Principal Officer competition 2019

ThumbTaxed

ThumbTaxed wrote: »

I have public sector experience and it certainly didn't help.

As I said, a crapshoot.

tea and coffee

In any previous comp I have done at lower grades, some portion of the psychometric tests (verbal/ numerical) was always used in grading.

sheepstealer

565 got me into the top 398 if that is any good to anyone

This part is new to me !!

"It is intended to invite those placed up to and including 398 on the order of merit to Stage 2 of the selection process which consists of an Online Video Interview. For those concerned further details will issue shortly."

sheepstealer

sheepstealer wrote: »

565 got me into the top 398 if that is any good to anyone

Yeah, around the 398 OoM small differences in marks make a big difference in the ranking. A nearly right versus ideal answer in one question could make a big difference in the OoM.

Tr1ckieD1ckie

Best of luck to everyone shortlisted for the video interview stage. Any idea how many posts might actually be filled on foot of this competition. I assume your placing in the OoM will also be impacted by each later stage- you're not necessarily fixed to your current placing in the OoM?

Irishder

ThumbTaxed wrote: »

We got the same score so you are as bad as me!

What did you get in the other one by the way?

458

Tr1ckieD1ckie

Tr1ckieD1ckie wrote: »

I assume your placing in the OoM will also be impacted by each later stage- you're not necessarily fixed to your current placing in the OoM?

From my reading, going by previous competitions you're starting from scratch at the next stage.

randomer542

Didn't get through
Smashed the Critical analysis one (which in my opinion is better marker for suitability to that role) but no the job simulation one which honestly, i still contend needed more detail in examples to make them viable questions.
Best of luck to all progressing

tea and coffee

Video interview info out already!!

Nautilus support

Smashed the critical and didn't make it, even though I got around 500 in the scenarios. I am going to send PAS an email asking where it was stated that the critical had no importance - hours of prepping for absolutely nothing, and 12 hypothetical questions are the only way to get to stage 2.. What a joke..

ShellyMCD

The ways of PAS are always a mystery!

Congrats to all who made it through. Best of luck with the video interviews and and all other stages of the competition.

Radial

I'm furious about this as well. Did really well on the Critical Analysis but only got 400 on the Job Simulation, so while I passed I don't think there's a chance of progressing to stage 2, even much further down the road.

Again, I would have assumed a combining of the 2 scores, this has certainly been the way in the past. I also prepared for the Critical Analysis to a large extent and it feels that it was to no avail.

I suppose it's fair in the sense everyone is treated the same, but you'd be slow to apply again based on such a 'Job Simulation'.

hardybuck

Deleted User wrote: »

I suppose it's fair in the sense everyone is treated the same, but you'd be slow to apply again based on such a 'Job Simulation'.

Job simulation will be that bit more difficult as you haven't worked at that level or if you haven't had a chance to work in the Civil Service and observe the habits of effective Principal Officers.

While everyone is in the same situation regarding the former, that's not the case for the latter.

Doodah7

From reading the last few posts, it seems that the aptitude test has set out what it intended to do. Anecdotal feedback from recent campaigns has been that many of the successful candidates have been able to 'talk the talk' but when it came to the actual role were unable to 'walk the walk' from the get-go.

Posters saying that they put huge amount of time into practicing the critical analysis but unable to do well in the job simulation (the 'walk the walk' bit) somewhat reinforces that opinion. For an existing Civil Servant, the scenarios outlined in the Job Simulation were broadly representative of what could occur (notwithstanding the seriously odd one or two) and it would have been a distinct advantage to have had access in a current role to the higher levels of the Civil Service when answering the questions. Again a point that shows that the aptitude test did its job.

To be an effective Principal Officer means being able to assess situations and use your best judgement on how to move forward, not how to crunch numbers or analyse text. A Principal Officer has staff to do that work which then feeds into the analysis process.

VanHalen

This is indeed strange - last time round i was placed high 400's whereas this time i was placed in the low one hundreds. I don't believe my ability to do this type of test has increased that dramatically. I wonder if the new format of having a camera and showing your wrists and ears (!) has anything to do with it?
Just seen the notice re video interviews to be held 2nd of December to 4th of December. It also says you wont get a message with a link to schedule the interview until Monday 2nd of December - again strange way of doing things.

