At Glance
You’ve read up on IOs and have thought about where and why you want to apply. So how do you start applying?
This article is part 3 of a series called “Careers in International Organizations (IOs) – an insider’s guide” – click this LINK to access an overview of the series.
Where to look?
First, you need to know where to look. The first place most people go is the UN Careers Portal. This is a good start but it’s important to know that it doesn’t contain all the UN jobs out there. To do so you’ll need to visit each UN agency or programme website. Other IOs are easier with their career pages showing the most up to date vacancies. A good aggregator is UNjobs which actually has jobs across most IOs (not just the UN). Many organizations are also making the jump to LinkedIn – although don’t expect them to have an Easy Apply button. One notable exception is the Centre for International Dialogue in Lisbon which recently adopted Easy Apply!
The Vacancy Notice:
Each IO job will, as expected, have a vacancy notice.
The key thing to keep an eye out for is Essential (sometimes called Mandatory or Key) Qualifications. These are a combination of academic credentials, on the job experience and language skills.
You must meet all these qualifications for your application to be considered. Put another way, don’t bother applying unless you meet – and generally exceed them. The HR department screens out any applications that don’t meet the Essential Qualifications, meaning no amount of explanation in the cover letter will ever get your application before the hiring manager. Please also remember that, when counting years of professional experience HR departments often exclude internships, meaning that 5 internships of 6 months each don’t automatically give you 2.5 years of experience. It’s generally better to work in a national government or company for 3 years in a more junior full-time post than to have many internships in international organizations.
Next up, Asset (or Desirable) Qualifications are used to separate the best candidates from the list of qualified candidates. When applying to an IO you’ll need to pretty much meet or exceed the Asset Qualifications in order to be shortlisted.
The Back of the Kitchen:
Before I continue with this article it’s worth giving you a peek into the workings of a typical HR shop so that you can understand how your application is considered, triaged, and ultimately leads to an interview (or job offer).
First off, the high-level process in almost every IO is one of triaging applications, meaning reducing the number from the initial set of applications (hundred or thousands) to the 5-8 people who will get an interview.
The first step in the review is the long-listing process. This is often done by hand but increasingly via assessment algorithms in modern talent management systems. This means that your application and CV should be standardized, coherent, and machine readable.
The long list is typically between 10 and 30 applicants and IOs will aim for a balance of genders and nationalities. The aim is to get the pool of candidates down to a group which can be further tested.
The next step is typically an offline interview which may also include a written test. You can think of it as a video-based interview with your responses being recorded for later viewing by HR (and possibly the hiring manager). The questions are general, aimed at assessing your communication and critical reasoning skills, and short in duration (typically 2-5 minutes each). You’ll have anywhere between 3-6 questions. Tests can be varied but with the advent of ChatGPT most smart employers are rethinking them (for example moving away from written responses and more towards PowerPoint slide decks).
HR then reviews the interviews and will propose a short list of 5-8 candidates. Some organizations go overboard and may interview up to 12 candidates but, in my experience, this is overkill and results more in tired management than in better quality candidates.
The short-listed candidates are invited to a virtual real-time interview with the panel (typically consisting of HR, the hiring manager, and 1-3 other managers from other departments). Interviews are usually 45 minutes long and include an overview, 6-8 competency-based interviews (Article 5 goes into more detail on this) and a point for you to ask one or possibly two questions at the end. Following the interview, you may be tested again (but rarely so if you were tested at the long-listing stage). You may also need to do a language test. This is particularly important in organizations which have two official languages (examples being NATO where you will have a test or the OECD where you’ll be asked one interview question in the other language). This test is not generally a deal breaker, but it can be a determining factor if two candidates are similarly skilled.
The panel then recommends the candidates who meet the eligibilitybar and could be hired. These individuals sometimes have their references checked (although more forward leaning IOs have done away with this step since it adds almost zero value to the process). The names of the recommended candidates are then sent to the Secretary General (or Head of the organization) for a final decision.
The selected candidate is not necessarily the one who performs best in the interviews but must be one of those who meet the eligibility bar.
This gives a Secretary General discretion on appointments (I’ll go into more detail on this in chapter 4).
To give you an insight into the numbers I’ve compiled a table so you can see how candidates progress through the steps:
The last column is there to give you a sense of how many times you’d need to apply for a job to be invited to an interview. Of course, this is an average and stronger candidates will fare better, but the key takeaway is that applying for 10 jobs in the IOs won’t necessarily lead to a guarantee. As Wayne Gretzky once quipped: “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”
Cover Letters:
Cover letters rarely make any difference in a modern hiring process. I can tell you for a fact that in modern IOs they are filed and rarely read. However, having one is a nice touch. Remember though to keep it relevant to the post (not generic), free of spelling mistakes, and never over one page. Think about it more as a covering note which states that you’re excited about this vacancy and draws attention to one or two experiences in your CV which are of relevance to the vacancy. Keep it simple.
References:
I hate them personally but many IOs still require references. This is a holdover from the fact that the internal administration of IOs is based on Regulations and Rules approved by their governing bodies (Member States). Those rules are very similar (in some cases standardized) and it’s a pain to change them. Most have the archaic requirement for references and so the HR teams in IOs mindlessly carry out that administrative task.
If you need references as part of the process, you’ll be asked for them at the application stage, but they won’t be checked unless you’re one of the top candidates being sent for consideration by the Secretary General. Normally, the HR team should check with you at that point so that you can give your referees a heads up (particularly if it’s your current manager). Some get sloppy and miss that. Additionally, some more senior individuals may not wish to have their private phone numbers and emails shared at the application phase (since you do dozens of those in a job hunt). A good approach is simply to provide the name of the reference but in the mandatory email address field write upon@reque.st as the email address. This gets the application submitted but still forces HR to come back to you for the email address later in the process when you know it’s serious.
When selecting references, they should be people who you have worked for in a capacity which is relevant to the post you’re applying for. They can’t be familial relations and shouldn’t have been subordinates (unless there’s a very good reason for this).
Lastly, know your references well and understand your relationship with them. I recall a case where a colleague was hurt by a reference simply because the job they had applied for (and were about to be offered) was at the same level as the person they asked to be their reference. This applicant later realized that his referee didn’t quite appreciate having someone of the applicant's age (mid-thirties at the time) make it as high up as he was in the last three years before his retirement. Clearly this applicant should have done his homework and considered the situation through an empathy lens. Because he didn't he missed out on the opportunity.
Onwards:
Armed with this information you should have all the tools you need to apply for a vacancy and understand the process. But there’s a bit more you need to think about. In Article 4 I’ll speak about the Three-legged Stool of IOs and why this should be a key factor you consider before hitting submit on a specific job application.
Help and Coaching:
As part of our practice OrdoStrategica offers help and coaching for those interested in pursuing careers in IOs. If you would like to learn more about our help and coaching options please contact us. If you're specifically interested in coaching from Andrzej you can schedule a session on his Intro page.
