Your application 

Your application should demonstrate your suitably for the role, with particular emphasis placed on how you match the 'essential' criteria from the personal specification on the job description. 

Experience 

Reflect your career history, including all or most of your work experience.  You can exclude short-term jobs from years ago which are no longer relevant, but avoid leaving gaps in your recent work history. 

When listing the duties you should list those which describe the job you did, but also include any that align with the skills, knowledge, or experience from the personal specification. 

Qualifications 

The qualifications you list should depend on the job you are applying for; be guided by those listed personal specifications. 

You might also want to consider listing any qualifications you hold which are specific to the job or industry to which you are applying and others which demonstrate certain skills, knowledge or experience which are listed on the personal specification and not demonstrated elsewhere in your application. 

Competency Questions 

For some jobs we will ask you at the application stage to describe a situation you were involved in which demonstrates a specific skill, knowledge or experience you hold.  An effective approach to responding to these questions is by outlining a situation, your task, the actions you took, and the result achieved. This approach is known as the STAR method. 

Focus on your individual actions and contributions to the situation.  Avoid describing what "we" or "the team" did to ensure clarity about your specific actions. 

Be mindful of any word limit.   

Supporting Statement 

Use this chance to show why you're right for the job. Explain your interest and what you would bring to the role. Provide examples that demonstrate how you meet the job’s personal specification.  Consider the STAR method as above. Link experiences and qualifications to the personal specification if not immediately clear. We can't assume anything about your skills, knowledge and experience. 

Be mindful of any word limit and in any case be concise.