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Anyone here who works for the city or was recently hired for the city position. What was your timeline?
I know that Federal government takes forever (I worked for Fed. Government before) - about six months from application date to first day on the job. And it takes about 1.5-2 months of waiting for the offer (if it ever comes) after the interview (comparing to 7-10 days at private sector).
But what about civil service, city jobs? I am an applicant to few cities and had few interviews. How long do I wait for the decision?
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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I've spent over 20 years as a hiring manager at public agencies. We have a lot of rules to follow that private employers do not, and we staff HR at a minimal level, so with multiple openings at the same time things slow down even more. My last hire started Monday, the opening came last November.
I have seen internal promotions handles in two weeks, but anything open to the public is at least going to take 6-8 weeks from start to finish, but may take that long just to get the interviews set up.
City employment is pretty similar to federal hiring. Might be a little more speedy. That would be somewhat determined by what city you're talking about. Some are more streamlined than others.
Thank you! I also found the following comment from someone who works for City HR:
As far as the actual process in the cities it tends to be much longer than what it takes in private business. From the time an ad runs for a position it can be 2 weeks to 2 months before interviews actually happen and up to 4 months before someone actually fills our vacant positions. Sounds ridiculous? It is...
After we review applications and pick who we want to interview we have to have the list of interview candidates approved by HR, our interview questions have to be approved by HR, and we have to get you all scheduled along with 3-5 staff members who are on the interview committee. Our committee has to be made of of the proper "diversity" balances so we're very restricted on who we can put on the committee. After interviewing we strive to notify the candidates within 2 weeks but we can only do that after Human Resources approves our choices and the writeups that we provide to justify them. Then if the chosen candidate accepts we have to get them through criminal background checks, mucho paperwork, drug testing, and physicals for some positions. It's kind of a miracle when we see one of you finally walk onto the job one day.
So, how does HR "approves" the candidates who were selected by the hiring department after the interview? I thought that City HR already approved by reviewing applications and placing qualified candidates on eligible list and once hiring department made up its mind, it is final decision? No?
Last edited by odessit771; 03-24-2011 at 08:17 PM..
In San Francisco, it takes a long time for someone to receive information about a specific position.
-First they post a general job description and qualifications on the .gov website.
-This opening stays open for about 3 months
-Interested candidates apply with the required information.
-HR screens all the applications (called examinations) to ensure they meet the education, experience and certification qualifications. Each person is award points based on what they put on their application (education, experience etc).
-During the screening process, they still open up another 3 month application pool to get more applications to screen.
-After a lengthly screening process, candidates who reach the cutoff point for points award are put onto a list.
-The list is then sent to the departments that you were interested in working for.
-When there is an opening within a department, they send out the job descriptions to the people on the list.
-If you're interested, respond with resume and application.
I applied back in October and was notified that i made the list in February. Some time in this month (March) i started getting job descriptions in my email from various departments that I stated that I was interested in on my application. Overall, it would have taken up to 6 months for a city job.
So, how does HR "approves" the candidates who were selected by the hiring department after the interview? I thought that City HR already approved by reviewing applications and placing qualified candidates on eligible list and once hiring department made up its mind, it is final decision? No?
Bisjoe: how does the final candidate gets approved by hr? I thought that since he already on the list he is approved + hiring department picked him.
And how soon does the hiring dept notify its top pick? I know they have to discuss with hr. Does this take weeks?
Thanks!
i applied on may and was called on June to do the test... after 10 business days i got an email saying i passed and i was put on the eligible list... as up today July /2012 i haven't receive a call for the interview... i wonder how long that could take
Totally depends on the city/county, and on the nature of the vacancy. If they need a replacement fast, the process is usually fairly quick with the only slowdown being the background check. In situations where it's a large-scale hiring where there are several positions in several locations the whole thing can take a while--the IRS for example has a pretty slow drawn out process where you can have at least a month or two between steps in the process, especially in the early stages.
But even federal can be fast depending on the agency, and again, on why they need someone. What they all seem to have in common is that the background check can take a lot of time.
I applied for a city job on 7/30 and I was notified that I passed the initial screening on 8/09. The written exam was scheduled for 8/18 and I received confirmation that I passed on 9/07. This confirmation also invited me to the computer exam that was held on 9/15. On 10/01 I was notified that I passed all testing phases and became an active candidate for the job group that I was applying for. Certain job announcements started being sent to me directly for which I then had to apply for separately. I applied for one job on 10/11 and was invited today 10/26 for an interview next week. I was told there will be a 30 minute interview and then a 30 minute test on the computer to figure out some sort of problem. Looking back it doesn't seem that long but it feels like forever.
I am pretty excited and nervous, I have not had an interview for over five years so I feel a little rusty!
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