Nautilus support

Doodah7 wrote: »

From reading the last few posts, it seems that the aptitude test has set out what it intended to do. Anecdotal feedback from recent campaigns has been that many of the successful candidates have been able to 'talk the talk' but when it came to the actual role were unable to 'walk the walk' from the get-go.

Posters saying that they put huge amount of time into practicing the critical analysis but unable to do well in the job simulation (the 'walk the walk' bit) somewhat reinforces that opinion. For an existing Civil Servant, the scenarios outlined in the Job Simulation were broadly representative of what could occur (notwithstanding the seriously odd one or two) and it would have been a distinct advantage to have had access in a current role to the higher levels of the Civil Service when answering the questions. Again a point that shows that the aptitude test did its job.

To be an effective Principal Officer means being able to assess situations and use your best judgement on how to move forward, not how to crunch numbers or analyse text. A Principal Officer has staff to do that work which then feeds into the analysis process.

I'm an AP and I virtually disagree with everything you said. Steering away from the "my minions will do the job of crunching numbers and analysing text for me" mentality is exactly what makes a PO a good PO. Also, strongly agreeing, agreeing or slightly agreeing (or disagreeing) in an absolute factual vacuum is not a good test, particularly when there are 12 (and not 100) questions and you can get lucky or unlucky. I know people who would ace the job and they just failed.

hardybuck

Nautilus support wrote: »

I'm an AP and I virtually disagree with everything you said. Steering away from the "my minions will do the job of crunching numbers and analysing text for me" mentality is exactly what makes a PO a good PO. Also, strongly agreeing, agreeing or slightly agreeing (or disagreeing) in an absolute factual vacuum is not a good test, particularly when there are 12 (and not 100) questions and you can get lucky or unlucky. I know people who would ace the job and they just failed.

There are most certainly excellent candidates who will fail these tests for a variety of reasons.

I'm not a fan of them, but they are a necessary evil when you have thousands of candidates going for maybe a hundred jobs. I think it's unfortunate that 2/3 of all the PO jobs have to be filled this way. That should change to 1/3.

I've also heard the anecdotal feedback coming through from the AP and PO competitions where a lot of really raw candidates seem to be coming through, but they also need to be supported to develop.

However, I don't think the minions comment is fair. I think the point is that experienced Civil Servants will probably be at an advantage in that area of the tests - which shouldn't come as a huge surprise to anyone.

How much weighting should be applied to job simulation is another debate, but again I think it would be fair to say that POs spend more time moving stuff along and using their judgement rather than analysing data.

Summer2019

Would any of the candidates in this competition, who also took part in the previous PO competition, know if more batches were called for interview or futher stages, ie. in the AP competition they reached candidates who got order of merit 1700 or more in stage 1.


As this PO competition will be open for two years, there might be another batch called forward to stage 2.


Any views on this?

ShellyMCD

It didn’t happen in the last competition. There was only 1 batch called. And only 1 batch called in 2015. The ratio of APs to POS is probably 3:1, so can’t see that there is the same demand.

Riskymove

Summer2019 wrote: »

Any views on this?

in neither of the previous 2 competitions were additional batches called

it is very unlikely unless lots of people fail to get on the panel


Off the top of my head
In 2015 about 350 were called to next stage and 180 put on a panel

in 2017 they only called about half that and only 80 or so made it to a panel

There are still people on the 2017 panel for regional posts



So really given the numbers of actual PO vacancies expected I cannot see more than one batch on a panel for 2 years

ThumbTaxed

Doodah7 wrote: »

From reading the last few posts, it seems that the aptitude test has set out what it intended to do. Anecdotal feedback from recent campaigns has been that many of the successful candidates have been able to 'talk the talk' but when it came to the actual role were unable to 'walk the walk' from the get-go.

Posters saying that they put huge amount of time into practicing the critical analysis but unable to do well in the job simulation (the 'walk the walk' bit) somewhat reinforces that opinion. For an existing Civil Servant, the scenarios outlined in the Job Simulation were broadly representative of what could occur (notwithstanding the seriously odd one or two) and it would have been a distinct advantage to have had access in a current role to the higher levels of the Civil Service when answering the questions. Again a point that shows that the aptitude test did its job.

