Recommendation for IT Certificate.

[Zardoz]

. And that test wasn't considered easy- I was told after having passed the test that there was a job retraining scheme for university graduates who were paid to receive 1 year of full-time training and preparation for this test, and less than 50% of the participants passed. That really blew my mind.

Keep in mind that it is in the test provider's interests to create the perception (accurate or not) that a given test is difficult. Not only does it raise the status of the test, it also encourages those who have finished the test more likely to boast . . . sorry, more likely to share with others their incredible accomplishment - creating the overall perception of some sort of elite status or closed 'membership' which others want to join.

It is true that test providers attempt to create the perception of difficulty, but that's ancillary to the main objective, which is to create the perception of practical competency in a given domain. And that is what test-takers who have passed the test actually want to boast about.

But that perception doesn't necessarily match reality, because the tests don't actually validate practical competency. What they validate is rote memorization, abstract logical reasoning and perhaps more than anything else, the test taker's motivation/determination/grit to actually pass the test. To be sure, these are very desirable qualities. They are just not the quality that the test purports to be validating and that the successful test-taker typically represents him/her/xirself to be having.