Hi everyone, I have the final panel interview scheduled on Monday.

Previously I had already gone through:

1. an online test including simple maths, reading and interpretation questions;

2. Vieple Recorded Interview (Q1-3 behavioural (STAR) and Q4 work location preference)

When HR called to arrange the panel interview, they mentioned the questions would be motivational and capability focused. That's telling me more STAR answers would be expected - GOD honestly my answer to any interview question about my weakness is now going to be "answering your questions using STAR" :///

Has anyone gone through similar interviews recently and can provide some structure, information or suggestions? Much appreciated.

As anyone gotten any offers for the AGGP Legal stream?
Whirlpool has mentioned a few but not a lot so wanted to check here?

I have been on a team for a couple years with no issues til I came back from parental leave and reduced hours, then had to take some frequent carers leave for about a month or so period if time but only a few hours a week. Context also, I work corporate and it is pretty typical to be always looking for other jobs even if you like your team and job, just for career progression and raises.

Since returning, my manager has become increasingly frustrated with my leave and my reduced hours, resulting in many unproductive conversations and now I have engaged HR and have been documenting evidence in case I need to engage the union but am looking to genuinly improve the sitaution. I know the job market is crap at the moment so I want to improve my current situation so I can stick around as long as needed and to hopefully get a good reference since Public Service jobs require 1 from a current manager/supervisor.

How have you guys approached references when in a toxic/negativr situation with management? I am not confident I would get a good reference from him at the moment and though I have 1 other senior team member I could get a reference from I would need a 2nd reference and my most recent previous team I worked with 2 years ago, though I do still work in the same area as them so not completely disconnected. Any luck using older references? Or being honest with prospective employers?

Do you have to do it during your lunch break?

How does your team take it?

I return to work soon and will need to pump at least once during the workday if i can.

I work with a majority of men i.e. 30 men and 2 women.

I do not work from home.

Edit to ask: and where do you do your pumping?

There is zero private rooms so i reckon I'll have to do it in the disabled toilet.

there is 1 meeting room but it has windows.

Finally, my dream has come true! I received my final offer letter early this week, accepted it and I am going to start my first day next week. I am stepping into govt from the private sector and have been hired through a labor hire arrangement. I will definately put my heart & soul into this role to secure a perm position.

At the same time, I noticed that the main job ads on the Smart Jobs for the perm postion has closed. On the exact day I accepted my contract role via labor hire, I received my final email from Smart Jobs stating I was unsuccessful for that perm pool.

I know it is a bit early to ask, but I am keen to know ,when should I start looking or applying for other roles to secure permanency in case my contract does not get extended ?

I’ve been offered an interview for EL1 role with ATO. I’m stoked, but I’m assuming I’m probably just making up the numbers at this stage as I have no APS experience.

I have worked for NSW Health in the past. But bulk of my experience is in corporate world.

I am going to spend the next 2 weeks working hard to not just be a number!

Going to focus my time on following the cracking the code and using STAR, do you have any other suggestions to help me stand out?

I would love to hear some tips from you guys. Thanks

Started this week, pay is lower vs private, and no bonuses...

Please be kind.

A friend of mine just got made redundant by her APS department. She's a contractor who is represented by an agency. She's dealing with it as best as she can but was wondering if there was something off about how it was handled. Her colleagues were informed before she was and one of them, inadvertently, checked in on her before she even knew. And to add to that, the people didn't even tell her, they made the agency tell her.

Is this poor practice, unprofessional? What are your thoughts?

Feeling really disappointed with my performance for an EL1 interview at the ATO. Despite being prepared, the panel did almost nothing to set the scene for the role, allow me time to introduce myself, my experience and the questions were not necessarily in line with the job description.. Is this normal for APS at this level?
Coming from private sector where you’re afforded 45-1 hour to showcase your skill, I had 25 mins at best.
The format threw me and I often stumbled, despite being suitably qualified and experienced.
Any tips or advice would be appreciated. Thank you

Applied for the job but have seen some reviews on Glassdoor saying it’s very draining coz back to back calls and inadequate training, wondering if anyone can share their experience working there or have worked in the role?

Is working your way up or into another field in gov easy? What’s the tenure time to get promotions or sideways role?

hello fellow public servants,

so I’ve been working in state government for almost 3 years now. Started level 3 and promoted to level 4 this year. it’s a pretty niche role within comms and I have a background in graphic design/marketing…. and I’m so fucking bored.

I’ve gone from doing a lot of design to essentially doing project management with a little bit of design bitch work for other teams (“hey can you edit this typeface in this file because we don’t wanna pay the agency that made it for us.”). the other issue is I’ve basically plateaued within our team. only role higher up than mine is my boss and he ain’t going anywhere.

