The programme offers a number of courses designed specifically for Fast Streamers, including on civil service Behaviours, Strengths and interviews, supporting members throughout their time on the scheme. It brings together a network of high-profile providers who specialise in our key delivery areas: leadership and management, career development and support for job applications, wellbeing, and upskilling.
A recent addition to the FDA Learn programme is a course looking at the Development Trajectory Assessment, undertaken by Fast Streamers in their second year. Led by providers Chris Park and Neil Rider, both civil service ‘trained trainers’ for Civil Service Success Profiles, the course looks at the one hour verbal assessment and the approach to Behaviour examples, experience and Strengths with hints and tips and the use of STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result), which is mandated as part of this process. Read about the experiences of current Fast Streamers who took part in the course below:
Mudassir Amin says: “I followed the format in the course for the Behaviours and the Strengths and got great feedback overall. The questions that you shared also helped a lot. I think overall the course is well designed and serves the purpose of preparing the candidates for DTA.”
Karra Graham-Small says: “Thank you for running the DTA course. I genuinely found it extremely helpful. I had my DTA earlier today and passed it, which is a little bit of proof that it worked! I also don’t think I would have passed or gotten the scores I did if I’d relied solely on the information provided in the FSET sessions.”
Umaymah Alom says the course “was very engaging and definitely helpful for my upcoming DTA. I particularly thought it was brilliant how Chris answered participant questions by providing sample answers of potential things that could be asked in the DTA in relation to the participant answer.”
Dan Marshall, who is currently the FDA’s Fast Stream Convenor, shares feedback from a participant: “I caught up with one of our members today at ADC who attended the recent DTA session you did based on the new guidance. They described it as fantastic and said it was so much more in-depth and practically useful than anything FSET have provided.”
Member Zoe Audra adds: “I really like the FDA learn courses, especially the Success Profiles ones because the facilitators have a wider understanding of design decisions behind Success Profiles. I’ve attended a lot of generic ‘Behaviour writing courses’ since joining the civil service but it wasn’t until I went to “writing Behaviours” by FDA that I actually understood why I was writing them. Suddenly, something clicked into place for me and now I find them (relatively) easy!”
An opportunity to join the fastest growing union in the UK.
This week, the FDA attended the 2026 TUC Congress in Brighton. FDA delegates spoke to and moved motions on a range of topics, including the review of the civil service, supporting effective management, accountability and safe contracting in the NHS, and the importance of an evidence-led approach to regulation.
Yesterday, FDA staff and reps attended the 2026 Fast Stream annual Base Camp, welcoming this year’s new joiners to the scheme and sharing the benefits of FDA membership with them.
By joining the FDA, you’ll be standing alongside more than 26,000 other members who believe that public services – and the people who deliver them – matter.
