GovCentral

The 5 P's to Job Search Success

Chris McConnell | GovCentral — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 06:27:00 -0800

Submitting a job application is an emotional investment. You spend hours reviewing your resume and KSA essay to make sure everything is worded correctly and accurately describes just how awesome you are. After you send it, you just know that the hiring manager is going to think your application is a masterpiece of accomplishment. Surely this application must be included into the literary canon with the likes of Hemingway and Salinger.

And then you wait…and wait…and wait.

You may want a career in government, but are frustrated with the process and the lack of feedback. You are losing motivation and want to give up.

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Does this sound familiar?

Working for the government at any level, whether it is federal, state, or local will lead to an enriching and fulfilling career. People don't work in government for the money. They do it to help their community and fellow citizen. But as you may be experiencing, it can be difficult to get your foot in the door.

At GovCentral, our goal is to help you be successful and prepared every step of the way. There are a few things we believe will help you stay motivated in your job search and improve you chances of finding a career in government.

No magic pills. No limited time offer. No short cuts. This is common sense advice that we have learned along the way.

We call it the 5 P's to job search success. Why? It sounds catchy. However, these concepts are universal. We can't guarantee that this will get you hired (that's up to you), but we can tell you that following the 5 P's will make you a better job candidate.

The 5 P's for job search success are:

1. Finding your Passion

2. Being Proactive

3. Remaining Positive

4. Staying Persistent

5. Keeping Patient

Next: Finding Your Passion

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Finding Your Passion

If there is one common trait in public servants, it is passion. It is a passion to solve problems and a passion to help their fellow citizen. Right now, there is a research analyst at the Department of Education thinking how to better train teachers and make students smarter. There's a Border Patrol agent keeping us safe from terrorist threats. A social worker in St. Louis is helping a family find affordable housing, while the mother works during the day and takes classes at night.

Take 5-10 minutes and write down what you are passions are. This is a personal exercise; it doesn't have to be perfect. Make it about you. What ever your passion is, there is a job somewhere in the Government doing exactly that.

Understanding your passions will help you focus and narrow your search. This will help keep you free from distractions.

When you send in your application on USAjobs, there is only so much space to tell your story. What it is that makes you, well, you?

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Being Proactive

If you want a career in government, no one is going to knock down your down just because you are thinking about it. You have to earn that job!

After writing down what you are passionate about, think about what careers you have a lot of knowledge in, and which ones you don't. For example, say you are interested in working for your local economic development board. It's important to understand what factors a company will consider when deciding where to open a new office. To be a successful candidate for that job, you'll need to understand federal, state, and local taxes and labor laws, what the average wage is for different areas and how a company fits into the existing structure of a city. Some of these skills can be learned through experience, but a lot of them can be learned at the Library or on the Internet. You may also need to go back to college to beef up those skills.

When you find a job with the government that you feel passionate about, see which skills you may be weak at. Then find a way to mitigate those weaknesses or turn them into strengths.

Next: Remaining Positive

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Remaining Positive

According to happier.com, research shows that the optimists have a shorter job search and will find a better job. The key to being positive is to focus on your happiness.

When you are in a bad mood, you're more likely to sulk and not care about what happens in your job search. You are also more likely to feel defeated when you don't hear a response from a job application. It's really easy to fall into a routine of hanging out with Oprah and Ellen instead of hustling for that next job.

What to do when you're feeling blue? Listen to your favorite song. Write down the good things that are going on in your life. Visit your family or friends.

Remaining positive keeps the focus on finding solutions as opposed to brooding over problems. This is the same mindset the government looks for in its employees. Edgar Allen Poe was an amazing poet and writer. But he would have been horrible as a tax adjustor.

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Staying Persistent

You've found your passion and are being proactive in learning in understanding your strengths and weaknesses. You're also keeping positive about everything, even if you aren't seeing results yet. This is where persistence comes in.

It's not enough to send 3-4 applications to USAjobs and wait for a response. If you are passionate about a career in government, then you'll need to be persistent to earn one.

Whenever I applied for a job, I would immediately move onto the next job application. The ball is already rolling with the first application. Move on to the next one.

There's a couple different ways to think about how being persistent will help you find a new job. One-way is to think of it is submitting job applications persistently.

The second way is to be as persistent as you can to follow up on a job announcement. At the end of every vacancy announcement on USAjobs, there is contact information from the hiring agency. As you know, the government hiring process can take a while. Follow up with a phone call a couple weeks after you submitted your application. This information can be found at the end of every vacancy announcement. If you haven't received any communications from the government after 3-4 weeks, you probably weren't selected for the next round. It's never fun to get rejected, but the effort it takes to feel sad about it is better spent being proactive and find the next job you're passionate about.

Next: Keeping Patient

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Keeping Patient

Patience is the anchor to the 5 P's because it is the only way to navigate the government application process and remain sane on the other end.

The Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry and the rest of his staff are trying to figure out how to streamline the way the federal government recruits and hires new employees. Until that happens, you'll still need to work with the system as it is.

At the core of it, when you apply for a government job, you either move to the next round or you don't. You have control over your application, but you have no control over the process that a hiring manager must go through. It's important to be patient (but persistent) while your application stumbles its way through the bureaucratic process. Getting angry and frustrated won't make the process move any faster.

Remember what is important. The important thing is your passion for a career in government.

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Bonus: Practice, Practice, And More Practice

The more jobs you apply for, the more interviews you go on, the better applicant you will become. Practice does not make perfect when constructing an application for a government job.

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Further reading

The Best Entry Level Government Jobs

Government Job Report - Top Hiring Federal Agencies (November 2009)

Climb the Government Career Ladder

Temporary Jobs Forecast: 2009-2010

John Rossheim | Monster Senior Contributing Writer — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 11:14:00 -0700

As usual, contingent hiring is expected to be a bellwether for the broader labor economy. “We expect to see improvement for temporary workers before we see it anywhere else,” says Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute. “But that’s not happening yet. We’re still seeing declines in temp help services, though they’re much smaller declines.”

As the economy sputters toward recovery, employers by the thousands are hesitating to hire even contingent workers, and legions of temporary employment agencies are fighting for life. In this environment, workers who aspire to land temporary jobs need to be savvy about their job search -- and prepared to elbow out millions of laid-off Americans desperate for a paycheck.

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On the rollercoaster ride of temporary employment, this historic recession has been a high-speed plunge. Yet if the economy has found a bottom, temping could make a substantial -- if gradual -- recovery as companies continue to hedge their staffing bets.

