It still baffles me that people do applications so badly for jobs with pretty high salaries. An application generally includes two things — a cover letter and a resume. And people mess them up. Sometimes it is because they read a private-sector-oriented website about jobs and cover letters and try to keep it to a page — this is NOT how government applications work, so many people get screened out because they listened to the wrong advice. This chapter will tell you exactly what to do, some minor variations if you want to be creative, and some very clear things NOT to do.
You’ve seen an announcement of a “selection process”. You have printed out the list of qualifications (“merit criteria”), and you’re ready to start. If you look at the Statement of Merit Criteria (aka the “poster”), you’ll see a bunch of different sections in it. The five most important ones, and how they are tested, are listed below.
AREA | WHERE TESTED |
Eligibility criteria |
|
Essential Experience |
* Officially it is 100% through the above two elements, but in practice, it is more like 80% cover letter, 5% resume, 5% written, 10% interview — I will explain what I mean by that where relevant below |
Knowledge |
|
Abilities |
|
Personal Suitability |
* Similar to the experience section above, this is for the official reference checks, but in a practical world there is approximately 5-10% that is through informal reference checks, and I’ll cover that in more detail below. |
With that framework in mind, we now turn to the meat of this chapter — crafting your application with your cover letter, your resume, and information about applying online.
Understanding cover letters for government
The application process has changed dramatically in the last eighteen months as most departments are now insisting on applying online only, and not giving an option to submit a cover letter by email. However, the principle is the same, so I am going to cover the standard cover letter for government competitions in order to show you the standard of what they are looking for even in the new online application process.
We’ll start with a typical cover letter. You’ve heard of cover letters before, you have even probably written some. And you’ve vaguely heard those magical words of wisdom from 20 years ago that is all over the internet — “your cover letter should be no longer than a page”. If you listen to that advice, you will get screened out. You will fail the application process, and you won’t even get to actually show your skills. Why? If you look back in the chapter on the overall process, I said the cover letter is the first step for candidates in a very bureaucratized process that is governed by legislation.
And I want to scare you with something about the importance of your cover letter. If you do a PROPER cover letter, the first one should probably take you at least two to three hours to do. After you have several samples done for different competitions, you’ll see some of the elements start to repeat, and your time will drop, but it should still take you at least an hour. If you are doing it quicker than that, there’s a pretty good chance you are missing things.
If your Uncle Harry wants to hire someone to work om his ice cream store, he can run a quick interview, ask you some basic questions, and as long as he doesn’t ask any illegal or discriminatory questions, he can basically run whatever type of interview he wants. Heck, he can just put a sign in the window that says “Help Wanted” and whoever shows up first, if he likes them, he can hire them. Not so with the public service. The legislation says that every applicant must demonstrate they meet the merit criteria for the job. And over the course of the process, you will have to demonstrate the five things I mentioned above — eligibility, experience, knowledge, abilities and personal suitability. The first two are demonstrated through your application, most of which is your cover letter itself, and you cannot possibly do it in a single page.
Some housekeeping elements
Your cover letter should start off with the basics — the competition number that you are applying for, the title of the position, the classification and level, and if you have one, your Personal Record Identifier (PRI) number (a number issued by the Government if you’ve worked for them as a formal employee — it’s your master ID number for employment with the government). These are basic tracking elements, and it helps the HR person properly file your application, which of course you want to be mistake-free. Here’s the standard format I use:
I am writing to you in order to apply for the (title) (xx-xx level) position in the (section, department) (competition xxxx-xxx-xx-xx-xxx). I am sending this letter, and the attached detailed resume, in order to demonstrate my eligibility (A) and qualifications (B-Essentials & C-Assets) against the Statement of Merit Criteria. My PRI number is xxx-xxx-xxx.
All of the information you need for this paragraph is on the notice of the competition — it’s all there. You’re just copying it over. Verbatim. No ad lib, no creativity, make it exact. So, what would this look like in practice? A lot like this:
I am writing to you in order to apply for the Sr. Policy Analyst (EC-05) position in the Corporate Planning Division, Policy Branch, Health Canada (competition xxxx-xxx-xx-xx-xxx). I am sending this letter, and the attached detailed resume, in order to demonstrate my eligibility (A) and qualifications (B-Essentials & C-Assets) against the Statement of Merit Criteria. My PRI number is xxx-xxx-xxx.
That’s it, that’s all. Your intro is written, with all the tracking info the HR person needs in order to file anything, and more importantly, if it gets lost somehow or mis-filed, where they should file it if/when they find it separated from the rest of the files. Basic housekeeping — a place for everything, everything in its place.
Eligibility
The first substantive item you have to address in the cover letter is that you are even eligible to apply. This divides itself into three components — core eligibility, conditional eligibility, and language profile. Let me start with core eligibility. I’ll spend a bit more time than is necessary on a simple part of the core, your address, because it will demonstrate how core works — it is either yes you’re eligible or no you’re not, very cut and dried.
Most postings for jobs are limited by geographical area (called the “Area of Selection”. It will likely say something like:
OPEN TO: [Employees in] the [Department of Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC)] [occupying a position at the EC-07 level or equivalent] in the [National Capital Region (NCR).]
* The [xxx] brackets in the above indicates the four separate elements to prove to show you’re within the area of selection for this process.
So, lots of jobs will be limited to the “the National Capital Region”. If so, you can’t apply unless your permanent address is in the NCR. If for example you are working and living in Vancouver, but you thought, “Hey, I’d like to apply for jobs in Ottawa”, you still can — but only those that were open to the entire country (some are limited, some are not). This isn’t meant to be discriminatory, it’s to limit the applicant pool to a manageable size. The goal for the hiring manager (remember him or her from the chapter on process?) is to be able to assess enough applicants to allow some choice of candidates at the end, not to assess every possible person in the universe who might be able to do the job. A large enough pool, and no larger.
If the government is hiring a fairly generic position, and they think they can get someone in the NCR, they’re not going to want to plow through all the resumes from people all over the country, incur the cost of screening them, interviewing them, selecting them, etc., only to have a large percentage of them say, “Oops, I don’t want to move across the country after all.” If you can find local workers, you can limit your pool of applicants to just that area. Same for people in Vancouver competing against other Vancouverites; no need to open it up to the world, if you can find enough local people who are qualified.
It’s a completely different world though when a department does a massive post-secondary recruitment (completely open for geography) or they have a very narrow field of study they want to recruit from and might have trouble finding people (veterinarians, for example). In those cases, they’ll go large on the geographic eligibility in order to get a big enough pool to guarantee some chance of finding qualified people. Just big enough, and no bigger.
How does the government know where you live? Because your application includes your postal code. If you’re in the appropriate zone, you’re screened in; if you’re not, you’re screened out. Nobody will even look at your letter or resume. It’s a strict yes/no test.
Now, would the government know if you’re lying if you put Aunt Sally’s mailing address instead of your own? Up front, probably not. HR will check the address you give them to make sure you’re in the zone, but at the start, that’s all they will do. It’s simple, it’s efficient, it’s low cost. If you give them an address that fits the criteria, they’ll screen you in. So you’ll think, “Hah, I’m in!”. Well, not really.
Suppose you get all the way through and make the pool. At that time, HR has a much smaller number of remaining people to deal with. So they’ll then double-check your address that is in the payroll system (since most applicants already work for government), and if you aren’t in the zone, you’ll get bounced from the competition. Yep, you might make it all the way through on a lie, and THEN they’ll bounce you. Some people have even made it all the way to getting a letter of offer, but when the HR people went to generate the letter, they noticed, “Hey! They can’t live in the NCR if their office is in Vancouver! Something’s not right!”. And the person was then bounced.
Now you might think, “Well, at that point, they might waive the requirement, since I’m the best candidate, and they’ll really want me then.” Here’s the deal — they can’t. It was a legal requirement of the competition. If you don’t meet it, you can’t be hired as you were never qualified to enter the competition in the first place. You’ll be tossed, because they have to toss you. No choice at all. Not only will the hiring manager be ticked off, you’ll also have wasted their time and yours, and look like an idiot.
If you aren’t eligible, don’t apply. Yes you meet it, and you’re screened in; no you don’t meet it, and you’re screened out. That’s how most core eligibility works. Black and white, very clear.
When I have given presentations on this, people tend to think I’m over-explaining this one, and I tend to agree. I do it because I want people to understand that for core eligibility, you either have it or you don’t. And people understand postal codes and maps and zones. But even this has some exceptions, as most rules do. Here are three that come up, using an example of a job in Ottawa:
- Your regular position is in Quebec, but you are working on a three month assignment in Ottawa…can you apply?
- Your regular position is in Vancouver, but you are on leave, and living with your parents in Ottawa…can you apply?
- Your regular position is in Ottawa, but you work for Foreign Affairs, and you’re currently assigned overseas…can you apply?
All three of them have the same answer — it depends. Depends on the wording, depends on the nature of your assignment / leave, depends on the department doing the screening and what their normal interpretation for handling such things is (if they’re strict, you’re out; if they’re flexible, you’re in). It’s a bit of a grey area, even when normally the questions are black and white. But each of those are not “lies” that aren’t remotely true, they are degrees of nuances that present some exception to the black/white world.
However, if you want to challenge or clarify an eligibility element, do it AT THE START. Ask for permission to be screened in, make it clear and transparent. Because the last thing you want to do is make it all the way to the end before you ask, at which time they are likely to be VERY strict and rigid with the rules. Not to mention that you’ll waste time even applying. Just ask.
But geography is not the only restriction. Back at the beginning of this section, I noted possible wording:
OPEN TO: [Employees in] the [Department of Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC)] [occupying a position at the EC-07 level or equivalent] in the [National Capital Region (NCR).]
Based on that, you are also required to prove:
Sample wording | Restriction | Comments |
OPEN TO: [Employees in] the [Department of Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC)] [occupying a position at the EC-07 level or equivalent] in the [National Capital Region (NCR).] | ||
[Employees in] | Type of employee | Usually one of four headings, including:
The other alternatives are open to the public or recent graduates. |
[Department of Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC)] | Department / Region | Usually one of two sub-criteria:
|
[occupying a position at the EC-07 level or equivalent] | Level | Often reserved for deployments or assignments/secondments, it means you have to be “at the same level” already, i.e. it can’t be a promotion. Sometimes it is also for acting assignments or specific recruitments i.e. they’ll let you apply if you are one level below. |
[National Capital Region (NCR)] | Geography | Usually one of two sub-criteria:
|
Not surprisingly, if it says that, you have to be:
- an employee, not just on contract or casual;
- working for ESDC, not Health / Finance / Environment;
- an EC-07 or equivalent (this tells you you have to be at level, this isn’t a promotion or an acting opportunity); and,
- working in Ottawa/Gatineau, not elsewhere in the country — your actual office has to be in the NCR.
When you apply, your application first goes to the HR people. All of those four things are in a central database and HR people will check to make sure it matches, using your PRI number to look you up. If any of the bits don’t match, they screen you out and the hiring manager will never see your application. You’re just done. Lots of people try to be creative to fake their way past eligibility, and a few years ago, it was occasionally possible.
Except when they got all the way to the appointment phase, someone goes to do the paperwork, and HR would bounce it — kicking the person out of the competition at that point, because they were never eligible in the first place. There is no grey area on these points — in / out, yes / no. If you’re in a strange situation such as being on assignment with ESDC, ask HR if you are eligible or not — the rules will say yes or no, and you can then proceed or not.
Now, as noted above, 90% of eligibiity has to be covered in the cover letter and so you’ll tell me, as noted above in the example, that you are an indeterminate employee working in the department listed at the same level and working in the region specified.
If it says “indeterminate/permanent” employee, don’t apply if you are term or casual. If it says “employees”, then indeterminates AND terms can apply, but not casuals. If it says “persons”, some departments will consider casuals too, most won’t.
There are two other areas where it is not quite so black and white. First, under the educational requirements, it frequently asks you for a university degree. For example, it might say for the EC categories:
Graduation with a degree from a recognized university with acceptable specialization in Economics, Sociology or Statistics.
That seems like a simple yes/no, but there are variations on what constitutes “specialization” (often viewed by tribunals as at least 5 courses in undergrad and 3 in a graduate program, but managers can set whatever number they deem appropriate on a competition-by-competition basis). But more importantly, the advertisement will then say things like:
NOTE: Candidates must always have a university degree*. The courses for the specialization do not necessarily have to be part of a degree program in the required specialization. The specialization may also be obtained through an acceptable combination of education, training and/or experience.
* Degrees may include, but may not be limited to Political Science, History, Psychology, Geography, Criminology or other disciplines associated with social science.
Some people find that confusing, and rightfully so. The rest of the eligibility factors have no wiggle room, but this one is more about general skills than certification. So, for example, if you had a degree in Psychology or Criminology, but you could show that the courses were cross-listed with Sociology, the screening manager may decide that is sufficiently close to accept your application. Other times, someone may have done a degree in Urban Planning, but has a “minor” in economics with five courses in the field as “electives”. Or perhaps they did a degree in history, and then after they graduated, did some additional electives in Statistics. So they would have a degree + courses outside their degree program that meet the specialization requirement.
