Question: Harrods graduate scheme?

Is anyone going or went to the assessment centre for the retail graduate scheme at harrods? I was wondering if anyone knows what kind of exercises they use. Thanks!

Answer:

Hi, I went to an assessment centre last week for the placement programme so not sure if it would be the same. But they really do work you hard. Throughout the day we had to do about 6 different tasks, involving role plays, individual speaking and a one on one interview. They really do push you, but was a really good experience and was kind of enjoyable.
For the first task they took us into Harrods in the morning before it opened and had to re-merchandise a wall in pairs. They asked us why we did it the way we did, what we found difficult and wether we would do it differently if we could do it again.
Next was an introductory talk about Harrods and what the day would intale. We then had to stand up individualy, and say are names, the university we attended, why you want to work at Harrods, and what we learnt from the first task.
Then was onto the dreaded roleplays. We were each told we would play a manager and given a pack of information about an employee who was underperforming and were told we were going to be giving the 'employee' an appraisel. We had 15 minutes to read through the pack, write notes on what we would say and then told to leave the room. One by one we were then called back into the room, where one of the interviewers pretended to be the employee.
Second role play was a group discussion. Again we were given a pack of information and told we were part of a managerial team who were having a meeting to try to improve the problems within the pack. We were given 15 minutes to prepare are notes individually, and then were made to talk for 35 minutes in the group about are findings (pretending to be managers) this was hard as you had to make sure you had valid points to add.
Another role play was a team briefing. We were given another pack with various info that needed to be brought up in a morning team brief. Again, we had 15 minutes to prepare, organising what info needed to be focused on ect. Then one by one were called into a room to give our 'team' (the interviewers) their brief.
Last was the one on one interview with a line manager, which was very relaxed. But we were asked very challenging questions so make sure you are prepared.

Hope this helps :)

I am going to the harrods assessment centre next week but for the specialist graduate programme not the retail one! I haven't been able to find anything on what the day will be like and they said we don't to prepare but I reckon it will just be some group exercises? Hopefully someone will reply who has actually been to one!