The Recession: Tough Times for Temporary Employment

Here’s how tough things have been for temps: The number of workers on temporary assignments dropped a staggering half-million over the past year to 1.74 million in September 2009 from 2.26 million a year earlier, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

However, some in the industry are hopeful about the future. “The temp market is showing major signs of recovery just in the last two weeks,” says Maureen Mackey, a principal of staffing firm Mackey & Guasco Associates in Darien, Connecticut. Of late, her phones have been ringing with orders from financial companies who are betting on a recovery in their own fortunes.

The upshot for those seeking temporary work assignments? Assess which industries are leading a recovery in your region and position yourself as a top candidate by acquiring industry-specific skills.

Financial Challenges for the Staffing Industry?

Temps also need to understand the financial stress their staffing agencies may be suffering.

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Staffing agencies, especially smaller ones that routinely take out short-term loans to make payroll, are stretched. “Nobody’s able to get loans, and we can’t afford to float a $2,000 weekly billing for an admin,” says Mackey. “This is why the temp market is in gridlock.”

These difficult financial conditions are not likely to abate quickly. “While the credit crunch is not getting worse right now, it is very tight,” says Shierholz.

For some of the nation’s 20,000 staffing firms, the strain has been too much. “A lot of staffing companies have gone under in the last couple of years,” reports consultant Bruce Steinberg.

What does this mean for temps? When signing up with an agency, check into the firm’s ability to make payroll, and try to determine the scope of opportunities they’ll eventually be able to offer you. If they’ve failed at maintaining client relationships through these hard times, they may be doomed.

Where the Temping Recovery May Have Already Begun

Despite all this doom and gloom, some sectors of temporary employment have begun to show signs of life:

• “There’s been a pickup in light industrial and seasonal retail hiring, and an uptick in IT,” says Brendan Courtney, a division president at staffing firm Spherion.

• “Consumer products companies, insurance and, ironically, the banking industry are starting to hire temps,” says Mackey.

• “You find a lot of temporary healthcare jobs to cope with varying patient census levels,” says Steinberg.

• “Consulting firms are looking for admin/support people, and the market for secretaries is picking up a little bit,” says Mackey.

Looking Ahead

American companies remain deeply uncertain about whether sustainable growth will materialize anytime soon. This will most likely temper employers’ desire to renew their growth by bringing on temporary workers.

“The devastation of the first two quarters of 2009 will linger in people’s minds and on their P&L statements,” says Mackey.

Next year may bring a positive turn for temping opportunities but probably not a steep climb. “We may have an extended period of flatness,” says Courtney. “So 2010 will not be a recovery year, but it will be better than 2009.”

What’s the bottom-line forecast? Staffing industry analysts predict that 2010 will see a 5 percent increase in staffing activity.

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Read the original article at Monster.com

Much Good is Done by Government Workers

Max Stier | Partnership for Public Service — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:12:00 -0700

Anti-government sentiment has been prevalent across the country, fueled in part by the acrimonious health-care debate, anger over the Wall Street and auto industry bailouts, anxiety over high unemployment rates, and worry over increased spending and ballooning budget deficits.

These feelings of distrust and resentment, seen in public opinion polls, vocal town hall meetings this past summer and during various demonstrations, have been stoked by provocative television and radio commentators, bloggers, and by some politicians who seem to take pleasure caricaturing public servants as faceless, uncaring "bureaucrats." Lost amid the emotion and the inflammatory rhetoric is what our government and its dedicated public servants accomplish every day — the delivery of vital services and the creation of innovative programs to deal with some of the nation's most serious and seemingly intractable problems.

There are countess success stories of unheralded federal workers making a big difference in the lives of Americans.

This op-ed published October 8, 2009 at the Modesto Bee

Take the issue of veteran's care. Janet Kemp, a dedicated public servant in Canandaigua, N.Y., created the Department of Veterans Affairs' first-ever national suicide prevention hotline. The 24-hour, seven-day- a-week service has handled more than 160,000 calls in the last two years and helped rescue more than 5,000 callers from suicidal situations.

In one case, a soldier deployed in Iraq put a gun to his head and threatened suicide while talking to his mother during an online video chat. The mother called the hotline, the staff contacted his unit, and she watched as authorities saved her son's life.

Don Burke and Sean P. Dennehy, both CIA analysts at the agency's headquarters in Virginia, worked tirelessly to break down cultural barriers that have prevented information sharing across our nation's 16 intelligence agencies. They built Intellipedia, a Wikipedia- like clearinghouse of intelligence expertise that now has more than 900,000 pages and 100,000 users.

Analysts have used Intellipedia to examine potential threats to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, to argue about potential perpetrators of the 2008 Mumbai attacks, and to create a protocol for documenting cases of improvised explosive devices in Iraq.

Thomas Waldmann has spent five decades working on behalf of the American people at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md., making cutting- edge discoveries that have led to significant advances in the treatment of cancer, AIDS and multiple sclerosis.

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At the Naval Medical Research Center in Silver Spring. Md., microbiologist Patricia Guerry spent years creating a promising Campylobacter vaccine to prevent the world's top cause of food-borne intestinal illness, while at the Justice Department in Washington attorney Walter Benjamin Fisherow has presided more than 16 legal settlements with coal-fired power plants that led to the removal of 2 million tons per year of harmful pollutants from the air.

Michael German of the Department of Housing and Urban Development's Atlanta office has also been working to help the nation, tirelessly building a successful program that brings an array of community partners together to attack and deal with the root causes of chronic homelessness in cities around the nation.

There certainly is a legitimate debate about the size, the role, the spending and the effectiveness of our government, and there is no doubt that federal workers can improve their performance and that government should be held to a high standard.

Recent public opinion polls show that only about 23 percent of the public trusts government to do what is right, not a historic low but certainly a sad commentary and well below the 44 percent in 2000, and the 60 percent in the 1970s who felt government was on their side.

But it is important to keep in mind that collectively it is our government and that the people of our government are engaged day-in and day-out seeking to protect our health, safety and welfare of the nation.

It is easy to fall back on old stereotypes that often are reinforced in the media, where a 2008 Gallup poll found that 57 percent of the public believed the news coverage about government was negative.

Attacking government may make some people feel good, improve media ratings or provide some short-term political gain, but it is shortsighted, ignores the positive accomplishments that take place every day, and in the end, demeans us all.

DHS science and technology puts innovation first

Dr. Roger McGinnis | Department of Homeland Security — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 05:48:00 -0700

It is a dangerous world out there, where threats -- both manmade and natural -- are predictably unpredictable.

