sift. It has two parts: a situational judgement test and a behavioural styles questionnaire. The Met expects this stage to take about two weeks.

Both parts ask about you at work, not about what you know. For the judgement test, read the scenarios for who is at risk and what the rules say, then choose the response a careful officer would. For the questionnaire, answer consistently and honestly.

The online assessment has a competency-based interview, a written task and a briefing exercise. Each is timed. In the interview you get one minute to prepare and five minutes to record each answer. The Met says results usually arrive within three weeks of sitting.

This is a performance assessment more than a test of knowledge. The way to get better at it is rehearsal under the same conditions: a timer, a camera and a question you have not seen.

One minute to prepare is enough for a skeleton, not a script. Jot three words: the situation, what you did and the result. Then speak from them. When five minutes is the maximum, aim to use about three, which leaves a margin and avoids rambling.

Practise with competency themes you can expect, such as working with others, dealing with a difficult person or taking responsibility. Record each practice answer and watch it once for pace and clarity.

In the written task you take on the role of a police constable and complete an urgent task for a line manager. The skills are reading a brief accurately, picking out what matters and writing it clearly and quickly.

The verbal half of the free reasoning test above is a decent warm-up for the reading half. For the writing half, practise by taking a one-page factual summary and rewriting it into five clear sentences in ten minutes, then checking that every fact survives.

The Met assessment centre has a values-focused interview, then a medical and a job-related fitness test. Results typically take four to eight weeks, though this varies from person to person. Plan your fitness preparation early, because it is the stage with the most lead time.

You may apply to several forces at once, but you can only start the online assessment with one of them. Choose which before you begin. For more on how other public-sector employers compare, see our guide to public sector assessments.