To ask for advice on how to improve a Civil Service job application (rejected after initial sift)?

[LimaLemur]

Hi all,

I’m currently a civil servant working at EO (executive officer) level, which is a fairly junior grade.

I recently applied for a role at HEO (higher executive officer) level, which I was particularly interested in.

I’ve just found out that my application wasn’t successful, unfortunately.

The application went through an initial sift on the competency communicating and influencing, and I scored a 3 unfortunately, which I’m a bit frustrated about.

Does anyone have any advice that they might be able to offer here (either in the thread or on private message) about improving competency scores, please? I feel a bit deflated.

Thanks for your help, everyone.

Use specific examples for each competency and if possible give measurable results

E.g) I did x resulting in y demonstrating z

Ask for feedback as well

Thanks for your reply, Shoxfordian.

I don’t think I’m able to ask for feedback, unfortunately, as my application didn’t pass the initial sift, where it scored 3 out of 7 (as mentioned above).

In terms of using specific examples and giving measurable results (for this particular example and for others), I made sure to give specific examples of how I demonstrated the competency and a clear result.

(This example was about helping a student to prepare for an exam, so I mentioned the predicted grade that she had and that she achieved this grade in the exam that I had helped her to prepare for).

Bump :)

I’m now at a stage where I’ve applied for three roles at HEO level and I haven’t yet got to the interview stage for any of them.

I’ve received feedback (with numerical scores) on my competency answers, but no written feedback that would help me understand where I’m doing well with my answers and where I need to improve.

I feel deflated and at a bit of a loss as I’m not sure how I can improve my answers to the competency questions so I can get higher scores.

Please could someone advise?

is your department still using competencies or have they moved onto success profiles? your approach will need to be different depending on that. if it is still competencies at sift stage it is a tick box exercise, so in order to have a high scoring competency you will need to meet all of the good behaviours and none of the bad. Read the framework advice and make sure all of the positive behaviours are included - this is sometimes really hard because they don't naturally fit into your example, so you might need to merge two examples into one. Its also important to use the STAR approach. TBH i'm not very successful at these competencies either...

if you have received numerical scores it will give an idea of how strong your examples are - 4 is supposedly a pass but it can sometimes be 3 if few candidates, or 5 if lots...

Can you ask a HEO or SEO in your area, preferably one who does recruitment or has recently been recruited, to go through your application with you? It's how I've always improved and don't know anyone to be honest who is successful without asking for help in that way

Yeah pick a couple of either managers or recently been through recruitment process colleagues to have a look for you? If you PM me your comp I don’t mind commenting briefly but too much feedback can sometimes be counter constructive and confuse you!

I'm a G6 in the Civil Service and do lots of recruitment. If you'd like to PM me I'll drop you my email address - you can send through your most recent examples and I'll have a look if you like.

If you don't want to though that's fine - can you ask your manager, or a mentor, for help with them?

Wow, very generous offer @HavelockVetinari Can I send you mine the next time a competition comes up?

Thanks for your guidance, mamado and Jager!

mamado, the applications were all done using success profiles, although I didn’t have to submit a CV or personal statement with my application, so I just wrote my answers to the competencies they asked for using the STAR format as I’d done previously for competency-based applications.

Jager, thanks, that’s really helpful - I’ll definitely ask my colleagues if they're happy to have a look at my applications.

In the meantime, would anyone here at HEO level or above be happy to have a look at my answer to the sifting competency (communicating and influencing) and suggest any improvements or changes?

f83 and Havelock, thank you so much - that’s so generous of you both!

@GiveMyHeadPeaceffs sure! I've helped a few MNers over the years with this kind of thing, I remember how tough I found competency stuff when I was starting out.

@HavelockVetinari thank you so much!

My department is just moving to success profiles and from the training it’s less of a tick box exercise and the competencies are graded overall as an example instead. In theory it should make it easier to use real examples but we’ll have to wait and see! Have you done the training on CS learning/discover?