We cannot always find answers in an off-the-shelf toolbox.

That is the thinking here in the Homeland Security Department's Science and Technology Directorate, where we spend a small portion of our research and development (R&D) budget on high-risk, high-payoff ideas.

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Each year, DHS S&T identifies ideas that, while extremely challenging from a technological standpoint, would change the game in favor of homeland security if they are successful. These ideas become projects that are run out of the Homeland Security Advanced Research Project Agency (HSARPA).

This is a place where, with some very cutting edge technologies and unbounded imagination, the improbable is challenged and made possible.

Such high-profile risk taking is not for the faint of heart, particularly for scientists, engineers and program managers who are trained to contain risk rather than embrace it.

Ask me what sort of significant technological breakthroughs S&T would like to see in the next three-to-five years, and I would say the first is in the area of security screening.

Currently Americans and travelers everywhere undergo security screening at airports, mass transit systems and places where large crowds gather such as stadiums, arenas and even theme parks.

We have all come to accept the screening as a necessary requirement to ensure our safety.

However, I am very hopeful that we can develop technologies that will help reduce the wait time, stress, inconvenience and general burden placed on the public and security screening personnel.

We all know that today at we are limited in the amount of liquids we can carry on aircraft and we are required to follow the 3-1-1 rule.

We are also no longer shocked when asked to remove our shoes and coats and to remove our computers from our carry-on luggage.

However, these steps are time consuming and often a stress-inducing process. It was the desire to remove some of the security screening "hassle" while increasing safety that led to the start of the Magnetic Visibility (MAGVIZ) program.

This project is investigating the use of a very low power magnetic resonant imaging system to identify all liquids and gels that individuals might want to carry onto an aircraft or into other secure locations.

Another project designed to speed up the security screening process is the Future Attributes Screening Technology (FAST) program.

The main goal of the program is to enhance detection of malintent or the intent to cause harm by the use of technologies to enhance the capabilities of screening agents.

We believe this will greatly reduce the number of individuals asked to step into a secondary screening area.

This program is designed to look specifically at behavioral and physiological indicators without any need to access personally identifiable data for that individual.

We also believe that the technology has by default an unbiased screening ability.

We have successfully demonstrated the first and second phases of this particular project and hope to have fully integrated multi-sensor system demonstration in 2011.

We are also working on critical infrastructure projects such as the resilient electric grid project. This initiative uses a new type of power cable that prevents shorted power lines from causing rolling blackouts like the kind the United States experienced in 2003 and 2006.

HSARPA just completed a successful demonstration of this technology, proving the new cable could limit the amount of current flow cause by a short and prevent the fault from cascading.

We are also working on systems that will:

* Quickly repair breached levees;

* Rapidly seal off sections of tunnels to prevent the spread of fire and dangerous gases;

* Harden security cameras to allow video images to be collected for forensic purposes in the event of a blast, fire, natural disaster or crime;

* Develop extremely small chemical detection chips that can be integrated into personal communication devices, such as cell phones;

* Develop an entirely new method for detection of biological agents;

* Non-intrusively detect dangerous agents inside shipping containers;

* Create a non-contact fingerprint detection system to speed up the process of fingerprint collections and increase the accuracy of those prints collected;

Bottom line?

We are pushing the technology envelope and working on extremely challenging projects to improve our safety and security with the hope of giving back to our citizens some of the freedoms we enjoyed prior to 9/11.

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Dr. Roger McGinnis is Director of the Homeland Security Advanced Research Project Agency at the Department of Homeland Security.

Office of Naval Research is proof of government's technology cutting edge

Max Cacas | FederalNewsRadio — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 05:44:00 -0700

Another convenient stereotype attached to all things related to the Federal Government is the notion that somehow, all those billions of dollars spent annually still result in technology that is "behind the curve".

Several years ago, DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, sponsored the DARPA Urban Challenge, to spur college students, inventors, and industry to develop autonomous robotic vehicles for the military. The idea: to create vehicles that can drive themselves from one point to another for such military activities such as supply convoys and patrols. The goal, to safeguard American troops in combat.

Listen to this story at FederalNewsRadio.com

But DARPA isn't the only government or Pentagon agency where technology is a cutting edge pursuit. Just west on Fairfax Drive in Arlington from DARPA headquarters is the Office of Naval Research, where I had the opportunity to ask Doctor Lawrence Schuette, ONR's Director of Innovation, about that stereotype of government technology being behind the curve.

You can't prove or disprove a statement like that, and it's a statement you hear a lot about the government. But I can offer that, in the case of Navy platforms, what people see visibly, ships, airplanes, the teeny piece of submarines that they see, perhaps they all look alike, and it's not so much the platform, as what's inside it.

It should be noted here that much of the scientific and technology work of the Office of Naval Research is classified. That said, I asked Doctor Schuette to discuss what he could about the cutting edge technologies being developed by his organization, which was chartered by Congress in 1946.

"We perform science and technology development for the Navy," Schuette told Federal News Radio in an exclusive interview at his Arlington office. "We do near-term work for the war fighter, and some of that is classified, because you're trying to protect how well it works. We do mid-term work, stuff that we know will be on a ship or plane in the hands of a warfighter. And we absolutely do that cutting edge work for thirty years from now."

As an example, Schuette described an electromagnetic rail gun, which he says "in its final form will be able to shoot a projectile 250 miles. No one's ever done this.

And it will use electricity to do it," instead of chemical munitions. He says the ONR website has video of a demonstration of a prototype capable of delivering a 10 megajoules (a measurement of energy) shot.

"We've gone well beyond that," he said, adding that the rail gun is an example of the kind of work that keeps the Navy on the cutting edge.

Schuette also discussed a recently initiated "free-electron laser program" to produce an advanced laser weapons system. Development of that system, he says, is likely to be a multi-year project working with "industry, academia, and the Department of Energy laboratories, and Navy laboratories."

Turning back to the electric rail gun again, Schuette jokingly says he recently got a verification that this project was definitely on track, when an electric rail gun was featured prominently in the recent "Transformers" movie.

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On the Web:

U.S. Navy - Office of Naval Research

KSAs out, TalentLink in at Homeland Security

Suzanne Kubota | Senior Internet Editor | FederalNewsRadio.com — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 06:52:00 -0700

When the Office of Management and Budget's Peter Orszag put out a memo in June saying "the Federal hiring process needs to be reformed. The current process is lengthy and encumbered by burdensome requirements and outdated technology systems," DHS was listening.

