Senior Management Opportunities

Senior Management Opportunities

Principal Officer Level

Stage 1

Pre-Test Information Booklet

This is an important document so please set some time aside to read it in advance of the test session.

Background Information

Why Exercises are Being Used

The Public Appointments Service is committed to principles of good recruitment practice. These principles involve the fair and impartial selection of the best candidates for the position using job relevant measures. Research evidence shows a strong relationship between exercises of the type being used on the Senior Management Opportunities Principal Officer Level competition and on-the-job performance.

The Exercises which are being used in the Senior Management Opportunities Principal Officer Level competition measure a range of skills and qualities that were determined through analysis of the requirements of the Principal Officer role.

The exercises reflect the types of issues faced by Principal Officers. However there is no advantage to be gained from having worked in a particular sector/ Department/ area. Even if you feel that knowledge you may have in the area is relevant, you should use only the information supplied in the exercise.

Overview

There are two exercises used at Stage 1 of the Principal Officer competition; a Job Simulation Exercise and an Analysis Exercise.

Both of these Exercises will be administered online. Therefore you will require a PC or laptop to complete these Exercises.

You will be unsupervised when taking them. During the testing window an email support facility will be available to deal with any technical issues you may have.

Candidates must reach the required standard in both Exercises. Those who achieve the required standard will be ranked accordingly. Qualification at Stage 1 is no guarantee that a candidate will be invited to Stage 2 or subsequent stages.

There will be a set time window during which you must take the Exercises – 23rdto 31st March. You are strongly advised to complete both of your Exercises early in the testing window.

You can sit the Exercises in whichever order you prefer.

If you lose your internet connection, you can log back in to complete the Exercise. However, you are expected to complete an Exercise in one sitting.

Please note that while candidates complete these assessments online in an unsupervised environment, those who qualify and are placed highest on the order of merit may be required to sit similar tests in a supervised environment at a later stage in the process. If a candidate’s performance at a supervised assessment is outside the expected scoring range from their unsupervised assessment, it will call into question the validity of their unsupervised assessment scores and they may be excluded from subsequent stages of the selection process and the competition(s)

Note:

• You may take the Exercises in a venue of your choice wherever you have access to a computer and a reliable internet connection;
• Please be aware that taking these Exercises within a secure IT network e.g. such as your work or college network which may have firewalls or other security technology in place, may cause you technical difficulties. In such instances PAS (or any company or service provider operating on behalf of PAS) will not be liable;
• As the Exercises will require your full concentration, please ensure that you take the Exercises in a quiet environment, where there are no distractions and where you will not be disturbed;
• You are advised to take the tests on a PC or laptop and to use a mouse you are familiar with. Do not attempt to take the tests on a smart phone, mobile or tablet device;
• Close down all other applications except for your browser windows and internet connection, and stop all other activity on your computer;
• You should run through the ‘Instructions and examples’ part of the programme before taking each Exercise. This will enable you to get use to how to move between questions and how to record your answers.
• Further information on the PC /Laptop requirements to take this assessment is provided at Appendix 1 at the end of this document;
• As stated, email support facilities will be available to deal with any technical issues you may have in relation to the tests. The support email, for technical issues only, will be .
• Please be aware that both of these Exercises are timed and they will automatically finish after the allocated time has elapsed. For your convenience a timer will appear on the screen and will indicate the time you have remaining on the Exercise.

Link to the Exercises

You will soon receive an update to your publicjobs Messageboard outlining when you should expect to receive the link to your Exercises.

You have a limited number of days in which to complete and submit your Exercises. You are strongly advised to give yourself sufficient time and not wait until the final hours of the testing deadline to take the tests. No time extensions will be given.

You will receive instructions on how to access the Exercises online. You will need to use the web link provided to gain access to the Exercises.The system will ask you to confirm your candidate number and to confirm your agreement to accepting the responsibilities listed.

