The single most useful thing to know about Civil Service behaviour questions is this: your answer is not being judged on how impressive it sounds. It is scored against a published marking key, the Success Profiles behaviour markers for the grade you applied at. The person sifting your application has that list in front of them. Most applicants have never read it.
That gap explains most rejections. Strong candidates with genuinely good examples write answers that read well and score badly, because the answer never touches the specific things the marker list credits. The fix is not better writing. It is knowing what the list says.
To be clear about where this comes from: none of it is inside knowledge. The Cabinet Office publishes the whole framework at gov.uk/government/publications/success-profiles, free to read, with a candidate overview written for applicants. Everything below is drawn from it. This guide is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Civil Service or any government department. If you only do one thing, read the source rather than this page.
Who this is for
The framework asks you to evidence what you did. It does not set out to test how well you write about yourself, but in practice that is part of what it ends up measuring, because the only thing an assessor can credit is what made it onto the page.
That catches people out for reasons that have nothing to do with whether they can do the job. Some find writing about their own work genuinely hard. Some have a strong example that involves something painful, and have never had to hand it to a stranger in 250 words. Some have a disability or condition that makes recall, structure or written expression harder than it looks from outside. Plenty of people simply do not think of what they did as an achievement, because at the time it was just Tuesday and somebody had to sort it out.
None of that is a shortage of evidence. It is a shortage of specific detail written down, and the marker list is the checklist for finding it. Reading the criteria you are being scored against, published by the people doing the scoring, is not gaming anything. It is the reason they published them.
Nothing here changes the assessment or lowers the bar. The example still has to be real, it still has to be yours, and an answer that reaches for markers you cannot honestly evidence will read as hollow and score worse than a plain one that is true. What the markers do is tell you which parts of the thing you already did are the parts worth writing down.
And if any part of the process is itself a barrier, reasonable adjustments are available at every stage on request, from the application form through to interview. Asking for them is routine and does not count against you.
Nine behaviours, six grade bands
The Success Profiles framework defines nine behaviours: Seeing the big picture, Changing and improving, Making effective decisions, Leadership, Communicating and influencing, Working together, Developing self and others, Managing a quality service, and Delivering at pace. A job is assessed on a chosen subset named in the advert, never all nine, so the advert tells you exactly which marking keys apply.
Each behaviour is then defined separately at six grade bands, from Administrative Assistant and Administrative Officer (AA and AO) at the bottom, through Executive Officer (EO), Higher and Senior Executive Officer (HEO and SEO), Grades 7 and 6, up to Deputy Director and above. Across the whole framework that is 326 distinct markers. The behaviour name stays the same; what it takes to demonstrate it changes completely with the grade.
The same behaviour, two different marking keys
Take Communicating and influencing. At AA and AO grade, the markers include:
"put forward your views in a clear, constructive and considerate manner"
"use plain and simple language, being careful to check written work for errors"
"listen and ask questions to ensure your understanding"
At Grade 7 and 6, the same behaviour asks for:
"explain complex issues in a way that is easy to understand"
"deliver difficult messages with clarity and sensitivity, being persuasive when required"
"monitor the effectiveness of own and team communications and take action to improve where necessary"
Markers quoted from the Civil Service Success Profiles behaviours framework, Cabinet Office. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Last checked against the published framework on 24 August 2026.
Same behaviour, different job. The AA and AO version is about clear, careful, error-free communication in your own work. The Grade 7 version is about difficult messages, persuasion and improving how a whole team communicates. An answer full of team-wide influence on an AO application reads as inauthentic, and an answer about checking your emails for errors on a Grade 7 application scores low. Pitch at the band you applied for.
All nine behaviours at Executive Officer grade
The advert names which of these you are being assessed on, usually three of them. Below is what the published framework asks for at Executive Officer, the band most people apply at. Find the ones your advert names and write to those bullets specifically, because they are the list the assessor has.
