Recruiter Rachel - Transcript

Hello everyone. My name is Rachel, and I work as a Resourcing Partner for the Government Finance Function. This means I help government departments recruit people into finance roles from early careers right through to senior leadership.

I work closely with hiring managers to agree what skills and experience they need and support with recruitment campaigns, making sure we have the right people with the right skills in the right roles.

I also support candidates by helping them understand what we're looking for and how to show their strengths clearly, and we do this by running candidate support drop-in sessions and producing Application Support Guides.

The Government Finance Function spans across the whole of government, so I'll be working with multiple different departments at any time. This is what makes my role really interesting, and I really enjoy the variety.

If you want to apply for a role, the first place to start is the GFF careers website, www.financecareers.civilservice.gov.uk You'll find all finance vacancies and apprenticeships here.

This will take you through to Civil Service Jobs, where you'll need to set up an account before making an application.

Most government finance roles follow a similar process where you might be asked for a CV, a personal statement, and you might have to answer specific questions.

I would always recommend reading each role carefully and tailor your application. It is not a one-size-fits-all, and each department might be asking slightly different requirements. Also, if their department are offering a candidate drop-in session, or you've got the hiring manager's details, I'll always suggest joining a candidate drop-in session or reaching out to them. Here you can find out more about the role, the department, and truly what they're looking for to help you with your application.

My top tips would be to use the requirements of the role like a checklist to making sure you are meeting all the essential criteria. The STAR method is also a great way to structure your answers. You've got Situation, Task, Action, and Result.

So you describe the situation, but I would suggest keeping this section brief.

In the task, describe what you needed to achieve, and then you have action results, and these are the areas that are really important and that you really want to expand on to really get a good idea of what you needed to focus on, what the outcomes were, and also if you can use specific details and facts and figures, it's a great way to demonstrate your skills.

Always use the I. "What did you do? What was your impact?" As opposed to, "Well, we did this." What was your contribution in the team? And you don't have to use just work examples. They can be Duke of Edinburgh, volunteering work, any projects that you've worked on at school to really show your skills.

In government finance, it's not just about numbers. It's about how you approach your work every day and working as part of a wider team. We look at several behaviours which could include making effective decisions. That means using the information that you have and being able to weigh up different options and spotting any risks before they become problems.

Communicating and influencing is another behaviour. Finance can be complex, so being able to explain things clearly to people who aren't finance specialists is really important.

Another key behaviour that we look at is working together. You'll often be working as part of a team, so being able to build strong relationships and supporting the people around you makes a huge difference.

These are just some of the behaviours that we cover in interview process. But again, please look at the criteria for each job that you are applying for, and they will tell you exactly what they are looking for.

We would love you to join the Government Finance Function, and a great place to learn more is on our careers page. It tells you all about what it means to work in government finance, and you can watch videos and hear from people directly about the work they do and listen to their career journeys to really bring it to life. Finance roles can vary and can include analysing data, planning, budgeting, but also things like transformation, developing processes, technology, and using AI to help teams make better decisions.

I would suggest to start thinking about how you can demonstrate your skills like teamwork, communication, and problem-solving through what you do in day-to-day. This could be in school projects, part-time work, any volunteering work that you do, or any sports that you play in to show teamwork.

A career in government finance can really open so many different pathways, and you can work on a huge range of interesting projects.