| | Recruitment policy
ESA's recruitment policy is to attract and retain the right calibre of staff to meet ESA’s evolving needs.
This challenge must be met while at the same time making every effort to follow the key principles underlying ESA's recruitment philosophy.
These are:
- to employ highly qualified staff to enable ESA to achieve its objectives and deliver outstanding results for the Agency
- to give primary consideration to qualifications, knowledge, skills and personal qualities, including the capacity to adapt and evolve over the longer term
- to ensure that all staffing decisions are fair, equitable and transparent
- to give due weight to nationality and gender to ensure fair representation
- to consider the short-term need for flexibility and internal mobility without losing sight of possible long-term requirements for organisational change and the development of career potential
Selection procedure
Vacancies are normally filled through direct competition arising from a vacancy announcement although in some cases staff may be reassigned to another post within the same grade, the same location or the same Directorate.
Vacancy notices are published internally on the Agency’s intranet and, if open to external competition, are published on this website. Posts filled by competition at the A5 and A6 level are always published externally as well as internally. When necessary, additional means of recruiting staff are used such as newspaper advertisements, publication on specialised commercial websites and the use of specialised recruitment companies.
Communication and outreach campaigns or job fairs may also be held to attract under-represented categories of applicants such as women in engineering and scientific fields, and nationals from some Member States.
The selection of candidates is generally conducted by an interview board, which evaluates the qualifications and suitability of candidates.
Security directives
In the performance of their duties, ESA Staff Members handle confidential information that is considered to be property of the Agency and must be handled accordingly and to the benefit of ESA and its Member States. All candidates are subject to a screening procedure within the legal constraints in force at the time of recruitment. To this end, any support information provided with all applications, such as diplomas to verify educational qualifications and any other titles will be verified. In addition references provided by applicants will be contacted.
|  | ESA's Gender Equality Advisor | |
Gender equality
ESA follows an equal opportunity policy, the main purpose of which is to improve the representation of female staff, particularly in engineering and scientific fields, and at management level. Gender equality is recognised as being a basic principle of democracy and respect for the individual, as well as an essential factor in a balanced professional environment. To encourage gender equality among its staff it is ESA’s policy to:
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increase awareness of the importance of an equal opportunity policy within the Agency
- pursue a pro-active policy towards the recruitment of women
- address the constraints arising out of the need to reconcile family and professional lives
ESA has already put in place a number of benefits and initiatives to help staff members to reconcile their private and professional lives. Some examples are: parental/family leave, flexi-time and part-time work. Efforts are also underway at ESA’s four main establishments to provide daycare facilities for the children of staff members, either on-site or at local daycare centres.
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