PASS THE CONTRACTOR EXAM – Part 3: The Art of Guessing

PASS YOUR EXAM with THE ART OF GUESSING

Part 3 of a three-part series. Part 1: Study Tips. Part 2: Test Taking Strategy.

How to identify the WRONG answers & try to determine the BEST response:

Always guess instead of leaving the answer blank, there is no penalty.

• Use hints from questions you know to answer questions you do not.
• Change your first answers ONLY when you are sure of the correction, or other cues in the test cue you to change. Remember that you are looking for the best solution, not only a correct one.

Eliminate the wrong answers first – Most exam questions always feature one or more answers which are clearly incorrect:

For example, let’s look at this question:

Question: What is the relationship between a prime contractor and a subcontractor?

1. Employer-Employee
2. Contractor to Subcontractor
3. Contractual
4. No relationship

Start by looking for BAD answers first, look at the question and compare it to the various solutions.
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(1). Employer-Employee We know that on a specific project a subcontractor is not an employee of the prime contractor, they are a subcontractor so we can quickly discount this answer.

(2) Contractor to Subcontractor I like this answer because at first glance it looks like it might be possibly correct, so I am going to consider it for now.

I also like (3) Contractual, since we have determined a subcontractor is not an employee of a prime contractor, in (1) and we know that a subcontractor is also a fully licensed contractor. The Prime Contractor holds the contract for the primary project, and the subcontractor has an arrangement with the prime contractor.

(4) No relationship. This answer makes no logical sense. A prime contractor always employs a subcontractor.

CONCLUSION: We have now eliminated both (1) and (4) so guessing the correct answer (2) or (3) is 50/50 instead of having only a 25% chance of getting it right.
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Let’s look at (2) and (3), to see if we can’t improve our choice to the 100% correct answer.

The (2) Contractor to Subcontractor relationship is (3) Contractual because the subcontractor is not an employee of the prime contractor. Thus I would choose (3) Contractual as it is the best, most complete answer.

The Correct Answer is (3)