Read the OMB memo here

Homeland Security is well on its way to hiring as many as 1,000 cybersecurity experts, thanks to efforts to reform those two things. Sharie Bourbeau, Deputy Under Secretary for Management at DHS, told FederalNewsRadio, the largest non-military department in the federal government is doing away with the KSA, the dreaded Knowledge, Skills and Abilities portion of their job application.

In order to "compete in this labor market with private industry to ensure that we get the top talent," said Bourbeau, DHS is taking two immediate steps.

We need to streamline the hiring process and make it more applicant friendly and less labor intensive, similar to what you would expect from the private sector. To that end, we are specifically moving to elimate the requirement for the Knowledge, Skills and Abilities essay-like questions and requesting less information and documentation right up front. We actually did this at headquarters about a year ago.

In addition, said Bourbeau, the Department is working to write all job announcement in plain language "to move away from the federal speak."

The second step DHS is taking is to implement a new IT platform across the Department. The goal here, Bourbeau told The Federal Drive, is to make more of an "assertive effort to go after the passive applicant."

We need to follow up with those applicants that we meet at job fairs or other venues to invite them to apply for our jobs, so to that end, one of the things that we are getting ready to deploy is a tool called TalentLink. Basically it's where applicants post their preferences for certain types of jobs that they fell that their skill sets are well-aligned to. They post that, and we go out and we can scan across the mulitiple venues and actually touch these applicants and invite them to compete for our jobs.

TalentLink has been in use for "about the past year" at DHS headquarters and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The new tool, said Bourbeau, has some significant differences from what applicant may be used to finding on USAJobs.gov.

It's more like Monster.com, where I can go on as a potential applicant, post my resume across multiple venues where I'm interested. If I'm interested in IT, if I'm interested in HR, if I'm interested in fill-in-the-blank - contracting, that I can post my resume, if you will, my application, my resume, my documentation. And then what we will be able to do is do a search across those competencies and pull down applicants to see if we have a good - quote - marriage, and then we do the outreach. It's not a guarantee that those potential candidates will be hired, but we will indeed do an outreach to invite them to participate and compete for our positions that we have available.

Bourbeau said that after some additional testing, the Department hopes to "have TalentLink operational by the end of this year."

Be sure to check out Federal News Radio's 5 Fallacies of Government Series. Tomorrow we examine the slow hiring process and discover if it has to be that way. For a link to the series, click here.

Lawmaker seeks to fix "outdated & old" federal hiring process once and for all

Max Cacas | FederalNewsRadio — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 06:36:00 -0700

For Jeffrey Zients, the chief performance officer at the Office of Management and Budget and long-time D.C. entrepreneur and businessman, his first job in the Federal Government offers an opportunity to cast this judgement on the process by which almost all civilian employees of the government are hired:

"In my experience, the best talent doesn't loiter for five months," he told the Enterprise Risk Management conference in Arlington on Wednesday. "It finds another home."

Listen to this story at FederalNewsRadio.com

Zeints says the need, some would call it the desperate need, to fix the seriously broken federal government hiring process is the reason he is working closely with John Berry, the director of the Office of Personnel Management. It's a subject that Berry addresses at almost every public speaking opportunity, as he did this past July at the Excellence in Government Conference.

Now is the time we must hire and recruit the best. Expect the best. Respect their successes and honor their service. To achieve this, we are going to fix hiring and recruitment so that it is fair, simple, fast, and based on merit.

That's the 30,000 foot view of the goal set by Berry, Zients, and indeed, President Obama, who has said publicly that he seeks to make Federal Service "cool" again.

But permanent change may have to come from Capitol Hill, where a long-time advocate for federal workers has his own ideas about why the federal hiring process is broken.

The reason I would tell you is that they are still using structures of World War Two. Which means it is outdated and old.

Senator Daniel Akaka (D.-Hawaii), is chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on the Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce, and the District of Columbia.

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"Unfortunately for the Federal Government," he told Federal News Radio in an exclusive interview, "whatever is there, they continue to use it, until somebody comes along and revises it and changes it. I feel strongly as chairman of the Federal Workforce subcommittee, and with my dear friend Senator George Voinovich (R.-Ohio) that we are committed to change it, to improve it, to slim the process of hiring."

Both Akaka and Voinovich, the ranking Republican on the Federal Workforce subcommittee, are long-time advocates on behalf of federal workers.

Speaking in his office in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill, Senator Akaka was asked to talk about Senate Bill S-736, the "Akaka-Voinovich Federal Hiring Process Improvement Act".

The act will eliminate some of these requirements that end up taking time. Our bill will try to slim that back to about 80 days, or two and a half months. That will be a huge difference, but my hope is that we can reduce that more than 80 days.

Akaka explains that in testimony before his subcommittee over almost the last decade, officials have said that the government is at a disadvantage in competing for talent.

"We've heard that while they're waiting in line for a federal job, they get an offer and get hired by the private sector. Senator Voinovich and I really want to make the Federal Government the 'employer of choice'. Part of this is the hiring process."

Chairman Akaka says the first hurdle for his bill has been met: it has been approved by the full Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and is awaiting a date for debate and a vote by the full Senate.

Akaka says he and Voinovich are hopeful that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.-Nev.) will schedule S.376 for consideration before the end of the session in December.

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See the story at FederalNewsRadio.com

Full Speed Hiring (but not so fast)!

Mike Causey | Federal News Radio — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 06:05:00 -0700

Before the 9/11 terrorist attacks, most U.S. airport security was aimed at making sure people didn't bring guns on board or try to hijack aircraft to Cuba or Libya. These were serious concerns because they had happened before.

Editor's Note: Mike's column today is part of FederalNewsRadio's special report, 5 Fallacies of Government? All this week we examine commonly held beliefs about the federal government and its employees. Click here for FederalNewsRadio's full series coverage.

During that pre-attack period, a Washington TV station did a series about security at our own National Airport. The crew, led by a well-known and charming (aren't they all) anchor, planned a feature on security: Passenger searches, electric fences, background checks of airport personnel, etc.

After a couple of visits by the TV crew (anchor, various horse-holders, camera and sound types,) the station's producer asked security if it could streamline things for the TV station team. Cut some corners. After all they knew each other, and time is money in TV. Field crews are expensive.

The federal security types agreed as a courtesy (and also hoping the station's gratitude would be reflected in its story). So they let the entire crew come and go without being patted down. Day after day. Cameras rolling. After all they were all pals, right? And they had passed an early, if cursory check. So...

What could possibly go wrong?

