Jun 5 • 🎯 Coaching & Accountability
Stuck at 64-65% on your Red Seal?
Here's why (and the 4 words costing you marks)
It's almost never what you think.
I've coached a lot of tradespeople who are strong in the field but keep landing in the mid-60s on the written exam.
Same story every time: "I know this trade. I don't understand why I'm failing."
Here's the truth most of them don't know.
The Red Seal exam is less than 10% memory recall.
The rest — 90% — is apply it and diagnose it.
So if you're studying by memorizing facts, you're drilling the smallest part of the test.
That's why knowing the trade cold and still scoring 64% isn't a contradiction.
You're losing marks in how the questions are read, not in what you know.
And it usually comes down to four words. These each want a different answer — even on the exact same system:
- FIRST — the very first thing you do
- NEXT — the step after what's already been done
- BEST — the best of several choices that could all work
- CAUSE — the most likely reason for the problem
Watch for NOT and EXCEPT too — they flip the whole question.
Most people in the mid-60s pick the right system but the wrong one of those four.
You answer with a correct action — just not the FIRST one, or the BEST one, that the question actually asked for.
That's a handful of marks, every exam, quietly costing you the pass.
The fix isn't more PDFs.
It's a method. On every question:
- Underline the key word (first / next / best / cause / NOT).
- Say what it's really asking.
- Cross out the two answers you know are wrong.
- Choose between the last two — and say why in your head.
Slow down a little to read carefully. It actually saves time, because you stop changing right answers into wrong ones.
If you're stuck in the 60s, you're probably closer than you feel — often just a few marks.
The work isn't learning the trade over again. It's plugging the leak.
Drop your trade + how many attempts below and I'll tell you the one block most people in your trade leak marks on. 👇
Red Seal 309A Construction Electrician and IBEW Local 993 member with 15 years in the field — BC Hydro Site C, Dawson Creek Hospital, industrial controls, GE Wind.
Red Seal Rescue, is a national coaching program for Canadian Red Seal candidates who are strong on the tools and stuck on the written exam.
Namaste, Will Do no harm. Take no shit. Pass your exam.
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Stuck at 64-65% on your Red Seal?
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