Seeing the big picture4 markers ▾
- Understand how your work and the work of your team supports wider objectives and meets the diverse needs of stakeholders
- Keep up to date with the issues that affect your work area
- Take a keen interest in expanding knowledge in areas related to your work
- Focus on overall goals and not just specific tasks to meet priorities
Changing and improving7 markers ▾
- Regularly review own and team’s work and take the initiative to suggest ideas to make improvements
- Give feedback on changes in a constructive manner
- Take a positive, open approach to the possibility of change and encourage others to do the same
- Help others to understand changes and the reasons they are being put in place
- Identify and act on the effects changes are having on your role and that of the team
- Look for ways to use technology to achieve efficient and effective results
- Consider accessibility needs of the diverse range of end users
Making effective decisions5 markers ▾
- Take responsibility for making effective and fair decisions, in a timely manner
- Analyse and research further information to support decisions
- Talk to relevant people to get advice and information when unsure how to proceed
- Explain how decisions have been reached in a clear and concise way, both verbally and in writing
- Demonstrate the consideration of all options, costs, risks and wider implications, including the diverse needs of end users and any accessibility requirements
Leadership4 markers ▾
- Show pride and passion for your work and positive, inclusive engagement with your team
- Understand your areas of responsibility and display awareness of the wider impact of your actions
- Proactively role model and promote an inclusive workplace, promptly dealing with inappropriate language and behaviours when they arise - including any instances of discrimination or misconduct
- Give praise and credit to colleagues and stakeholders where appropriate
Communicating and influencing7 markers ▾
- Communicate clearly and concisely both orally and in writing
- Take time to consider the best communication channel to use for the audience, including making the best of digital resources and considering value for money
- Interact with others in an enthusiastic way
- Express ideas clearly and with respect for others
- Listen to and value different ideas, views and ways of working
- Respond constructively and objectively to comments and questions
- Handle challenging conversations with confidence and sensitivity
Working together6 markers ▾
- Develop a range of contacts outside own team and identify opportunities to share knowledge, information and learning
- Show genuine interest when listening to others
- Contribute to an inclusive working environment where all opinions and challenges are listened to and all individual needs are taken into account
- Ensure it is clear that bullying, harassment and discrimination are unacceptable
- Offer support and help to colleagues when in need, including consideration of your own and their wellbeing
- Change ways of working to aid cooperation within and between teams in order to achieve results
Developing self and others6 markers ▾
- Identify gaps in own and team’s skills and knowledge
- Set and consistently meet development objectives
- Seek learning opportunities
- Support the development plans of all colleagues, recognising how diversity of experience/background can help to build an inclusive team culture
- Consider the contributions of all team members and delegate work to aid the learning and development of all
- Encourage and listen to developmental feedback from colleagues
Managing a quality service6 markers ▾
- Work with customers to understand their needs and expectations
- Create clear plans and set priorities which meet the needs of both the customer and the business
- Clearly explain to customers what can be done
- Keep colleagues and stakeholders fully informed of plans, possibilities and progress
- Identify common problems that affect service, report them and find possible solutions
- Deliver good customer service which balances quality and cost effectiveness
Delivering at pace7 markers ▾
- Regularly review the success of activities in the team to identify barriers to progress or challenging objectives
- Identify who and what is required to ensure success, set clear goals and areas of responsibility and continually assess workloads considering individual needs
- Follow relevant policies, procedures and legislation to complete your work
- Ensure colleagues have the correct tools and resources available to them to do their jobs
- Have a positive and focused attitude to achieving outcomes, despite any setbacks
- Regularly check performance against objectives, making suggestions for improvement or taking corrective action where necessary
- Ensure that colleagues are supported where tasks are challenging
Two things worth noticing in that list. The marker counts differ, from four up to seven, so "evidence every marker" is bad advice at the thick end and you are better picking the ones your example genuinely touches. And several behaviours overlap, particularly Working together and Communicating and influencing, which is why the same story can be reused across applications if you shift which part of it you lead with.
How a sifter actually scores your answer
Departments do not publish their internal mark schemes, so treat what follows as a working model rather than a description of anyone's process. What is published is the marker list itself, and it is written as observable behaviour, which tells you what an answer has to show. A sentence like "I always communicate clearly with stakeholders" gives an assessor nothing to work with, because it is a claim rather than evidence. "I rewrote the letter in plain English and complaints about it stopped" gives them something, because it shows the thing happening.
