State-owned enterprise jobs are posted by each company on its own careers site. Many of these companies recruit the way a private company does, with a CV or an online form, interviews and checks before an offer. Others, such as India’s public sector undertakings, recruit through numbered advertisements and exam scores, closer to a civil service intake. The official notice tells you which route a job uses.
A state-owned enterprise, or SOE, is a company the state owns in whole or in part and runs as a business. In India the term is often public sector undertaking, or PSU. This post covers how they recruit, from the pages of UK Government Investments, Coal India and Aramco.
What counts as a state-owned enterprise?
A company in which the state holds shares, all of them or some, and which sells goods or services. UK Government Investments (UKGI) acts as a shareholder representative for UK government bodies, and its governance page lists “the public sector and state owned enterprises, wholly or partially owned” that it works with. The list shows how wide the term runs:
| Body on UKGI’s list | What UKGI says about it |
|---|---|
| British Business Bank | A 100% government owned economic development bank for small businesses |
| Post Office | The UK’s largest retail network |
| The Royal Mint | Makes and distributes coins for the United Kingdom |
| Ordnance Survey | Great Britain’s national mapping service |
| Network Rail | Owns, operates and maintains the railway infrastructure in England, Scotland and Wales |
| Eutelsat Group | A satellite operator listed in Paris and London, with the UK government a shareholder since September 2023 |
The list also includes Channel 4, National Highways and the National Wealth Fund. Some bodies on it work in nuclear defence or supply defence programmes. Zorlya leaves defence and arms out, and so does this post.
Ownership can be full, as at the British Business Bank, or a shareholding alongside others, as at Eutelsat. Each body is its own employer, with its own careers pages and its own rules.
How do SOE jobs differ from civil service jobs?
Government owned company jobs differ in who employs you. The employer is usually a company, so the notice, the contract and the selection rules come from that company and not from a civil service commission. Three things follow:
- Where you apply. On the company’s own site, or the route its advertisement names.
- How you are selected. It might be a CV and interviews, as at Aramco, or an advertisement and an exam score, as at Coal India.
- Who sets the terms. Eligibility, grade, pay and contract are in that company’s advertisement or offer.
Whether staff of an SOE count as public servants depends on the country and the company, so read the contract.
How do India’s public sector undertakings recruit?
By advertisement. Coal India’s careers page says its vacancies are notified through job advertisements in leading newspapers and in Employment News (Rozgar Samachar). The detailed advertisements, provisional selection lists and related notices are on its official website. The careers page also has sections for appointments, results and interviews, the medical standards for selection, and internships for students in Coal India and its subsidiaries.
Graduate engineers can enter through an exam score. When we read Coal India’s site, it carried a notice for the recruitment of Management Trainees based on GATE-2027 scores, the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering, and linked to a notice for experienced professionals at E-8 grade through lateral entry. The web page carries the notice’s title and advertisement number, and the advertisement document holds the details. Read that document for the disciplines, the eligibility and the dates before you apply.
Coal India describes itself as a Maharatna company on its site and lists eight subsidiaries, among them Bharat Coking Coal, Central Coalfields, Mahanadi Coalfields and the Central Mine Planning and Design Institute. Check which company a notice names as the employer and where the post is based, since each subsidiary is a company of its own.
How does a national company hire from abroad?
Aramco runs separate routes for Saudi applicants and for international applicants on its careers site. Its page for international applicants says it looks for experienced professionals in engineering, geosciences, drilling, R&D, education, finance, law and administration, and generally seeks five to 10 years of applicable experience. Its hiring process has six steps:
- Application. If your CV shows the skills Aramco wants, it asks you to complete an Application for Employment. It says sending that form with your CV can shorten the wait for a reply.
- Interview. With technical representatives in London, Houston or Singapore, at a recruiting event, or by video.
- Conditional offer. A written offer from a regional office such as Aramco Americas, Aramco Overseas Company UK, Aramco Singapore or Aramco India. It sets out the conditions you must meet and the pay package.
- Relocation. A relocation adviser helps with the medical examination, the background checks and the visa.
- Orientation. A pre-departure session for you and your family.
- Arrival. Aramco has a general office at Dammam airport, open 24 hours a day.
The offer is conditional, so keep your current job until the medical and background checks are cleared.
Can you join the board of a state-owned enterprise?
Yes, through public appointments, at least in the UK. UKGI says it takes part in appointing or reappointing over 100 board members every three years across its portfolio, often with executive search firms. It looks for relevant senior experience, communication skills, data literacy and sound judgement, and asks people interested in board roles to register on the Cabinet Office Public Appointments website.
How do you check that an SOE job notice is real?
Start from the company’s own site. Coal India’s careers page carries a public notice saying that people claiming to represent it have offered false jobs, sent fake interview letters and appointment offers with its name and logo, and asked candidates to pay money into bank accounts. It also says details from its genuine advertisements have been used in a misleading way on websites and social media. Coal India says it takes no money from any candidate at any stage, apart from an application fee if the advertisement names one.
From that notice, three checks:
- Find the advertisement on the company’s own site, with the same number and title.
- Pay nothing beyond the fee printed in the advertisement.
- Treat an offer that came without an advertisement, an exam or an interview you can trace as false until the company confirms it.
Once a notice is genuine, read it like any posting, with the employer, the grade, the location and the contract first: how to read a job posting has a method. If you apply to companies in more than one country, one resume for many countries covers what changes in a CV.
Questions people ask
Are PSU jobs government jobs?
They are jobs with a company the government owns, which is not the same as a post in a ministry. The advertisement and the contract say who employs you and on what terms.
Do I need GATE for every PSU job?
No. At Coal India, GATE scores are the route for the Management Trainee intake. Its site also linked to lateral entry for experienced professionals and to internships for students.
Can foreigners work for a state-owned enterprise?
Some companies hire abroad. Aramco has a route for international applicants, with interviews in London, Houston and Singapore. Others set nationality rules in each advertisement, so read the eligibility section first.
What does a state-owned enterprise pay?
The pages we read give no figures. Aramco sets out the pay package in its conditional offer, and an Indian PSU advertisement is the place to look for the pay of the post.
What we know and what we do not
Every rule above comes from the pages of UKGI, Coal India and Aramco. The sites of the OECD, which publishes guidelines on state-owned enterprises, India’s Department of Public Enterprises, New Zealand’s Treasury and the Norwegian, Swedish and Finnish governments refused our requests or showed a bot check, so this post uses none of them. The Aramco pages we read do not say who owns the company. We did not open Coal India’s advertisement documents, so this post gives no eligibility rules, exam papers or pay for its posts.
Zorlya does not apply for you. After you sign in, Zorlya collects roles from 130+ sources into one feed, scores each one against your resume, names its source and links to the original posting, where you apply. The app lists where the roles come from, and how it works shows the steps.