The only thing that saves us from the bureaucracy is its inefficiency - Eugene McCarthy


First of all, what is the Selection Criteria process?

Selection criteria (alternately: listed job requirements) is a formal process for positions within the Australian public service/sector (Federal, State & Local government) although some welfare, professional associations and educational institution also utilise the process. Written responses which address selection criteria give the potential employee an opportunity to demonstrate in writing that they have the knowledge and skills required for the advertised position. The process provides a set of measurable standards against which the employer can assess an application.

Selection criteria will provide a set of questions (often between 5 – 7 questions) for the potential employee to respond to. These questions will have been formulated to give you the respondent an opportunity to demonstrate their suitability for the position. All questions have to be answered and the answers must demonstrate value against the selection criteria – as often the selection panel will rate the responses prior to reading your curriculum vitae.

Just to internationalise my blog, selection criteria are also known as Knowledge, Skills & Abilities (KSA) in the United States or Competency Based Statements (CSB) in the UK.

If we consider the premise that the process of selection criteria was developed to enable a single method for evaluating candidates to ensure an efficient and equitable system then the selection criteria process fails on both accounts.

Let me break it down into its two logical components.

An EFFICIENT system?

It is a common ideal in recruitment and retention strategies that those organisations which can reduce the time to source – time to hire periods gain an advantage over their competitors. In the pre-boom years up to late 2008 and was consistently asked how government agencies could retain and attract staff against the increasing competition in the commercial sector. My first two answers would always be look at your remuneration strategy and increase efficiency (starting with the scrapping of the selection criteria process).
Consider some of the workflow issues surrounding a government process compared to a commercial one. For a government agency to get approval you need to complete the following:

• Job Analysis;
• Position Description;
• Position Approval;
• Selection Criteria/KSA Review & Approval;
• Advertising;
• Screening & Selection (which includes in a SC/KSA example additional overhead to cover-off those hiring approval administrative steps);
• Hiring
• Onboarding.

This is a very basic dot-point workflow. With at least one extra step (SC/KSA review & approval) and one step with increased administration (screening & selection) any role which takes on the Selection Criteria has additional overhead from requirement to the onboarding stage. Prior to the GFC the Queensland government was so concerned with its time to source – time to hire metrics that in at least two of its largest departments it reduced the selection criteria requirement from approximately one-page per question to a maximum 2-page response. At that time the timings to recruit a public sector employee were still measured in weeks, sometimes months while the commercial groups led by a surging mining industry could hire within days.

An EQUITABLE system?

One of the other major areas of concern for government and which the selection criteria were supposed to address was the idea of equality of hire as the West moved away from Public Service exams (also known as Civil Service exams in the US). The selection criteria process was seen as the answer to weed out unqualified persons from applying for government positions.

Putting qualifications (and to a lesser extent nepotism) aside as societal issue largely dealt with by market and technology based reforms how does making someone with no experience of writing a formal selection criteria or minimal understanding of the STAR methodology (Situation – Tasks – Actions – Results) make them less of a potential high-achieving employee.

It doesn’t.

All that the selection criteria manages to achieve now is to have created an industry of ‘selection criteria writing experts’ who for a fee will write up your working history in a document which will tick all the boxes on a selection panel’s clipboard so that you can go in and sell yourself. This is not a step toward modernity but a reverse back into history and little better than the Public Service exams they replaced. Like the Imperial examinations of China selection criteria may give you a better bureaucrat but hardly likely to endear you to the best talent in such areas as health, engineering or finance (sectors in Australia, UK and the US with high-demand from both government and commercial interests).

A Case Study

I am currently applying for two roles. One is with a federal department and one with a state department. The roles are very similar in remuneration and scope and I am professionally excited about both opportunities. The only real difference is the hiring approach utilised is completely divergent.

The federal department is utilising the selection criteria response while the state department role is hiring via an agency. The federal department advertised via its portal and a job board (Seek) approximately three weeks ago while the agency representing the state department contacted me directly late last week after reviewing my LinkedIn profile. The federal department received my formal application today (it still has a number of days before the online process finalises) while the state department representative has already completed the screening phase and I am already scheduled to meet the department’s senior executive in six working days where I will be professionally grilled for an hour.

The basics again, two roles on offer both of which are professionally exciting. Two processes utilised, but only one which is efficient & equitable.

In conclusion it was interesting to read the head of the US Office of Personnel Management, John Berry who stated as far back as June 2009 that "Our society operates on a résumé-based approach, and for years, the government has had its own approach separate from that. What I'm hoping we can accomplish is a culture shift to have the federal government rely upon what the societal norm is."

What is the societal norm? Its resume or curriculum vitae based material traditionally housed on paper but now moving more to an online publication.

To use anything else is inefficient and inequitable.