Application process
Civil Service Technical Questions: Examples and How They Are Scored
Published
Civil Service technical questions assess the Technical element of Success Profiles: your professional skills, knowledge or qualifications, measured against the framework your profession publishes. The advert states what is required and how it will be assessed. There is no single scoring scale, so the advert, job description and interview invitation are the only authority for your campaign.
The short version
Technical is one of the five Success Profiles elements, alongside Behaviours, Strengths, Ability and Experience. The requirement is set by the profession's Head of Profession, which usually means a published framework with levels. It is assessed by a named method, scored on a scale the department chooses, and prepared for in one way: find the framework, locate the level for the grade, and build your evidence in that framework's language.
What Technical means, and how adverts phrase it
The official definition is short: Technical is "the demonstration of specific professional skills, knowledge or qualifications". Each Head of Profession defines what their roles need, and gov.uk notes that "a number of the professions have a professional framework" setting that out.
Two lines of the guidance do most of the work for a candidate. "The job advert will list any technical requirements", and "additional information about the technical requirements for that role will be included within the job description". Where a qualification or membership is required, you may be asked for evidence of it, so have the certificate or membership number to hand before you apply.
In practice, adverts phrase the requirement as a heading, typically "Technical skills", followed by bullets. A digital advert might say "Programming and build: Working level". A policy advert might name the Policy Profession Standards. An analyst advert might ask for "membership of, or eligibility for, the Government Social Research profession". Each bullet is a scored criterion, written in the words the panel's scoring sheet uses. How Technical sits beside the other four elements is covered in the Success Profiles explainer.
How Technical is assessed
The guidance lists the permitted methods: application form, CV, interview, technical presentations and exercises, technical tests, work samples, in-tray exercises, oral briefings and written analysis. Scottish Government's candidate pages narrow this to five it actually uses: a technical test, a job-related simulation, a briefing or analysis exercise, a technical-specific presentation, or an interview question.
| Method | What it looks like | When it is used |
|---|---|---|
| Interview question | A question about method or judgement in your discipline, often hypothetical, scored against the framework level | The default; most roles with a Technical element use at least one |
| Technical presentation | A set topic in your field, delivered to the panel, followed by questions | Policy, communications, analytical and leadership roles; the brief arrives with the invitation |
| Technical test | A timed online or in-person test of knowledge or skill | Roles where knowledge can be tested objectively: data, finance, legal |
| Work sample or coding exercise | A hands-on task, take-home or live, reviewed by a specialist | Digital roles; DBT says a hands-on assessment is "not uncommon" |
| Written analysis or briefing | A document or dataset to analyse, with a written or oral brief produced in a fixed time | Policy, analysis and economist roles at HEO and above |
| Qualification check | Evidence of a certificate, registration or professional membership | Finance, legal, medical, engineering and other regulated professions |
The invitation tells you which of these applies. If it names a presentation, the format rules in the interview presentation guide apply as well as the technical criteria.
How Technical is scored
No cross-government scoring scale for Technical is published. The two departments that do publish their approach differ.
DBT states that "technical skills are scored out of three and linked to a proficiency level", and that for digital roles technical skills "directly influence your offer and salary range". That is a consequence of the framework having levels: a Practitioner-level score produces a Practitioner-level offer. COPFS takes the opposite approach, scoring "behaviours, experience and technical skills on the same 1–7 rating scale used at sift", with technical questions there described as testing "your specialist knowledge or skills relevant to the job role".
So two candidates in two departments can face the same technical question and be scored on a three-point and a seven-point scale respectively. Your advert will not always say which, but the job description will say what level is required, and the level is what the score is anchored to. For how the 1–7 scale works where it is used, see how interviews are scored.