The Exercises Being Used

Job Simulation Exercise (35 minutes duration)

This exercise is designed to assess the following competencies:

•Leadership and Direction

•Managing and Delivering Results

•Building Relationships/ Communication

In this exercise, you will be presented with a number of situations typical of those that may occur in the role of Principal Officer. For each situation you will be given a series of five possible actions and asked to rate each in terms of their appropriateness; i.e. you may rate the first action as highly inappropriate, the second as appropriate etc.

There are 12 situations and you will have 35 minutes to rate the 60 options in this exercise.

Analysis Exercise (30 minutes duration)

This Exercise is designed to assess your ability to critically analyse information. It contains a number of documents and you will be given 30 statements and asked to state whether each is true, false or cannot say based on the information in the brief. This exercise will last 30 minutes.

Practice questions

Practice questions for each of the exercises are presented over the next few pages. Please note that when you access the link to the actual Exercises, practice material will be available.These practice questions are similar in format to what you will find in each of the Online Exercises.

Exercise 1 – Job Simulation Exercise

In the Job Simulation Exercise you will be presented with a number of situations which are typical of the kinds of situations dealt with by Principal Officers. For each situation you will be given five possible options for handling or managing that situation. Your task is to rate each of those options in terms of their appropriateness using the scale below.

Marks awarded will be based on the extent to which your response matches the agreed ratings. If you are close to the ideal response, marks are still awarded, e.g. if an action is deemed ‘highly appropriate’ and you select ‘appropriate’, there will be still marks awarded.

Each option should be rated in isolation to the other options, i.e. treated as if it were the only option available. It is also very important to remember that there may be Situations where a number of the options may be classified as Highly Appropriate, or Highly Inappropriate etc. You may use the same rating more than once if you wish.

Do not spend too long rating any one option – make your best choice as to the appropriateness of each of the actions.

It is important to remember that while the exercises are set in a particular Civil Service context, all judgements should only be made on the information provided in this exercise only.

Your role:

As a Principal Officer, you report to a Director and manage a small number of Assistant Principal Officers (who, in turn, manage their teams of Higher Executive Officers, Executive Officers and Clerical Officers).

Examples

Situation 1

As part of your research into Environmental Technologies, you are about to commence a significant benchmarking project with an external research partner. You have been informed by another colleague that they have heard that this particular research partner does not have a good track record for keeping within budget. The decision to work with this research partner has come following a tendering process and consultation across the top management team within your Department, of which your Director is a member. You are working towards a tight deadline with limited resources and budget.

Rate each of the following options for dealing with this situation using the A to F scale below.

Situation 2

You have been leading a large-scale project for the last fifteen months and all the milestones and deadlines have been met. The project is finally coming to fruition. Your contribution is coming to an end and you are preparing to move on to your next piece of work, which your Director tells you is high profile and interesting. You are keen to take up this opportunity. However, you get a phone call from a colleague who informs you that the project team, of which you are both members, needs to carry out an additional piece of work that was documented in early meetings, but has not been followed up on and included in the project plan. Completing this last piece of work would mean having to pass up on the high profile project.

Rate each of the following options for dealing with this situation using the A to F scale below.

Sample Answers

1. If you feel that action number 1 is a Highly Inappropriate Action, you should select F - ‘Highly Inappropriate’.

1. In action number 2, if you feel that this is Inappropriate, you should select E, ‘Inappropriate’.

1. If you feel that Action number 3 is ‘Slightly Appropriate’, you should select C.

1. If you feel that Action 4 is an appropriate response, you should rate it as B – ‘Appropriate’.

1. If you feel that Action 5 is appropriate, you should rate it as B - ‘Appropriate’.

These answers are for illustrative purposes only.

You will see that not all of the A-F ratings have been used and the “Appropriate” rating has been used twice.

Exercise 2 – Analysis Exercise

The Analysis exercise is designed to assess your skills in critically analysing information and your ability to make decisions. You will be presented with a background context for the Exercise. Please note, the facts, people, policies, Departments and details set out in the background context and scenarios are fictitious and have been created for the purpose of the Analysis Exercise alone. They should not be seen as a true reflection of Government policies nor of the policies or practices of any Department. You do not need any specialist knowledge of the subject area described in the Exercises as they are intended to be realistic and typical of situations faced by senior managers.

