Revisited competitions, extended training: the State completes its reform of the senior civil service

"The State needs all the talents, all the personalities, all the skills", underlines in an interview with AFP Maryvonne Le Brignonen, the director of the INSP.

The reform of the three competitions for access to the INSP presented on Tuesday must therefore "diversify the people who pass the competitions, whether it is a question of social, geographical or academic diversification", she specifies.

An imperative at a time when senior civil servants are regularly accused of being disconnected from reality, and when women represent barely 43% of some 90 INSP students - against "about 35% a few years ago" , insists all the same Mrs. Le Brignonen.

To attract new profiles, the school intends to review in depth the tests of the three access competitions.

From 2024, the classic “analysis notes” and “compositions” are over: the written tests will be lightened overall but will be enriched with a “practical case”.

The challenge of this new test is to better value the professional experience already acquired by the candidates, where the written competition was so far "quite academic", explains the director. But also to test the knowledge of the candidates in terms of ecological and digital transition, one of the priorities announced by the Minister of the Public Service, Stanislas Guerini.

Final touch

The oral tests will be extended, with a one-hour interview which should allow the candidate to highlight his personality and his professional project.

"We know that candidates are more shy, less naturally at ease, either because it's their personality, or because they have less social codes and need time, two, three, five questions to warm up and really reveal yourself", argues Maryvonne Le Brignonen.

Ultimately, with the changes made to the competitions, "the idea is to have candidates who are less stereotyped than in the past" and "to give everyone a chance when people are highly motivated and have a lot work."

For the past few years, the INSP has reserved six places per promotion for scholarship students, via the "Talents preparation". But this is only an experiment for now.

Other developments presented on Tuesday, schooling will be extended by two and a half months to last two years from 2024, and the academic year will now begin in September rather than January.

The curriculum will therefore be aligned with the school calendar, which should allow parents, and in particular mothers, to more easily combine private life and training at the INSP.

"At the competition level, our juries are trained in cognitive biases and we set up joint juries", so as not to unfairly penalize female candidates, adds Maryvonne Le Brignonen.

By attempting to diversify the recruitment of its executives, the State is bringing the final touch to its major project of reforming the senior civil service.

Highly symbolic, the removal of the ENA brand in response to the crisis of + yellow vests + and the disappearance of the bodies of the most prestigious civil servants had been the first steps.

Last fall, the government tackled another totem by deciding to abolish, again from 2024, the INSP exit classification.

This small revolution caused a stir among the few thousand senior officials. In June 2022, a few days apart, diplomats and INSP students went on strike, an extremely rare public mood movement among state executives.

The current students of the INSP have been "stakeholders" in the reform of the access competitions and the exit procedure, assures the director of the Institute, before indicating that they sit on its board of directors and within its pedagogical council.