Higher Executive Officer 2024

THats great. Best if luck with it 😊. Now if only Limk would start also.

Can I ask your OOM?

is this batch 1 Kildare?

Jesus. I'm sorry for anyone that will end up with you as a manager 😔 Can't learn empathy I suppose.

Don't be so rude. Even if you work from 8 to 4 in the office, you might not be home with traffic for another hour. If you have cover arranged until 4, then that has zero impact on work when the kids get home but if you're in the office 5x a week, that does have childcare implications. Should the kids just be left unattended for an hour?

Or was this just an excuse for you to have a whinge and a go at someone?

They haven't started Batch 2 yet f

For Offaly is this the 2nd or 3rd batch you were called off for interview?

Does anyone have any tips on How to approach the Presentation.

Its what I fell down on last time and I'd appreciate if someone could guide me towards a resource where I could pick up some ideas.

Thank you

Has anyone any update on Westmeath, have they hired anyone where are they at on panel? Are they even interviewing. This is the most frustrating part of the process. 🙃

Writing the report… my tuppence…

You are required to write 3 pages. The instruction recommends you break it down into two parts - the 'why' and 'how' of your chosen topics' project.

Mine went something like this…

Under 'why', my first page and a bit, is a summary of the chosen topic in my own words. For this, I summarised points straight from the Civil Service Renewal 2030 with a reference or a few to it, and other relevant docs such as the strategy doc for the specific departmet I chose, stating why I thought the the priority I chose should be the top priority. Look up the 'Civil Service Renewal 2024 Action Plan' pdf, and the 'Civil Service Renewal Action Plan 2024 to 2026 Progress Report' (both attached) for pointers too.

What I found useful in the early stages of looking up strategy docs and trying to get a handle on my chosen priority was to make notes of info I found that seemed relevant, but I wasn't sure where the info would fit into my report. I made these notes at the end of the 3 pages, and put them in a dififferent colour text to distinguish them as notes. For yur research, you'll likely be scanning lots of PDFs quickly, and there's nothing more frustrting then later thinking "where was that thing I read about 'X' that I could reference for point 'Y' I'm trying to make now". You may end up deleting most of these notes, or maybe using them all.

Up to this point, all you've been doing, pretty much, is putting the Renewal 2030 into your own words with references to it.

Next, is the research to help justify 'why' you think your project is needed.

For the research, find other strategy documents containing your chosen topic, and any other research you see fits your topic, and ensure you reference the sources. I like to use 'ctrl+F' to search for info on the priority in each and any pdf I found - dont read the whole thing, you only need references, and you don't want wasting time reading unnecessary stuff, which is why I suggest using the 'ctrl+F'. My research filled the rest of page two, pretty much.

Under 'how', the third page, I put forward how the project would be managed by me as an HEO.

Someone else in this thread posted the attached pdf, the 'Project Management Handbook'.

I picked the main headings from this, and used them as the steps in the project.

Go to p5 under the heading '1.2 Project Management Principles for Public Service', and you will find 11 subheadings in blue text. Use these as your headings. I wrote bullet points under each of these 11 subheadings. Some just required a sentence or two, or just a single word, and some a little more.

What the 'Handbook' did for me is it gave me a template to write the 'how' part, and, I believe, hit all the areas I may be questioned on. I did the Interdepartmental 2022 and left out any reference to costs and I fudged an answer in the Q&A. I failed the interview on that, having scored the equivalent of an approximate average of 73% across all other areas that were marked (I was gutted!). I had costs on a post it, and never put any down on the submitted sheet, which is why I recommend using the 'handbook' headings, so you dont miss any touch points.

What I found useful too was to not try and make it fit 3 pages straight off the bat. Also, when starting out, use the headings from the handbook, use bullet points under them (even one word 'points', you can fix it up later), until you feel you've given an answer under each heading. Then edit it, removing the bullet point style, and edit it to make it look more like a paragraphed report that reads with a flow.

Hope that helps someone in someway. Good luck to all!

That is a great help, thank you so much for the detailed response!

It was a reality check actually. You get promoted, due to policy you’ll most likely have to be in the office everyday for a period of time. The same policy that highlights the fact that working from home isn’t childcare. So you gonna ignore that too like you do the childcare part? What did you do before Covid? Cause most civil servants were in the office everyday.