CourseToJob guide · content date . Tool instructions reflect the CourseToJob service. Editorial method.
Quick answer
Write to the advertised behaviours and experience, in the Success Profiles language the vacancy named. Keep the CV a plain two-page file. Skip this page if the role is not on Civil Service Jobs — a local-authority or NHS form is a different artefact.
Other situations: Skip for SCS campaigns with a named search firm that asked for a narrative brief, and for public-sector jobs that are not Civil Service (NHS, police forces, local government often differ). Follow that advert.
What are Success Profiles doing to the CV?
The vacancy tells you which elements are tested: behaviours, experience, strengths, ability, technical. The CV mostly carries experience and technical. Behaviours usually live in the form. If you ignore the listed behaviours, a beautiful PDF will not save you.
Checked against publicly described Success Profiles practice, 13 August 2026. We are not the Cabinet Office. If the advert changed the list, the advert wins.
Worked method: print the vacancy, highlight the behaviours named, write one STAR draft each in a side document, then cut the CV to dates, scope, and numbers. Upload a single-column file.
How do you show experience without a novel?
Each recent role: title, employer, dates, two to four bullets with scope (team size, budget, caseload) and a result. Civil Service readers know jargon; they still need a number. “Led a policy” is empty. “Led a 14-person consultation; 2,400 responses; recommendation accepted” is a line.
| Leave | Prefer |
|---|---|
| Passionate about public service | A delivery number in a real setting |
| Responsible for stakeholder engagement | Who, how often, what changed |
| Various duties as required | Cut the line |
Personal statement on the CV: four lines max, targeted at this campaign. Longer statement: CV personal statement.
What should the file look like?
A4, single column, standard headings, no photo, no icons, selectable text. Civil Service Jobs is not a place to test a two-column executive template. If they ask for a CV and a statement separately, do not merge them into one designed brochure.
Use Classic or Professional. Medium-risk sidebars are for a named hiring manager who asked for design, which this channel is not.
Paste test: free ATS check. Builder: CV builder.
How do you translate private-sector titles?
Keep the real title. Add a gloss in the first bullet: “equivalent to a Grade 7 budget, not a Civil Service grade.” Do not relabel yourself G7 because a blog said so. Panel members will check. Lie-by-mapping is still a lie.
If you have never written a behaviour example, draft them before you touch colour. The expensive failure is an empty behaviour box, not an unfashionable font.
Career change: career change CV.
How is this different from an NHS CV?
NHS person specifications are clinical and banded. Civil Service Success Profiles are behaviours plus experience. Do not send an NMC-led file to a policy role, or a behaviour essay to a ward manager post. Match the portal in front of you.
NHS page: NHS Jobs CV. Default UK file: how to write a CV.
How long should the personal statement on the CV be?
Four lines, campaign-specific, no “I have been passionate about public service since school” unless you then prove it. The 250–500 word statement, if the campaign asks for one, lives in the form or a separate upload. Two statements that disagree are a problem.
If the campaign forbids a CV personal statement, skip it. Follow the campaign pack. Default profile advice: personal statement.