This is not an interview
The Core Standard is a realistic, scored assessment that puts an assistant through a real working day. Employers use it to see how a candidate performs before they hire. EAs and Private PAs use it to prove how good they are and stand out in recruitment processes, giving employers and recruiters real evidence of how they perform, not just how they interview.
Which one are you?
Launching autumn 2026. Founding-group members get early access, 20% off, and a hand in shaping the product.
Built by two specialists: the founder of Lily Shippen, one of the UK’s leading specialist EA recruitment agencies, and award-winning C-suite EA, Emily Partridge.
The person taking it, your candidate, or you assessing yourself, is dropped into a realistic working day: the same calibrated scenario for every candidate at that level. Real decisions, no multiple choice. Every answer is written in their own words. It shows how someone actually thinks, not what they rehearsed for an interview.
Every response is scored on the five pillars: acuity, partnership, communication, prioritisation and execution, then reviewed and signed off by a specialist before it reaches anyone.
You pick the level and send your candidate a private, single-use link. They sit a realistic working day online. You receive a detailed report, scored across acuity, partnership, communication, prioritisation and execution, with a clear hire recommendation, before you've spent an hour interviewing.
No more relying on gut feeling. No more polished interviewers who fall apart in week one. You see how they actually think, at the level you're hiring for.
This one is for you. For years we have watched brilliant EAs and Private PAs miss out on roles they would have been perfect for, judged on how they read on paper rather than on what they can actually do. A CV cannot show judgement, or how you think when a day falls apart. The Core Standard is your chance to prove it, on your own terms.
You don't need an employer to send you this. Take the same assessment employers use, on your own, and get TCS Certified: a full report on how you did, a one-page summary for recruiters, a digital badge, and a certificate. One sitting, graded against every level, your result is the level you demonstrated.
Every CV says "proactive, discreet, detail-oriented." This is the proof.
In 15 years of specialist EA recruitment, the question we were asked more than any other by clients was: "How do you test your candidates?" At Lily Shippen we heavily vet every candidate we place, but there was always a missing piece.
Interviews test confidence and presentation. They don't reveal how someone triages a chaotic inbox at 8am, handles a last-minute board paper, or navigates a sensitive situation with a difficult stakeholder.
The Core Standard fills that gap. Every assessment is a realistic working day, designed from real situations we've seen play out across hundreds of placements. It's built on what actually predicts success in the role, not what looks good across a desk.
We have always cared about championing this profession. Businesses have to evolve in how they hire, because when they do not, the same brilliant people keep being overlooked for how they read on paper rather than what they can do. This is our attempt to change that, and to give an assistant a way to prove how good they are, on their own terms.
Lily Shippen recruits. eavolve develops. The Core Standard assesses. Together, they support EAs and PAs and the businesses that rely on them, from hire, through development, to measurable performance.
Lily Shippen & Emily Partridge, Co-founders of The Core Standard
Every other profession has a benchmark. Lawyers qualify, accountants sit their exams, salespeople have their numbers. Executive Assistants and Private PAs have had nothing: no independent, objective way to show the level they actually work at.
So when you go for an internal promotion, ask for the payrise you have earned, or move to a new role, you are left making your case on a CV and a good interview. Neither shows how you think when a day falls apart, how you protect a principal under pressure, or how you hold a room in writing. The Core Standard gives you that benchmark: an independent, scored measure of how you perform across a real working day, and something concrete to put in front of your manager or a new employer, evidence rather than opinion.
The Core Standard opens this autumn. Join the waitlist for launch news and updates, and be first to hear when the soft-launch price goes live.
No spam. Just launch news, early access, and your discount.
For the first two weeks after launch, sit the full Core Standard Certified assessment at the soft-launch price of £100, instead of the standard £225. Limited to the launch window.
Claim the £100 soft-launch price