I am going to be having my sergeant interview in a few days and I was looking to get some tips on things that may come up in the interview.
Will it have more or less questions on the RAF & RAFAC and what types of personal questions may they ask?
Staff or cadet?
Cadet
I saw you write afterwards it was cadet! Mine was all about staff. This will be even more localised.
Here is some of the ones I ask, but talking two some sncos on your squadron will get the most accurate.
– why have you applied for promotion
We currently have an interesting dynamic on the Squadron at the moment with a group of
cadets who have stagnated and are being overtaken by cadets who have joined after then. If
you were promoted what would you do to keep them interested and positive about the Air
Cadets?
Being part of an NCO team is about balancing skills and qualities. What quality can you
bring to the team that may be missing from the
You were unsuccessful at the last round of promotions – what have you done to improve your chances on this occasion?
The Squadron set up allows for 9 Cpls, 5 Sgts, 3 FS and a CWO – how important for the smooth running of the Squadron that all these positions are filled?
One of the Air Cdre’s concerns at the moment is retention of cadets, the average length for a cadet to stay is 18 months. What can a JNCO do to ensure new cadets stay a member of the Air Cadets?
What activity are you looking forward to most in the next 12 months
Sometimes things don’t go to plan, when in cadets have things gone wrong for you?
Follow up question: What would you do differently if you were to have that scenario now?
Not including yourself, who would you promote to Sgt?
Follow up question: What do you feel they would bring to the current NCO team?
During RAFAC Junior NCO training it is encouraged that when you get promoted you should develop yourself by becoming a ‘reflective practitioner’ What does this mean to you?
- If they don’t know what that means, ask them what they would do to develop themselves as an Air Cadet
In your letter you state XYZ , as an NCO it is important to lead from the front, and ABC. What impact do you feel that this is having on the Squadron?
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I wouldn’t expect either highly personal questions or much about the RAF to be honest. Rather, it would be how do you see the Sgt’s
role and how will you act differently to how you do as a Cpl.
I’d expect a question about what is good on your unit and what can be done better, and maybe a scenario type question about how you would deal with an issue that comes up (say discipline).
Lastly if you have a lot of other commitments - sports, say, or school, you might be asked how you’ll balance those.
Best of luck!
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Ooh good questions, might borrow!
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These are great, might have to swipe and deploy them for use on my own unit.
I’ll try and dig out those we currently use later to give some further food for thought to the original question.
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@Ginge.nco sorry I can’t put my hands on them at the moment but here’s some additional questions off the top of my head to consider as part of your preparation:
- Recruitment is an important area for any Sqn, do you have any ideas in how we can improve our recruitment process targeted at people such as yourself?
- You are delivering training to a group of Junior cadets, one of the cadets continues to be a disruption, calling out and providing distracting responses. What do you do?
- You witness a cadet you know reasonably well smoking behind the building, what would you do?
- The staff have opened the building but when you go out onto parade in the car park you notice a rather full looking shopping bag over to one corner that wasn’t there before. What would you do?
- A cadet approaches you and asks to have a private chat, they indicate they want to raise some concerns about another cadet who happens to be a close friend of yours. What would you do?
– Would you promise to keep anything they told you secret? - A cadet persistently turns up with scuffed toecaps and their inspection records for a couple of weeks show that the shoes have always been annotated as ‘needing work’. What would you do?
- A cadet comes to you asking where they should position their new badge on the brassard, it’s not a badge that you are familiar with or have yourself, where could you go to find an answer?
- You’re away on a camp and (assuming you’re under 18) are in mixed accommodation with other NCOs and cadets, some of the other senior NCOs, one of which is a FS starts vaping and passing around or encouraging others to try it. What would you do?
- The organisation loves acronyms, doe you know what RISE stands for?
– Give me an example of a time when you have shown ‘R’
– Give me an example of a time when you have shown ‘I’
Hopefully this will l help you think a little outside the box and give you an idea of some of the awareness required as you progress up the rank structure. If you can answer each of these confidently then brilliant, you’re doing really well. Hopefully though, some of these will be a challenge and require you to think about the answer or even go and do some research to find what on earth I’m talking about.
Now stop reading, go and answer the questions. Come back to see the topics and areas for thought below.
Q1 - we’d like to see how you process and think of new ideas. Do you follow the ‘same old approach’ or are you an ‘outside the box thinker’
Q2 - We’d like to see how you may respond to a typical situation you find yourself in. Does the Sqn have a process for dealing with such situations? Are you aware of it? What’s the first step of the process? What other options are available? What happens if after giving them a verbal warning the level of disruption continues?
Q3 - This comes down to integrity. Would you simply mention it to the cadet involved and remind them it’s not appropriate? Would you ‘grass’ your mate in to the staff?
Q4 - Think Op Wideawake and HOT, your Sqn security officer will be a good point of contact for a refresher on this if you’re not familiar.
Q5 - Cadets will look up to you, they should see you as a friendly and approachable individual. This is likely to result in you becoming the first point of contact for instances in which a cadet wants to disclose information. This could vary from anything from bullying to ‘a lot worse’. It’s important that you always make time to listen to that cadet, don’t ask any leading questions or probe any further than what they’re prepared to tell you. You’ve got to inform them that the information they’ve provided can’t be kept secret and that you have an obligation to report it to the staff but only those relevant will be aware of it.
Q6 - This isn’t about simply handing out a ‘telling off’ because they can’t get it right. Take a minute to think about why they’re struggling, maybe they don’t have access to the tools required, maybe they’ve never been shown how to? carry out a training session, offer to help out and get them to a standard they need to be at. If resources are a problem see what you have around the Sqn, speak to the staff, can we send them home with a shoe buffing kit?
Q7 - Cadet Portal will handle most of this for you
Q8 - Another one on integrity here. I raise this as it’s a real and recent scenario. It can be very tricky being in such a position, do you allow it to go on or do you try and call it out as setting a bad example. You may even be a secret vaper yourself (I would hope not) so would you end up participating? How, who and would you report it?
Q9 - Respect, Integrity, Service, Excellence.
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