This is why answers that merely sound senior or polished tend to do badly. Tone is not what the published markers describe. They describe concrete things: talked to relevant people, explained the reasons, considered risks, checked understanding. If the words are not there, there is nothing for an assessor to point at. If you want to see this scoring run against your own draft, Application Coach checks a written answer marker by marker against the real framework for your grade.
STAR: the recommended shape
Official guidance recommends the STAR method for written behaviour examples: situation, task, action, result. Set the scene in a sentence or two, say what you specifically needed to do, spend most of the answer on what you actually did, and end with what happened because of it.
The weighting matters more than the acronym. Weak answers spend half their words on situation and task, describing the office and the project, then rush the action. Sifters credit the action and the result, because that is where the markers live. As a rule of thumb for a 250-word statement: two or three sentences of setup, then everything else on what you did and what changed.
Two more facts from the official framework worth knowing. Examples may come from work, volunteering or hobbies; a well-evidenced example from running a community group beats a vague one from employment. And reasonable adjustments are available at every stage of the process on request.
Where good examples lose marks
The same handful of faults come up over and over in behaviour answers:
Claims without evidence. "I am a strong decision maker" scores nothing. The marker list wants the decision itself: what you weighed, who you consulted, what you decided, what happened.
The invisible "we". Team achievements told entirely in "we" leave the sifter unable to score you. Keep the team context but name your own contribution: "as part of the team that moved the service online, I mapped the old process and trained the four staff who used it."
No result. An action with no outcome is half an answer. Even an approximate outcome ("waiting times came down, from around two weeks to a few days") beats none. If the honest result is that the decision was later reversed, say so and say what you learned; assessors credit honest reflection.
Answering the wrong behaviour. A gripping story about delivering under pressure scores nothing against Making effective decisions if it never shows a decision being made. Match the story to the marking key, not to what you most want to talk about.
The practical method
Before you write, find the markers for the behaviour and grade in the advert. Pick the example from your own history that lets you touch the most of them honestly. Write it rough, in your own words, without worrying about polish. Then check it against the markers one at a time and ask of each: where in my answer is this actually shown? The gaps you find are almost always detail you have and forgot to write down, not experience you lack.
For a worked example of this exact process, marker by marker at EO grade, see our Making Effective Decisions walkthrough. If the advert asks for a personal statement rather than separate behaviour boxes, our Civil Service personal statement guide covers what that one is scored against and how long it should be. For the CV side of a public sector application, our public sector CV guide covers the anonymised format and what sifters look for there.
Frequently asked questions
How long should a Civil Service behaviour answer be?▾
The application form sets the limit, so read it rather than assuming: 250 words per behaviour statement is common in the adverts we have looked at, but it varies. Use nearly all of whatever you are given. A 120-word answer rarely carries enough evidence to show the markers, and anything over the limit risks being cut off.
Can I reuse the same example for different behaviours?▾
On one application, avoid it where you can. Assessors read the whole application, and the same story twice reads as a thin evidence base. Across different applications, reuse is fine and sensible. Adjust the emphasis to the behaviour being tested each time.
What if I have no work examples?▾
The Civil Service explicitly accepts examples from volunteering and from life outside work. Organising a community event, treasurer duties for a club, caring responsibilities that needed decisions and planning: these can all evidence behaviours. What matters is that the example is real, specific and yours.
What is the difference between behaviours and strengths?▾
Behaviours are about evidence from your past: what you did and what happened. Strengths are about what energises you, and the official guidance says strengths answers should not be rehearsed because assessors want your initial response. This article covers behaviours, which is where written preparation pays off.
Are behaviour answers read by a computer?▾
Written behaviour statements are assessed against the Success Profiles markers for the grade. Departments run their own recruitment and do not publish the detail of how each stage is handled, so check the advert if it matters to you. Either way the answer is the same: the evidence has to be written down, because nothing can credit what is not on the page.
