5.2 Honest, Accurate LES Answers: Recall, Estimates & Consistency
Key Takeaways
HRD's guide said the WSQ and LES contain internal mechanisms to identify dishonest responding, which may lead to disqualification.
For count questions, fix the time window, use records, count events rather than impressions and match the question's exact condition.
Answer questions about how others see you from evidence such as performance evaluations, not from how you would like to be seen.
Accurate answers are automatically consistent; answers invented for effect tend to contradict each other.
Honestly reported ordinary imperfections are weak bypass grounds; proven untruthfulness is treated far more seriously.
5.2 Honest, Accurate LES Answers: Recall, Estimates & Consistency
The LES asks you to count, estimate and recall: how often, how many, since when, compared with whom. Most candidates who give inaccurate answers are not lying; they are guessing quickly about things they never tallied. This section is about getting those answers right, which is what honesty requires in practice.
Why Accuracy Matters Twice
The 2019 HRD-format preparation guide gave two reasons to answer honestly, even when others suggest shading answers to look better:
- Built-in checks. The WSQ and LES "contain internal mechanisms" that can identify candidates who are not responding honestly. If your pattern suggests dishonesty, you may be disqualified.
- Background verification. Departments run their own background investigations and obtain information related to some LES and WSQ questions. If what they find is inconsistent with your answers, they may disqualify you.
HRD does not publish how the internal checks work, so any specific claim about "lie scales" or statistical cutoffs in prep material is speculation. The safe rule needs no guesswork: answer what is true, as precisely as you can.
Answering Count Questions
Questions like "Within the past two years, how many times have you...?" are easiest with a method:
- Fix the window. "The past two years" means the 24 months before the exam, not your whole work history.
- Use records when you have them. Pay stubs, scheduling apps, school attendance reports and old emails often show absences or late arrivals.
- Count events, not impressions. "I rarely miss work" is an impression. "I called out twice last winter when I had the flu, and once to move apartments" is a count of three.
- Answer the question's exact condition. The sample question asked about days off taken "because you did not feel like going to work." A documented illness may not fit that wording. Read the condition carefully and count only what matches.
- Choose the range that contains your count. If the options are never, once, twice, three times and more than three times, and your count is three, choose three.
Answering "How Would Others Describe You?" Questions
The sample question "Your previous supervisor would describe you as someone who usually does..." asks for another person's view. Base it on evidence:
- What did your performance evaluations actually say?
- Were you given extra responsibilities, asked to train new staff or offered more hours?
- Did a supervisor ever counsel you about workload or effort?
If your evidence says "about as much work as most coworkers," that is a respectable, honest answer. Most people are average on most things.
Consistency Without Memorizing
Biographical surveys often ask about related facts in different ways. You might be asked about job changes in one item and the length of your longest job in another. Accurate answers are automatically consistent. Answers made up for effect tend to contradict each other.
Your personal history timeline from Section 5.1 is the best consistency tool. If you know you held three jobs since high school, and your longest lasted 26 months, every related answer will line up.
Minor Flaws Are Normal
Every adult has missed a deadline, changed jobs, lost a temper or had a weak semester. An LES profile describing a perfect past is less believable, not more impressive.
Massachusetts civil service hiring decisions focus on evidence, not perfection. When a candidate is bypassed, the Civil Service Commission asks whether the department had reasonable justification supported by credible evidence (Section 1.3). An ordinary, honestly reported imperfection is a weak basis for a bypass. Proven untruthfulness is a different matter, because honesty goes to the core of police work, and it is much harder to overcome.
| Situation | Honest LES approach |
|---|---|
| You left a job after a conflict with a manager | Answer job-change and supervisor questions accurately; be ready to explain later. |
| You failed a course and retook it | Report completion and effort accurately; the retake shows persistence. |
| You have little community involvement | Choose the low option; describe other responsibilities, like family or work, where asked. |
| You cannot remember an exact number | Reconstruct it from records; otherwise choose the most likely range, not the most flattering. |
A Quick Pre-Exam Checklist
- Timeline of schools, jobs and activities with month and year
- Count of jobs held, and reasons for each departure
- Rough count of unplanned absences and late arrivals in the past two years
- What your last two supervisors' evaluations said
- Community, volunteer, team or military activities and how often you take part
Bring this knowledge into the exam room in your head, not on paper. Follow the notice to appear about what you may bring.
An LES question asks how many times in the past two years you took a day off because you did not feel like working. You took three sick days with the flu and one unplanned day off to go to the beach. Which count best matches the question?
Four, because every absence in the two-year window counts toward the total
Zero, because absences for any medical reason never count on the LES
One, because only the beach day matches the question's condition
Three, because illness absences are the only ones employers track
What did the 2019 HRD-format preparation guide say could happen if a candidate's WSQ and LES responses suggest the candidate is not answering honestly?
The candidate may be disqualified
Nothing, because the survey cannot detect dishonest answers
HRD automatically adds a penalty of exactly 10 points
The candidate is required to retake the WAT
A candidate's supervisor evaluations consistently rated them "meets expectations." An LES question asks how a previous supervisor would describe their workload compared with coworkers. Which answer is most defensible?
More than their fair share, because that answer sounds best
Less than most coworkers, to appear humble
Leave it blank, since supervisors are subjective
About as much as most coworkers, matching the evaluations
Why does a written personal history timeline help with LES consistency?
Candidates may bring it into the exam room and copy answers from it
Answers drawn from accurate dates and counts agree across related questions
HRD requires it to be uploaded along with the online application
It replaces the background investigation that the department would run
Sections you finish are checked off in the contents.