If you have been working in a field for quite a while (usually more than four years, the same time to do an undergraduate degree) and if you have been doing a lot of economics or statistics in that time, the hiring manager may decide that is equivalent experience and accept you. However, let me perfectly clear — it is YOUR JOB AS APPLICANT to convince them you have the educational background needed. I’ll discuss this in more detail below, but the burden of proof is on you. If you have a degree in Economics / Sociology / Statistics for this example, your proof is easy. You say “I graduated from University of Manitoba in 1994 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics.” They will ask you later in the process for a copy of your diploma to prove it, but for the cover letter, that is sufficient. However, if you have a different degree and are relying on extra courses that you took to prove the specialization, or relevant work experience, you should list the courses you took or the work you have been doing that is relevant. If you don’t explain, they don’t have to come back and ask for more details — they can just screen you out. Your job is to prove it — the burden of proof is on you.
The second initially grey area is your language profile. It will likely say something like “BBB/BBB” — this means that you have to have intermediate english and french (in brief, X means no ability, A is basic, B is intermediate, C is fluent, E is exempt equivalent to native speaker). As with the first elements, the HR person will go into the PSC database and check your current results (good for 5 years at a time). If you have a current profile that meets or exceeds the level required, they’ll note it. If your profile is out of date OR you have no profile OR even if you have a current profile that is LESS than needed, they’ll note that you do not meet BUT won’t screen you out — they’ll send you for a language test, likely at the end of the process i.e. the last step before they appoint people.
Here’s the reason why you don’t get booted immediately — the legislation governing competitions says generally that you have to meet all the requirements at the time you apply (so just because you were planning to move to Vancouver, you couldn’t apply if you were still working in NCR). However, there is separate legislation regarding Official Languages and it says you have to meet the language profile of the position at the time of appointment. As a result, all of the other eligibility elements are tested at the beginning of the process, and you’re in or you’re out, but language levels are almost always tested at the end so that your results are as close as possible to the time of appointment. But it is still a yes/no element later — if you fail, you’re out. (With a minor caveat…a competition may say “various language profiles” which might mean if you get BBB, you’re eligible for a BBB job but not one of the other ones that requires CCC — the equivalent of being “out” for the jobs with higher language requirements and “in” for the jobs with lower language requirements.)
Here’s some sample text that shows how to meet the above requirements (if you’ve given your PRI previously, you don’t need to repeat it).
I am an indeterminate employee of HRSDC working in the National Capital Region as a substantive xx-xx, and my PRI number is xx-xxx-xxx. I have a Bachelor’s degree in xxxxxxxxxxxxx from xxxxxxxx (19xx) and a Master’s degree in xxxxxxxxxxxxx from Carleton University (20xx). I meet the official languages proficiency for the position, with a current profile of EBC.
A frequent question from people is what to do if you are taking language classes, know you’re close, want to apply, but don’t have a current profile. That’s simple:
I meet the official language proficiency for the position, but my profile is out of date and I need to be retested.
Let’s be clear though. If you are AAA, and the requirement is CCC (i.e. no indication of various language levels), you’re not likely to make that level by the time you are tested in the process. Unless you’re close to the level, and expect that you’ll actually meet it at the time to be tested, faking your way through the application is generally a waste of everyone’s time. It’s a yes/no criteria — you meet it or you don’t. Or if you’re hedging your bets on how effective your current progress is going, you will meet it or you won’t. The manager can’t get to the end of the process and say, “Oh, too bad, they’re a great candidate, I’ll drop the language requirement.”
Conditional Eligibility
I am slightly mis-using a term here, because it isn’t exactly what the Public Service Commission means when it says “Conditions of Employment”. I call them conditional eligibility because you can meet all the other elements, make the pool, and then when they go to offer you a position, be unable to take it. Let me explain, because it isn’t the same as you being “out”.
First, there is “reliability and security”. It isn’t always clear what this means on a poster, but it is your security clearance. There are proposals to change the way security clearances work, but there is generally “reliability” (looking a lot like a simple background check for criminal records), “enhanced reliability”, “secret”, and “top secret”. These are all variations on a theme, with top secret asking for the most detail, going into a full background check for someone who is likely to have access to very sensitive high-level materials such as policy proposals, Cabinet decisions, or security files.
If you go through the whole process, make the pool, and they go to appoint you but you fail the Top Secret clearance, it means you don’t get that job, but it doesn’t exactly remove you from the pool. They may have other jobs that require lower clearances that they can appoint you to, although technically it is supposed to negate your candidacy like having too low of a language profile. But it’s handled more as a grey zone than a black and white decision point. In addition, though, you may have to wait for your clearance to come through before you can start since you have to have it to be appointed. Foreign Affairs is well-known for this, with some people waiting up to a year to start their job once their top secret clearance is complete. Of course, if you apply to a pool to work at CSIS, where all the jobs require Top Secret, and you fail, well, you’re just out. There are no “lower” jobs to be considered for, they are all closed to you.
Second, there are “other conditions of employment”. Sometimes they are black and white (such as “a valid drivers license”), other times the employee wants to discuss what exactly the term means before accepting the position. For example, a common phrase is “willing and available to work occasional overtime”. Does that mean once a month or three times a week? Does it mean planned overtime or sudden overtime? This could have serious implications for someone who has to arrange childcare. Equally, there is often a requirement for “occasional travel, as needed.” Employees might be willing to travel, but there’s a huge difference between a short business trip to Toronto for 2 days and a 3 week trip to Bangladesh for a series of meetings. However, before the employee is appointed, they have to formally agree to the conditions. More and more, HR sections are asking for it in the cover letter when they apply or if not there, later when the appointment process comes along. Personally, I put it right up front in the cover letter so there is no doubt of my continued eligibility:
I am willing to work overtime as required, and travel within Canada and internationally as part of my duties. I have a Level II – Secret security clearance which was updated in 20xx.
Note that this last example is NOT required, but I still recommend it in the cover letter. Some HR people will tell you to completely take it out, waste of space, because THEIR department doesn’t work that way. Some departments do, and some HR people move from department to department and don’t always follow the new practices. I have been told too that some departments say not to mention the language part at all because they have to test that anyway; other departments have screened people OUT (even though they’re not supposed to) if the cover letter didn’t say it.
Here’s my bottom line — it costs me nothing to include it and if it avoids someone screening me out for no reason and avoids my having to “fight” to get back in, I’ll put it in my cover letter.
Quick summary of what you need to include:
Title, Level, Competition, PRI
Education, Employment status, area of selection, language, citizenship
Security clearance, organizational needs (EE), operational requirements (relocation/travel/overtime hours), conditions of employment (travel/irregular hours/part-time)
Experience
So I covered eligibility, and it took a lot of space to explain why you need about two paragraphs to ensure you’re not screened out. Now we come to the actual meat of the cover letter — how you show that you have the experience the manager is looking for in the poster.
Remember I said that private sector advice books tell you to keep your cover letter to a page? This is fine for the private sector where your cover letter outlines a bit of the type of experience and jobs you have had, and with a short resume, acts as an offer to the manager to call you to discuss it in more detail. That’s not the way government works.
Government competitions are governed by legislation and rules, since you’re going to be paid by the taxpayer, and the regulations say that you have to demonstrate in the cover letter how you meet each experience element. I don’t have to invite you in to discuss it, and in fact, I can’t — I have to have you TELL ME in the letter how you meet it. The burden of proof is on you.
Now, some private sector people would read that and say, “Sure, but I can still do it in a page.” No, you can’t. Because you don’t know what proof means.
If you look at a poster, there are likely at least four separate experience requirements. And you have to prove to me that you meet each and every one of them. You can’t just say “I have it”, you have to show me how you have it, what you were doing, when you did it, etc. For most experience requirements, you’re probably looking at a minimum of about 8-10 lines of text in a cover letter, and 1-2 paragraphs. Multiply that by four separate experiences, add two paragraphs from before on eligibility, include a salutation + closing, and an address at the top, and to fit that in a page, you would need about a size 6-point font. Not the best strategy to impress someone.
While some competitions do impose some length restrictions, most don’t constrain you too much. Let me give you a specific example of what I’m talking about in terms of proof. Suppose it asked for experience in managing human resources. Some people have tried writing the following:
I have experience managing human resources as I have been a manager of a team for 2 years.
Great! But how big a team? Was it one person or ten? What kind of team? Were you leading a research team on a file, like a working group, or were you the boss of several people? Did you approve leave? Did you manage their workloads? Did you rate their performance? Was it full time for two years?
All you have done in the sentence is that you did “something”, but it doesn’t prove to me that you managed human resources. You can’t just say it, you have to tell me and give me details. Try this one instead:
Since 20xx, I have had extensive responsibility for human resources. I acted as deputy director within the policy coordination team at CIDA, assisting in leading a team of eight, directly supervising two policy analysts, and acting as director for extended periods of time. While working at SDC on international issues, I was the head of a team of seven analysts and one support staff on issues related to bilateral relations, multilateral engagement, and policy development. As manager in policy integration at HRSDC, I led a team preparing an integrated policy framework, implementation plan for creating a Centre of Excellence, strategic regional engagement, participation in medium term policy planning, branch coordination of corporate planning requests, and international benchmarking and comparisons; and I am now the manager of the performance team within Integrated Planning and Acccountability, as well as having acted as director for five weeks during the summer.
That’s better, it adds more detail, but it’s missing something huge, at least for government. Now try the following:
I have significant experience as a manager of human resources since 2002. From 2002 to 2004, I was the acting deputy director and then acting director in the xxx section of xxx department, for a team of six employees. This included assigning work and developing resource plans. From 2005 to 2014, I managed teams of varying sizes – five employees while at xxx on the international front, three employees in xxx department’s Policy Branch, and varying-sized team since xxxx in my current Branch (ranging from three to eleven employees) and currently a team of seven.
Since xxxx, I have undertaken the fully delegated HR function for all of my teams – establishing performance objectives and expected results including formal performance management reviews, assigning work and managing workloads across team members, identification of resource needs and approval of training, and leave management (including both regular leave as well as two instances of extended sick leave without pay).
Now we’re getting somewhere. Is it likely overkill? Absolutely. Because it is my job to prove I meet the criteria and I don’t want anyone to have to think about it when they read what I wrote — I don’t want anyone “deciding” if it meets the criteria or not. I want them to read it and think, “Yep, obviously he meets it, tick that box, move on”. Overwhelmingly convincing, that’s the goal.
But let’s dissect what you need to tell them:
- What your job was (manager, deputy director, team leader, etc.);
- When you did it (gives indication of duration); and,
- What you did + what that means.
Most people skip immediately to the “what you did” part (i.e. I managed HR) without saying what their job was, or for how long. More importantly though, the manager needs to see the “evidence” of what you did — headings plus examples plus some context (i.e. deputy director, team of six, assigning work and developing work plans, performance management, approving leave, etc.).
I’m partial to the following structure as an example, but you can use whatever style you want:
I have experience in [xxx criterion from the poster] while working as [job title] at [department, branch, division] from [year to year]. One file where I had to do this was [yyy] where we were [context]. As such, I had multiple occasions to do [aaaa], [bbbb], and [cccc]. Another file was [zzz] where I also did [aaaa], [bbbb] and [dddd]. In [this other position], I also got to do [dddd] and [eeee].
Is that example perfect? Hardly. It’s simply functional. It makes sure you’re on the right track to populate your letter with the type of experience that people need to include to DEMONSTRATE / PROVE they meet the requirement.
Why don’t people do that automatically? Partly because they don’t know that they need to do it, partly because they often don’t do any preparation before writing the cover letter that would allow them to have the evidence, and partly because they don’t know how to structure their letter in the first place.
Now that you have seen my sample text above, you should realize something. I am going though the poster line by line and showing how I meet the criteria. No, it’s not flowery. No, it’s not creative. It is very linear. Why? Because the process of applying is linear. I, as candidate, have to PROVE that I meet EACH element. The easiest way to do that is to do it in the same order it’s listed. Because that way I don’t miss anything AND it is how the HR and hiring manager people are going to tick the boxes. In order.
Which means, if it asks me about my educational background, I’m going to write a sentence or paragraph about my education. If I have four experience requirements, I’m going to put a heading and then some text, like:
EXPERIENCE 1: MANAGING HR
[Examples of how I have managed HR]
EXPERIENCE 2: MANAGING FINANCES
[Examples of how I have managed finances]
That is why advice from private-sector cover letter examples doesn’t work, because that’s NOT how they do them. In the private-sector, your cover letter might look like:
Dear [employer name]
[Intro para to snag their attention]
[Example Job 1 with the giant results you achieved]
[Example Job 2 with the giant results you achieved]
[Closing]
Great, but now you’re applying to government. How does Job 1 and Job 2 relate to the four headings I’ve asked you about? Because if they don’t, you’re out. It is not my job to play forensic detective on your resume to see if you MIGHT meet, or even if you’re a wonderful person, it is YOUR job to PROVE TO ME that you meet my requirements or I don’t have to interview you. The regulations say so very clearly.
I have always done my applications exactly as I outlined above (heading 1, proof, heading 2, proof). So much so that early on in the changeover from the old application system to the new, consultants were flagging my application as “gold standard” formats for people to use. It just made the screening process for them so much easier. Yes, he has experience and there’s the proof all together. Tick.
And you might buck at this requirement. You might think it is stupid. So let me explain why it isn’t, with a very practical example.
Back in 2007, I ran a competition for an EC-06 position. You’ll know from the previous chapters than an EC is an analyst. Good at evidence-based analysis. And a -06 level is pretty senior. They’re not fresh off the street, they’ve likely been doing analysis for a number of years. Including writing memos to Ministers where they give some background, outline an issue, give their evidence and analysis, and make a recommendation. So they know what a basic argument in paper form looks like when you’re trying to convince someone of something. Which is what a cover letter is — it’s an argument in paper form to me as the hiring manager trying to convince me that you meet the experience requirements.
