Civil Service job personal statement - AIBU to ask for advice?

[ComingUpTrumps]

Hi all,

I’m applying for a Civil Service role that asks applicants to submit a personal statement and CV.

The personal statement word-limit is 1,000 words, so it’s a decent word length for expanding on skills and experience and reasons for wanting the job.

However, the application also has a separate section called ‘Desirable skills and experience’. The answer word-limit for this is 250 words, so it’s much less than the personal statement.

As it’s such a tiny word allowance and there are around 5 desirable skills, I’m unsure how to approach writing my answer to this section. (I’ve attached a photo of this section, for context).

One plan I have in mind is to summarise the experience mentioned in my personal statement so it fits the 250 word limit for this section and also shows what skills I have.

I don’t think it would be helpful for them if I just repeat what I wrote in the personal statement though.

Has anyone had experience of this type of application when applying for Civil Service jobs? I’d be grateful for any advice!

Bumping in case anyone has any advice :)

I’d expect to see -
Something about the organisation values and how you demonstrate them
Concrete examples of achievements that demonstrate skills
Some indication you’d researched the role, the future, the business plan/strategy and your part in that.
How you can demonstrate knowledge of current affairs and political awareness.

I've recruited for the civil service and I agree with pp, depending on the area you may want to focus on political trends impacting this area, structural changes , public opinion etc (I did some MOJ recruitment and the expectations were slightly different, although still technically civil service)

I recruit for public sector (not civil service), and I would do a bullet point for each key skill listed explaining (concisely) how I met it and preferably giving an example of a past experience.

I would put the bits about organisational values, indications that you’ve researched the role etc into the general personal statement section.

Current CS here. Business awareness and vision is less important. We have been trained to write and assess competency and behavioural examples for years and are somewhat institutionalised to value it. Personal statements are a fairly recent thing so we all still very much recognise the competency format. You should focus on examples and experience. If you can weave in the organisational values then great. But really the focus should be on what it says there under essential skills.

The job sounds like it’s probably drafting responses to Parliamentary Questions and writing briefings. Ensure your application has brilliant, succinct language use. Use examples of collaborating with others and having to write effectively, including to persuade with factual arguments.

For a competency example you would use the STAR format- look it up. In a statement you will use that less fully but it can still be there, light touch.

I’d recommend writing along the lines of:

“I have [refer to or rephrase essential skill] excellent interpersonal skills. I demonstrated this in my role as X when I had to Y (e.g. coordinate 3 teams to deliver doodlebops). [situation and task ]. I set up a network of bla blas and explored their priorities.... [actions]. In the end, my team’s goals were achieved and the network still does stuff. [result].

I thrive on e.g. collaboration and getting results at pace. For example, I [insert achievement] and I [insert larger, more full example as above].

In this role, I believe I would be able to demonstrate my political knowledge [or something that demonstrates you actually want THIS job]. I was coordinator for the X team and regularly had to negotiate over priorities while bearing in mind something-or-other. My political experience was further developed when I .. [ example].”

You should phone the hiring manager if you get the chance. They might give you some clues.

My comment above was re the personal statement. You could throw in some bullets. We like those.

For the 250 words I’d do similar to what I suggested above. But ideally using an example that demonstrates several of the essential skills.

You should also look up Civil Service Success Profiles and behaviours. There’s loads of info. The essential skills described are mainly in the ‘working together’, ‘collaborating and partnering’ and ‘delivering at pace’ behaviours.

I’m in the midst of a huge recruitment drive - don’t repeat anything , I have seen a lot of people just cut and paste CV into the personal statement and they were graded very poorly as a result. For the personal statement breakdown into the essential criteria mentioned and then for the 250 words cover off the desirable section

I've applied for loads of CS jobs and I'd be surprised if there's a winning formula. Sometimes I've been offered jobs, sometimes interviews, sometimes nothing and the way I've approached the application has been pretty consistent and thorough (I'm pretty good at applications.) In all situations I've ended up with a better job elsewhere before CS can screen the applications which can take months. I'm sure there be some good advice here but be prepared to wait and maybe don't put your eggs in one basket or get your hopes up but good luck.

I think I'd make sure that the 250 word box covered off all the essential and desirable criteria. Competency based styles of assessment can be really pernickity in terms of where something is answered- there's a risk that if you put it in the personal statement it may not be marked as that's the wrong question.

Certainly use the personal statement to emphasise your relevant skills and experience, using different examples, but make sure that the 250words stands alone and fully answers that section.

I'd also make the personal statement a bit more personal in terms of what motivates you/drives you to want to be a civil servant, in the context of some of your previous experience, and some references back to civil service roles/policy objectives. I.e. I did XYZ which resulted in a reduction in child inequality in the local area. This has given me a real understanding of the differece that XYZ can make in reducing social inequality and has given me a drive to make a real difference through work of the department.

And yes yes to using STAR format for the 250 words as well. 250 words is a challenge but they always seem to do this for essential criteria questions. Making it into a coherent response within the word count is a skill in its own right.

Thanks so much everyone! This is all really useful advice. I found it tricky to get all 5 of the essential skills to fit the 250-word word limit but hopefully managed to concisely communicate the essence of all of them in the word limit.