Civil Service- mistake?

[Elli123]

Hi, I recently joined the civil service after a long service in another public sector organisation. This has been a total career change for me, I’ve been there 6 weeks and hating it!!! I’ve practically been given no induction or training and pretty much just been left doing very little. My line manager is in back to back meetings so has spent approx 3 hours in total with my in 6 weeks. I’m mainly home working as all of my team are in a different location. Are all civil service departments like this?
I applied for another role in a different department at the same time as my current one and although I passed the interview for this, I’ve found out I’ve been put on the reserve list. I had hoped this might be an escape route…,
Im now wondering if maybe joining the civil service was a bad idea (I was attracted by flexibility and pension as still have primary school kids). Both jobs are SEO level.
any thought/ advice appreciated.

In our department you couldn't level transfer without being 'released' by current post, is the other post a higher grade (sorry if I missed it on the thread)

You should have clear work objectives, do you have these yet as you can then think what you might need development with - maybe job shadowing colleagues, or even your line manager or other appropriate people. If you do not have work objectives you should chase as the line manager should always set these in agreement with you.

You'll be on probation, so you should be having regular checkpoint calls, even after probation these should be monthly 121's and ensure you raise your concerns there and that you note them, there should be a form for your department to record these conversations and send a copy afterwards to line manager.

Definitely not all departments or teams are like this but unfortunately this hasn't been a positive experience because of line manager failings, yes they may be very busy but you still should be getting a bit of clarity and help to bed in, even in a self-starting type environment....

I started at a G7 role earlier this year and could have written something very similar. In fact, by week 7 I had a job offer for something else. I stayed in the end for the pension and flexibility but not the job, which is dull and has too many managers. I was recruited on a general “we want people from outside of this sector and will support them to be x” (x is a DDAT profession). Unfortunately no one told my line manager this who was expecting a specialised and experienced x. i was thrown at it and expected to get on with it (which is fine, the salary and grade was a demotion from my last job) but with no technical knowledge or support it was dreadful. I will not stay long term - it is friendly but they have no idea how to treat people and ambition is not supported.