Online service will survey users interests and skills and suggest possible Whitehall professions

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A web service has been launched that allows current civil servants and would-be officials to find new careers in Whitehall by answering questions about their interests and motivations. 

Career Matcher is an addition to the Civil Service Careers website that suggests appropriate professions for potential new recruits – or existing officials looking for a change – based on responses to a handful of multiple-choice questions. Staff could even use the service to check whether it thinks their interests and motivations make them a good match for their current job.

Brian Stanislas, who is product manager for the careers site, said Career Matcher had been developed in response to feedback from site users that called for more “straightforward and easy to use guidance” on civil service career options after concerns the existing information was “puzzling”.

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“User research has told us that there is a lack of confidence for some members of the public that holds them back from applying to work within the civil service,” Stanislas wrote in a blog post. “This may be because of historical and/or anecdotal stereotyping of the civil service and the types of people that the organisation is looking to attract. Career Matcher allows users to self-assess their transferable skills and interests to see where they could be a good fit to work in the civil service.”

Stanislas, who is part of the Civil Service HR digital and analysis team in the Cabinet Office, stressed that the three profession options suggested by the matcher were “not exhaustive”.

Stanislas said almost 1.8 million people had used the Civil Service Careers site since it was launched in July 2018. He added that just over 1m site users had gone on to look for job opportunities in the Civil Service Jobs portal as a result. The site hit the one million users milestone in September last year.