Economic Service Placement 2023

Hello, has anyone been interviewed yet for the GES placements 2023 yet? If so is there any advice you can provide

Hi,

I had an interview on Thursday for the GES placement by the Department of Work and Pensions.
The questions wont be the same for everyone as they have a pool of questions and will randomly question you from it, (or maybe even ask new ones entirely)

They first asked me 'unmarked' questions:
- Why did you decide to study Economics at University?
- Why do you want to work for us?

Then came a question with some follow up questions based on "Managing a Quality Service"
- Describe a time when you had to work in a part of a team and deliver results in a short amount of time.
It was followed by questions:
#Was there a time where you thought you needed improvement during this time? What did you do?
# What was the ultimate goal for your team and how did your results compare?

After came 3 Questions from Macroeconomics first, then Microeconomics.

Macroeconomics:

- Lets say the Government has started numerous road projects within the country, explain the effect of this in Macroeconomic terms.
(follow up question / #):
# What do you think the short run effect would be?

- Is it always good to increase government spending? At what point is the inflation due to increased government spending a bad thing?

- A country is going through a debt crisis, explain how this affects its economy.
(follow up question):
# what will the investors who have invested in this country do at the present time keeping the debt crisis in mind?

Microeconomics:

- Name as many form of market failures you can and elaborate for each how they fail.
(follow up questions):
# apart from perfectly competitive and a monopolistic market what other form of a market can arise without government involvement?
# can you give a real world example of collusion?

- The greenhouse effect is a negative externality. Explain what is meant by this in microeconomic terms.
(follow up question)
# if the government imposes restrictions on producers to prevent this affect, what will it mean for the consumers?

- Explain how different forms of markets have different impacts on prices of goods

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Apologies as I might have forgotten some follow up questions or the exact wordings.

My advice for the managing a quality service part is to be confident in your answers: there is no wrong answer in this part really, just present your answer using the STAR method (Situation, Task, Action, Results)
Heres a link to a couple of example questions for this part of the interview: https://careerbuildingjobs.com/managing-a-quality-service/

For the economics part, revise and brush up on your A level economics knowledge + a bit of First Year Uni Economics. Make some concise notes if you can.

For me personally, I was dissapointed with the way i gave my interview: i lacked structure and was waffling a bit sometimes ( a result of poor preperation). In all honesty the interview itself is not tough, and the interviewers are very nice people who will make you feel relaxed from the get go. Just make sure you are confident in your preperation.

Again this is all subjective from my side so take it with a grain of salt and good luck to you.

(edited 1 year ago)

Reply 2

mcfcokay

1

You guys heard anything back and what departments are you most interested in?

Reply 3

Ruk_2003

3

Got a provisional offer a few days before Christmas. No set location yet, but I interviewed with the ONS.

Reply 4

HopeS746

1

I got a provisional offer too before Christmas too but haven’t heard anything else atm

Reply 5

Leah3852

13

Original post by Lejutt

Hi,

I had an interview on Thursday for the GES placement by the Department of Work and Pensions.
The questions wont be the same for everyone as they have a pool of questions and will randomly question you from it, (or maybe even ask new ones entirely)

They first asked me 'unmarked' questions:
- Why did you decide to study Economics at University?
- Why do you want to work for us?

Then came a question with some follow up questions based on "Managing a Quality Service"
- Describe a time when you had to work in a part of a team and deliver results in a short amount of time.
It was followed by questions:
#Was there a time where you thought you needed improvement during this time? What did you do?
# What was the ultimate goal for your team and how did your results compare?

After came 3 Questions from Macroeconomics first, then Microeconomics.

Macroeconomics:

- Lets say the Government has started numerous road projects within the country, explain the effect of this in Macroeconomic terms.
(follow up question / #):
# What do you think the short run effect would be?

- Is it always good to increase government spending? At what point is the inflation due to increased government spending a bad thing?

- A country is going through a debt crisis, explain how this affects its economy.
(follow up question):
# what will the investors who have invested in this country do at the present time keeping the debt crisis in mind?

Microeconomics:

- Name as many form of market failures you can and elaborate for each how they fail.
(follow up questions):
# apart from perfectly competitive and a monopolistic market what other form of a market can arise without government involvement?
# can you give a real world example of collusion?

- The greenhouse effect is a negative externality. Explain what is meant by this in microeconomic terms.
(follow up question)
# if the government imposes restrictions on producers to prevent this affect, what will it mean for the consumers?

- Explain how different forms of markets have different impacts on prices of goods

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Apologies as I might have forgotten some follow up questions or the exact wordings.

My advice for the managing a quality service part is to be confident in your answers: there is no wrong answer in this part really, just present your answer using the STAR method (Situation, Task, Action, Results)
Heres a link to a couple of example questions for this part of the interview: https://careerbuildingjobs.com/managing-a-quality-service/

For the economics part, revise and brush up on your A level economics knowledge + a bit of First Year Uni Economics. Make some concise notes if you can.

For me personally, I was dissapointed with the way i gave my interview: i lacked structure and was waffling a bit sometimes ( a result of poor preperation). In all honesty the interview itself is not tough, and the interviewers are very nice people who will make you feel relaxed from the get go. Just make sure you are confident in your preperation.

Again this is all subjective from my side so take it with a grain of salt and good luck to you.

This was so detailed and so helpful, thank you! I really hope you get the role. Is this for the Government Economic Service Sandwich Student Placement Scheme?