Sky asks apprentices for no CV and gives every candidate a feedback report after each digital assessment

Sky's own material describes strengths-based, scenario-led digital assessments rather than classic aptitude papers, so no practice test mirrors them. Our reasoning test is still useful warm-up for the number and reading work inside job simulations, where you may need to read a short brief or a table quickly and act on it.

Our test is a timed set of numerical and verbal questions with right answers. Sky's immersive assessment and job simulation score how you prefer to work and how you handle realistic tasks, which a reasoning test cannot rehearse. Sky does not name a vendor, a time limit or a pass mark on the pages we found.

A strengths-based process asks what energises you and what you do well naturally, rather than whether you can recite a competency example. Sky applies it from the very first form, which is why it does not ask for a CV. For a school leaver with little work history, this is good news: you are compared on how you approach situations, not on how polished your past looks.

The flip side is that you cannot cram for it. Preparation means knowing yourself: which tasks you lose track of time doing, which ones drain you, and how you behave when a plan changes at short notice. Spend twenty minutes writing those down before you start. Answers then come faster and more consistently.

Sky describes its first online assessment as immersive: you meet Sky's products and work through realistic scenarios, choosing how you would respond. The second is a job simulation tailored to your area, with four versions across corporate and technology streams. For high-demand technical programmes, Sky now combines both into a single sitting it calls one stop.

Read each scenario as if it were your first week in that team. Which response helps the customer, keeps colleagues informed and solves the problem in a way you would actually follow through? Sky values these qualities enough to build whole assessments around them. Our situational judgement guide covers how scenario tests are scored and why extreme or people-pleasing answers tend to do worse than honest, balanced ones.

Sky says every candidate receives a feedback report after each digital assessment. Few employers commit to this, and it is worth using. If you move forward, the report tells you which strengths came through clearly and which were faint. Take those into the assessment centre: prepare one example that shows each faint strength in action.

If you do not move forward, the report is still useful for the next cycle or for another employer's scenario test. Keep it.

Sky's programme pages set conditions that have nothing to do with ability: you need the right to work in the UK without sponsorship, you must be above school-leaving age, and you cannot be in other education while on the apprenticeship. Sky explains that most of these come from apprenticeship funding rules in England.

If you already hold a degree in a related subject, read the programme's criteria carefully, because funding rules can exclude you from an apprenticeship at the same level. A two-minute check here can save weeks.

Sky describes the final stage as a bespoke virtual assessment centre, with business stakeholders as assessors and tasks linked to its responsible business work, such as Sky Zero, its climate programme. Candidates who have been through it describe tasks designed to get to know them rather than trick them.

Test your camera, microphone and connection the day before, find a quiet room, and read up on Sky's climate and community commitments so you can talk about them with some substance. Our assessment centres guide has a checklist for virtual days.

These come from anonymous reviews, university careers pages and prep guides. They often disagree, and Sky has not confirmed them. Read them as leads, not rules.

• Prep sites describe an earlier Sky stage as a situational strengths test using fictional but realistic workplace scenarios.
• WikiJob describes a short telephone or video conversation, about 20 minutes, on why you want to work at Sky, though Sky's own journey page does not list it.
• Candidates on Glassdoor and The Student Room report apprenticeship processes taking roughly two to three weeks for some roles, and longer for others.
• Assessment Day notes that candidates may be asked to sit a situational strengths exercise again at the assessment centre.