I came in thinking the interview was about saying the right things. Mike showed me it was about hearing the question. The room changed the day I understood that. I walked out an Administrative Officer.

Twelve years across seven bureaus. He taught me to read policy the way the people who wrote it read it. The essay I rewrote four times was the one that crossed the line.

The Seed-Sowing introduction was the first thing that worked. I stopped reciting my CV and started laying hooks. The panel asked me the questions I wanted to answer. I am wearing the badge now.

Mike had been at the counter. He knew the judgment calls before I described them. The drills were not theory. They were the room, rehearsed.

One badge. One oath. He took me through the four stages and never let me skip the fitness. The board asked about trade-front judgment. I had the answer because I had lived it in practice.

I was the candidate who went blank at sixty seconds. The Rugby Strategy gave me a frame I could stand on. Sixty seconds stopped being a threat. It became the easiest minute of the interview.

Policy Express did not hand me answers. It handed me the lens. By the third month I was reading the news differently. The panel noticed before I did.

I could not afford the full stack. The Study Aid Programme covered half. Mike never treated me as a discount. He treated me as a candidate. I cleared the final board in March.

The marking was the point. Mike read what I wrote and told me the truth. Two sentences in, I saw the gap between what I meant and what landed. I stopped writing for myself. I started writing for the reader.

He made me do the premortem before every answer. What could derail this. What would the panel probe. I stopped being surprised in the room. Surprise is what fails you. He took that away.