The frameworks adverts point at
Find the framework before you prepare a single answer. The level descriptor for the grade is the closest thing to the scoring sheet you will see.
| Profession | Framework | Levels or structure | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Digital and data | Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework (formerly DDaT) | Awareness, Working, Practitioner, Expert, per skill, per role | Adverts quote skill names and levels directly; the level is what the score maps to |
| Social research | GSR Technical Framework (February 2022) | Technical skill areas by GSR grade | Explicitly stated to satisfy the Technical element of Success Profiles for GSR roles |
| Policy | Policy Profession Standards | Three pillars: strategy, democracy, delivery | Adverts and presentations are usually built around one or more pillars |
| Project delivery | Project Delivery Capability Framework | Role-based capability levels | Withdrawn from gov.uk on 10 June 2025; the material now sits with the Government Projects Academy, so check the advert for what it references instead |
| Finance | Government Finance qualification requirements | Accountancy qualification or membership | The gov.uk example of a Technical requirement met by a qualification rather than a skill level |
Grade matters here as much as it does for behaviours. A Grade 7 digital advert typically asks for Practitioner in the core skills; an HEO advert for the same role family asks for Working. The Grade 7 interview guide covers how the behaviour bar rises with grade; the technical bar rises the same way, and the framework tells you exactly how.
Example technical questions, and how to answer them
Scottish Government publishes two example technical interview questions. The other four below are typical of what adverts in those professions generate; they are illustrative, not published items.
| Discipline | Question | Status | What a scoring answer contains |
|---|---|---|---|
| Communications | "What key elements would you include in an effective communications strategy?" | Published (Scottish Government) | Objectives tied to the policy aim, audience insight, channels chosen for those audiences, messaging, evaluation measures, and the risks you would plan for |
| Digital | "Describe how you would approach debugging a complex issue in a software application." | Published (Scottish Government) | A repeatable method, the tools you would use at each step, how you would decide between a hotfix and a root-cause fix, and how you would stop it recurring |
| Policy | "A minister asks for options to reduce waiting times in a service your team owns. How would you build the advice?" | Typical | Problem definition, evidence base, the three pillars (strategy, democracy, delivery), options with trade-offs, delivery risk and how you would test the advice with operational colleagues |
| Analysis | "You are given a dataset with missing values across several variables. How would you decide how to handle them before analysis?" | Typical | Diagnosing the missingness pattern, the options (deletion, imputation, modelling), what each does to bias and variance, and how you would document the choice |
| Finance | "A directorate is forecasting a year-end overspend of eight per cent. What would you do in the first two weeks?" | Typical | Validating the forecast, separating committed from discretionary spend, the governance route, early escalation, and the control you would put in place |
| Project delivery | "How would you decide whether a project in amber should be re-baselined or escalated?" | Typical | The criteria you would apply, what evidence you would collect, who owns the decision, and what each option costs the sponsor |
Every right-hand column has the same shape: a method with steps, a decision inside it, and the trade-off that decision involves. That is what the framework level describes and what the panel is listening for.
How a technical answer differs from a behaviour answer
A behaviour question asks what you did; a technical question asks how you would do it. Behaviour answers are evidence of a past event, structured as situation, task, action, result, and scored against behaviour descriptors. Technical answers are about method and judgement in your discipline. Many are hypothetical, so there is often no example to tell, and STAR is not required; forcing a past example into a "how would you" question usually means you never actually describe the method. Where you do have relevant experience, use it as illustration inside the method, not as a substitute for it.
The scoring anchor is also different. A behaviour is scored against the grade descriptor; a technical skill is scored against a framework level. Say which level you are evidencing, in the framework's own terms: "at Working level I would be expected to do this with support; at Practitioner level I would be the person others come to, which is how I have been operating." That sentence does the panel's mapping for them. The competency-based question guide covers the behaviour side of the same interview.
A weak and a strong answer to the same technical question
The question is the published Scottish Government example for digital roles: "Describe how you would approach debugging a complex issue in a software application." The answers are of the kind a panel hears, not transcripts.
