Recruitment guidance

Our guidance represents good practice for the recruitment of communicators to the Civil Service and for the selection of staff for promotion.

It combines good practice from the private and the public sectors with the Civil Service Commissioners’ requirement for fair and open competition. The aim is to maintain and improve professional standards across government.


Success profiles

Success profiles is the recruitment framework used within the Civil Service. It includes a candidate overview.

The Success profiles framework is being introduced to attract and retain people of talent and experience from a range of sectors and all walks of life, in line with the commitment in the Civil Service Workforce Plan.

The framework moves recruitment away from using a purely competency-based system of assessment. It introduces a more flexible framework that assesses candidates against a range of elements using a variety of selection methods. This will give the best possible chance of finding the right person for the job, driving up performance and improving diversity and inclusivity.


Resources

Resourcing Toolkit: Recruiting for communication professionals

This toolkit is designed to be used across the Government Communication Service (GCS) profession, by individuals who are responsible for the strategic and/or operational resourcing of communications professionals.

It shares best practice, advice and guidance to support you and to ensure there is consistency across the profession. It does not supersede resourcing policy or practices which are carried out within departments.

A brief guide to competencies

The Civil Service competency framework sets out how we want people in the Civil Service to work.

Approach to writing competencies:

The STAR method

Using the STAR method:

  • Situation
  • Task
  • Actions
  • Results

It allows you to set the scene, show what and how you did and the overall outcome. The job holder (and later the interviewer) will use these methods to gather all the relevant information about a specific capability that the job requires.

The CAR approach

  • Context
  • Action
  • Result