Civil Service Success Profiles are the framework used to decide what a candidate needs to demonstrate for a particular job. Instead of assessing every vacancy in exactly the same way, recruiters can select the elements that are relevant to the role.
There are five Success Profiles elements: behaviours, strengths, ability, experience and technical. You will not necessarily be assessed against all five. The job advert should tell you which elements will be used and at which stage.
The five Civil Service Success Profiles elements
| Element | What it is |
|---|---|
| Behaviours | The actions and activities people do that result in effective performance in a job. |
| Strengths | The things you do regularly, do well and that motivate you. |
| Ability | Your aptitude or potential to perform to the required standard. |
| Experience | Knowledge or mastery gained through involvement in or exposure to an activity or subject. |
| Technical | Specific professional skills, knowledge or qualifications relevant to the job. |
The framework is deliberately flexible. A policy vacancy, an operational role and a digital specialist role may all use different combinations of the five elements.
1. Civil Service Behaviours
Behaviours are the actions and activities associated with effective performance. They are grade-specific, which means the expected evidence changes as the level of the job increases.
Preparing for a Civil Service EO interview? The EO Civil Service Behaviour Interview Pack contains 18 full B-STAR model answers across all nine behaviours, with two realistic questions for each behaviour.
The nine current Civil Service behaviours are Seeing the Big Picture, Changing and Improving, Making Effective Decisions, Leadership, Communicating and Influencing, Working Together, Developing Self and Others, Managing a Quality Service and Delivering at Pace.
A vacancy will normally select only the behaviours relevant to that role. They can be assessed through written examples, interviews, tests, presentations, simulations or other selection methods.
Start with our Civil Service Behaviours guide, then use the individual behaviour pages for examples and grade-specific guidance.
2. Civil Service Strengths
Strengths are not the same as behaviours. The Civil Service defines strengths as things you do regularly, do well and that motivate you. Unlike behaviours, strengths are not defined by grade.
Official guidance describes three parts of a strength: performance, engagement and use. In other words, it is something you can do well, something that energises you and something you use regularly.
Strength questions are often shorter and more immediate than behaviour questions. The official guidance advises candidates not to rehearse scripted answers because recruiters are interested in your initial response.
Our Civil Service Strengths guide includes the current strengths dictionary, question examples and links between strengths and behaviours.
3. Civil Service Ability
Ability is your aptitude or potential to perform to the required standard. The Civil Service often assesses ability using online psychometric tests.
Common examples include the Civil Service Verbal Test and Civil Service Numerical Test. Depending on the role, other online tests may also be used. These tests are usually designed to assess aptitude rather than specialist knowledge of the vacancy.
The advert tells you if a test is part of the process. Where a Civil Service online test is used, your score may be compared with a reference group and the recruiter can set or raise the pass mark for the campaign.
4. Civil Service Experience
Experience is the knowledge or mastery of an activity or subject gained through involvement or exposure. This is the part of Success Profiles that most directly asks: what relevant things have you actually done?
Experience may be assessed through your CV, personal statement, application questions or interview. The recruiter may focus on particular essential criteria, such as leading a programme, managing budgets, operating a service, working with a particular profession or delivering a specific kind of change.
Experience questions do not always fit neatly into a behaviour framework. If the panel asks about your experience of managing suppliers, for example, answer that question directly rather than forcing an unrelated behaviour story into it.
See our Civil Service Experience Interview Questions guide for examples.
5. Civil Service Technical
Technical assessment is used where a role requires specific professional skills, knowledge or qualifications. What counts as technical depends entirely on the profession and vacancy.
A digital role might test technical knowledge of service management, architecture, data or software delivery. A finance role might assess accountancy knowledge. A project delivery role could use a professional framework or a presentation based on a delivery scenario.
Technical criteria should be stated in the advert or associated professional framework. Prepare specifically for those criteria rather than assuming generic interview preparation will cover them.
How Success Profiles are used in an application
A vacancy may use different Success Profiles elements at different stages. For example, you might complete an online ability test first, submit a CV and personal statement based on experience, provide written behaviour examples at sift and then be assessed on behaviours, strengths and technical criteria at interview.
There is no single sequence used for every Civil Service job. The key document is the vacancy advert. Read the section explaining the selection process carefully and note exactly what will be assessed at each stage.
Success Profiles at sift
At sift, recruiters assess the evidence you submitted against the advertised criteria. Depending on the vacancy, that can include behaviour statements, your CV, a personal statement, technical evidence or specific application questions.
Many Civil Service organisations use a 1–7 rating scale for scored evidence. The standard can vary by organisation and recruitment exercise, so do not assume every item is scored identically.
Our Civil Service Behaviour Scoring guide explains the common 1–7 scale in more detail.
Success Profiles at interview
At interview, questions can cover behaviours, strengths, experience and technical requirements. Presentations or other exercises can also be used. Panels assess against the criteria in the advert rather than against a universal list of interview questions.
Behaviour questions usually need structured evidence. Strength questions should sound more natural and immediate. Experience and technical questions may be more direct and can require detailed subject knowledge.
See our Civil Service interview questions and example answers for practical preparation.
What replaced Civil Service competencies?
Success Profiles replaced the old recruitment approach based primarily on the Civil Service Competency Framework. Behaviours are the closest successor to competencies, but Success Profiles are broader because recruiters can also assess strengths, ability, experience and technical requirements.
If you still see search results or older advice referring to Civil Service competencies, use our Civil Service Competencies guide to translate the old terminology into the current framework.
How to read a Civil Service advert using Success Profiles
- Find the section explaining the selection process.
- List each Success Profiles element being assessed.
- Note which stage each element appears at.
- For behaviours, check the behaviour descriptions at the grade of the vacancy.
- For experience and technical criteria, map your evidence directly to the essential criteria.
- Prepare for strengths by reflecting on your genuine preferences and ways of working rather than scripting answers.
- Check whether there is a presentation, online test or other exercise in addition to the interview.
The biggest Success Profiles mistake
The most common mistake is treating every part of the process as if it were a behaviour question. A beautifully structured STAR answer can still miss the point if the panel asked you a technical question, a direct experience question or a strength question.
Success Profiles are designed to give recruiters several different ways to assess suitability. Your preparation should do the same: know what kind of evidence each part of the vacancy is asking for, then answer in the format that best demonstrates it.
Official Success Profiles guidance
The current Cabinet Office guidance is available on GOV.UK. It includes separate guidance for behaviours, strengths, ability, experience and technical assessment.