Of some 84 people who applied, only 25 did their cover letter the way I outlined above. Heading, proof, heading, proof. How many did I screen in? 24. Of the 25, all of them had the proof laid out very clearly and 96% convinced me. Because it was clear proof. The one who didn’t make it wrote a good letter, and they almost convinced me even though they were doing very different work than what I was looking for in the poster. Almost close enough. I even went so far as to ask for a second opinion from another manager because they were close.
Of the original 84, 20 people had no cover letter whatsoever. In the current climate, where the regs are much clearer now, they would immediately be rejected. No letter = no proof, they’re out. A resume is not sufficient. However, in 2007, the department I was in was not ready to be quite so harsh so I had to play forensic detective on their resume to see if they had, somehow, managed to demonstrate all the elements for the job in the resume. Do you know what NONE of them mentioned? Oral briefings. I had an element in the poster that asked for experience in providing oral briefings to management. But, by habit, almost no ECs ever think to include that in their resume. They think about written briefings, and that is documented out the wazoo. Yet most never mention oral briefings. They missed on some other elements too, but they all missed was on oral briefings. Since they never said they did it, I had no proof to base my evaluation on, and since it is THEIR job to prove it to me, they were automatically out. That’s not me being harsh or draconian or rigid — it is like an eligibility requirement. If they don’t work for ESDC, and that’s the scope, they’re out; if they give me no evidence in their application of oral briefings, they’re out. The regs don’t ALLOW me to screen them in. {Okay, small exaggeration there — the regs do say to screen them out, but there are ways to fudge the requirement and let them in, but officially, I was supposed to screen them out, and I did.}
That left 39 people who had done their cover letters mostly like the private-sector examples. They gave me lovely intro letters, mostly in a single page telling me they had experence, loads of experience, tons of experience, they were the Donald Trumps of experience, but gave me no examples or proof of how they had it. About ten recycled previous cover letters and didn’t even bother to make the effort to tailor it in anyway to my job. (Small tip — if I’m looking for an analyst, and one of the elements is “attention to detail”, and you send me a cover letter saying you’re applying for the “project manager” position, it doesn’t look too good). Again, as with those with no cover letter, I had to play forensic detective. Of the 39, I screened in about ten. Or approximately 25%.
Let’s recap:
- With proper cover letter — 96% screened in;
- Cover letter done badly — 25% screened in;
- No cover letter — 0% screened in.
I did several comps around the same time, and they all had similar outcomes.
Somewhere around 2012, Health Canada started including a phrase in their posters. It said, basically, “Please note that it is the candidate’s responsibility to prove in their cover letter that they meet the criteria in the poster. Information in the resume is not sufficient. One way to do this is to use each experience as a heading and provide your examples under it.”
They ACTUALLY told candidates how to write the letter, and people still didn’t do it. Each competition, people would try and be creative and then wonder why they got screened out. By 2015, all departments were applying the same standard — if there was no cover letter, the application was tossed immediately. And the regs were updated to not only say they “could” toss them, they know say they “should” toss them. It’s the only way to ensure fairness across the process. We transparently evaluate what you tell us, we don’t go fishing.
Proper preparation
Yet, even with the proper format, people sometimes get screened out for jobs they are completely competent to perform. Why? Because they don’t give enough evidence in the cover letter.
Many candidates follow a typical approach of simply matching experience headings with the closest previous job that matches. So, here’s what that looks like:
Experience 1 | Job 1 |
Experience 2 | Job 2 |
Experience 3 | Job 1, 3 |
When they go to write the cover letter, they will talk only about Job 1 to substantiate / prove they meet the requirements for “Experience 1”. Similarly for Experience 2. From time to time, they might talk about two jobs, but not often.
Because we as candidates tend to think of our past experiences in terms of “what jobs I had”, not the sub-elements of each of those jobs. So when we prepare, we miss stuff. Contrast the above table with the following template. In my presentations, I have frequently called it “Secret Template #1”, but you’ll see that is a bit grandiose of a name for what I’m talking about.
Secret Template #1 – Quacking like a duck! | |||||
Job 1 | Job 2 | Job 3 | Academic | Volunteer | |
Experience 1 | x | x | x | x | x |
Experience 2 | x | x | x | x | x |
Experience 3 | x | x | x | x | x |
From that table, you should notice three things:
- I have put all the past jobs across the top so that you can see which apply to each experience;
- I’ve added any academic or volunteer experience you might have; and,
- I have put an X in every single box.
Why did I do this and what difference does it make?
Start with the Xs in the first row. Using this template, your preparation is a lot more rigorous. Rather than saying “Which of my jobs lines up with Experience 1”, you are now instead asking, “For experience 1, what did I do in Job 1 that was related to this?”, then “What did I do in Job 2?”, etc. Your goal is to put something in every box, no matter how minor.
Let me give you an example, and it will become a lot more clear why this helps. Suppose the experience requirement #1 was experience in managing financial resources. If you’re an EC, this may be a HUGE challenge for you to answer. You want to apply, but you’ve never been in charge of the budget before. Which might suggest you’re out before you even start (that happens).
Except, wait a minute. In Job 1, you were doing some research and you hired a contractor to help you. Contracts have financial components. Put it down. In Job 2, your boss asked you to do an analysis of research by the division for various research projects over the previous three years, and the project list included costs and totals for the division. Plus you “forecast” the expected projects for that year too, with the costs attached. Again, it’s finance-related. Put it down. Maybe your third job was when you were a waitress. Pretty sure you had to manage money, do totals, ring in expenses, right? Put it down. Oh, look, in your academic courses you took accounting and budgeting. And in your volunteer work, you were the treasurer of your church choir. Put it down.
You now have five separate examples for that experience requirement that you can combine into a single kick-ass paragraph. Will it be enough to screen you in? I have no idea. Depends on the person doing the screening. And what other people say too. But that isn’t your job to worry about — your job is to write the best dang paragraph you can about YOUR experience. Maybe something like this.
I have experience with managing financial resources throughout my academic, volunteer and professional career. During my academic studies, I studied accounting and budgeting, and was able to put it into practice as the Treasurer for the St. Alphonse Church Choir, 2003-2006. I was responsible for managing the budget, forecasting expenses, producing reports, and co-signing on all disbursements. While I was at university, I was the senior waitress for the ACME Diner (200x-200x), and had to verify all cashes at the end of the night, and balance the floats for each waitress. In addition, I regularly had to make the night deposits. Since joining government, I have also managed research contracts to do x, as well as analysed past costs against current budgetary projections for all research projects for our division (previous three years plus current).
Is that enough? I still don’t know. As I said, that’s up to the hiring manager to decide, and you should make HIM or HER decide. Don’t decide for them. Your job is to craft the best paragraph you can, without lying. You might embellish a little, make yourself sound a little more professional than you were, or more important than you were, but don’t go too far outside the lines. It’ll just bite you later.
But for each and every experience requirement, if you follow the template above, you stand the best chance of coming up with enough evidence to support your claim that you meet the requirement. You don’t have to use ALL the examples you come up with, just the best ones. You want to prove overwhelmingly you meet it, and often one single job isn’t enough to show it.
Be A Duck, Not a Swan
Yet people feel uncomfortable writing the above. They say, “But that’s not what they mean by managing financial resources!”. My response to that is two-fold:
- If you don’t think you meet it, why are you applying?
- How do you know what they mean?
Seriously, it’s your choice. If you don’t think you meet it, don’t apply. If you think you’re close, apply and LET THEM make the decision as to whether it is enough. Don’t decide for them.
But people don’t do that. You know what they do instead? They try to be self-deprecating and hedge their wording by saying, “While I have no experience in managing financial resources,…”. And then they write the para above. Because they think that’s more “honest”.
Except the hiring manager isn’t reading any longer. You told her in the first sentence you don’t meet the requirement. You said it VERY CLEARLY. So she stopped reading, put an X in the box for that element and moved on. You TOLD HER to do it. You SAID very clearly, you don’t meet that element. So why would she keep reading?
Ignore the specifics of the above, the financial or HR management stuff. Think of it as a random person who says they want to hire a duck.
Yes, a duck. Why they need a duck is not for me to judge. They said they need a duck, let’s assume they need a duck.
If you want the job, do you say “I’m not really a duck…”? Do you say, “I’ve never really been a duck…”? Do you say, “I have lots of friends who are ducks…”?
No, if you want the job, you say “Quack, quack, quack!”.
If you want to be a bit more verbose, you say, “I’m a duck, I’ve always been a duck, I’m the best damn duck you ever saw, quack, quack, quack!”.
Because they are hiring ducks. If you say “I’m not really a duck”, they move on. They’re busy and you just told them you don’t qualify. Why are you wasting their time?
I know, you’re a special swan, but you could be a duck if you only had the chance. Fine, tell them you’re a duck. Tell them you flap your wings. Tell them you speak duck. Tell them you are slightly off-yellow. Tell them you have webbed feet. DO NOT TELL THEM YOU’RE NOT A DUCK. That’s their job to decide i.e. if having wings, speaking duck, being off-yellow, and having webbed feet qualifies you as being a duck?
You’re still not completely comfortable with this, I know. But you already decided you think you can do the job or you wouldn’t be applying. You think you can be a duck. This part of the process isn’t evaluating whether you’re actually capable of being a duck, it’s seeing whether the experience you have is enough to qualify for an interview to be a duck.
Maybe for you, off-yellow is enough. For them, maybe you have to be fuzzy and bright yellow. You don’t know. The only way to know if you meet their threshold is to apply.
Now, if you do the above chart and you have NOTHING in that row, yep, you’re probably stretching too far. Or if you feel like you’re stretching two or three elements. But, other than that, it’s up to you if you want to try to be a duck or not. They said they’re hiring ducks. If you tell them you’re not a duck, they move on.
Completing the cover letter
So now that you have Secret Template #1, you can go through and do a bit of analysis of what experience you have for each element. Then craft a paragraph or two for each one. In the end, your cover letter probably looks like this:
Dear xxxx,
[Opening] — I am writing….(info about comp, number, your basic eligibility, conditions of employment, etc.)
Education:
xxxx
Experience 1:
xxxx
Experience 2:
xxxx
Experience 3:
xxxx
[Closing]
So that is your basic cover letter. Wait, what do I mean by “basic”?
I mean there are two other elements that you have to address. First, there are “asset experiences”.
The ones I mentioned above are the first part of the poster and are considered “essential experience” requirements. But often posters also have what are known as “asset qualifications”. So, for example, suppose a hiring manager is looking for an office manager, AS-04 level.
The essential experience might be having worked as office manager previously, managing some staff, handling correspondence, and coordinating a calendar for a senior manager. Standard stuff, and often core to the position.
Yet the hiring manager might also look at the position and think, “You know, they also have to help with staffing, managing the budget, and our internet site. It would be great if they had that too.”
To put it simply, the first elements were “must haves” and now these three are “nice to haves”. So, the first four would go in as Essentials, and the last three might go in as assets:
- Experience in coordinating staffing actions;
- Experience in coordinating a budget for a directorate;
- Experience in managing an external website;
The wording might be better in an actual case, but you get the idea. These aren’t REQUIRED to apply, so they are listed separate.
But if you have them, you HAVE to tell them in the cover letter. Not later. In the cover letter. Because a hiring manager might get 100 applicants for one position. And they can say, “Hey, that’s a lot. Let’s see how many have the asset 1 on staffing.” And do an additional screening. Suddenly that “asset” looks a LOT like an essential. Because they might now only interview those who had that asset. Why not? If they have enough applicants, they might as well only interview them.
Separately however, it is also a reason later for them to choose you at the end. Suppose ten people make the pool, but you have an asset they don’t. Why wouldn’t the manager choose you?
In both examples, it only helps you to tell them you have it and to craft the same paragraphs as you did for the essentials. Yes, it’s more work. But do you want the job or not?
You would be surprised how many people don’t bother addressing the assets. Or doing so in the barest of terms. And then being surprised later when they get screened out because they didn’t bother to tell the manager they had that experience too. And later is too late.
If you meet the assets, INCLUDE in your cover letter. Every single one that you meet.
Don’t freak out if you don’t meet something in the assets, this is the manager’s “Christmas wish list”, nobody is likely to have all of them. That’s why they are assets, not essentials.
So how long is your cover letter at this point? Three to four pages is not uncommon. I once had a first draft that was 17 pages and I cut it to 6. Usually there isn’t too much restriction on the length of a traditional cover letter, although this is changing (see notes about digital applications below).
Don’t forget your resume
You just wrote four pages about yourself, tailored to the specific job, and yes, it took you a long time. But you also have to include a resume. There are lots of exciting models out there, and there are books and books about possible models. Again, mostly for the private-sector. Few are useful for government jobs.
For example, lots of resume formats suggest having an upfront “skills section” where the candidate lists the skills they have acquired. Not surprisingly, the books recommend this list match the skills list for the job you are applying for, so the manager can “see” what skills you have.
Except listing them is irrelevant to government competitions. You had to PROVE them in the cover letter, so why re-list them again? Similarly for things like “goals” or a “description” of yourself. That’s not part of this stage of screening.
A resume has one purpose and one purpose only in a formal competition. It validates the information that you included in the cover letter by noting the jobs you had, where they were, the duration and times, and what duties you had. Think of it like it is a “supporting reference document” that acts in support of the cover letter.
