11 Million - Recruitment

Young NCB were asked if we could help the Office of the Children’s Commissioner OCC, Now known as 11million in recruiting new members of staff to their organisation.

Hear from Young NCB member Alice Thomas, 17 from Bromley about the project and what it was like to be involved:

I helped recruit staff for the Office of the Children’s Commissioner (Now known as 11million)

When I first read the email from Young NCB looking for young people to help with interviewing at the Office of the Children’s Commissioner I had little idea of what we had to do but it seemed like a simple way to get more involved, so I volunteered. When I arrived at the main office in London Bridge for the introductory session I could tell immediately that the rooms had all been designed with the help of children and young people: everything from the crescent moon sofa in reception to the inflatable armchairs were comfortable, colourful and fun.

David and Adriana from Young NCB helped me and five other young people to try a series of exercises to help us with the interviews and we each wrote a couple of questions to ask the candidates, so that we had an idea of what would happen on the day. I was on the panels for the Commissioner and CEO’s Diary Manager and Personal Assistant. On both days, there were three young people helping with the decision and when we arrived we were each given a copy of the job description and CVs of the applicants. I was really pleased to notice that all of them had experience working with young people.

In the interviews, we took turns to ask questions and found that we were learning as much about the process of organising an office as the interviewees were about the OCC. For example, did you know a diary manager could work an 18-hour day just trying to work out where their employer needs to be tomorrow? It certainly made me appreciate seven hours at school more.

On both days, we were allowed to use the computers in the lunch break and the office ordered pizza, which was really good – though I’m not sure how it fits in with promoting healthy eating for children! The second time, the Commissioner, Al Aynsley Green, was helping with the interviews so we were able to find out more about his role and he got to listen to our thoughts and ideas.

I know the rest of the interview team will agree with me when I say that it was great experience: we got to see the interview process from the other side of the desk and the OCC can only have benefited from including young people. I'm sure that given our success, they will continue to do so in the future.