On the last day of filming one of the crew, maybe the dashing anchor himself, smuggled in a replica gun. I think it was a .357 magnum revolver which would look impressive on the nightly news. It did.

After filming themselves being passed through what was then nonsecurity, the crew caught on tape how "easy" it had been to smuggle a weapon (maybe a couple) past the "bumbling" federal security team. It was dynamite on the evening news.

The TV station had a field day. The airport security crew couldn't get air time to explain what happened. I found out about it much later while doing a story on the airport.

Not fair, you say.

Well, yes and no!

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In a Marquis of Queensbury world, where manner and courtesy reigned, it would have been dirty pool. But the TV station was playing by different rules. It took advantage of the courtesy and respect shown it by the security folks by tricking them. To make a point.

Point taken.

For some time after that, anybody who even looked like they had a media connection was yanked out for a very full search. That produced outrage from our side.

So what does this have to do with the slow government hiring process?

Maybe nothing, maybe a lot.

For years the government has been under orders to shorten the (usually very long) time it takes to get somebody on board. Critics say the best candidates get bored and take jobs in the private sector. That the government is sluggish and its hiring process is run by slugs.

But what if they streamlined it completely. Walk in and get hired the next day.

Wonderful.

Except we live in a dangerous world. For many, many federal jobs, extended vetting is a good idea. Not just Defense, Homeland Security and the CIA but also outfits that have all our secrets: Social Security, the IRS and the Census Bureau, to name a few.

Prediction: The very member of Congress who demands that agencies shorten their hiring turnaround time (maybe because of a constituent complaint) would be the first member of Congress in line to blame federal workers the first time a security problem happened because of a "sloppy" (or too brief) clearance, which allowed a spy or former ax-murderer to join the payroll, came to light.

Actually the solution is simple, at least for the politicians.

Streamline the hiring and clearance process. Set a time (what, one week, two weeks, four weeks tops) to get people on the payroll. Or suffer the consequences. At the same time, safeguards should be in place that would insure that the government didn't hire dangerous or untrustworthy people, ever. Or suffer the consequences.

Do it fast, but don't make any mistakes. Or else.

See how easy it is?

Next problem!

The Demise of the KSA?

The beloved KSA, the Knowledge, Skills and Abilities part of federal job applications, may be going the way of the Dodo and the Great Auk. We learned about DHS's efforts yesterday on the Federal Drive. Click here for more.

Possible FEHBP tax in the works
by Suzanne Kubota

Health Care reform could cost Federal Employees more money. An excise tax included in health care reform legislation would smack a 40 percent tax on some health insurance plans, including your FEHBP, beginning in 2013. The tax wouldn't directly come out of your pocket, but the insurance companies are sure to charge someone more to make up the difference. Details can be found in this morning's Federal Newscast on the Federal Drive page.

Nearly Useless Factoid
by Suzanne Kubota

Radioactive rabbit feces are getting scooped up as part of one of the nation's largest environmental cleanups. Seems the bunnies burrowed into contaminated sites within the Hanford nuclear reservation, and now "helicopters have flown over the area to map out places where rabbits deposited the contamination, which emits gamma rays." The good news, notes Senior Correspondent Mike Causey, is "they can pick up the pellets at night!" (I wonder if the Swedes know about this. See the NUF from October 16th.)

To reach Mike: mcausey@federalnewsradio.com

GSA Makes Its Case That The Government is a Good Buyer

James Williams | Commissioner | General Services Administration — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 07:23:00 -0700

As commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service, I often hear the phrase, "The government is a bad buyer."

I have a different perspective.

FAS works with more than $50 billion a year in taxpayer money.

By serving as the government's central acquisition source, the General Services Administration has for six decades provided customers with efficient and best value products, services and solutions.

Additionally, using GSA multiplies customers' resources and allows them to focus on their mission critical activities. Those are all traits of good buyers, not bad.

Here are a few more examples of how GSA and its customers debunk this 'bad buyer' myth on a regular basis, and how we are meeting President Obama's mandate to ensure that taxpayers get the best deal possible for government expenditures.

Purchasing More, Spending Less

FAS acts as a good buyer by bringing customers and partners together to identify and address common requirements under one procurement.

By serving as a single, collaborative source, FAS efficiently meets customer needs, saves taxpayer money and reduces procurement process times.

For example, three government agencies recently needed land mobile radios.

The Federal Systems Integration and Management Center (FEDSIM) in our Assisted Acquisition Services organization consolidated their requirements and established pre-negotiated contracts known as blanket purchase agreements (BPAs).

These BPAs provided the agencies with pre-qualified and steeply discounted price options.

Also, FEDSIM posted the BPAs on GSA's online shopping system, GSAAdvantage!®, giving these customers quick and easy access to the products.

Moving beyond products, FAS' travel services programs offer deep hotel and airfare discounts. In fiscal 2008, for example, FedRooms® hotel rates were 32 percent lower than corporate rates listed by Business Travel News.

In addition, we estimate that the recently awarded City Pair Program contracts will save taxpayers more than $6 billion in 2010.

By aggregating agencies' requirements and jointly procuring goods and services, FAS takes advantage of deep pricing discounts, reduces overall procurement time and maximizes acquisition workforce resources.

Additionally, using GSA's e-tools, including the online FedRooms and travel reservation systems, increases overall government efficiency.

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James Williams is Commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service at the General Services Administration

Read the rest of the story at FederalNewsRadio.com

Vendors Face Smaller Profit Margins From Government Work

Jason Miller | Executive Editor | FederalNewsRadio — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 07:17:00 -0700

You can tick off a list of federal project failures from the FBI's Virtual Case File to the Homeland Security Department's E-Merge program that dot the history of acquisition. Add to that the famous examples such as the $500 hammer and the $1,000 toilet seat, and you can see how the perception that the government can't buy economically even if the product was free grew over the past three decades.

But these anecdotes only tell one side of the story. FederalNewsRadio talked to experts who have made it a career selling to the federal government, and their perspectives are quite a bit different.

"The government is a good buyer," says Gary Barth, vice president of Canon's government marketing division. "They certainly compete everything and are definitely going with low price. They take advantage of their size and potential they offer to any manufacturer."

And Barth isn't alone in his opinion. Renny DiPentima spent more than 30 years working for the government and the last 15 in the private sector running SRA International. He says the government is especially good in two areas-commodity purchases such as computers or servers, and small item purchases that can be done at the local hardware story or office supply store with a credit card.

"The government gets a better price than anyone else for straight forward and standard equipment," DiPentima says. "It could be because of the bulk of the buy or just because of the competitive nature of the procurement.