Which means the simplest design is to have:
- Job title 1, Organization, Times, Experience/duties
- Job title 2, Organization, Times, Experience/duties
Here’s an example from when I was working at CIDA:
Sr. Policy Analyst, Corporate Secretariat, Deputy Minister’s Office, CIDA: December 2004 – August 2005
Responsible in newly-created analyst position in Deputy Minister’s office for horizontal analysis of broad corporate initiatives; coordination and liaison with Branches seeking project, program or policy approvals of the President and Minister; representing the Agency at internal and external meetings with Minister’s staff; coordination and liaison with sub-units of President’s office (Corporate Planning and Analysis Group, Canada Corps Unit, Business Operations Group, Parliamentary Relations, Cabinet Liaison, Correspondence Unit, and Executive Briefing Unit) for input into Agency-wide exercises; leading on Agency input into requests from central agencies; acting as Executive Assistant to the Deputy Minister during absences of the EA; and corporate analysis of Treasury Board submissions.
It tells the reviewer my title, where I was doing the job, and when, plus gives a flavour of the types of duties I performed. While it is obvious from the above descriptions of a cover letter, each cover letter is relatively unique. And equally, a resume of your past job can be rather static.
Except for one thing, which is a best practice stolen from the private-sector. In the private-sector, they advise you to sprinkle key words liberally into your cover letter and resume, using the same words as are in the job description.
For government, you can do the same. So, for example, the above resume example was one I used in my resume for a job that required experience with “horizontal analysis”, “coordination and liaison”, “Central Agencies”, and “Treasury Board submissions”. If another job required “collaboration”, I could change the “coordination and liaison” to “collaboration with…”. It’s a “nice-to-do” if you have time, as it helps validate things a little more strongly.
I consider a “nice” addition, beecause as I said at the beginning, if you do your cover letter properly, it can take you several hours to apply. Which means more time spent tweaking your resume as a “supporting” document may not be the best use of your time. The cover letter is critical, the resume is simply needed to be solid.
Applying Online
I confess that I had a large debate going on in my head for this whole chapter. I kept wanting to write phrases like “But now they do it this way…” because the online system has a completely different interface than what I just outlined. And probably 90% of the applications today HAVE to be done online, the Departments won’t accept an email version of your cover letter and resume.
So, if you’ve been paying attention, you could be really angry right now. It seems like I just spent thousands and thousands of words to explain how to do a cover letter and you don’t even use them anymore. Trust me, I wasn’t leading you astray.
Yes, the online system has automated the process, but the content is still the same. Here’s what’s different:
Area | Traditional paper or e-application | Online system |
Basic Eligibility Criteria (PRI, address, etc.) | Top of the cover letter | Separate fields, pull down menus, able to be stored and “auto-filled” by the system |
Conditions of Employment | Top or bottom of the cover letter | Separate fields, pull down menus to say yes or no, different for each job |
Education | In the cover letter under separate heading | Combination of pull down menus and supplmentary text boxes, some of which can be auto-filled |
Essential Experiences | In the cover letter under separate headings | Separate text boxes, one for each experience |
Asset Experiences | In the cover letter under separate headings | Separate text boxes, one for each experience |
Resume | Separate e-file, properly formatted | Separate text box, no formattting, can be auto-filled from saved versions |
There are three problems with the online system, which is why I spent all the time explaining the above. And why I think you should use the above approach, even if eventually you copy and paste it into the online system.
It’s online through the internet, and thus the online system can and does time-out or crash. You can save drafts as you go, but there have been people who were working on their application quite diligently only to lose their connection or have the system time-out on them. Bye bye carefully crafted content. A giant pain-in-the-patootie. If you do it off-line first, you can just recopy and paste it.
The interface is pretty, well, basic. It looks like it was generated to be compatible with a Commodore 64. It isn’t very pleasant to look at, and people start getting focused on “I need to put something in every box” rather than “I need to answer this question with overwhelming proof that I meet the criteria”. It isn’t uncommon for people to start typing, feel constrained by the basic text box, and craft much shorter examples than they should. The threshold of proof hasn’t changed, just the way you send the info.
Finally, the format in the boxes is ASCII text. Yes, I know that’s stupid. Yes, I know HTML at least would be useful. But it is basic text. No underlining, no bolding, no indents, nada. It’s just text. Even for your resume. That’s right, you don’t get to upload an e-file (since they might have viruses embedded), you just have to copy and paste into the text box.
THREE IMPORTANT TIPS
- Since you know it can time out, or crash, or just constrain you as you’re writing, do it offline first and copy and paste your text when you’re done.
- Left-justify everything, the boxes don’t maintain formatting at all.
- When you go to copy and paste, paste into a program like NotePad first as it will strip out any weird characters that Word sometimes leaves in text. Then copy and paste from NotePad into the HTML form on the website.
That last one seems stupid, I know, or not worth worrying about. Until you find out that you just applied for a job that pays $70K a year, and the manager is seeing your resume looking like:
]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; P. Sherman
]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; 42 Wallaby Way
]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; ]&; Sydney, Australia
The HTML site tries to strip all that crap out, and you may not see it on the screen, but some wordprocessing programs like to put weird codes in. Even trying to save as ASCII doesn’t really get rid of all of them. Pasting into NotePad and then recopying from there over will get rid of 99.9% of all of it. Just a thought.
In Conclusion
That was REALLY long, wasn’t it? All to tell you how to simply apply. I spent the time on it because it is the single simplest element to fix to stop you from getting screened out before you even get to the competition. If you do it right, you get to continue; if you do it wrong, you might as well not even apply in the first place.
Hi Paul,
I’m applying for, what I think is a specialized position: a dental hygienist for the Canadian Dental Care Plan at Health Canada: https://psjobs-emploisfp.psc-cfp.gc.ca/psrs-srfp/applicant/page1800?poster=2227596
It seems we’re meant to apply via the online application. There is no where to put a cover letter in the online application. I was considering pasting my cover letter along with my resume in the text box reserved for the resume – formatted in notepad.
What do you think? Will this simply cause confusion with my resume? I will just be reiterating information that will already exist in the text boxes designed for the essential qualifications, so might pasting a cover letter with the resume be a potential turn off for the reader?
Hi Holly,
One thing that is misleading with my guide is that things have shifted in recent years. In a lot of previous applications, you could upload a cover letter, but if you did it right in the first place, it really isn’t going to be any different than what you put in the individual boxes now. That is the whole point of the boxes, forcing you to answer each element. If they give you the boxes, tehre is literally nothing else you have to say that is likely relevant to your application. Strengths? Not relevant. Other experiences they didn’t ask about? Not relevant. That’s the point of the boxes — all the info they need, nothing they don’t.
As such, it’s likely better to NOT re-include the cover letter in that box.
Note however that SOME applications/postings do NOT give you the subboxes already done. They sometimes JUST give you a pasting box to use for a full cover letter. In those cases you would use it.
Good luck!
Paul
Hi Paul,
Thank you for this guide! One of the screening questions in the job I am applying for is whether you have a M.Sc. or Ph.D. in chemistry or biochemistry. In the job posting, having an advance degree is classified under the asset qualifications, so I know it’s not mandatory. However, I do have a M.Sc. in food science and agricultural chemistry during which I did take chemistry courses. Would it be alright for me to select no to the question, but then elaborate in the text box about my education?
Thank you
Hi Rachel,
Apologies as you have likely already applied at this point. Your question is one of my favorite ones as it is, in part, the reason for the name of the guide, i.e. Be the Duck. People want to be honest with their applications, but they often want to be “OVER” honest in a sense. They want to be technically perfect, so they often do things to shoot themselves in the foot.
In this case, it asks, “Do you have a degree in chemistry or biochemistry?”. If you say NO, that’s the end of that question. You can write whatever you want, nobody will see that info. They won’t read it. You told them NO, so they can stop there. People like to do the same thing on multiple elements, “Well, I am not actually a duck, but I speak duck”. Not a duck? You’re out. In this case, you DO have a M.Sc. and it does include agricultural chemistry. Is that good enough? I don’t know, and neither do you. You think it might, so you want to put it in. But if you say NO, and then add your text, nobody will read it. And it’s not your job to decide. It’s theirs to see if it meets the requirement. And it’s not like you’re saying, “Hey I have a degree in spiritual healing and interpersonal chemistry”. You have a M.Sc. and it has parts taht are similar to the chemistry they’re talking about, you just went agricultural instead of biochem. So, you can say YES, and here’s what I have. If they agree it’s a YES, great; if they decide NO, also great. Cuz you were going to say NO anyway.
I’ve had this conversation with lots of people, and they’re like, “But I feel like I’m lying!”. If you were way outside, sure; but chemistry-adjacent is enough to say YES and let them decide. I’d be more worried you screen yourself out by saying no and someone else said YES with the same degree and got in. The worst outcome of saying yes is they review it and decide it’s a no for that asset. Which is no big deal. None of them are going to be saying, “SHE LIED!”.
Good luck…
Paul
Hi Paul,
Thank you so much for such a helpful resource! This is my first time applying to a government job. The posting I am applying to is a Patent Examiner position SG-PAT-03 with Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada – Canadian Intellectual Property Office. The only essential qualification is a Bachelors degree in mechanical engineering or other acceptable degree with a strong foundation in mechanical engineering principles, for
example biomedical engineering which is what I have. They have only asked for a resume, there are very basic screening questions such as asking for security clearance, second language evaluation results etc. I am assuming this is because it is a training level position.
I want to make sure that my resume covers all my experience and that I am not screened out. I am however confused because if the essential qualification is just a bachelors degree, how will I be screened out. Do you think adding experience and tying it to the abilities or the job description will increase my chances of making it to the next round? There is no option to provide a cover letter. I do have a 2 year relevant work experience and I am not sure if that adds to my chances of getting selected for the position.
Thank you!
Hi Arsala, I assume you’re going through the general recruitment position (https://emploisfp-psjobs.cfp-psc.gc.ca/psrs-srfp/applicant/page1800?toggleLanguage=en&poster=2128062). As you noted, it only asks for a relevant bachelor’s degree with no particular other experience to demonstrate. You’re not alone in being surprised, that is a very unusual way to run the application process. Most jobs require SOME evidence of relevant work experience. I can only assume their reason for doing so is to make the application process as simple as possible and get lots of people applying.
Since all you have to do is provide a resume, then do so as you would have originally. Make sure it notes the university degree you have, and yes, make sure the rest of the resume outlines your various work experiences, including highlighting the most relevant. While lots of sites have stuff about fancy formats, the simplest format is usually the best: EDUCATION / WORK EXPERIENCE / OTHER with Work Experience a simple heading for the title, place, and timeframe that you worked followed by a description of your duties and/or achievements in that position. In short, yes, tying your experiences in this situation will help your chances to make it to the next round.
Now, as for how you might get screened out, I confess the wording of the posting is a little contradictory. It makes it look like a formal job posting i.e. for specific jobs, includnig the 4 mentioned, BUT above that, it says it is creating an inventory. My suspicion is that they will do a weed on the resume and take the top x % of candidates that look attractive. They will then screen those into an actual competition. If not, the only alternative is basically to screen in everyone that meets the education requirement, although sometimes that becomes a bit technical. They COULD decide for example that someone with degree X with only specialization in ME does not have “enough” to justify it. There will be people who apply who have say a degree in economics but in first year, they took some ME courses before switching majors. Technically that might look like it comes close, but they’ll screen them out. Or they like biomedical engineering but NOT biochemical science. There are some areas in there that someone might THINK they qualify, or try to qualify, and they’ll get screened out.
It’s interesting to say “inventory” but then “Oh, and we have all these other elements to test later”, including Knowledge.
For now, do your resume with tailoring, and submit.
Good luck,
Paul
Hi Paul,
I echo others in saying thanks for the resources! I am looking at an Ontario Public Service job. The OPS provides a sample cover letter and resume, I am wondering if I should adhere to their sample formatting? They do not list the education requirements in the job description like other government postings, but presumably I should be explicit and list my education.
Hi Justine,
Whenever any employer gives you a sample, follow it. Add education, anything else that makes you look like the post.
Paul
Hi Paul – thanks for putting together such a helpful and comprehensive guide.
Cover letter question: Is it necessary to outline on our cover letters our experience re: essential and asset qualifications that will be “assessed at a later date” (I assume through things like written exams and interviews)? Or strictly the assets listed within the section of ” In order to be considered, your application must clearly explain how you meet the following essential qualifications”?
I assume we should limit our cover letter to the latter, but keen to double check and don’t want to “put off” reviewers by including a lot of extra info that I don’t need to at this stage.
Kate
Hi Kate,
Thanks for your comment. Alas, there is a nuance in your question that needs to be untangled before I answer.
So, generally speaking, you ONLY cover the eligibility questions AND the experience elements. So, you wouldn’t cover knowledge, abilities or personal suitability in the application / cover letter.
Now, here’s where it gets sticky on two fronts. First, almost ALL applications now use online tools where you insert your information into pre-determined boxes. Soooo, it won’t ask you for any info about knowledge, abilities or personal suitability in the online applicaiton. To that extent, it isn’t so much about cover letters in the normal sense — you won’t have the opportunity to cover other stuff, most of the time.
