Civil service CV templates for public sector jobs
A civil service CV should follow the standard format: a plain, single-column job history in which each role lists your responsibilities and what you achieved. Sift panels score it against the essential criteria in the advert, sometimes with your name removed, so write every line to those criteria. Any free, plain template will do the job.
By Adam Smith, EditorPublished Updated
Three templates that suit public sector CVs
- Minimalist ATS
A Pro template in one column with plain headings and no graphics. It copies cleanly into online application systems and makes a job history easy to score against criteria, which is what a civil service sift does.
- Modern Professional
Modern Professional is on the free plan and uses a clean, modern single-column design. It suits council, NHS and civil service applications at any grade when you want a tidy CV without paying for one.
- Education & Teaching
Education & Teaching is a free, single-column template that puts qualifications and training near the top. It fits school, college and local authority education roles, and public sector posts where a degree or professional qualification is essential.
Sample CV
Free accounts open this example in the free Modern Professional template.
What a civil service application is made of
Civil Service jobs are advertised on Civil Service Jobs, and each advert tells you what it wants from you. The Civil Service recruits against Success Profiles, which has five elements: behaviours, strengths, ability, experience and technical. Not every element is used for every job. A typical application at executive officer level and above asks for some mix of these:
- A CV, sometimes in a set job history format, which assesses your experience.
- A personal statement against the essential criteria, often with a word limit set in the advert.
- Behaviour examples, each written against one named behaviour such as Delivering at Pace or Communicating and Influencing.
- Online tests for ability, and strength questions at interview.
Read the advert before you open your CV. If it says the sift will look at your CV and statement only, those two documents carry the whole application. If it assesses behaviours at sift, your examples matter more than your layout.
The civil service CV format
Keep it to a job history, most recent first. For each role give the title, the organisation type, the dates and your grade or its equivalent, then two parts: a line or two on what you were responsible for, and three to five bullet points on what you achieved. The panel is checking whether your experience matches the job description, so the achievements need a result and, where you can, a scale: the size of the budget, the number of stakeholders, the deadline you met.
Use one column and plain headings. Tables and text boxes can break when a CV is copied into the online system. A short profile at the top is fine, but the job history is what gets scored.
Anonymised CVs
GOV.UK guidance says a CV may be requested in an anonymised format, so details such as your name, age or gender do not reach the people doing the sift. When the advert asks for this, take your name and contact details off the page, leave out dates of birth and photos, and check the text for anything that identifies you, such as "as a mother of two" or the name of a small team everyone knows you led.
Writing to the essential criteria
The job description lists essential criteria, sometimes with desirable ones after. Copy them into a document and, next to each, note the role on your CV that proves it. If a criterion has no evidence, you either add a bullet point or accept that the application is weak on it. Use the words of the advert. A panel reading "experience of drafting ministerial submissions" should find that phrase, or something very close to it, on your CV.
Behaviour examples and STAR
There are nine Civil Service behaviours, and each is described at levels tied to grade. Level 1 covers administrative assistant and administrative officer (AA and AO), level 2 executive officer (EO), level 3 higher and senior executive officer (HEO and SEO), and level 4 Grade 7 and Grade 6. Read the level for the grade you are applying for, not the one you hold.
GOV.UK suggests the STAR method for examples: set out the situation and task, then what you did and how, then the result. Spend most of your words on the action, written with "I" rather than "we". Your CV bullet points can be short versions of the same stories, so a panel that reads both sees the evidence line up. Examples can come from work, volunteering or outside interests.
Moving between grades
A move from HEO to SEO, as in the example CV, is judged on whether you already do some of the next grade's work. Put those parts first: managing a small team or budget, owning a piece of policy end to end, briefing senior leaders directly. If you are coming from a council, a charity or the private sector, give the nearest equivalent grade in brackets, or describe the level plainly ("reporting to the head of service, managing two officers"). The panel cannot score what it has to guess.
Councils, the NHS and other public bodies
Local councils usually recruit through their own application portal with a form scored against a person specification. NHS non-clinical posts, such as administration, finance and project roles, mostly go through NHS Jobs with a supporting statement. Neither uses the civil service behaviours, but both work the same way underneath: criteria first, evidence second. Keep one master CV and cut it to fit each form, rather than writing from scratch each time.
Already have a CV?
- Check your CV free with the ATS checker: see how an application system reads it, with your top three fixes, and no sign-up.
- Tailor your CV to a job advert: paste the advert and see which parts of your CV to change.
Questions people ask
- Is there an official free CV template for civil service jobs?
- There is no single official template. Each advert on Civil Service Jobs says what it wants, which may be a CV in a job history format, a personal statement or behaviour examples. Any plain, single-column template works if it gives each role a title, dates, responsibilities and achievements.
- How do I make a name-blind civil service CV?
- Remove your name, email, phone number and address, and leave out your date of birth and any photo. Then read the text for details that give you away, such as a unique team name or personal circumstances. The online system holds your contact details separately from what the panel sees.
- How long should a civil service CV be?
- Two pages of A4 is the usual length, and some adverts set a limit or a fixed format. Put your most recent and most relevant roles in full, and shorten older jobs to a title, dates and one line. The sift panel scores evidence against criteria, not length.
- Should I use STAR on my CV or only in behaviour examples?
- Use full STAR for behaviour examples and statements. On your CV, keep a compact version: the action you took and the result, in one or two lines. That way the bullet points and the longer examples back each other up without repeating the same paragraph.
- What grade is a Senior Executive Officer?
- SEO sits above Higher Executive Officer and below Grade 7. In the Civil Service behaviours framework, HEO and SEO share level 3, so the behaviour descriptions are the same, but an SEO is usually expected to lead work and people more independently.
- Can I use the same CV for council and NHS jobs?
- Use the same base CV, then adjust it. Councils and the NHS score against a person specification rather than civil service behaviours, and many want an application form with a supporting statement. Copy your job history into their form and rewrite the statement for each post.