In this exercise, you will be given a series of Sections that contain Graphs and Tables as well as textual information. After each Section there is a series of statements. Based only on the information provided within each Section, please rate each of the statements. NB. Only the information within a Section is relevant for the statements within that Section.

Please indicate whether each statement is:

A = True - the statement is clearly true or follows directly and logically from the information given in the documents.

B = False - the statement is clearly untrue or clearly does not follow logically from the information given in the documents or

C = Cannot say - there is insufficient information to determine if the statement is true or false

Background context for the Analysis Exercise (NB. the context will be different for the live Analysis Test)

For the purpose of the sample exercises, you should consider yourself to be a Principal Officer in the (fictional) Department of Environmental Affairs.

You have been asked to lead the Environmental Technologies Implementation Group (ETIG) which comprises 27 staff. This Implementation Group has three functions: 1) carry out research into the area of Environmental Technologies and 2) provide advice and guidance to organisations in this area and 3) to provide financial support in the form of once-off grants for organisations wishing to increase their use of Environmental Technologies. More detail on the ETIG and its origins are presented below.

Environmental Technologies

Environmental Technologies can be defined as cleaner and more resource efficient technologies which can decrease material inputs, reduce energy consumption and emissions, minimise waste disposal problems or some combination of these.

The protection of our environment is of paramount importance. Not only does an unpolluted natural environment provide us with long term strategic asset, but any potential damage to the environment poses considerable risks to the future welfare of the citizens of Ireland.

High profile International treaties on topics such as the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions attempt to tackle environmental issues on a global scale. Ireland, in common with other countries in the EU and beyond, has seen considerable developments in the area of legislation and related enforcement, increased public expenditure (capital and current), and awareness initiatives to tackle this issue.

The Irish Government is committed to maintaining a high quality environment and, as part of this commitment, has established the Environmental Technologies Implementation Group (ETIG).

This Group is advised by an expert panel, which comprises a range of organisations including representatives from the Department of Environmental Affairs and the Department of Work and Enterprise, experts in the area of Environmental Technologies, representatives from Environmental Protection Groups and Employer agencies.

Your role:

You are responsible for the day to day operation of the ETIG and you have to manage several projects relating to the research, information sharing and grant allocation functions of the ETIG. You are also expected to contribute to briefings for the Minister and to implement and promote Government policy and initiatives under the guidance of your line manager, a Director with wider responsibility for a range of Environmental issues.

SECTION 1

EU Press Release – Environmental Technologies Action Plan

EU action plan to boost Environmental Technologies for innovation, growth and sustainable development

The European Commission today adopted an ambitious Action Plan to improve the development and wider use of environmental technologies. Many new environmental technologies have great potential to improve the environment and, at the same time, boost the competitiveness of companies. Examples of environmental technologies include recycling systems for waste water in industrial processes, energy-saving car engines, which allow cars to use less fuel and soil remediation techniques. However, there are still many barriers to the introduction of Environmental Technologies, including the complexity of switching from traditional to new technologies, and insufficient access to funding for projects. The Action Plan aims to overcome these barriers through a concerted European effort to help maximise the potential of environmental technologies. The Plan should enable the EU to become a recognised leader in environmental technologies. Key actions include establishing environmental performance targets for products and services and making the most of funding schemes and public and private procurement policies.

The Action Plan

The Plan contains eleven priority actions for the European Commission, national and regional governments, industry and other stakeholders to improve the development and uptake of environmental technologies. These include:

 developing and agreeing ambitious environmental performance targets for key products, processes and services. This will encourage their uptake by business and consumers, as has been shown, for example, by energy-consumption labels on fridges;

 mobilising financial instruments, both within and outside the EU, to share the risks of investing in environmental technologies, with a focus on climate change, energy and small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs). The European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development should play a role in this action.