Second, though, there are what they call “asset” elements. If they have asset education OR asset experience requirements, then you DO want to cover them in the application / cover letter stage. And generally, there will be boxes to fill those in. There may also be asset personal suitability, or asset abilities, which again don’t need to be / won’t be in the application.
In short, you cover all education and all experience elements, or just any box that you can in the online system 🙂
Paul
Thanks for your prompt reply!
This application is different from others that I’ve applied to in that it is mainly composed of a cover letter and resume (none of the pre-determined boxes that you’ve mentioned and that I’ve encountered before). Hence my confusion on how much of the “to be/may be assessed later” bits I should detail on my cover letter.
You’ve answered my question. Will cover all of the education and experience elements within the “your application must clearly explain how you meet the following” section. I do meet the asset qualification for education that is to be assessed later (PhD in my field), but I cover that off in my cover letter anyway.
Many thanks again!
Kate
Hi Kate,
For this one, may I ask if it is an entry-level job or perhaps a unique sector? Curious if there is an obvious reason to you why they aren’t using the PSC portals…often it is because they are a) entry level; b) a sector that is used to doing cover letters; or not a core public admin org (like CRA). Just curious…
Paul
Oh the application is via the jobs.gc.ca portal (if this is what you mean by PSC portal). The application fields include one to copy paste a cover letter (vs having the questions in individual text boxes, for each qualification) and one to copy paste a resume plus list references.
It isn’t entry (EC 07) and is for a unique ish sector (public health).
Thanks Kate. Interesting choice for them to do the general cover letter “drop”, I thought everyone had stopped doing that! One of the challenges with it is that some people will fail to adequately address each of the required elements because they’re, well, old. 🙂 Lots of people who haven’t applied to stuff in a while will do a generic letter, not know to have headings in cover letters, generally fail to read my guide at all hehehe It’s one of the reasons the portal often forces people to have the separate boxes. It automatically corrects for structural weaknesses in cover letters where someone tells about Experience X and thinks it should answer 1, 3, and 4 without actually saying that. Often they do it to be more friendly and less onerous for entry level…it could be that they left it “open” so that they get more applicants who can write (literally) outside the box and not feel constrained. Interesting approach. Of course, I confess, I know a couple of managers who did that because they had to put the text into the portal and thought it was easier than coding all the sub boxes, aka lazy gits. 🙂
Good luck either way! And good to know that some are still doing it, I am updating that section of my guide and had been thinking of dropping the refs to cover letters at all.
Paul
Hello Paul,
As many previous commenters have stated: thank you so much for your guides and continued advice on navigating the job search and hiring process for public service.
The opportunity I am applying for is the Foreign Service Development Program (FSDP) see below:
https://emploisfp-psjobs.cfp-psc.gc.ca/psrs-srfp/applicant/page1800?toggleLanguage=en&poster=1627660
I am doing my best to go over my resume and written responses constantly, but don’t feel confident about my application even though I have prior federal PS experience and current work with the provincial PS experience in immigration. There are not many resources online about the FSDP, so any general advice about approaching unique postings like this would be greatly appreciated. I am struggling to apply your advice regarding years of service to meet the essential requirements because the essential requirements do not have a minimum! I apologize for providing such a general request for advice; I might just be doubting myself and require some reassurance that I have done what I can.
Thank you again for taking the time to reply to comments from those interested in finding continued success in the public service. My career would not be what it is now without you or your resources.
Dill
Hi Dill,
The good news is that this is a relatively “entry-level” position. They are not expecting you to have years and years of experience, and in the core experience, not even immigration-related experience. It also notes for some people that they may not have obtained the experience through work, but rather volunteer work. That’s a pretty big clue that they’re rather open-minded about how people can meet it. You do still have to meet it, but if you have provincial experience, I think even 2y worth would cover it.
So, here’s your goal, always, in an application: overwhelming evidence that you CLEARLY / EASILY / OBVIOUSLY meet the requirement. I’ve recently had a discussion with someone about the threshold, and Iu used an education metaphor that resonated with them so I’ll use it again. Let’s say you apply for a job and it says you need a grade 8 education for it. But you have high school. And university. And some college upskilling. And some accreditations from a professional organization. You can say, “Yes, I have my grade 8” but then you go on to say how you alos have x, y and z. Overwhelming evidence that NOBODY could possibly read and not screen you in.
Normally, the error is that they see an experience like “experience providing service” and they write “Yes, I have experience providing service” (way too short) or “I have experience providing service at blah org for blah years” (also too short). Instead, you need to basically put in some of the examples (just as you would on a resume) of the types of services you provided, your role, where, who the clinets were, if there were other issues with the services, how was it delivered, how you adjusted, etc. For this one? I suspect 2y would be more than enough, but if you have more, do more. For the later experience, it’s only YES / NO for now. For those, don’t screen yourself unless you have ZERO of the part they ask. You have no idea at this point what the standard will be (grade 8? high school? univ? as a metaphor) so if you have any, say yes to the ones you do have experience with.
Hope that helps…
Paul
Hi Paul,
Many thanks for your detailed guides. I have a few questions, and forgive me if you have answered it somewhere. I looked through your guides but couldn’t find a specific answer to my specific situation. I am looking at the following job application for reference:
https://emploisfp-psjobs.cfp-psc.gc.ca/psrs-srfp/applicant/1111590/page1600?careerChoice=1935295&action=viewPoster
About me:
– Work as an indeterminate PG-04 for 2 years to the day almost, in the NCR performing the duties indicated as essential qualifications for 2 years. Prior to this, I was a PG-02 for 3 years before qualifying in the PG-04 pool. I wouldn’t say I would qualify for the essential qualifications in this poster based off of my work as a PG-02 because it was more materiel management focused as opposed to contacting. PG’s tend to fit into either or category.
– I currently have an English essential position and have not taken SLE and therefore no language profile. Secret security clearance.
Questions relating to the job poster and my experience and essential qualifications/ intent of process :
Experience/ Essential Experience:
1) Omitting the definition of * Recent and significant experience as it relates to the essential qualifications, I meet the mandatory criteria in terms of duties performed in my current role. As per the job poster, *Recent and significant experience refers to the depth and breadth of experience obtained through the performance of a wide range of activities related to the position and normally acquired over a period of approximately three (3) continuous years. To me, this seems subjective using the words “NORMALLY acquired” and “over a period of APPROXIMATELY three (3) continuous years”. In other words, would my experience as a PG-04 be relevant here given it has only been 2 years? How subjective is the word approximate here?
Intent of Process:
2) The intent of this process is to fill one (1) indeterminate position, which can be located in any of the following locations:
↪ Bagotville (Québec)
↪ Montréal (Québec)
↪ St. Jean (Québec)
↪ Valcartier (Québec)
“This process may be used to staff the same or similar positions with various employment tenures, language profiles, security requirements, and conditions of employment in various DND locations across Canada”.
I have no desire to re locate to any of those locations to fill the 1 indeterminate position, and wish to remain in the NCR. The poster also indicates under “The following will be applied / assessed at a later date (essential for the job)” that it is a “French essential” position.
With that being said, my question is, as using the intent of process indicating “This process may be used to staff the same or similar positions with various employment tenures, language profiles, security requirements, and conditions of employment in various DND locations across Canada”, does this mean if I am screened in based on the essential and asset criteria that a pool “may” be created? Basically I am aware I don’t qualify for the job based on the fact that I am not willing to relocate outside of the NCR and not French essential.
Can you help me determine if this job would be worthwhile applying to regarding the subjective nature of the “essential qualifications” and also what the process may be used for in terms of staffing or similar positions with various employment tenures, language profiles, security requirements, and conditions of employment in various DND locations across Canada? Does this automatically mean a pool will be created (it indicates MAY BE USED so I assume not).
Thanks in advance!!!
Hi Laura,
There is a LOT in that message to unpack, so I’ll see what I can do with it…
a. Subjective. It IS somewhat subjective, sure, and you CAN apply, but chances are, if you only have 2 years and it’s a normal PG job, they’ll screen you out. If they say “normally, you’d do a variety of things, it would be about 3y worth of experience”, then unless you have SOMETHING that voids that “normal” expectation, they MAY screen you out. For example, if you have been a PG-02, and it was run of the mill stuff or not even the type of work you mentioned above (different stream), that’s not encouraging. If you’ve been doing a full range of activities, all aspects of PG, and you have prior experience too (not recent), well, they might consider it. The only way to know if they will accept it is to apply. That’s the same for ANY requirement, really, it’s just they’re saying up front, “we’re likely to screen hard on this.” Put differently, if you don’t have 3 years, you had BETTER have something that makes you exceptional some other way in the same element — and PG-04 time might be enough to show yourself off.
b. Intent of Process. Yes they have four jobs, but the addition of phrase “may be used” generally means, yes, there’s a pool, not just four winners. Not guaranteed, it’s added to most posters, but generally yes. If they ONLY want 1 body, they often say that explicitly.
However, the “french essential” may sink you. Usually, it would say something else like “various linguistic requirements” if the pool wasn’t going to be limited to French essential. When it doesn’t, there is a POSSIBILITY that they could get through all the main stuff, and say okay, that’s our partially assessed pool (everything except the French) and then send people for assessment of French if/when needed. In this scenario, they COULD then decide to staff another linguistic profile from it, wouldn’t need the French, etc. That is a possibility in ANY process.
But is it likely? In my view, no. They had other options to broaden the criteria, and they didn’t. They are running it for four spots in Quebec, they’re looking for french ability, they are likely to test everyone for the final pool. If you can’t pass the french, they’ll likely toss you.
I’m going to go sideways for a moment though on the “location”. There are two reasons to apply for any job:
a. You want to get the job itself;
b. You want to make the pool.
If you’re not willing to relocate, “a” might be off the table. But if you want to make the pool, and maybe leverage it elsewhere, you could still apply even if you didn’t want to relocate.
I can’t tell you what to do because I’m not a PG working in DND who knows what their landscape looks like. If you’re atypical for one of the essential requirements AND don’t have your French, it wouldn’t be at the top of my recommendation list. On the other hand, if PG processes don’t come around very often or it is the ideal type of job, etc., then maybe you do want to apply. For the first part, the experience requirement, that’s a pretty low bar — all you would be committing to is writing an application. Maybe they screen you in, maybe they screen you out, not that big a deal. If it was ONLY that, I’d say apply. What have you got to lose other than a bit of time in applying? The French essential is a little more determinative to me. If you DO want to apply, is there anyone you know around the EX level who you could ask if there’s any flex on that element to use it elsewhere in Canada? Maybe there is, maybe there isn’t. But only management would now. Usually those who meet French also meet the English requirement, so it COULD be used elsewhere while still keeping the French essential requirement.
Sorry I can’t be more definitive…in the end, it’s a bit of a trade-off of “return on investment” in terms of prioritizing other comps that you do meet all the elements for vs. giving up time but perhaps making it to the end and you wasted your time and effort. Of course, interviews are good practice anytime too. Ultimately, only you can decide if it’s worth your time if you could make it all the way through and have nothing for it. Oddly though, that’s true of ANY comp. 🙂
Paul
Hi Paul,
Thank you very much for your insight ! I really appreciate the thorough thought process you responded with and after giving it some thought, i’m going to apply :). I have most of my screening questions drafted from previous applications, so it should be easy peasy. I do know some EX levels i will inquire with as you suggested.
Do you accept small tips as gratitude for your time and your reply ? if so, how can i go about that?
thanks and have nice evening,
Laura
Hi Laura,
Glad to be of help. And thanks for the offer of tips, but no, none are desired, thanks. I make a good salary as a manager, and this is a bit of an extension of my views of my “obligation” to share forward. If you want to reward me, so to speak, pay it forward to someone else some time and help them figure out how to apply or prepare or manage their career. 🙂
Paul
Hi Paul,
First, thank you so much for your guide! I am astounded at how erroneously I would have been applying for government jobs. I’m near wrapping up a 35+ year career with the military and have started the basics of new job hunting (resumes, cover letters, jobs.gc.ca, etc). I have also introduced your guide to my daughter who is a 3rd year undergrad and hopes to become a Fed employee (yes, she fully worked through your “Understanding Yourself” section).
You might not have had much/any exposure to the Federal Student Work Employment Program (FSWEP), but as we work to enhance her potential of being selected via the online application process, would you have any recommendation regarding the format of the resume she needs to submit? Should she stay with the standard civvy street two-pager, or provide something more along the lines of your cover letter format (run through Notepad to take out any formatting)? There are currently no specific job descriptions, I think it simply a large student job “pool” that she might get picked out of because she meets someone’s requirements, not because she is applying for a certain job.
I see you responded to Magnolia about a year ago in the letters below somewhat covering similar questions. Should my daughter approach her application the same way?
Thank you for your efforts on the guide and for any time you might spend considering this.
Hi Joe,
Glad you’re finding the site and guide useful. For FSWEP, I think it depends a little bit on what an applicant brings to the table. Many if not most applicants have very little related experience. Many have worked as cashiers or bagging groceries or flipping burgers or pushing buggies. None of that is BAD experience, but it makes it hard to show on a resume that it is related. If so, the best solution is to emphasize some of the aspects of the job that are progressive or more responsible duties. Emphasize reliability, etc.
If or where the applicant has some good experience, either from volunteering or academic skills (particularly economics, stats, research), they can highlight that wherever is appropriate. If it’s an previous job, go whole hog on it.
I confess I don’t much care for the sections on goals, or too much on awards, etc., but if there’s room, go for it. Definitely mention any computer skills — like if they use PowerPoint equivalent and graphs and tables in Excel, as well as writing in Word. Seems a bit old school to mention, but it helps tick a box or two.
