How can you help the recruitment process run smoothly?

• March 24, 2025

It can be exciting and nerve-wracking to undertake an interview and accept a new position, but there are a few things you can do through the process to assist our team in ensuring the process runs as smoothly as possible.

Application form.

Our application form is very detailed, and it is important that this is completed in full prior to your interview. If you are unable to complete it at home, please speak to our recruitment team who will invite you in beforehand so you can complete it on site.

• References

You will notice on the reference section we as for three employment referees (one being your most recent workplace), these must be professional emails, we will be unable to accept Gmail/Yahoo…etc accounts.

We must receive references that cover your last 5 years of employment (no matter how short this may be) As well as a character reference, which may go to a personal email, but cannot be someone related to you.

We always advise you to contact your referee if you are offered a position here at First City, so that they are expecting to receive our correspondence, will hopefully complete it promptly and to ensure you have the correct information for them.

You may be asked for additional references at interview, this could be to cover a longer time frame, or to contact an employment you’ve previously held similar to that you are applying for.

• Full work History

It may seem unnecessary to you, but due to our strict recruitment criteria we do require this, with any gap explained. This may have been seeking employment, on maternity leave, had medical grounds, or something else, whatever the reason please document it on the form.

DBS

The DBS is a criminal background check, it will ask you if you have any history to declare, please be honest on this question. The process will require certain documents in order to be completed, please ensure you check the documents are in date and valid. We have no control over the DBS process and how long it may take, and we are unable to provide an accurate timeframe of when it will be completed as this will vary from person to person. However, we can provide you with a tracking number so you can see what stage it is at through the process.

Induction

Our induction is held very regularly, running on alternate weeks, we would ask that you arrive on time for each session and complete the full week in one go. If you are not able to complete the full five days in one week we can discuss splitting this over two, however we will not be able to spread it out any further than this.

The sessions run Monday – Friday 9:30 – 16:30 only. Unfortunately, we do not run the induction on any other days or times. We understand things beyond your control can occur and so, if you are booked but unable to attend a day (due to sickness, family emergencies etc) please call and let us know as soon as possible as this will need to be rebooked and completed on the next available session.

If you are running late, you must inform the team as soon as you can, if you are going to be anymore than 10 minutes late you may not be able to join as the session requires a prompt start to run smoothy for the day and all other attendees on the course. If you are not admitted into a session, it would then need to be rebooked. 

All five days must be fully completed in order for you to commence working, so it is really important to be prompt and keep communication open with our recruitment team throughout.

Ask Questions

Don’t be afraid to ask questions throughout the process, we would rather ease any concerns or clarify any confusion as soon as it arises, so you are not left wondering or worrying until contract signing. Our recruitment team are on hand via email or phone call and are happy to assist you.

Your Role

The recruitment team will email you a welcome pack with your offer email. Please ensure you read it carefully as this will have more information about the department you are being recruited into (as discussed at interview). If you have any questions or are still unsure of where you are going to be placed, please let the team know!

We’ve mentioned our strict recruitment criteria previously in this post, but we’ve still not answered the why – why do we need his information before you are able to commence employment?

We follow such a strict recruitment process to ensure we are compliant with CQC and the local council. By doing so we can ensure that we are keeping our customers and colleagues across the business as safe as possible through due diligence and thorough checks.

In conclusion you can help your recruitment process run smoothly by ensuring accurate information is provided, attending your training on time and in full, by supporting us to chase references if required and keeping the communication channel open with us in the recruitment team.

If you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact our recruitment line: 01793 313044 or vis email to recruitment@firstcitygroup.co.uk