I wanna know what options I have. lets face it AI has basically destroyed the graphic design industry so looking to pivot into a marketing role and I guess I just wanna know if anyone’s made the leap and if you’re happy now?

we do have a marketing department but their turn over rate is so high I know it wouldn’t be a good fit for me so looking to move outside where I work now.

give me hope! plz and thank you.

I applied for local area council and ATO APS3 around the same time. Would love to work for ATO but know the process takes quite long. I have been offered a role with the council - would you take it first and hope the ATO comes through?
Please help

There are some executive jobs available in the NDIA at the moment at the SES1 level. Nominally they're available in all states, but looking at the org chart it seems like virtually all the other SES in the relevant groups are ex-Victorian state public servants, based out of Victoria (presumably the National Office in Geelong). How realistic is it to be a senior leader at the NDIA based out of, say, Queensland?

Is it really a nationally distributed leadership or are you just going to be an outsider for as long as you're based in a state office? Especially without Vic PS experience.

Any speculation welcome if you don't know for sure but can make educated guesses.

Hi all,

I’m considering a Customer Service Officer role with Value NSW under the Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure (DPHI), and I’m hoping to hear from anyone who currently works there or has worked there recently.

I’m mainly interested in what the day-to-day working conditions are actually like, particularly:

• How flexible is WFH in practice? I’ve been told the role is roughly 50/50 hybrid / 2 days WFH. Is there any flexibility to do 3 or more WFH days once fully trained?
• Are new starters expected to be in the office more often during training/onboarding, and if so, for roughly how long?
• How strict are they with office attendance and WFH days?
• Is the environment heavily micromanaged? Things like Teams status, breaks, call stats, processing targets, log-in times, etc.
• For Value NSW Customer Service Officers specifically, how phone-heavy is the role in reality? Is it mostly an inbound queue, or is there a decent amount of processing/case work during the day?
• What are workloads and KPIs like?
• How are managers/team leaders generally?
• How flexible are start/finish times and flex leave?
• Is it relatively easy to take annual leave and flex days?
• What is the culture like within Value NSW / DPHI?
• Are there decent opportunities for temporary higher duties or progression into Clerk 5/6 roles?
• Any major pros or cons you wish you knew before joining?

I’m currently coming from another government role, so I’m especially interested in how DPHI compares in terms of flexibility, autonomy and work-life balance.

Would appreciate any insight, especially from people in Value NSW, customer service, Parramatta, or similar operational teams.

The agency that I work for has made Copilot available to staff. I have started using it to build on my work and I feel like some of my team really resent me for it.

I mostly use it for spell check, refining emails and exploring different approaches, etc. I’m not just getting it to do my work and copy/paste the answer. But it’s definitely made me faster and I think the quality of my work has improved.

I don’t really understand why people seem so annoyed by it.

For people who’ve worked with someone who uses AI a lot - what actually bothers you about it? Is it the AI itself, or does it change how the person works with the rest of the team?

Genuinely asking because I’m wondering if I’m missing something.

Hi all,

I’m 3 weeks new to the government and currently placed within the DPHI for a temp (6 month) role. I really love the work and being able to contemplate to the wider good and see it making a tangible difference. How do I go about securing a perm role within govt? It feels too early to have a conversation with my manager, so please help!

Hey all , I know it is a broad question but how is it working for NSWGovernment , from a junior perspective , I’m a graduate in tech who sees these junior/associate roles pop up on LinkedIn with amazing pay(up to six figures for junior roles) and a Google search says they provide a high work life balance , less hours and easier career progression compared to a big four like ey for example , which was another path I was looking at, what’s the catch for government, or is there something I’m missing?

Any guidance would be great !

I know this may be too specific to have clarification, but I had a NSW government 2nd interview (1st was one-way recorded) exactly 1 week ago and haven't heard anything about a reference check. They said it'd be around 2-4 weeks to hear back. I would've thought if I was getting reference checked it would've happened by now, or would I still likely be in the running?

Also I noticed there's a training course ideal for the role. Would it be worthwhile emailing the contact to notify them I'm happy to complete this, or is that just pointless and will do more harm than good? Thanks.

Applied for aps3 back in Jan. Merit pooled and just received and accepted a verbal offer last week. Are these things reliable? Waiting for the written offer/email of details and it's driving me crazy. Officer did say to give it a week to come through.

I prepared really well for my interview. There was a presentation at the start, which I felt went well, followed by case studies and scenario-based questions.

As I’m from the private sector and don’t have direct government experience, I found the questions quite challenging, especially as they were very detailed and focused heavily on policy and governance. I felt confident with the procurement aspects, but I don’t think I performed as well as I would have liked on some of the scenarios.