For overall format, I like the standard layout of Title, Place, Timelines, Duties.
Hope that helps…
Paul
Hi again, Paul. Once more I’d like to thank you for sharing your knowledge. As mentioned above, I am a serving military member currently posted outside of the NCR (outside of Canada, actually). I will likely retire after 35+ years to the NCR. I noted your comments in the Guide regarding not to bother applying for NCR jobs if either the opportunity wasn’t open Canada-wide, or if you weren’t actually living in the NCR for an NCR-only sourced position. It seems to leave me in the position of not being able to apply for Ottawa-based jobs until I have retired and am physically in the NCR. Of course, I would prefer to “retire on Friday and come to the new Fed job on Monday” if I could swing it. Am I out of luck with this until I am in Ottawa and can only start the application process then? That could potentially leave an employment gap of 4-12 months or more. Is there any Fed flexibility for military types in the application process that you are aware of?
PS – FSWEP never reached out to my daughter, but she used your advice in structuring her resume and got picked up by the City of Ottawa for a full-time position! During her interview she said she never stopped talking. None of the short, clipped answers I would likely give.
Thanks again.
Hi Joe,
So, the “times they are a-changing”. In the past, zones were really hard-definition technicalities. If you were in position X, and it was in Vancouver, and the position only invited NCR, you could apply and they would screen you out. The new world is less stringent in some ways. Mostly on the front-end — there are fewer posts that are so narrowly limited, and given that so many people are WFH and some are working remote, some may NOT screen you out automatically.
Yet the situation is still confused. Many depts are actively trying to weed out non-zone people, say non-NCR for NCR positions, because they want them in the office say 2 days a week. If the person is outside NCR, it gets them in the world of remote offices, blah blah blah. Easier to say NCR-only, and you have to be in the box. But as I said, some depts are nto screening as hard as they used to, some are going harder.
The good news however is that I would try contacting ANY hiring manager listed on a positoin that interests you and explain you’re retiring from military, looking to move into NCR core, and see what they say. There is a LOT of pressure to be as flex as possible to get CAF into competitions…not necessarily guaranteeing jobs, but giving them chances. And often as the positiosn will give pref / priority to CAF, they may let you skate on the zone requirement. Only way to know is to ask.
Glad to hear your daughter made it through CoO selection! FSWEP is always a crapshoot…
Paul
Appreciate the quick and detailed response. Thank you.
Hi Paul
Thanks for this guide! I’m just wondering if you could speak to my situation. I just completed my PhD in a Canadian university. I have no working experience in Canada apart from volunteer experiences. Does work experience acquired outside Canada count, and are references outside Canada acceptable?
Hi Richard, glad you find it helpful.
The short answer is “yes” to both. However, the longer answer is a bit about risk and friction. Suppose for example I have two candidates. One has a Canadian degree from a recognized Cdn university, one has a foreign degree from Oxford. There are LOTS of people who will just say, “trust the Cdn degree”. Compared to OXFORD. They just do. It’s stupid, it makes no sense, but it happens. If your degree was from University of Mumbai (if that exists), higher risk for them.
Your PhD is from a Cdn university so you MOSTLY have that solved.
However, your work experience isn’t in Canada and your references are outside. This adds a bit of risk but mostly it adds friction for them to understand the structures and situation of those jobs, the type of employment it might have been, expectations and performance, etc., AND they have friction to contact someone who is not in a close time zone. None of it is “fatal” to your application, but it does mean someone looking to hire you has to do more work than the person who has all Cdn work experience and references.
For foreign credentials, one thing people frequently do is training programs that are designed to GIVE them Cdn work experience so they can reference it in applications. While yours is a Cdn PHD, you could consider the same for your work experience. Perhaps even at a lower level than you want.
P.
Thanks for your response, Paul! This is helpful.
Hi Paul
I was wondering, for screening questions, it says to write in about 500 words or so. I was wondering, would you recommend writing the full 500 words for the screening questions?
Hi Jaleel,
There’s no hard and fast rule to that, but here’s a slightly different structure to consider if someone asked you to demonstrate your ability to post comments on a blog (since you just did that, I know you can, so easy to choose):
a. I posted comments on a blog (i.e. you say you did it, and they will screen you out).
b. I posted comments on a blog using my internet browser (i.e. okay you did it, gave a little detail on how, but likely not enough to “prove” it).
c. I posted comments on a blog using my internet browser after reading the materials already on the site, and comparing some of the advice to the information I already had. I asked a question directly related to the application process for how to handle screening questions…(i.e. you did it, you told me how, and you gave me some flavour of what posting comments means, what it was related to, etc.).
If your word limit here was say 100 words, all three would “fit”. But it isn’t about trying to write “more” just to say 30 times “I did it”, but to give a full answer. I usually describe it as “level 3” details — yes you did it, it was about what, and this is what it involved. To write L3 level details, which is what you need to “prove” your claim / provide evidence of your claim, you are going to have to write more than just “I did it”.
A friend of mine likes to compare it to the game of Clue. It’s not sufficient to say “Professor Plum did it”. Nor even that Professor Plum did it in the Conservatory. You also need to say Professor Plum committed the murder in the Conservatory with a lead pipe (or candlestick, etc.). Any combination of the first two are nice, but you don’t win the game. Only all three get you the win.
Sooooo, you need to write enough words to get you to L3 coverage. If that is 500 words, great. 100 words, also great. 800 words, not so great.
P.
Hello,
Thank you for this write up.
I see that cover letters have been replaced by screening questions.
How long is too long an answer for a screening question? Is three/four paragraphs for a single screening question too much?
I am used to answering interview questions using the ‘STAR’ method; should I treat these screening questions as interview questions and answer it in a similar way? e.g. [From 2012 to 2015 I worked at as , during which time I worked on . I . The result of my actions was .]?
Should I be using these questions as an opportunity to showcase my successes (as evidence that I actually have the experience/know what I’m talking about)? Or is it enough to say, ‘During I worked as . I was responsible for ,’ without examples?
Should I assume that the screening manager is familiar with industry jargon, e.g. MSA, SOW, SaaS, etc.?
Thank you for your time.
Hi Richard,
Thanks for the question. It is true that cover letters are basically replaced by screening questions, but the approach doesn’t change. Whereas before you were basically going to respond with each element in your cover letter, now they force you to do it through the questions — one per element. While some people like the STAR method for interviews (I don’t), it is risky for cover letters as you’re more likely to leave stuff out you need while including stuff you don’t. I’ll present instead a different paradigm that most people seem to understand better…let’s assume you are asked for experience in writing different types of materials. You could say:
A. I have experience in writing different types of materials.
B. I have experience in writing different types of materials, including memos, emails, press releases, Q&As, powerpoint decks, reports, synthesis documents, etc.
C. I have experience in writing different types of materials through my job as a Junior Analyst. For example, while working on the release of our division’s annual research report, I wrote memos to the Assistant Deputy Minister seeking approval for the three different stages of the report. I also prepared 2 powerpoint decks in 2020 on the research that my Director presented at two internal committees. I also drafted the press release for the research report, including some backgrounders for the press, key infographics for the release, and responded to emailed questions from stakeholders. I produced two synthesis documents that were included as annexes in the report.
Level A says “I’ve done it”, and if that’s what you say, you’ll get screened out every time. Every poster has almost identical language, “It is not sufficient to say…”.
Some people go with Level B for simpler experience requirements, and about 20-30% of the time, it might be enough for a junior position. Most of the time it isn’t.
Your goal is Level C — to demonstrate not only that you have the experience, but also the context and role you played in doing it. A STAR approach might get you there, but it can often get people too focused on the tasks and results over the situation and activities/actions that are really needed here.
Note that in my example at Level C, I could still FAIL the element. Why? Because while I explained the different types of docs, I said almost nothing about the levels of approval it was for (I mentioned only the ADM) and I did little to indicate timing or duration. Was it a small one-off thing? Was it for different audiences and approvals? And I am only using one example. It would be better if I included:
-Yes, have experience
– Situation A where I was in Position X (timing/duration) and I did x, y, z for audience abc
– Situation B where I was in Position Y (timing/duration) and I did x, y, z for audience ABC
– Situation C where I was in Position X (timing/duration) and I did x, y, z for audience ABC
Paul
Thank you for the thorough response.
One last question.
Is it acceptable to name previous employers, or is this seen as useless information, or even crass? e.g. should I say, ‘During a role at a supermarket chain from 2010 to 2013, I did xyz,’ or should I say, ‘From 2010 to 2013 I worked at Walmart as a “ROLE NAME”, doing xyz’?
Thanks again.
Hi Richard,
Thanks for the question…I don’t think it is crass, nor is it useless, particularly if you have several jobs on your resume that might be similar. Your second formulation is likely better than your first. For example, if you were already in govt, you would say “I worked for DND from 2010-2013 as a policy analyst and TBS from 2016-2018 as a senior policy analyst.” If on the resume there was a policy analyst position from 2013-2016 at Fisheries and Oceans, but it wasn’t relevant so you weren’t referring to it in that question/element, you would still want to distinguish between WHERE, WHEN and AT WHAT LEVEL/IN WHAT ROLE. A danger could be, for example, if you worked as a stocker at Walmart, Loblaws and The Source, then saying generically “as a stocker”, it doesn’t really give them the details. Besides, you’re attaching a resume, and it will list such details anyway for them to validate, so no reason to hide it. But, you also get no “bump” that Walmart is better than Loblaws or Canadian Tire is better than Walmart, for instance. You’re just saying where you worked and what you did for what period. The more specific, generally the better your details are.
Good luck!
Paul
Hello,
Your HR guide is very helpful! Thank you so much!
I was wondering if you had any insight on my situation. I received an email about a month ago from HR that my initial job application was screened in, and that “shortly” I would be advised of the next part of the selection process (presumably a written exam). I was wondering if it’s normal for the next part of the selection process to take over a month to start, since they already completed the initial screening of candidates? Is it possible they already administered the exam to a portion of the screened in candidates already?
Thanks a lot,
Kevin
Hi Kevin, glad you’re finding it helpful!
The short answer is that it COULD be that they’re doing batches and have already done a portion, but that is rare. Too easy for two people who know each other to have applied, and one person gets it early and shares it with their friend, etc. So they try to make them simultaneous exams, wherever possible, if it would be any advantage otherwise.
Far more likely is they said “soon” but it was HR’s “soon” which is anything up to a year. 🙁
Paul
Hi Paul,
I see, thank you for your help! I will continue to wait!
In the meantime, I’ll keep reading your guide.
Thank you,
Kevin
Oh, I also thought of something else.
I have been put into an essentially qualified pool in November of 2021. I have not heard back yet in regards to a LoO, so I am assuming that they had decided on someone else.
I am just curious, how does it work for positions that say The intent of this process is to create a pool of qualified candidates for the Administrative position in Calgary, AB, Edmonton, AB, Kamloops, BC, Nanaimo, BC, Surrey, BC, Vancouver, BC, Victoria, BC, Brandon, MB, Winnipeg, MB, Regina, SK and Saskatoon, SK. This pool could also be used to staff similar positions of various tenures within Employment and Social Development Canada in the W-T Region. Numbers to be determined.
Did they have 1 position to fill for all those regions, or do they have none at the moment but are anticipating that some positions will come soon in each region. If you are already accepted into the pool, was it the same manager that did the whole hiring process for each region or different hiring managers based on the region you are in?
I apologize for the lengthy question. and once again Thank you!
So I don’t know the details for any specific pool, but I can tell you how it generally works. Let’s assume you are applying for perhaps a PM-02 position with a department with locations in every province in Canada. Sometimes, they’ll run a comp for a single city, multiple cities, multiple provinces, all provinces. The requirement is that the job generally all have the same Statement of Merit Criteria. But suppose the one in Vancouver is Gs&Cs management for program X. The one in Halifax might be for program Y. Or X and Y. Yet the SoMC are the same for both jobs. So multiple POSSIBLE positions in various locations.
Officially, in order to run a comp, they are supposed to have at least one job that they are officially staffing…when you start the process, you have to list a position number that you are trying to fill. So, the minimum is usually one, with others as anticipatory. If it is all anticipatory, they don’t even need that to launch. So suppose the person who actually has a position is in Vancouver. They’ll likely be heavily involved in the process. But, if the dept thinks they really have multiple needs in the future all across the country, they may have a central group doing the initial weeding, but when they go to to do interviews, they may have a variety of hiring managers actually doing interviews, with the obvious solution being that applicants in Halifax are likely to be interviewed by someone in the Halifax office. Not necessarily, someone central is coordinating, but quite often they have people who MIGHT want to pull from it participating in interviews.
The largest pools are national, and are often things like post-secondary recruitment. THey’re creating a huge pool of people, so the dept recruits from all over, and is often centrally run.
