How can I make my written work stand out?

Whether completing your Application Form, writing your answers to your ITOP/ ADC Stage 1 exercise or completing an ADC in-basket, how do you make your responses stand out from all the rest? Surely there are a limited number of right answers? What can you do to make yours distinctive?

The beauty of any of these exercises is that there is no ONE right answer. What you write demonstrates how you see things, how you evaluate information, how you reach decisions. Even if the end product is a little different from what the assessor may be expecting, as long as you can show that you have thought it through and can back up your answers, you will get credit. What they don’t want to see are conclusions which have no evidence to support them.

But how can you evaluate fully in your ITOP exercise or ADC in-basket? How do you draw conclusions that demonstrate effectively your ability to resolve problems and create solutions?

The trick is to work out your initial conclusions and then pause. Go back to the data and look again. What else do the facts and figures tell you?

Do different aspects relate to each other in a way you may have missed initially?

For instance, you might have some information that suggests a team is under-performing. You may have other data that says that individuals are feeling demoralised. The obvious conclusion may be that these things are somehow related. But what many people miss out on is the opportunity to explore this further. What else is there in the background information which could tell you more about this situation? There is little value in making unsubstantiated guesses. But often there will be links in the data that you have missed first time round. It is the candidates who spot these, and build on them with evidence-based conclusions and creative solutions who really stand out.

Do you need some practice using data and forming effective conclusions?

Find out how well you do this, and what you need to do it even better