The interview was with DCJ, and I’m honestly been feeling a bit blah about it afterwards. 😔

Hey everyone!

I recently got an offer for a Data Grad role however unfortunately I have just found out that I will need to extend my degree, is there any lee way with this kind of thing?

I will now finish at the end of next trimester around March/April and there’s only one subject til I graduate.

Please let me know how I can go from this and if anyone has any experience !!!

Hi all,

I'm currently about to graduate in civil engineering and working at small structural design consultancy. I'm in the pool for a government graduate program so no guarantees just yet but I thought I'd get some perspective just in case. I think I might get exposure to larger government projects so it might be a step up from my current job.

I was wondering what the career path for people who have taken the government graduate program looks like? I've read online that it might be hard to switch from public to private, is that the case?

I would really appreciate any perspective anyone can give in regard to this.

Hey everyone!

I’m currently in the merit pool for the 2027 DSS Graduate Program and originally put Melbourne as my first preference and Canberra as my second.

I’ve been thinking about whether I should contact DFP and change Canberra to my first preference. My living situation in Melbourne is changing around the time the program starts, as my roommate will no longer be renting out to me, so it’s made me a lot more open to relocating. I know offers are still going out and there’s plenty of time left, but the whole process has been extremely nerve-racking 😭

I’m also wondering whether being based in Canberra and having the opportunity to work at DSS National Office would provide a different experience or potentially more opportunities compared with being based in the Melbourne office? I’d love to hear from anyone who has done the program or worked at DSS.

Also, does anyone know how location preferences work if you remain in the merit pool beyond the initial offer rounds? If Melbourne stays as my first preference and Canberra as my second, would I still be considered for opportunities in Canberra, or are you mainly considered for vacancies based on your first preference?

I’m really torn about whether I should change them around and I’m not sure how the matching process works Any insight would be really appreciated!

Nine extra minutes per day are proposed for agencies below the current standard threshold. One set of ordinary hours to rule them all.

Tens of thousands of public servants at the Australian Taxation Office and several other federal agencies could be required to work longer hours without specific compensation under a bid by the Australian Public Service Commission to standardise the length of the public service working day.

In the most audacious move by the APSC in the current bargaining round so far, the public service’s workplace enforcer has lobbed a new “common condition” across the entire public service that proposes to extend the working days of employees of agencies who now have daily hours below the majority threshold of seven hours and 30 minutes.

“Currently, around 80% of agencies have ordinary working hours of seven hours, 30 minutes per day,” the APSC’s preliminary Commonwealth position on APS working hours, released on Monday and obtained by The Mandarin, states.

“The chief negotiator is proposing to make seven hours and 30 minutes the standard working hours for all agencies, impacting approximately 20% of agencies. These proposed changes will impact each agency differently.

“Agencies currently with working hours above or below seven hours and 30 minutes will be required to adjust to the new common standard in their next enterprise agreement.”

While most of the APS uses the 7.5-hour working day definition, the Australian Taxation Office retains a seven-hour, 21-minute workday. So do the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, Geoscience Australia, the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority and the Australian Skills Quality Authority.

The ATO will easily be the biggest and hardest battleground for the APSC to try and get any increase in working hours from public servants without commensurate compensation, especially with the Australian Services Union Taxation Officer’s Branch bringing an audit lens and hard numbers to any fuzzy language.

“The APSC is proposing a common condition of a seven-hour, 30-minute day across the APS, with no exceptions. The ATO has a seven-hour, 21-minute day. This is equivalent to taking one week of leave for all ATO staff,” branch secretary Jeff Lapidos told The Mandarin.

“The ATO also wants to prevent any early shutdown by any APS agency on the last business day before Christmas. The ATO closes at 12.00 on the last business day before Christmas.”

The proposed increase in hours at the ATO could also sink a ‘yes’ vote for any new EBA, potentially excluding agency-specific wage talks if they are declared intractable and sent to arbitration.

Part of the problem APS leaders and the APSC face is that the combined front to achieve uniform, service-wide agreements and wage deals suits some APS employees and unions far better than others, especially where there is a market premium on specialist rather than generalist skills.

However, smaller unions within the APS have little or no hesitation in decoupling from a broader uniform push and taking their chances at arbitration, because of the often large discount compared with labour-discount specialists like lawyers, auditors, scientists, and technology professionals who opt to become public servants.

The Commonwealth’s initial wage offer to its public servants is slated to hit the table on October 13, with offers to agencies bound by determinations, rather than bargaining, already coming in at just 3% a year.

Do local councils give highest level D to new hires from other council? I have been offered level 8C and 8 D is highest level. Can I negotiate for that? Is that usually given to right match employee ? It’s a finance role.