To be an effective Principal Officer means being able to assess situations and use your best judgement on how to move forward, not how to crunch numbers or analyse text. A Principal Officer has staff to do that work which then feeds into the analysis process.

The comments of a spoofer

Doodah7

Nautilus support wrote: »

I'm an AP and I virtually disagree with everything you said. Steering away from the "my minions will do the job of crunching numbers and analysing text for me" mentality is exactly what makes a PO a good PO. Also, strongly agreeing, agreeing or slightly agreeing (or disagreeing) in an absolute factual vacuum is not a good test, particularly when there are 12 (and not 100) questions and you can get lucky or unlucky. I know people who would ace the job and they just failed.

It is nothing to do with minions at all and if you think that analysing text and crunching numbers is what a PO is about, then you need to recalibrate your thinking.

I too am an AP and found the job simulation quite straightforward, finishing it in about half the time allotted, basically as it simulated certain work scenarios effectively...

Doodah7

ThumbTaxed wrote: »

The comments of a spoofer

You think?

Going by the feedback, looks like I barely missed the top third for the Job Simulation, not bad for a never Public Servant.

Going by this, approx 1200 (398*3) passed. And only the top third of the 1200 got through.

ThumbTaxed

Doodah7 wrote: »

From reading the last few posts, it seems that the aptitude test has set out what it intended to do. Anecdotal feedback from recent campaigns has been that many of the successful candidates have been able to 'talk the talk' but when it came to the actual role were unable to 'walk the walk' from the get-go.

Posters saying that they put huge amount of time into practicing the critical analysis but unable to do well in the job simulation (the 'walk the walk' bit) somewhat reinforces that opinion. For an existing Civil Servant, the scenarios outlined in the Job Simulation were broadly representative of what could occur (notwithstanding the seriously odd one or two) and it would have been a distinct advantage to have had access in a current role to the higher levels of the Civil Service when answering the questions. Again a point that shows that the aptitude test did its job.

To be an effective Principal Officer means being able to assess situations and use your best judgement on how to move forward, not how to crunch numbers or analyse text. A Principal Officer has staff to do that work which then feeds into the analysis process.

Yeah because doing better than another person on a job simulation is indicative of "walking the walk"! The opposite is totally the case. Those simulations are flawed and, based on results of similar tests on other competitions, this has lead to some bizarre people being called for interview over others.

But look if job simulation is weighted more highly than a cv of actual work, good luck to them if that is what they want.

Nautilus support

Doodah7 wrote: »

It is nothing to do with minions at all and if you think that analysing text and crunching numbers is what a PO is about, then you need to recalibrate your thinking.

I too am an AP and found the job simulation quite straightforward, finishing it in about half the time allotted, basically as it simulated certain work scenarios effectively...

I've never said it's what being a PO is about. But I've worked with many POs and the fact that the next batch will be chosen regardless of how quickly they can grasp basic info and or work with numbers is quite scary.

Also, I've just asked PAS where in the info booklet they mentioned the fact that the critical analysis was not going to be taken into account, and they responded that they decided after the tests were taken. I'm going to lodge a complaint as this has inevitably favoured a group of people over another, and they can't move the goalpost after someone scores

Nautilus support

Nautilus support wrote: »

Also, I've just asked PAS where in the info booklet they mentioned the fact that the critical analysis was not going to be taken into account, and they responded that they decided after the tests were taken.

As I said much further back, the Critical Analysis is pretty much an IQ test. Once you're over a certain IQ it's not necessarily an advantage (possibly a disadvantage). Plenty of Mensa types holding down very mundane jobs.

And the job simulation is just a whittling down exercise, nobody is going to be hired on the basis of this job simulation. It's a refined lottery, nothing more. Although I do understand the frustration of anyone missing out.

Matt le Kocha

The fact that the decision to ignore the analysis results was made after the exams is extremely worrying. This was not approach taken in previous competitions afaik.

Riskymove

Matt le Kocha wrote: »

The fact that the decision to ignore the analysis results was made after the exams is extremely worrying. This was not approach taken in previous competitions afaik.

I may be confusing it with a different competition, but if I recall in the previous one you had to pass the maths bit but it was not used to assess you for the panel