But the one area where the government still struggles is when they buy a one of a kind or unique system, particularly software systems, he says.

"There are too many stories where the government walked away from or has not had a successful procurement," he says. "If one looks ahead, the government is becoming more and more of a commercial off-the-shelf buyer of software. So it is more of myth than fact that they are not a good buyer. Some of it is old history that long ago has been corrected and in most areas, the government is a pretty good buyer."

The profit margins of major federal contractors as compared to the commercial sector illustrate Barth and DiPentima's historical views.

Jeremy Grant, chief development officer for Acquisition Solutions, which helps agencies develop requirements, says the average company in the S&P 500 earned about 8.5 percent profit margin, while most government contractors work on a five percent profit margin.

Grant, who also is a former industry analyst and worked for a large system integrator, says federal profit margins tend to be higher for specialized or high end products and services.

DiPentima adds that when the government develops software systems, for instance, the profit margin is around eight percent. But should a company develop a similar system for a commercial client the profit margin would be between 12 percent and 16 percent.

Read the rest of the story at FederalNewsRadio.com

The Government Really is a Good Buyer

Tom Temin | FederalNewsRadio — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 07:09:00 -0700

You've heard the horror stories. A nearly 10-year delay in acquiring new aerial refueling tankers. Big cost overruns on the electronic fence between the U.S. and Mexico. A failed interagency contract to build a system for handling Veterans benefits claims.

It's all enough to make anyone ask, can the government buy anything right? Do taxpayers ever get their money's worth?

Such questions date back at least to the Civil War, when crooked contractors sold sub-par shoes, uniforms and blankets to the Union Army. Blankets were made of a byproduct of cotton production, not cotton itself. That material is called -- shoddy.

And yet, the government buys lots of other things besides exotic fences stretching for tens or hundreds of miles, or high-technology jets. It also spends tens of billions of dollars a year on everyday commodities -- cars, office furniture and supplies, computers. How well does it do with these items? Turns out, the government gets the best deals of anyone.

Long time watchers of government buying pretty much agree that when it comes to procurement, there are two governments. There's the government that launches big and ambitious projects that often take longer and cost more than first reckoned. And then there's the government that buys large quantities of commercial products with the shrewdness of an experienced bargain hunter at Loehmanns.

Phil Kiviat is President of the consulting company Guerra Kiviat. His two decades of government experience as a technologist started in the 1960s. For the past 20 years he's been a marketer, and consultant to companies selling TO the government. Kiviat says there really are two sides to how the government buys.

The government does well, he said, when it buys undifferentiated products that really are commodities, but not so well when it tries to make standard products that are highly customizable, like software. And what's the problem with non-commodity buys? According to Kiviat, the government is often at fault for changing quantities or specifications over time, making for uncertainty and therefore greater risk for contractors.

Read the rest at FederalNewsRadio.com

The Retirement Wave

Jane Norris | FederalNewsRadio — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 06:59:00 -0700

Predictions have been made about a coming wave of retirements as baby boomers reach their 60's. Census Bureau estimates show that 78 million baby boomers were born between 1946 and 1964 and they are now beginning to hit early retirement eligibility. But a funny thing has happened on the way to retirement. Inside the Federal Government and in workplaces all across America, people are simply not retiring when they reach the age of eligibility.

Part of the reason is the economy, but according to a Pew Research Center study, there's more to the story. Pew Executive VP, Paul Taylor talked about the America's Changing Workforce study which shows that 93% of the growth in the Labor force from 2006 to 2016 will be among workers ages 55 and older. And this shift has been developing for some time.

Why aren't people retiring?

The reasons might surprise you. According to Pew, 54% of workers ages 65 and older say the main reason they work is that they want to. Just 17% say the main reason is that they need the paycheck.

The same trends show up in Government retirement projections too. The Office of Personnel Management numbers show that in 2009 almost 60,000 Federal Employees were eligible for retirement and more than 50,000 workers will reach retirement eligibility each year through 2018.

But eligibility doesn't necessarily mean workers decide to retire, according to a 2008 OPM report that analyzed the issue. Former OPM Director Linda Springer discussed the delay in government retirements with me and says that while retirements from the Federal service might not occur in the exact year of eligibility, retirements do occur in a fairly steady stream.

The OPM report produced while she was the Director showed that the employees stayed with the Government for four more years on average after becoming eligible for retirement and almost 25% remained for nine years or more.

The Effect

So when older workers stay on the job longer, does it cause an imbalance in the labor force? Former Chief Economist for the Labor Department, Dianna Furchtgott Roth, now Director of Employment Policy at the Hudson Foundation says the opposite is true. When older workers stay in the workplace, it's a benefit because they continue to contribute to the overall economy. According to Furchtgott-Roth, workers in Japan and the United States stay on the job beyond the average age of retirement while retirees in European countries often leave the workforce much earlier.

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Current economic conditions are having an impact on retirements as well. Social Security statistics show a 23% spike in applications for early retirements since last year. That spike seems to be related to early retirement claims from laid-off seniors who can't find other jobs.

The changing face of America

But the bigger picture shows that as the "baby boom" generation approaches retirement, the demographic profile of the U.S. workforce will undergo a substantial shift. A recent study from the Congressional Research Service shows that large number of older workers will be joined by relatively few new entrants to the labor force. According to the Census Bureau, there will be 204 million Americans aged 25 or older in 2010. By 2030, this number will increase by 23% to more than 251 million.

Most of the growth will occur among people aged 65 and older.

The Census Bureau estimates that while the number of people between the ages of 25 and 64 will increase by 15.5 million (9.4%) between 2010 and 2030, the number of people aged 65 and older is projected to grow by 31.7 million, or 79.2%.

As these changes begin to take hold in the nation's demographic profile, coupled with the reality that older workers want to stay on the job longer, the traditional retirement paradigm begins to change too. The shift in the workforce is evolving retirement trends. Projections, including those made by the Office of Personnel Management, are having trouble keeping up with the phenomenon.

As Peter Orszag, Director of the Office of Management and Budget recently wrote in a blog post: for a variety of reasons including the stubbornly high unemployment rate and current economic conditions, very simply, older workers are forgoing retirement and working longer.

Even workers in the Federal Government, who arguably have one of the best retirement plans in the country, seem to be taking part in this developing trend.

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Tailor Your Job Interview for Specific Audiences

Gladys Stone & Fred Whelan, Monster Contributing Writers — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 06:08:00 -0700

When you travel overseas, ever notice how native speakers welcome your efforts to communicate in their language? While no one may take you for a local, people appreciate when you show respect for their culture and point of view. Similarly, if you’re interviewing for a job these days, chances are good that you’ll be meeting with people in multiple areas of the company.

