NEW 2022 Assistant Principal Competition - Open and Interdepartmental

Hi all, just sharing an update - PAS have confirmed there are about 17 people ahead of me to be called for clearance. I'm 10th on the open, batch 4.3.

@Foxy1987

Including below the task that I had as part of the interview process.

Your Task
You are to assume the role of a recently appointed Assistant Principal Officer,
working in a Government Department in the Civil Service and giving a presentation to
a group of senior managers in the Civil Service. You are required to research a
particular topic/objective from the Programme for Government. Your task is to identify
the relevant issues, summarising and evaluating existing strategy, policy or initiatives
in this area and setting out 2 key actions that the Civil Service could take in furthering
this objective.

We were given a list of 4 topics and to choose 1. It was very vague but left opportunity to focus in an an area that you might have experience of or have an interest in. It says don't take more than 3 hours. It took me that length of time just to understand the ask.

Hope that helps.

That is really helpful thanks for this I really appreciate it!

Better get to work on my competencies before I get the topics!

Thanks again @PWDUB

@Ritournelle are you an open candidate for Dublin? I’m batch 3.3 and was told last week there were 8 ahead of me still for the open and I should be toward the end of that batch!

Hi all,

I have recently received my position first time in civil service.

I have my contract and it states 35 hours net or 41 hours 15 gross, can someone explain this as even with including lunch breaks it doesn't add up.

I am not on the clock and want to make sure I am doing all that is expected of me, I keep record of my times daily incase it was ever queried. Currently I am working approx 7 hours a day to get my 35 a week.

This is no doubt a stupid question.

3 hours to do a 2 page report and presenation on your area you are not working in……🙄 Fair play to anyone who managed that!.

I have no idea if I completed the exercise correctly or not!! But.. when I was drafting the report I did some research first & made brief notes. Then I expanded further on these for the draft. After that it took a lot of editing to get down to 2 pages. For me the editing was the most time-consuming part. I ended up with a report containing a very brief synopsis of each point researched. I expanded a little more on these when I was delivering the presentation, however time flies by quickly. Afterwards, in the questions posed by the panel, I found that they generally took a line or two from my report/presentation each time & asked me questions around it. That gave me further opportunity to provide additional info & (hopefully!) demonstrated I had done more research on the topic outside of what I had presented. . Also have some examples ready on juristictions outside of Ireland where they may experience similar issues, scenarios etc. Be able to compare & contrast between both. Best of Luck to everyone!!

Hi all, I am nearing the completion of my strategic analysis and I am panicked I have completely gone off track. Can anyone advice me if you took your strategic analysis objective and related it back to your current workplace? For example a topic around lifelong learning? TIA

Hi. I chose a topic which related to a different area from which I work so I was not in a position to relate it back.

I am also not really in a position to advise you on this as this is my first comp & I do not have enough of knowledge regarding the correct procedures to follow... However I just wanted to mention that the assignment booklet advises taking an impartial approach & therefore suggests not to personalise the activity. Just be careful & ensure you are still abiding by this so that you do not present one-sided personal views in the presentation as I think you could be marked down for that. Just something to be aware of! I hope someone else on here can offer you better & more constructive advice! Best of Luck!

Hi folks,

I finally got my log in sorted I've been following this thread for a while now, I was advised last week that there are 5 ahead of me for the Open Panel Dublin and I'm batch 4. Does anyone know if there has been any more movement? This thread is so handy 😊

Hi All,

I had my interview on 29/06/2024 and I believe they were interviewing up to Friday 05/06/2024 I hope everyone did well.

Do you know is there interviews this week or will the results be out by 21/07/24

TIA

Fwiw, with the previous batch of interviews, the last interviews were scheduled for 13 May and I received my results on 21 May so hopefully you will hear in the week or two

yes been staring at the phone all day!

To be honest I thought the worst bit was waiting to be admitted on Zoom best of luck !

yes starting to get nervous now usually out just before 4pm so best of luck

Results for Batch 4.3 out. Delighted/relieved to say I passed. Might be a while before I'm placed of course, if this thread is anything to go by! Congratulations to anyone else who passed, and commiserations to anyone who's missed out. It's a long old slog, but if you've gone through it once, your chances next time out are automatically better.

Delighted to get on the Open and Interdepartmental panels, well done to everyone and hard luck to those who were unlucky this time.

Thought we would hear by Friday but at lease don’t have to wait a few more days to find out!!

Does anybody know where the recruitment currently is at for open and interdepartmental panels?

I'm pretty sure that the OOM is just for the batch.

Congratulations everyone! The OOM is just for your batch, so even if you were e.g. number 3 on 4.3, there could still be e.g 20 + people ahead of you from previous batches to be placed.If you email clearance they give you an indication of this, seems to have slowed a bit but maybe thats summer holidays et al

We have just commenced the pre-employment checks of the Open candidates in batch 4.1 and we have completed the pre-employment checks of Interdepartmental candidates in batch 4.2.

We will commence the pre-employment checks of Interdepartmental candidates in batch 4.3 in the coming weeks. We will move through the order of merit as Interdepartmental vacancies are logged with us.

Congrats to everyone that got on the panel .unfortunately I missed out on the qualifying standard in one of the competencies just wondering is the results the full extent of the feedback available?