2023 Senior Executive Officer: Local Government

Avdel

Im not in the first stage of shortlisting but it seems to be a very slow process in comparison to other competitions

evillive

Just got message, application successful and shortlisted, further contact to come Friday 1st

Sunnysmile

@evillive great and good luck. I wonder how many people applied for this.

Shutuplaura

Good luck to all who go forward to the next stage. I was high in the order of merit but didn't get past shirt listing. I was surprised tbh because I have recently got thru shortlisting for an AP competition using similar experience, but that's life I guess. Is it possible to get feedback on how I failed, does anyone know?

Avdel

Thats unfortunate. You can normally get feedback but its very generic l. Best of luck with the AP competition.

RunRoryRun

Same here. Was in the 60’s in OOM but going no further. Always next time 🤣

Very best of luck, everyone.

Openair22

Should everyone have heard about the short-listing who were called on the first OOM? Is there any movement beyond that yet?

evillive

Came in 30s on the OOM and shortlisted, was invited to pick a date and time to interview in the new year, which I liked (picked mid jan) options into feb if I remember right. Interview will be via zoom. I guess after that they see how many qualify and fill the vacancies by LA before taking on the next batch of applications.

Sunnysmile

Also 975 candidates applied for the competition and 707 candidates were successful after the assessment stage. And from 1 - 414 on the order of merit to Stage 2 (Shortlisting) 237 candidates were successful and called forward to the final stage which is main interview. If there's a requirement for a second batch we will be contacted via the portal .

Openair22

Thanks for the updates it’s great to know, did PAS give this info on request or is it up somewhere regarding numbers through assessment etc?

Sunnysmile

@Openair22 yes from PAS - I emailed them re the numbers and they were very quick to respond.

Avdel

Very helpful thank you

Openair22

Thanks it’s great to know, will all those moving through the process keep us up to date its interesting to hear how it’s moving particularly straight to main interview from short listing, thanks!

Avdel

Just reading this comment again and Im a bit concerned 😟

My OOM is 722 so pretty low chance of going any further in this competition. Just wondering how the 707 number is calculated considering Im 722.

Sunnysmile

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121510780#Comment_121510780

I emailed PAS and asked how many people applied and how many were successful and if there will be a second batch - and that's the response I got from PAS in the email. You can email them and ask for the numbers too. 🙂

Gargoyle711

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121510780#Comment_121510780

Could it be related to the LA's that you selected? Is there a separate OOM for different areas?

Avdel

Im not sure. Ive emailed PAS do.ill wait until they come back to me.

kaykay27

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121515206#Comment_121515206

Gargoyle711, i asked this question in earlier (could of been here can’t remember) and the advise given was that there is only 1 OOM and not for seperate LAs….im hoping demand for wicklow won’t be high

Openair22

Is there many G8 vacancies in your LA areas?

kaykay27

ohh how do you find out the number of vacancies? through pas?

Openair22

If you’re already working in a local authority you may be aware of how many vacancies there is presently and likely over the next year due to imminent retirements etc

SolarVirgin

Hi folks,

Did anyone do the main interview yet - would be interested to know how they felt it went? I did mine last week and not happy with it overall.

Question: if you do the interview are you simply marked and placed on panel based on the overall mark (even if very low on panel due to mark) or is it the case that not all interviewees make the panel at all?

Thanks

evillive

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121658538#Comment_121658538

I'm up tomorrow, my interview board all appear to be HR recruitment/related people, so hoping I'll get a good run on my local authority experience and competencies even if they mightn't directly relate from their own careers.

Re the panel, based on what I've seen before if you pass, you will be placed per your marks and up to your selected LAs to come looking whe they need a body. Good luck anyways, the more time that passes after an interview you can always pick holes in responses you gave. I can't see why they would qualify someone if they did a dreadful interview. All theyhave for us up to this point is results of an online test to put us in some starting order and an application form which the interview should use in conjunction with the chat to ascertain how suitable we really are!!!

Eimys

@SolarVirgin I did mine last week and like you I wasn't happy either. The interview was nothing like I expected especially as I've been working in the public sector a long time and done many interviews in the past. It was a strange experience and I'm glad it's over. I guess I'll find out just how bad in Feb 🤣

As for making the panel, once you pass and get the number of marks they have set you'll generally be panelled.

Gargoyle711

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121662198#Comment_121662198

Sorry to hear you both didn't feel great after the interview. I'm up next week and prepping for it now. I'm coming from not-for-profit sector so a real newbie. Can anyone remember from the booking stage what the last date for interview was? I know I selected one close to the end hoping that I'd be called on another panel that I'm on for the CS - so just wondering what date in Feb is the last interview as I expect they'll then be able to order everyone by merit according to interview. Good luck with this next phase, the waiting is hard.

evillive

Got a good run on it this morning, did t struggle with too many questions but could have been stronger. The board were fair, got all the time allowed they covered the 5 competencies outlined and threw in lots of requests for my own examples putting the ball in my court a lot.

I imagine they'll meet stronger candidates but happy with my effort given my form and prep done

Best of luck to everyone else

Eimys

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121663777#Comment_121663777

I can't remember the last date for interviews but they did tell me that I'd find out the end of February. Best of luck with the result!

SolarVirgin

I'm not sure either on the last date for interviews. The details disappeared off my messages on the PS portal. I know I was the second day from the start. If end of Feb is when we hear I plan to put it out of mind completely. I actually kept getting flashbacks on how badly it went. 😂 Anyone know how many were going to interview. I think I read somewhere that about 100 were placed from last panel (21-23) so would need to be in top 100 to have a reasonable expectation of an offer within the lifetime of the panel (obviously location dependant).

Good luck to all still to sit.

theshiek

Interview coming up, any tips?

Was it mostly a case of rolling out your own examples?

SolarVirgin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121679440#Comment_121679440

Yes for me it was. What I'd say is that there isn't a chance to really get into the meat of anything. 4/5 competencies and examples. You'd kind of be better keeping it reasonably succinct / top level. They kept interrupting to ask questions and it derailed all my flow and brought the interview away from prepared stuff. It moved quite fast and they kept apologising but saying they had to move on. I'm used to busy meetings and robust exchanges but still felt I couldn't get any traction. Perhaps for you it will be different but based on my experience my advice would be keep examples short and be ready for lots of questions - some quite off topic.

Best of luck with it.