While they don’t expect you to be an expert in every area, employers do like it when you can “speak their language.” Of course you don’t have to learn all the buzzwords, But the more you can speak to their specific functional areas, the better chance you'll have of landing that job. Successful people always keep their audience in mind and tailor their communication to appeal to those they’re addressing. All you need to do is relate your experience to other areas in the company. Here are some approaches:

1. Sell Your Experience – Given the collaborative nature of the workplace, few things are done without a cross-functional effort. When a functional lead interviews you, impress upon them how you have been successful working with their area to achieve an objective.

For example, if you’re talking to a finance person and you are in marketing, discuss how finance played a key role in the development of the project strategies. Finance may have driven the revenue targets, the budget and ROI. It’s important to discuss how you worked together with finance, not simply asked them for numbers. Emphasizing how you worked together will let them know that you value their input and understand what’s important to them.

2. Relate Your Results – The phrase “No man is an island” applies more than ever these days. Your success depends on teamwork and the performance of others in and out of your group.

You’re in sales, meeting with someone in manufacturing. Let them know how manufacturing contributed to your success. For example, by reducing costs, you as a sales person were able to under-price your competitors.

3. Show How Their Area Helped You – Tell them how their functional area – no matter what it is – shaped your career. This will make them feel good about what they do and more importantly, they will feel good about YOU.

Say you’re in operations and you’re being interviewed by HR. Discuss how HR in your previous company helped you with management skills which positioned you for promotion.

4. Understand Their Challenges – The definition of an interesting person is someone who’s interested in me. The same holds true for the interviewer: if you show interest in their job, they’ll find you engaging.

Ask them what their goals are for the area. They will enjoy expounding on that and the challenges they have in achieving that goal.

5. Tell Them You Admire Them – Convey that you are focused on bringing groups together and view all successes as a win for the company.

Almost every company has team building activities. Ask about theirs and what they do to bring different functional areas together.

In this very competitive environment, you can lose out on a great opportunity if you don’t appear to be coming from a collaborative mindset. Be sure to demonstrate in your interviews that you see the big picture and appreciate the contributions of all departments.

Are Federal Workers Overpaid?

Chris McConnell | GovCentral — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 06:45:00 -0700

The Cato Institute, a libertarian leaning think tank, suggests that the average federal worker is paid more than the average private-sector employee, especially when fringe benefits like health insurance and pensions are factored in.

Nancy Folbre, Economics Professor at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in a recent New York Times article, wanted to explore if there was any merit to these claims.

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With little details provided by organizations about what defines the average federal or private worker, Folbre decided to dig into the details of the Current Population Survey to see what defines the average worker. The Current Population Survey (CPS) is a monthly survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau and released every month. For her article, Folbre used calculations from the 2009 March CPS survey.

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By her calculations, the average federal worker is older, more educated and works full-time compared to the private sector. While more likely to have employer-paid health care and a pension waiting for them upon retirement, the federal workforce is decidedly middle-class, with the majority earning $25,000 to $75,000 a year. The think tanks may be somewhat accurate, but comparing the average worker only tells half the story.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis explains that the federal workforce is concentrated in professional, administrative, and technical occupations while private-sector positions range from minimum wage to high paid CEO's.

According to Folbre's calculations, 43 percent of private-sector workers earn less than $25,000 a year, but the average compensation for Fortune 500 CEO's in 2008 was $11.4 million each. In comparison, President Obama will earn $400,000 in 2009, though he does get to live rent-free in the White House.

If we compare similar professional occupations, some people may take a pay-cut to work for the federal government.

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A law-school graduate starting at a Washington, DC law firm can expect to earn around $140,000 in their first year. That same graduate starting at the Department of Justice down the street will start at $60,000. While the DOJ lawyer can get up to $10,000 a year to repay student loans, the private sector lawyer should probably pick up the tab at Chef Geoff's.

Likewise, a mid-career IT Project Manager can expect to earn $80,000 at the Department of Veterans Affairs, but that same position in for a company like AT&T can earn you double that.

Starting a career in federal government is more than just a salary though. Many people choose public service to contribute to the greater good of society or for a greater work-life balance. In many cases, a federal worker may have more responsibility than their private-sector counterpart. For example, a laboratory technician at the Centers for Disease Control is researching the cure for HIV and a Federal Agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigations is undercover right now, rooting out the next corruption scandal.

In the federal government, there may be a cap on your earning potential, but not in your potential to affect change for the greater good.

The Care B.E.A.R. Will Save You

Chris McConnell | GovCentral — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 06:55:00 -0700

One of the best part of serving in the Military is playing with cool toys. Newsweek has compiled some of the best and strangest ones in a photo gallery they call, ahem, Weapons Porn.

Gadget blog, Gizmodo, has picked a favorite. It's the Battlefield Extraction-Assist Robot aka the Care B.E.A.R. I think this would be appropriate to extract over-served interns during a Capitol Hill happy hour.

Doesn't he look cute?

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Newsweek: Weapons Porn
Gizmodo: Care BEAR

Want Government Work? You Have to Get Specific

Derrick Dorcht | The Diversa Group — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 05:53:00 -0700

Question: Washington, D.C.: Why does the government actively advertise jobs on their job site that are reserved for people within the agency? I am very tired of applying for jobs only to be told, months later, they have decided not to fill the position. I am told this is because the person they wanted to promote from within somehow didn't get through the human resources process. How can I avoid these traps and not waste time filling out applications that will never be considered?

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Derrick Dortch: It is a frustrating process for sure, and honestly there is no quick fix. Do not give up.

The key for finding a government job is too look at what you are truly qualified for, target agencies that have the budgets to bring in a good number of people (i.e. the Department of Defense or the Department of Homeland Security), target the right positions and make sure you meet the qualifications. I see many people applying for positions they are not qualified for. They thought they were because of the title and the duties listed, but they did not read the qualifications and evaluations section to see what the agency was looking for in a candidate.
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Also you have to make sure you are applying to the right positions, with the right package. This means that if you are qualified, then you to have a targeted, powerful, persuasive federal resume, KSAs or supporting essay question responses and any other materials required. These materials need to be targeted to the position. They cannot be generic.

Develop a new strategy and get back out there. The government is hiring, and a new budget cycle has just started, so that means hiring will pick up starting now.