However, even if centrally run, the pool is open to the whole dept. I’ve pulled from these large pools before…as a hiring manager, I’m basically given a list of all the people in the pool and I can go through and apply various criteria to narrow down who I want to consider. So, I could go through, if I’m in Vancouver, and say “Give me everyone who is already in Vancouver”. I don’t have to consider everyone in the pool, I can apply a lot of different filters to narrow it down. I could also say, “Okay, only those with a Masters Degree.” Usually, the criteria is a bit more generic such as “Of the ten criteria in the SOMC, I really need the following three elements the most. Give me the top five candidates for each of those elements”. One recruitment I did, they sent me 200+ names. I chose written ability as the primary filter, and eliminated anyone who didn’t have at least 8/10 or more on that element. Then I applied judgement as an element, and did the same — taking only those with 8/10 or above. I think the third criteria I applied was for the element “thinking things through”. For that one, I did a similar weed. The end result was a small list of about 4 people who had 8/10 or above on ALL THREE of my elements. I reviewed their experience, interviewed two for best fit, and chose one. I hadn’t been involved in any part of the process up until then, and it was one of the best hires of my management career. I didn’t even flag in advance that I was going to need an EC-04 as I didn’t know way back when the process started. The dept knew we needed a lot of them in the next year, so they ran a big process, saving me from having to run a small one myself (nor did 200 other managers).
Paul
Thank you Paul for the detailed explaination. It puts alot into perspective.
Hello Paul, I have just discovered your guide recently and I want to thank you so much for helping us out by taking your time to put this guide together. I feel it has answered several questions for the behind the scene work. Very much appreciate it!
My question is if you had previously worked for the government and received your PRI #, but do not work for them any more, could you use your old PRI # on the job applications or is there no point because you will get another one?
If you do use your PRI#, could the hiring managers look you up and see your profile and verify you had worked there previously?
Thank you
Hi Marlene, glad you find it helpful! Yes, if you had a previous PRI, it is reusable, they generally won’t issue a new one but just the old one.
Paul
Thank you so much! This is so much helpful.
The other day I paid 29 dollars for a GC job application PDF document, which is way less informative than yours! I would pay 100 for yours if you do sell it!
Bravo!
Thanks, but this information is part of managing your career in the govt, it SHOULD be free. 🙂
P.
Hi there!
Hi there! I’ve perused around your pages and I haven’t seen much referenced about students jobs (forgive me if I’ve overlooked something).
I’m looking at doing a student practicum with the public service, and my school has forwarded me information about a relevant student position. The email is brief and provides a fairly vague job description, the work location, timeline and pay, and the only qualification listed is to be master’s student in xx field of study. Interested parties are to email the program officer directly with a resume, cover letter and 3 references (not using the online application portal). Do the principles for cover letters and references you described also apply to student jobs? I find it a bit tricky given that the job advertisement in question didn’t have an official or formal posting outlining essential or asset qualification, etc. Are the expectations for my cover letter the same in this case (needing to address in detail the essential and asset experiences, etc)? Will me references also be given rigorous questionnaires for this type of position?
I know others have mentioned it many times before but it bears repeating: thanks for all that you’ve done on this project to help internet strangers!
Hi Magnolia,
In the current version, there isn’t much about student jobs, nor is there much about “casual” jobs, but in those cases, the rules are somewhat relaxed. In an ideal world, you would know for example that there are, say, three main duties/experiences. And then you could craft your cover letter accordingly:
– Greeting
– Brief intro to who you are and what you’re applying for
– Paragraph about what you’ve done related to duty 1
– Paragraph about what you’ve done related to duty 2
– Paragraph about what you’ve done related to duty 3
– Thank you for your consideration / additional interesting bit about yourself (language?)
– Sign off
If you don’t have the duties, pick three things you think are relevant and use those as your duty 1, 2, 3 (research, analysis, writing perhaps). Student positions are often informally filled, but it depends on the hiring manager. In my case, although it’s been awhile since I hired direct, I would provide a job description, main duties, etc. to help them understand what they’re applying for. If you don’t have that, you can’t do all the stuff for formal jobs, and it’s not expected. A decent cover letter + resume is sufficient. For references, they’re likely to be short oral phone calls to say, “So, I am doing ref check for Magnolia … is she crazy? Anger management issues? Likely to steal the office furniture? No, oh, okay then.” It’s a pretty “light” touch.
Good luck!
Paul
Hi Poly Wagg,
thanks for this detailed breakdown of the application process. Ive used your advice several times over the years and the updates just getting more and more detailed! I love it!.
Question about this new online application process. The process by department uses is all through the online portal where they lay out all the essential and asset criteria in their own boxes to be filled in (‘screening questions’, as you briefly touched on above. And so there is no specific section for cover letter, however, there is one for resume. In regards to the first part of your advice in regards to showing how you meet the eligibility criteria, should this instead now be included at the top of the resume?
As an aside, as someone not originally from the NCR and based in a region, I take some offense to your claim that an eligibility requirement to limit applicants just to the NCR is not discriminatory. Although it may not be intentional and the purpose may be to limit the applications coming it, it limits the ability of the major of Canadians to apply for these jobs and so I imagine the representation of those working in the NCR, and where most of the main HQs are for all the departments, is not representative of the makeup of Canada. I have also seen how challenging it is for individuals not in that specific location to get those jobs unless they move themselves first. and I imagine the relocation costs of moving staff plays a role in how broadly to hire. If limiting the number of applicants to review is the real concern, then there are other methods that can be utilized which are more ‘fair’ to Canadians not living in the NCR or employees working in the regions that wish to further their career but are unable to as the opportunities for growth are limited in the regions yet are unable to meet the eligibility criteria to apply to the NCR and are thus stuck between the colloquial rock and a hard place. (that’s not to say its not possible, directly reaching out to managers and networking helps a lot and is one way around this antiquated system, but still a frustrating issue to deal with when a large proportion of external and internal job postings are limited just to those in the NCR).
Hello “Regional”! 🙂
So the first part is pretty easy. Before, when we were doing cover letters, and it said, “Experience in x”, I recommended in the cover letter that you say “Experience in X” and put all the details below it. Now, with using the online portals, you have a box that says “Experience in X” and you put it all in there. Hence, no more cover letter. The goal wasn’t for it to be written out that way and thus now you should put it in the resume, it was so that you didn’t write a generic response that didn’t prove the items so clearly or separately. Since the portal separates it out for you, you are already providing the info for each heading exactly as I used to recommend in cover letters (that’s not me being prescient, it was just that’s the easiest way to take online info and parse it out for good HR admin!). You upload your resume just as normal. If you’re pasting it (rather than uploading a file), I recommend pasting it FIRST into a text editor like NOTEPAD that can strip out any weird characters and then pasting from there to the box.
Now for the regional part. I get your argument and it is the exact argument for post-secondary recruitment being done nationally. Large open comps are done that way most of the time. Narrower ones are not. And the intent is pure cost, but not just the number of applicants. Let me give you an example where the poster has three requirements — experience in using Excel, a degree in statistics, and living in the NCR.
Do you need experience in Excel? Why couldn’t I hire you and then train you in Excel? We could, but it costs extra $$ to do that, while having no idea if you’re good with Excel or will even like it. It’s a crapshoot. And we also know that lots of people already have the experience. So we can just ask for it up front, save us time and money in not having to train you on it afterwards, all good. We are, in effect, discriminating against someone who doesn’t have experience in using Excel. Maybe they’re a MAC person and hates Microsoft. Maybe they are great in other spreadsheet software. I don’t know, but we use Excel, we want Excel experience, and if you don’t have it, you’re out.
Do you need a degree in statistics? Well, we could hire you without it and train you, but again, there’s a huge cost to it. So we make it a requirement and discriminate against anyone who doesn’t have it and therefore can’t compete.
Do you need to live in the NCR? This one goes a bit more broadly than you described it. Yes, there’s a cost to having it wide open as you do get way more applicants than you wanted. If you narrow it, the most likely criteria is more years of experience in doing policy work, which is what the vast majority of the jobs in the NCR are related to…we’re here because that’s where the policy decisions are done, just as they are centrally located in each provincial government for their capitals. Parliament is here, the Ministers are here, the policy debates are located here, so the policy people are here (traditionally, although this is changing, see below). So if they ask for 5y experience in doing policy work, to limit the number of applicants, most of the regional people will be out anyway. There are 260K employees in the public service, and there are more jobs outside NCR than there are in — 140K around the country, 120K in NCR. But when you break those 120K down, the # of policy jobs is way way higher. And in smaller depts, there are no regional jobs. There might only be 1000 employees, and they have then all located here. By contrast, the heavy processing jobs are located around the country.
The real costs (up until recently) has not been #s, but the additional costs. We can’t do face to face interviews in Ottawa and then only phone interviews with regional people, it’s too much of an advantage to be in person. So that means we either have to send people to the region to do the interviews or bring everyone to Ottawa. The cost is unwarranted when you have 150 qualified people already here. The requirement is to find a qualified person, not to find every qualified person anywhere in Canada. I noted that there are more jobs outside NCR than in, and most of those jobs are not open to the people living in NCR. I know this acutely for two reasons.
First and foremost, something that is not widely known by people in the regions, but of the 120K in NCR, I would estimate 60% at least are not from NCR originally. They came on co-ops, they worked in regions, they moved here and competed, they joined through national campaigns, etc. In my immediate directorate of 70 people, there are people from every province in the country working for us. So when people say we don’t represent the makeup of Canada, I blow them a raspberry. It’s simply not true. It’s common rhetoric, but it’s mostly BS.
Second, many of those people moved here for the jobs (in whatever order), and would love the opportunity to move back. But they can’t compete for the jobs in the regions. The reverse problem shows up for them…most of the regional jobs are delivery jobs, rather than policy, and it’s hard to compete even if the job was open, because they have the policy experience, but rarely delivery experience.
The other major cost element is relocation after hiring. If we hire you, we may for the move. So I’m paying for someone to move to Ottawa at a cost of multiple thousands of dollars when there are equally qualified people already living here, some from the same region as the new person, and if I hire them, I get the regional makeup you wanted, without the extra moving costs.
When it’s one job, maybe I’m talking $10K for multiple interview costs and one person’s moving costs. But when it’s 25,000 jobs, suddenly I’m spending $250M extra. That’s a lot of cash to be spending to solve a problem I don’t have. People from the regions have already found a way to work here. Tons of them. More than half the workforce in NCR.
If we were doing it because we were “privileging” people who were born in NCR region, I’d agree with you. When it’s done for cost, and almost all of my coworkers come from elsewhere, I’m not convinced.
The interesting part is that things are changing as a result of COVID, in two different ways. Like your desire for the jobs, MPs have always complained there are too many high-paying jobs in NCR and why can’t you move those depts around the country. As I noted, they’re mostly policy jobs and they put them where the Ministers are and tied to Parliament. This is not unique to the GoC, or even federally — every country or jurisdiction in the world tends to centralize their government administration. In the US, Canada and Australia, it is more obvious because of the geographic size. And MPs, as I said, want jobs to be better “shared”. They make the same arguments about representation, makeup, etc., and they’re mostly crap reasons. But the REAL reason, and the one that holds water, is some of those jobs are pretty lucrative for local economies. So even if you could move 100 jobs to your constituency, it looks great politically. Except they REALLY want the processing jobs, not so much the policy jobs, as there are more of the processing jobs than policy and thus more people who would benefit across the local jurisdiction. Why hasn’t it happened? Because everyone did policy face to face. There was no other real option.
With everyone in Work From Home mode, they rolled out video conferencing tools for EVERYONE. We used to have it for boardrooms usually used by ADMs or DGs, but now, everyone can use their desktop. People can actually DO interviews by video, for everyone. Nobody comes to in-person interviews (at least not currently). And people can easily interview the person in New Brunswick or Saskatchewan. There are no added interview costs. So why not do broader interviews? If they have experience, great. HR is still resisting on #s, but since many of them are from regions too, they’ll get there.
But the extra note is that with WFH, and the possibility of some of the work (including policy) being 100% WFH in the future, it’s possible to have some of those jobs BE in the region. Depts are recruiting people from across Canada right now, and while the jobs might be in Ottawa eventually (*), in the short term at least, you can generally work anywhere you want in Canada. People have moved back home or are at their cottages. Some are staying with family, some even took the risk and signed leases, hoping for flex in the future. The downside of all this is that it is subject to TBS rules (always conservative), Parliamentary approval (likely to be positive), individual depts (managers are conservative), and unions (that generally benefit from everyone at a single job site, as union support is lower for virtual workers). It’s anyone’s guess what that will look like though for the long run. [* I said eventually because a lot of govt rules have to change to make “work anywhere” possible, and I am not convinced they’ll all get changed; some people are getting hired in Montreal, for example, but it won’t surprise me if they get told eventually they have to move to Ottawa to keep the job.]
For examples, I have a friend from PEI who works in Ottawa, but if he could get paid the same as he is now with the same job level, he’d move back to PEI in a heartbeat. He’d give up promotion opportunities probably to do it. Another friend would love to move back to Nova Scotia to be with family, and WFH would be awesome for her. She’s tried to get in with ACOA, but regional jobs aren’t open to her and they’re not willing to give her a permanent job, just terms, plus she’d have to accept limited advancement opportunities. Another friend made the leap back to Winnipeg a few years ago, and she has struggled as an EC in a PM/AS world. Few opportunities, little understanding of her skillset, poor utilisation of her abilities, etc. Another changed careers and moved back to Calgary. Another would move back to Vancouver tomorrow if he could take the job with him.
The funny thing though is MP support is messy. They love the idea of these jobs “coming to their region” with the employee who chooses to live there. But then they want the job to stay there, even if the employee decides to move to another province. They like the jobs coming “in”, they don’t like it if the employee chooses to move away.
The really odd thing though about WFH, which is in your favour, is that most depts have realized that policy work, which was always viewed as requiring face-to-face workers together, has now been proven to be able to be done *IF* the same employees have the proper tools to do it (video, network access, laptops, etc.).