FailWeak answer: describes activity, not method
"I'd start by looking at the error and trying to reproduce it. Then I'd check the logs and look through the code to find where it's going wrong. If I couldn't find it I'd ask a colleague or search for the error online. Once I found the bug I'd fix it and test that it worked, then push the fix. I've done this a lot in my current role and I'm generally quite good at finding bugs quickly."
Read it as a specialist on the panel. Every step is something any developer would do, none of it is a decision, and nothing distinguishes Awareness from Practitioner. "Look through the code" for a complex issue is not a method. There is no mention of isolating the fault, no trade-off, no prevention. It would be hard to score above the lowest band on either a three-point or a seven-point scale.
PassStrong answer: walks the method and names the trade-offs
"First I'd pin down what 'complex' means here: intermittent, environment-specific, or only under load. I'd get a reliable reproduction before touching code, because without one I can't tell a fix from a coincidence. If it only happens in production I'd pull the traces and logs around the failing requests and compare them with a healthy one, looking for what's different rather than what's wrong.
Then I'd narrow the search: bisect recent changes if the issue is new, or isolate components by stubbing dependencies if it isn't. I'd write down my hypothesis before testing it, so I'm not just poking at things. Once I've found the cause there's a real decision: if users are affected now I'd ship a contained mitigation, a feature flag or a rollback, and fix the root cause behind it; if the blast radius is small I'd go straight to the proper fix. Either way the fix comes with a regression test that fails without it, and I'd write a short post-incident note on how it got past review.
I've been doing this without supervision for two years and I'm the person my team brings tricky issues to, which is the Practitioner level the advert asked for."
The second answer is longer because it contains decisions, each with a reason attached, not because it lists more activity. That is what a framework level describes and what the panel can score.
Preparing when the advert names no framework
Some adverts list technical skills without pointing anywhere. Ask the vacancy contact named in the advert whether the criteria are drawn from a professional framework and, if so, which; recruiters are used to the question and the answer tells you which document to prepare from. If no framework exists for the role, treat the technical bullets in the job description as the criteria. Each one becomes a heading in your preparation, with a method you could describe, an example that shows you have used it, and a plain statement of the level you are working at. Then re-read the invitation, because the method of assessment is what decides whether that preparation is spoken, written or demonstrated.
Common questions
Success Profiles defines Technical as the demonstration of specific professional skills, knowledge or qualifications. The requirement for a role is set by the relevant Head of Profession, usually by reference to a published professional framework, and the job advert lists any technical requirements along with the method used to assess them.
There is no cross-government scale. Departments set their own: DBT scores technical skills out of three linked to a proficiency level, while COPFS scores technical skills on the same 1–7 scale it uses for behaviours. The advert, the job description and the interview invitation are the only reliable guide for a given campaign.
No. A technical question tests method and judgement in your discipline, and many are hypothetical, so there is no past example to structure. Walk the panel through how you would approach the task, name the trade-offs, and show you are working at the level the framework describes for the grade.
By whichever method the advert names: an interview question, a technical presentation, a technical test, a work sample such as a coding exercise, a written analysis or briefing, or a check of your qualifications or professional membership. DBT notes a hands-on assessment is not uncommon for digital roles.
The one the advert or job description points at. Digital and data roles use the Government Digital and Data capability framework, social researchers the GSR Technical Framework, policy roles the Policy Profession Standards. If none is named, ask the vacancy contact and treat the technical bullets in the job description as the criteria.
You may be. Success Profiles guidance says you could be asked for evidence of your qualifications or professional membership where a role requires them. Have certificates or membership numbers ready at application, since a qualification check is itself one of the assessment methods listed.
In some departments, yes. DBT states that for digital roles technical skills directly influence the offer and salary range, because the score maps to a proficiency level. Most departments do not publish any such link, so assume it applies only where the advert or the department says so.
Practise before the real thing
Reading how panels score is step one. The candidates who pass are the ones who practised saying their answers out loud — and got scored feedback against the official Civil Service Behaviours framework before interview day.
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