When aligning a CV and Success Statement for a senior executive position in the Civil Service, it's crucial to tailor these documents according to the Civil Service's Success Profile Framework. This framework evaluates candidates not just on their competencies but on a combination of elements including behaviours, strengths, ability, experience, and technical skills relevant to the role.
Special Considerations for Civil Service CVs and Success Statements
Each section of the CV and Success Statement should directly respond to the selection criteria detailed in the job description. This involves carefully reading the job description to understand which elements of the Success Profile are most relevant and tailoring the CV to highlight these elements. Broad elements include:
- Behaviours - These should reflect the specific behaviours outlined in the job description which might include leadership, communicating and influencing, working together, and delivering at pace. Each behaviour should be substantiated with concrete examples that showcase effective performance and outcomes in previous roles.
- Experience - Highlight relevant experiences that demonstrate mastery and knowledge in fields pertinent to the job role. This includes detailing specific situations or roles where you've effectively applied your skills in a real-world government or public sector context.
- Strengths and Ability - Identify and articulate your core strengths and abilities that resonate with the requirements of the role. This may include decision-making capabilities, strategic thinking, or specific skills like policy formulation or stakeholder engagement.
- Technical Skills - If the role requires particular technical knowledge or qualifications, these should be prominently listed and detailed, showing both the qualification and how it has been applied practically.
The Success Statement, in particular, should succinctly articulate how your background, skills, and experiences make you the best candidate for the role, directly addressing the key elements of the Success Profile Framework relevant to the specific job. This approach ensures that your application is not only comprehensive but also directly aligned with the Civil Service's holistic method of assessing candidates.
Behaviour elements to address in your CV and success statement
Seeing the Big Picture
- Qualitative - Describe your understanding of the broader organisational goals and how your role contributes to these. Include any strategic initiatives you have influenced or led.
- Quantitative - Provide specific outcomes, such as increased efficiency or cost savings, that resulted from your strategic initiatives or decisions.
Changing & Improving
- Qualitative - Discuss your ability to adapt to changes and lead transformation efforts, including how you encourage innovation within your team.
- Quantitative - Cite specific examples of improvements made, such as process enhancements, and quantify their impact on operations, e.g., reducing processing time by X%.
Making Effective Decisions
- Qualitative - Illustrate your decision-making process, including how you gather and analyse information to form decisions.
- Quantitative - Mention the results of key decisions, such as the successful implementation of a new system, including any measurable benefits like reduced errors.
Leadership
- Qualitative - Describe your communication strategies and how you tailor your approach to different stakeholders to influence outcomes.
- Quantitative - Provide examples of team achievements, such as project completions, or improvements in team performance metrics.
Communicating & Influencing
- Qualitative - Describe your communication strategies and how you tailor your approach to different stakeholders to influence outcomes.
- Quantitative - Detail specific instances where your communication skills led to successful negotiations or stakeholder buy-in, highlighting the tangible outcomes.
Working Together
- Qualitative - Explain your approach to collaboration and building effective partnerships both within and outside the organisation.
- Quantitative - Quantify the success of collaborative projects, for example, through the number of collaborative projects or the percentage increase in partner engagement.
Developing Self and Others
- Qualitative - Discuss your commitment to personal and professional development, including how you support the growth of others.
- Quantitative - Share metrics or feedback that illustrate the improvements in performance or capabilities as a result of your development efforts.
Managing a Quality Service
- Qualitative - Focus on your approach to upholding high standards of service delivery and customer satisfaction.
- Quantitative - Provide specific examples, such as customer service ratings or compliance rates, to demonstrate the effectiveness of your service management.
Delivering at Pace
- Qualitative - Highlight your ability to efficiently manage workloads and prioritize tasks to meet deadlines.
- Quantitative - Offer examples where your ability to deliver at pace resulted in meeting critical deadlines or achieving targets ahead of schedule.
By strategically incorporating both qualitative and quantitative information in the description of behaviours, applicants can create a well-rounded profile that convincingly portrays their suitability for the role in terms of both actions and outcomes. This holistic approach is vital in Civil Service applications, where both the impact and the method of achieving it are valued.
Schedule an appointment
Please click on the telephone icon to arrange a complimentary call at a time that is mutually convenient.
~ Elle Bradshaw