Police staff supporting statement: evidence for the form

A police staff supporting statement should explain how your own experience meets the civilian vacancy's person specification or role profile. Read the force's current instructions before drafting and check whether you have an open statement, separate competency questions or both. This guide concerns staff employment applications; use the relevant recruitment guidance for police officer applications, and keep witness statements outside this process.

Start with the force's own requirements

Greater Manchester Police's Supporting Information for Police Staff Employment, hosted on its WCN recruitment platform and checked on 9 November 2026, asks applicants to match experience, attributes and knowledge to the role requirements. Its supporting information section invites examples from paid or unpaid employment and asks applicants to explain how those experiences meet the person specification.

The document is undated. Use the current advert and application portal to confirm the instructions for your post, including any length limit. This guide uses GMP's evidence-writing advice; it does not establish current eligibility or vetting requirements.

Read every part of the vacancy's role profile before choosing examples. Mark the criteria that the current pack says will be assessed in the application. Copy any question into your planning notes so that you can see exactly what your answer must address. For the difference between essential and desirable lines, use the criteria guide.

Separate supporting information from the other fields

GMP's guidance distinguishes employment responsibilities, qualifications, other relevant skills and supporting information. Complete the fields the current form asks for, then use the statement to make the connection between evidence and criteria.

The table describes sections in the fetched GMP document. It is a reading aid for that document, not a promise that every force uses the same fields or assessment method.

Section in GMP guidance	What the guidance asks for	Evidence to prepare
Responsibilities	Main duties of present or most recent employment, with examples where needed	Tasks that relate to the person specification
Qualifications	Relevant qualifications and training achieved, plus relevant short courses attended or in progress	Accurate course titles and whether each is completed
Other relevant skills	Other skills, including IT, language skills and voluntary or community activities	A real example of where you used each relevant skill
Supporting information	How experience, attributes and knowledge meet role requirements	Your personal action and its connection to a criterion

Check any assessment marks against the legend in your own role profile. Do not assume a blank mark exempts you from a requirement. Ask the recruitment contact if the pack leaves the assessment stage unclear.

Follow the question when the form asks for a competency

If the current form gives a specific question, plan an answer to that question before reusing material from a general statement. Keep a separate evidence note for each answer. A question about a particular occasion needs enough context for the reader to follow what you did on that occasion.

GMP's supporting information advice says: "Be specific about your personal involvement in activities described." Apply that check to the verbs in your draft. Where a team completed a task, explain which part you handled, what you decided and when you involved a colleague. Avoid taking credit for a decision that someone else made.

For an open statement, work through the criteria in a clear order. For separate questions, follow their wording and limits. Neither format gives you a reason to invent police experience: identify the setting where the example actually happened.

Plan an example without writing a generic police statement

The criterion below is an illustrative planning prompt, not a quotation from a force role profile. Replace it with the wording in your vacancy and choose a situation you can discuss accurately.

Criterion: "Ability to communicate information clearly."

• When and where: identify the real role or unpaid setting and who needed the information.
• What you did: describe how you explained it, checked understanding and handled any question you could not answer yourself.
• What happened: state the observed outcome and how it relates to the criterion in this vacancy.

Leave out identifying details about members of the public or colleagues. If the example involves sensitive information, describe your action without copying a private record. Keep any claim about following a procedure tied to what you actually knew and did.

Before you submit

Careers Wales' personal statement guidance advises using examples relevant to the job description, following the form's instructions and keeping within its word limit. Check that every answer names your own contribution and that the employment and training fields agree with the statement.

The general writing guide covers assembling a draft from criteria. You can check your draft against the person specification to find requirements that still lack an example.