Start here · 2024 Framework
Civil service grades explained
What CO, EO, AO, HEO, AP and PO actually mean, how the board's expectations rise with each step, and how to choose the grade that fits where you are now.
The grades at a glance
The Irish civil service runs on a ladder of general grades. Each is a step up in scope, judgement and responsibility, and each is recruited through the publicjobs assessment mapped to the 2024 Capability Framework. Here is the shape of the ladder from the entry general grade upward.
Clerical Officer
Entry grade
The entry general grade: processing, records and frontline support, working to clear procedures.
4 capabilities scored
Executive Officer
First supervisory grade
First supervisory and independent grade: owning your own work, using judgement within your remit, supporting colleagues.
6 capabilities scored
Administrative Officer
Graduate entry
Graduate policy and analysis entry: research, drafting and analytical work, often on new questions.
8 capabilities scored
Higher Executive Officer
Middle management
Managing a function or small team: planning work, delivering to standard, developing people.
8 capabilities scored
Assistant Principal
Senior management
Leading a business area: strategy, change, resourcing and decisions that carry real consequence.
8 capabilities scored
Principal Officer
Senior management, division
Senior leadership of a division: setting direction, accountability and cross-organisation influence.
8 capabilities scoredProgression runs from entry to senior leadership. Moving up depends on competitions, performance and opportunity, not on time served alone.
Grade titles vary slightly across departments and the wider public service, but this is the standard civil service general-grade ladder. The publicjobs competition you apply for names the grade and the capabilities it will assess.
How the bar rises grade by grade
The capabilities keep the same names as you go up. What changes is the level of evidence the board expects behind them. The same word, say "judgement", is scored very differently at CO and at AP.
Scope: how big is the thing you are deciding about
At CO and EO the board wants sound decisions about your own work and your own queue. At HEO it widens to your team or function. At AP and PO it is a business area or a division, where a decision changes how other people work and carries budget or risk. Pitch an EO example at AP scope and it sounds slight. Pitch an AP example at EO scope and it sounds like overreach.
Ownership: how much was yours to carry
Lower grades evidence doing the work well and taking initiative within a set process. Higher grades evidence owning the outcome: setting the plan, weighing the trade-offs, and standing over a call when it was genuinely yours to make. As you climb, "I did the task" has to become "I decided the approach and I was answerable for it".
People: who you are responsible for
At EO, leadership is informal: bringing on a colleague, sharing knowledge. At HEO it becomes managing a team’s work and development. At AP and PO it is leading through others, setting direction and building the conditions for a whole area to deliver. The people sub-elements are scored against that reality at each grade.
Recency and level both count
Across every grade, boards weight examples from the last three to five years, and they weight examples that were genuinely at or near the level you are competing for. A strong recent example that operated at the grade beats an older, bigger one that did not.
Which grade should you target
Target the grade you can already evidence. Not the grade you would like on your payslip, and not the grade you think you could grow into. The board is not scoring potential. It is scoring whether the behaviours you describe already sit at the level of the grade.
A useful test: for each capability the competition will assess, can you name a real example from the last few years where you did something at that grade's scope? If you are reaching for hypotheticals or borrowing from work well below the grade, you are likely a competition too high, and the score will show it.
If you are between two grades, the honest move is usually to compete for the one you can fill with real, recent, at-level examples, do well, and build the next tier of evidence in the role. A near-miss at a grade you were ready for beats a thin showing at one you were not.
Once you know your grade, the capability guides show you exactly what the board is testing under each heading, with a full high-scored answer beside a low-scored one so you can see the bar rather than guess at it.
Quick take
Common questions
How many capabilities does the board score at each grade?
Should I apply for the highest grade I can?
Can the same example work for more than one grade?
Practise the real publicjobs format for your grade
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