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Working in government

Explore the skills you need to work in government - part of the Government Campus learning curriculum.

From:
Government Skills
Published
7 October 2021
Last updated
28 July 2023 — See all updates

The Civil Service is a large, complex, modern organisation. Some of the skills you need to succeed in the Civil Service - such as writing skills - are common to all such organisations. Others - such as understanding Parliament and legislation - are more specific to working in government.

Contents

To help you find the learning you need, this page is divided into the following sections:

  • Writing and personal effectiveness
  • Understanding government and Parliament
  • Digital and data skills for all
  • Policy and strategy skills for all

You can also explore other parts of the learning curriculum:

Writing and personal effectiveness

Writing

As civil servants, we write daily - from emails to drafting papers to briefings. Whatever level you are working at, writing skills are something you can continually refine. We have developed a series of courses to help you take action when developing your writing skills.

Writing skills

Download our new interactive guide or access one of our courses directly:

  • Foundations of writing in government -  This free online course that you can complete at your own pace covers: Jargon, Acronyms, Short Sentences, Plain English, Editors and Readers (JASPER). These principles are relevant to all writing: whether it’s internal emails, notes of meetings, text for websites or more formal reports.

  • Writing effective emails - This course provides useful tips on how to write and structure your emails with colleagues and external stakeholders.

  • Advance your writing in government (PDF, 7MB) (£) - This course builds on the foundational skills course and helps teams focus on effective writing in government. Delivered by Apolitical over 4 weeks, the course allows participants to learn flexibly.

  • Advising, briefing and drafting (£) - This course focuses on writing briefings, submissions, ministerial correspondence and writing for different audiences and drafting lines to take.

Personal effectiveness

Personal effectiveness is essential in the workplace. It involves performing to the best of your ability, managing your time efficiently, and maximising your skills. By improving your personal effectiveness, you can enhance your productivity, achieve success and develop your career. Learning opportunities include:

  • Collaboration across departments, government and beyond - This free online course introduces you to the value of collaboration and the practical skills and techniques that you need to work across government.

  • Asserting yourself positively (£) - This course provides you with ways in which you can recognise different behaviours and have strategies to deal with them to develop greater confidence to communicate your ideas and develop greater influence around the workplace.

  • Presenting confidently (£) - This course will give you tools and techniques to deliver presentations with greater confidence. Whether you are presenting at internal meetings, briefings and public events to large or small groups of people, the techniques will enable you to get your message across more effectively and confidently.

Understanding government and Parliament

Understanding the Civil Service Code

The Civil Service Code governs how all civil servants must conduct themselves. Developing an understanding of the Code is a key part of induction training for new civil servants but you can undertake a refresher at any time and more advanced, tailored training is available quarterly.

Working with Parliament

Parliament has a daily impact on the work of every civil servant, department and profession and understanding how to work with Parliament is essential for all civil servants in order to support ministers and ensure our work is effectively communicated to MPs and peers. Parliamentary training is free and available to all civil servants and our ‘Working with Parliament’ page is designed to guide you through the entire parliamentary learning offer so you know which learning is right for you.

Understanding devolution

Understanding devolution, how it impacts your work and how the four governments work together is critical for all civil servants and will help you deliver more effectively for citizens across the UK. Our devolution and intergovernmental working page will provide you with a good introduction to devolution and intergovernmental working and why it is important.

There are also fortnightly webinars delivered by the devolution team and you can find out more about the training or intergovernmental placements by emailing them.

Digital and data skills for all

Digital and data skills are vital for all civil servants, not just those in the digital, data & technology (DDaT) and other related professions. We all need to ensure we are comfortable with using data and are keeping pace with digital developments to provide the best service to users. Find out more about what is planned - including how we are supporting this year’s One Big Thing which aims to ensure every civil servant has completed at least one day of data training - in our 'Digital and data skills for all guide' (August 2023) (PDF, 1.1 MB, 9 pages). Existing opportunities include:

  • Data visualisation 101 - This free online course provides good data visualisation techniques to reduce complex evidence to its core, allowing stakeholders to understand what matters.

  • Data quality - Whether you use data regularly for reporting purposes or only occasionally to help inform specific projects, this free online course will help you to consider data quality issues and equip you to have more effective discussions with data specialists.

Policy and strategy for all

Public policy is the management of the government’s role in improving the UK’s welfare, security and prosperity to secure meaningful outcomes for citizens. It shapes the context in which all civil servants work in and policy and strategy skills and knowledge are essential for all civil servants.

Understanding policy

Later in 2024 we will be introducing a Policy 101 course to ensure all civil servants understand the policy profession standards across the three pillars of strategy, democracy and delivery.

There are also some areas of policy that touch all of our work, whether we are in the policy profession or not. These include:

  • Understanding the UK outside the EU - This free online course is a must-read for all. It explains how the UK’s position relative to the European Union (EU) has changed, the opportunities of our changing relationship with the EU and the UK’s new position as an independent actor.
  • Climate and the environment - This free online learning provides an introduction to climate change, the Government’s response to it and its implications for working in the Civil Service.

Policy and strategy skills

Updates to this page

Published 7 October 2021
Last updated 28 July 2023 + show all updates

  1. Added 'policy and strategy for all' section and 'digital and data skills for all guide'.

  2. Added link to new Working in Parliament page and refreshed learning content.

  3. The Leadership College for Government has been removed from the lead organisation. Strand 2 is not within the Leadership College's remit.

  4. Added document: The 39 Steps

  5. Added information on training opportunities.

  6. First published.