Personally, I think cost will drive a greater openness for both broader interviews as well as potentially not having to move here if you get the job.
Good luck,
Paul
Hi Polywogg,
As a current government employee applying for assignments, this was tremendously helpful. I frankly don’t know how I got my first job considering what my cover letter and CV looked like then.
Most of these assignment opportunities request a brief cover letter and CV. There aren’t really any essential/asset qualifications but more a “who we’re looking for” or list of responsibilities. I’m not sure how to craft my cover letter to these pretty vague requirements.
Also a lot of my experience in project management/change management was from private sector experience more than 10 years ago. I really want to get back to PM work but none of it was in government. I’m focusing my CL on that experience and hope that will be enough.
Thank you so much for this very thorough explanation. It’s very much appreciated.
Anne
Hi Anne,
You raise two really good points that aren’t well covered in my current version of the guide.
a. The easier one is “project management”. There are a lot of references in different parts of government to “project management”, often in the form of “we really need to improve our project management capacity”. And for the initiated, one might think since there is a category actually called Program Management who manage “projects” (i.e. PMs), that’s what they mean. Almost uniformly? They don’t.
They mean more often than not AS or CS people managing business or computer/IT projects. So, I flag that as you need to be specific when you say you want to go back to project management to mention (as you did) that you mean types of change management, business projects, etc. I worked at ESDC in corporate areas and regularly we kept seeing refs in HR docs to “we need project management” and the solution from HR was to hire more PMs. Except that wasn’t what they wanted most of the time and it would go through several edits before people would have it worded properly.
b. The “cattle-call” assignments are a pain in the butt because, as you say, they frequently have no specific elements they’re looking for that you can respond to. And, to be blunt, they don’t even necessarily say very specifically what areas they’re hiring in. So you could write a great cover letter for someone in IT projects that would sail right by the person who leads HR projects because you didn’t know HR was even going to look at it. Or a generic “change management” one that the IT people skip over as it seemed too “soft” for what they’re looking for. In short? I’m not a fan. The end result is you pretty much are a hybrid of generic private-sector advice (key pitch information) and public sector (key experiences and abilities).
When I update the guide in the next few months, that will be a primary area to address…
Paul
Thank you Paul. Looking forward to the next revision.
Dear PolyWogg, a very big thank you for such a lively, helpful demystification of government!
I have two questions, and these are:
(i) whether the Canadian government hires analysts who have worked similar positions for foreign governments? I know this is common in the UK – equally, that the UK might be unique in its rather free market approach to government.
(ii) whether, after 10 years abroad, it isn’t wiser to return to Canada and cultivate Canadian experiences (though they may not be governmental just yet).
I ask because I have spent nearly all of my twenties in Europe, first in the private sector, then for a PhD at Cambridge, which I am two months away from submitting. For all my analytical skills, I am acutely aware of the fact that my last Canadian experience was my undergraduate degree a decade ago! I am in the midst of behavioural and analytical testing for two ministries in Canada (Agriculture and Infrastructure), which is encouraging (though how much remains I cannot say!), but may shortly be faced with an offer from the UK government. It would be very relevant in terms of government, but very little in terms of Canada. Another option is to return home after the PhD regardless, and put all my efforts into becoming (re)acquainted with Canada – though this may mean not working for government immediately, or taking a job for which I may be overqualified.
Probably worth specifying that I have no dependants, and am therefore fortunate enough to have a bit of leeway making these choices!
Any insights would be very gratefully received.
Very best wishes,
Yasmin
Hi Yasmin, what a great combo of questions. I’m not sure I have anything resembling a definitive answer, but I’ll give it a go. 🙂
So the first Q is whether GoC hires people with foreign government experience. Unfortunately, that is way too broad of a category. There is a huge difference between someone who, for example, was an IT person vs. someone who was an admin vs. someone doing stats work vs. policy. It also depends on the substantive sector such as fisheries vs. health vs. whatever. So let’s break it down a bit by the steps.
Step 1 for hiring is often citizenship. It is harder for someone who has foreign citizenship to pass a security check than it is for a Cdn citizen. That’s not entirely “nationalistic”, sometimes it’s just info availability. If you have Cdn citizenship, and you’ve lived in Canada, we have tax records, bank accounts, etc, basically a paper trail for the person, and we can figure out where they were and what they were doing, including in-person interviews with neighbours or coworkers. If, instead, we have to do a background check on someone who lived in India for the last 5y, we can’t pull them up in our databases as easily even if Canadian, and even less so if they aren’t Canadian. So on that basis alone, I’d say you’re right, we are not as open to hiring those with foreign experience if they are not Cdn citizens, unless it’s some sort of formal exchange i.e. a UK civil servant or Australian civil servant comes to work for us, a secondment essentially. So those who are working for foreign govts generally as an open market have more trouble getting hired.
Step 2 is consideration of their experiences when applying for jobs. As you noted, the best experience is the one that is closest to what they are looking for…so if you’re applying for an EC-05 position at Health, the person with the best chance is probably an EC-04 at Health. Doesn’t mean no one else has a chance, just recognition that they have to work a little harder for their experience to be couched the right way and perhaps “better” demonstrated in the application than otherwise. Each “step” removed from “in govt / in same dept / in same field / in Canada”, the harder you have to work to show you’re qualified.
So if you’re applying to work in epidemiology for Health Canada, and you’ve been working in epidemiology for the Ministry of Health in the Netherlands, those are pretty good elements…the only “piece” you’re missing is Canadian experience. So you’ll have to work a little harder to show how the other 3 “checkboxes” stack up against the 4 they’re asking for.
Step 3 and 4 (written and interview) are a bit more challenging still, but in different ways. And is, in my view, far more subtle. I can tell you that there are some managers who will not care one way or the other, they’ll interview you, they’ll look at the experience and think, “They’re great!”. Others will look at it and go, “Sniff, well it wasn’t in Canada, so it doesn’t count”. That isn’t a blanket reaction either way, and really depends on the manager. Sometimes it is ignorance, sometimes it is a bad experience with someone who didn’t have the local experience and needed more training to get up to speed, etc. Whatever. There’s little you can do about their reaction. However, what you can do is make sure any examples you give are as clear for context as possible. If you worked for the Dutch in their policy coherence unit, most depts would have no idea what that was…so you’d have to explain it was a PCO-like central policy unit with strong coercive powers for approvals like TBS.
Step 5 is references, and while everyone is “open” to international references, hiring managers often want to talk to the references for the one they plan to hire. They might do questionnaires for references for a bunch, but if they’re hiring a more senior person (EC-05 or -06), they’ll usually want to chat with their current supervisor. That’s harder to do with a 6-8 or 12h time difference. I suspect that sounds really silly, and since I used to work at CIDA and DFAIT back in the day, plus domestic international shops, I know how some people talk global but only operate local. The idea that you could call someone in Germany is, like, calling an astronaut on the space station. Even with modern video calls, there are still people who are stuck in the old way of thinking we had with our parents that LD calls are for short conversations at Xmas or emergencies, not routine reference checks. Sigh. Man I feel old sometimes when I talk to these people.
Sooooo, for steps 1-5, yes, I agree it’s harder. But as you saw, I would nuance it differently at each level and how serious it is. Plus how you respond is more about how you explain / couch things.
Your second Q is even more difficult. Which is better:
a. Equivalent experience at level in a foreign country; OR
b. Lower-level experience in Canada.
I would love to tell you (a) is better, and in many cases (particularly for sciences) it would be, but for a lot of policy work, I would say b will sway managers more easily. And perhaps that is the real answer…”a” is better if you can explain it well, but “b” is easier to understand. Let me give you an example from a friend. He was running a comp and part of the job was “forecasting” for finances. So he screened out a person from another dept who had said nothing about forecasting in their application (remembering of course the onus is on the applicant to prove they have the experience necessary and often the screening is done by HR people who may or may not know the subject matter). The person called to ask “WTF?” because he had clearly stated that he did the monthly “x” report for finances in his dept. That report ONLY existed in his dept, at least by that name. So he said “x” assuming the screeners would know that at his dept, “x” included full forecasting for the next 3y. They didn’t and he was screened out. It was easy to “fix”, but even within GoC, people are often terrible at explaining things across depts. They “assume” people understand contexts that they don’t, and then the markers are noting, “Answer was confusing, not clear what their role was or the challenge they were addressing 4/10”. In your case, I would say if you are planning on returning, I would be tempted to go for “both” i.e. your previous experience + some local experience (at whatever level) in Canada when you return.
FYI, I would avoid talking (and thinking if you can!) as “lower level” or being “over-qualified”. I started my career doing a lot of stuff I was “over-qualified” for, with a full BA and MPA later, and yet I was doing stuff that had little ties to the policy stuff I had as skills. But later, when I was a more “senior” policy person, I had numerous times where I was suddenly involved in, say, a conference, and because I had 3y doing logistics work for DFAIT, I had a much easier time coordinating everything between policy and operations. Equally, I have a better understanding of Grants and Contributions than most ECs. I was “over-qualified” in one sense, but it was still new experiences. Heck, even doing data entry for some stuff may not have been the best use of my skills at times, but there are times when now I have to do it too. One way I often explain it is that your “level” is an average — it is the level at which most of your work should be. Sometimes I have been doing the work of an ADM at meetings, I’ve chaired meetings of ADMs and led discussions. Does that make me an ADM? Hardly, I’m not EX even. Much of the last 10 years, I bop between EX-01 level and EC-07 level files. But, once in awhile, I do CR-4 tasks too. Doesn’t mean I’m “over qualified”, it just means my activities vary by day. The majority are manager-type (as opposed to manager-level). I like the way you described it as “local experience” as opposed to “lower level experience”. Just a caution. Now, if we’re talking driving a cab, that’s not going to help you get “local experience” that the hiring managers will recognize. 🙂 Not “lower level”, just not the right type.
Good luck!
PolyWogg
Dear PolyWogg,
I can’t thank you enough for such a quick, thorough, and helpful reply!
Re. nationality – I should have mentioned, I’m a dual CDA/GB citizen, but grew up in Quebec. Your point about having to be even more deliberate in showing how foreign experience might be equivalent is a good one – as is the point that anything I do in Canada will inherently be more understandable to hiring managers.
Re. jobs specifics – I’m in currently in the running for an EC-02 in Infrastructure and a Co-00 in Agriculture, so junior enough not to (yet) need subject area expertise. The UK job is roughly EC-03, but across a variety of areas (it is in a somewhat unusual, transversal team).
The use of ‘overqualified’ was clumsy, thank you for picking it up. I suppose that while I can explain the geographical side-step of working in the UK, I can’t quite put my finger on the as-yet-unknown side-step of coming home should neither ministry work out. That said, I’ve just made the CAR for Agriculture! Fully intend to be as explicit, precise, and deliberate as I can to show that I’m the best duckie for the job!
In any event, I was relieved that your practical advice tended towards (b) that is, ‘lower-level’ (to the extent that such a thing exists, as no job solicits a single, linear set of skills) and in Canada. As the PhD ends and the job hunt accelerates though, it’s dawning on me that employment pragmatics aside, I want to come home. As taking the UK job doesn’t seem to be an unmitigated advantage (which would otherwise justify another year or two abroad), I suppose I have my answer!
Many thanks again,
Yasmin
Dear PolyWogg, first of all, your blog is a real time safer and is very well written, especially for people who have no experience in applying for government jobs. My question is the following: I am applying for a job as a FE engineer in Hamilton right now. I believe I meet all the required experience and knowledge criteria. Since I graduated from the Technical University of Vienna, Austria with an Engineering Master, my academic background is currently being assessed by the PEO. I am also waiting for my permanent residency. Both will most likely take a while. The dead line for applying for the job is the April the 7th. It is essential to be considered to have degree from a recognized post-secondary institution and I most likely cannot provide that evidence until the the 7th of April, but sometime in the next 4 weeks, will I be screened out for sure, or is it not an issue, since I will be able to provide that qualification, but just not right now.
Thank you for your time
Hi ALexander,
I could wax and wane about foreign credential recognition, recognized institutions, etc. and while interesting, all of it mostly irrelevant. The short version is you apply with what you have for the deadline you have. You can’t speed up your recognition or your PR status, and you can’t move the deadline. All you can do is apply and find out how they treat your situation.
Generally speaking, you need the degree for the deadline. But you have the degree. Is it from a recognized institution? That’s a separate question. You should apply stating that you meet the criteria and providing your dates, etc. If they ask for more details, provide them; if they screen you out, well, that’s the break. But better they screen you out after you apply, then for you to screen yourself out before even applying. Because maybe they WON’T screen you out. Or maybe you have more evidence by the time they ask for it.
It would be a different situation if you were in the process of graduating but didn’t have a degree yet — you’d likely be out automatically. For example, if you needed a special class of drivers license, you would need to have it when you applied; you can’t get it after the fact. All of the reqts for eligibility except language are on day of application, basically. You HAVE the degree, what you lack is your equivalency and recognition. But they didn’t ask that yet. Just if you have the degree.
PR is another matter. If it is required on day of application, they’ll screen you out. But maybe they won’t require it. It’s a bigger obstacle in my view than your degree, but some comps rule you out immediately, others leave you in and screen out later, others are open to it all the way through. It varies by dept and even area.
Good luck, but definitely focus on applying for April 7th as if you qualify. Let them tell you “no”.
Paul