Competitive vs. Non-Competitive Civil Service

What Is a Competitive Position?

Competitive positions require candidates to pass a civil service examination and be ranked on an eligibility list. Appointing authorities must hire from among the top candidates on the list. Most state and many local government jobs are competitive titles.

What Is a Non-Competitive Position?

Non-competitive positions require applicants to meet minimum qualifications (education and experience) but do not require passing a formal examination. Candidates are evaluated directly by the hiring agency based on their credentials.

Key Differences

• Exam requirement: Competitive requires a written or performance exam; non-competitive does not.
• Eligibility list: Competitive hires must come from a ranked list; non-competitive hires are agency-selected.
• Job security: Both offer civil service tenure protections after a probationary period.
• Application process: Competitive applicants apply during an exam announcement window; non-competitive positions are posted like regular job openings.

How the career service splits

N.J.S.A. 11A:3-2 is short enough to quote in full effect: the career service has two divisions, the Commission assigns titles to each, and it may move employees between them. Of the 4,973 career-service titles CSC publishes, 3,957 sit in the competitive division and 1,016 in the noncompetitive — about 3.9 examined titles for every one that is not.

Why a title is in the noncompetitive division

It is not a judgement about the work. N.J.A.C. 4A:3-1.2 lets the Commission place a title in the noncompetitive division when at least one of three things is true: competitive testing is not practicable given the knowledge, skills and abilities the job needs; ranked eligible lists have not met or are unlikely to meet appointing authorities' needs, for reasons the rule names as salary, geography, recruitment difficulty and working conditions; or immediate appointments are needed because of a new legislative program or a major agency reorganisation.

Read plainly, two of those three are about the labour market rather than the job. A title lands in the noncompetitive division largely when an examination would not produce usable candidates.

What the split does not mean

A noncompetitive appointment is not provisional, not temporary and not a lesser grade of employment. N.J.A.C. 4A:3-1.2 requires every noncompetitive appointee to meet the minimum requirements in the job specification and to complete a working test period, and N.J.A.C. 4A:4-5.1 puts all regular career-service appointments under a working test period, with four narrow exceptions that have nothing to do with which division the title sits in. The examination is a method of selection, not a level of tenure.

One detail shows how firmly the divisions are separate rather than ranked: in State service, a lateral move from the noncompetitive division to the competitive division is treated as a promotion (N.J.A.C. 4A:4-7.6), even between titles of substantially similar work.

The consequence that actually changes what you should do is how a vacancy reaches you. A competitive title is filled from a ranked eligible list, so the route in is an announcement, an examination and a place on that list. A noncompetitive title has no list to be on, so the route in is meeting the published requirements and finding an appointing authority with a vacancy.

Neither division is the unclassified service, which sits outside the career service altogether and is enumerated by statute — 1,198 titles, covered on classified vs. unclassified.

Browse competitive titles or browse non-competitive titles. Also see: NJ Civil Service Exam Guide.