Civil Service United Kingdom Reviews

Cons

Sometime excessive bureaucracy was an issue
pay could be better

Cons

Bureaucracy can be a bit stifling

Cons

Variation between departments (and even business units within the same department) in how corporate policies are implemented. For example, some places where I worked explicitly had no flexi policy as the Deputy Director did not permit it and these were in non-frontline/operational roles in Whitehall, resulting in low staff morale.

Variable quality of managers, ranging from excellent to appalling, including at senior levels of leadership - and limited means for more junior staff to challenge this (there is the annual staff survey, but this can be of limited effectiveness if the person implementing the changes is the manager in question). Constant churn in senior leadership and restructures of teams.

The pay freeze means that promotion is often the only way to get a pay rise - staff are not rewarded for wanting to stay in a post for a longer period of time resulting in a high turnover of staff and confusion to stakeholders.

The stacked ranking system used for appraisals in many Whitehall departments, where there are "quotas" for each box marking, is extremely demoralising to staff while not increasing productivity. Why bring in a system that has been abandoned by many private sector companies and criticised by numerous Business publications and academics?

As much as the Civil Service has tried to make progress with diversifying its workforce, problems still remain deep rooted regarding the recruitment, appraisal and promotion opportunities available to BME employees, who more often than not are stuck in the more junior grades with very limited opportunity to progress up the ranks unless they are lucky enough to be mentored by someone at a more senior level who takes an interest in their career progression. In my opinion it is this that is key to real progression - ability, qualifications and experience is often not enough.

Unfortunately the stereotype of Senior Civil Servant who is a white, often Oxbridge educated male still rings very true and some departments in particular are very bad for recruiting to this type for middle management/senior roles - not just the more "traditional" ones such as Ministry of Defence, but outside of Whitehall too in the devolved administrations such as the Scottish Government. Good luck if you're a woman from an ethnic minority...

Cons

Salary and lack of opportunities to progress

Cons

Can't promote within role, have to move jobs

Cons

non- team work, lack of relevant training, lack of diversity in top management posts.

Cons

Some lack of communication and forward planning

Cons

Poor performance management, pay freeze

Cons

Awful application / competency-based interview process that doesn't allow candidates to demonstrate skills and experience to do job

Cons

Can be slow moving, bureaucratic. Some departments are more modern than others e.g in terms of IT.