The Police Recruitment Process

Every year, about 60,000 people apply to be police officers. Only about 7000 are successful. In many ways it could be said that to pass the Police National Recruitment System, including the process for applying to be a Police Community Support Officer (PCSO), candidates have to go through a de-selection process, rather than a selection one. The police need to whittle down this huge number of applicants to a more manageable number. This is the reason why many forces limit the number of application forms issued, or put very tight deadlines in place. It acts as the first barrier.

The recruitment process is examining seven key skill areas. These are:

- Diversity
- Community and Customer Focus
- Problem Solving
- Effective Communication
- Resilience
- Team working
- Personal Responsibility

You must obtain the required level in each of the seven areas in order to pass the police recruitment system.

The Recruitment stages

The recruitment process is, broadly speaking, as follows, although the order of some of the following elements may change depending on force.

The Application Form

The application form is actually a series of forms, covering everything from your medical history to the character of your relatives. However, the most important form is the one that asks you for evidence of your “competencies”, or skill areas. Here, you will be asked to provide evidence, or examples, of having gained experience of certain types of issues. Having passed the paper sift, you will be invited to a day long assessment centre.

The Assessment Centre

The police assessment itself will last approximately four hours. The assessment is standardised across England and Wales, so regardless of which police force you are applying to, you will take the same assessment. On the day, you will be required to undertake the following exercises:

- Two 20 minute long verbal and numerical reasoning exercises (an IQ test)
- Four role-play exercises, each role-play lasting five minutes, but with a five minute unmarked preparation phase before each one. The candidate takes the role of a Customer Service Officer in a fictional leisure complex. A typical exercise may require them to meet an angry customer who feels that they have received a poor response when they have complained about, for example, abusive comments from a member of staff
- A 20 minute long structured interview, where you will be expected to answer each question for up to five minutes without prompting. The four main questions change slightly each year, but always ask for specific examples covering four of the seven “skill” areas.
- Two written exercises, each one lasting 20 minutes. In these exercises the candidate, still in the guise of a Customer Service Officer, will be given some written information regarding an issue, and then asked to write a response. A typical exercise may concern some type of demonstration at the centre, at which problems have arisen, and the candidate is tasked with providing a suitable solution to deal with the problem.

You will normally get the results of this after approximately two weeks.

In Force Procedures

After passing the assessment centre, a small minority of forces may call you back for an “in force” interview. This will concentrate on local policing issues and knowledge of the force itself, along with more general questions.

Once you do this interview, assuming it is required, you will do your physical and medical examinations. At this stage, you will probably be made an offer of a place, subject to the usual security vetting procedures. From date of application, the whole process can take anything from six to twelve months, before you actually receive a start date.

John McTaggart, Talking Blues Police Recruitment Training