.:aaron.helton:.

On October 16, 2009, I sat for the United Nations National Competitive Recruiting Exam (UN NCRE) P2 Interview in New York City, USA.  Since I am in Washington, DC, now, it was a 2 hour, 45 minute train ride up the east coast.  I had to get up pretty early to get there with enough time to find the UN building, which turned out to be about 2 miles from NY Penn Station.

Anyway, before the interview, the Office of Human Resources Management (OHRM) provided some basic preparation instructions, which I attempted to follow on the train ride in.  Among the materials provided was a document containing the UN competencies, qualities they are testing for with the interview process.  Other tips included reading periodicals, newspapers, and the UN’s web sites and those of its agencies.

I arrived in New York armed with what I could glean from the United Nations Wikipedia page (which, frankly, is easier to read than trying to navigate the UN system) and answers to a few particular questions I could think of (namely what the difference between peace keeping and peace building is).  Upon arriving at the UN building, I had to go to the information desk and call the contact number I was given.  Escort is required in the building, which makes sense.  Once my escort arrived, he presented me with a badge and took me up to one of the offices.  I have to say, the inside of the UN building, at least in NY, is about as gray and featureless as it could possibly get.  Even if I had wanted to take mental snapshots of distinctive features, there wouldn’t have been much.

Presently my escort ushered me into a similarly featureless room, where a lone chair was situated facing a blank wall outside an empty cubicle.  I was early, and so I sat and waited.  The room I was in was adjacent to a conference room that had frosted windows.  Beyond I could see daylight and shadowy forms moving about as if in conversation.  The inner room was the interview room.

After waiting about ten minutes, one of the panelists opened the door and showed me in.  The room was arranged with two tables butted together in the center of the room, four chairs on one side and one chair on the other.  An extra chair in the corner provided a resting spot for my coat and briefcase.  Some blank sheets of paper rested on the table in front of me, and the panelists advised me that, while I could take notes, the papers would have to stay with them.  The interview style is one I have experience with, as I have been through many interviews in the last 6 years.

The panelists briefly introduced themselves.  There were three women and one man on the interview panel.  After introductions, they explained that the interview consisted of two parts: competency questions and the international affairs questions.  It was all very formulaic, and the panelists remained largely neutral throughout.  Each took a turn either asking a question or asking a follow-up question, trying to gauge from my responses the level of exposure to the various competency areas.  The only competency they didn’t specifically ask about is communication, since this was evaluated holistically with the interview.

I was not nervous to begin with, and I never felt uneasy while they probed for very specific circumstantial details.  My examination subject is Information Technology, so a number of the questions had at least a component of this, and one panelist continually sought out the specific technologies I mentioned (like what operating systems, programming languages, database systems I had worked with).  The competency portion took a while, and I am pretty sure I was very thorough with my answers.  I was satisfied with the answers I gave anyway.

Once the competency portion was done, the panelists explained the rules for the international affairs portion.  This portion consisted of one question in each of four subjects.  If I did not know the answer to one of the questions, they said, I could ask to skip that question and go to another question in the list for that subject.  I was allowed to use this only once during  the interview.  The four sections and the accompanying questions were as follows (keep in mind that these are the best I can recall; actual mileage may vary, so use with caution):

• (General UN) Recently, UN aid workers have suffered attacks.  In your opinion, what is the cause of these attacks and what can be done to keep them from happening?

• (Environment, Science, and Technology) What are the drawbacks of solar power?

• (Economics and Social Affairs) What is the global poverty threshold, and what is the UN doing to fight global poverty?

• (Security) What is the United Nations Peacebuilding Commission?  Why was it created, and what does it do?

I had to skip one of the questions, presumably in the economics section, because I had never heard of the subject.  The original question was something like, “What is the Doha Development Round and why has it failed?”

I have to admit, my answers to the international affairs section were rather anemic compared to the competency answers.  I happen to know a bit about solar power, so I had a good enough answer for that, and my attempts to find the difference between peacekeeping and peace building paid off for me (have to say thanks to NCE_Candidate, one of the readers who commented on an earlier thread, for that bit of advice).  I knew just enough about the global poverty threshold that I could answer that (I said it was $2 a day, which turned out to be right according to Wikipedia).  The rest of the questions, meh.

After that, the interview was done.  I was escorted back out past the office security, and that was that.  The next step is that the examiners will reconvene and determine who will be recommended for placement on the roster.  Once on the roster, there is of course no guarantee of a job, but agencies will be able to select pre-screened candidates from the list for further interview.  I was told that a candidate may only turn down two offers before being removed  from the roster, but there is no cap on the time one may remain on the roster.

Does anyone know when this year’s results will be finalized?  Share your thoughts below.