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Adapted from a recent online discussion on washingtonpost.com with federal employment expert Derrick Dortch

Management Matters: Turn Styles

Dave Mader, Jeff Myers and Steven Kelman — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 05:57:00 -0700

The broad, sometimes little-defined concept of change - especially as it relates to improving government management - was a central theme of the 2008 presidential election. Now our new president is faced with having to make good on the promise of change during one of the most challenging economic environments the nation has seen since the Great Depression.

The question is which management and leader- ship techniques deliver effective, meaningful change - and which do not. If there is a recipe for successful government reform, what are its core ingredients? Is there anything similar about the leaders who have been the most successful - or was it even skill, or just chance? Did those who failed make avoidable mistakes, or did they encounter an obstacle that no one could have overcome?

Although change is inevitably complex, the prescriptive measures are often most effective when they are simple and intuitive.

A recent study, "What It Takes to Change Government," by the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton found similarities in the methods used by public leaders who succeed. The study examined successes and failures of 12 federal agency leaders in the two most recent administrations.

Based on the experience of successful former agency chiefs such as David M. Walker of the Government Accountability Office, Charles Rossotti of the Internal Revenue Service and James Loy of the Coast Guard and compared with less successful ones, 10 key considerations emerged as a roadmap for political appointees and career executives alike.

1. Get a Running Start

Use the time between nomination and confirmation to meet with Congress and key stakeholders. Successful agency heads are twice as likely as less successful ones to use this period to interact with stakeholders and start to develop their strategy.

2. Fewer Goals, Greater Success

The successful leaders generally focus on three, or fewer, goals. Those who failed often had four or more. But it's not as simple as trimming back. Goals should be outcome-oriented, such as improved results for customers in an observable way. Unsuccessful leaders most typically set tactical, action-based goals, such as: We need a new computer network. We need a new payroll system. We need a new building. Moreover, the goals of successful leaders are intuitive, free of jargon and communicated consistently across audiences.

3. Collaborate With Employees

Resist the knee-jerk temptation to focus on political appointees. Nearly every successful leader emphasized a collaborative style of developing and implementing change, compared with those who did not attempt ambitious change. Also of interest, the successful cases typically had a smaller percentage of political appointees than federal agencies on average.

4. Manage Within

Don't focus only on the outside world. Successful leaders said they spent nearly half their time on efforts inside the agency, versus with Congress, media and interest groups. They spent internal time building capability, providing vision and guidance, and holding people accountable. Unsuccessful leaders spent just one-quarter of their time internally.

See the Rest of the List at Government Executive

What is a Veterans Recruitment Appointment?

Office of Personnel Management — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 10:06:00 -0700

The Veterans Recruitment Appointment (VRA) -

The VRA is a special authority by which agencies can appoint an eligible veteran without competition. The VRA is an excepted appointment to a position that is otherwise in the competitive service. After 2 years of satisfactory service, the veteran is converted to a career-conditional appointment in the competitive service. (Note, however, that a veteran may be given a noncompetitive temporary or term appointment based on VRA eligibility. These appointments do not lead to career jobs.)

When two or more VRA applicants are preference eligibles, the agency must apply veterans' preference as required by law. (While all VRA eligibles have served in the Armed Forces, they do not necessarily meet the eligibility requirements for Veterans' preference under section 2108 of title 5, United States Code.) Terms and conditions of employment: VRA eligibles may be appointed to any position for which qualified up to GS-11 or equivalent (the promotion potential of the position is not a factor). The veteran must meet the qualification requirements for the position. (Any military service is considered qualifying for GS-3 or equivalent.) After 2 years of substantial continuous service in a permanent position under a VRA, the appointment will be converted to a career or career conditional appointment in the competitive service, providing performance has been satisfactory. Once on-board, VRAs are treated like any other competitive service employee and may be promoted, reassigned, or transferred. VRA appointees with less than 15 years of education must complete a training program established by the agency.

Eligibility Criteria:

The Jobs for Veterans Act, Public Law 107-288, amended title 38 U.S.C. 4214 by making a major change in the eligibility criteria for obtaining a Veterans Recruitment Appointment (VRA). Those who are eligible:

Disabled veterans; or

Veterans who served on active duty in the Armed Forces during a war, or in a campaign or expedition for which a campaign badge has been authorized; or

Veterans who, while serving on active duty in the Armed Forces, participated in a United States military operation for which an Armed Forces Service Medal was awarded; or

Recently separated veterans.

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Veterans claiming eligibility on the basis of service in a campaign or expedition for which a medal was awarded must be in receipt of the campaign badge or medal.

In addition to meeting the criteria above, eligible veterans must have been separated under honorable conditions (i.e., the individual must have received either an honorable or general discharge).

Note: Under the eligibility criteria, not all 5-point preference eligible veterans may be eligible for a VRA appointment. For example, a veteran who served during the Vietnam era (i.e., for more than 180 consecutive days, after January 31, 1955, and before October 15, 1976) but did not receive a service-connected disability or an Armed Forces Service medal or campaign or expeditionary medal would be entitled to 5 pt. veterans’ preference. This veteran, however, would not be eligible for a VRA appointment under the above criteria.

As another example, a veteran who served during the Gulf War from August 2, 1990, through January 2, 1992, would be eligible for veterans’ preference solely on the basis of that service. However, service during that time period, in and of itself, does not confer VRA eligibility on the veteran unless one of the above VRA eligibility criteria is met.

Lastly, if an agency has 2 or more VRA candidates and 1 or more is a preference eligible, the agency must apply Veterans' preference. For example, one applicant is VRA eligible on the basis of receiving an Armed Forces Service Medal (this medal does not confer veterans’ preference eligibility). The second applicant is VRA eligible on the basis of being a disabled veteran (which does confer veterans’ preference eligibility). In this example, both individuals are VRA eligible but only one of them is eligible for Veterans’ preference. As a result, agencies must apply the procedures of 5 CFR 302 when considering VRA candidates for appointment.

How To Apply: Veterans should contact directly the Federal agency personnel office where they are interested in working to find out about VRA opportunities.

5 Signs Your Resumé is Passé

Tania Khadder | GovCentral — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 06:27:00 -0700

The workplace is not what it was five years ago. Neither is the job hunt.

The most successful candidates are those who are ready and willing to adapt to a changing landscape. But it doesn’t matter how ready you are for the modern workplace if your resumé’s straight out of 1994.

And sometimes, it's the most minute details that make all the difference.

Does your resumé speak to the modern hiring manager? Or does it need a serious makeover?

Your resumé might be passé if…

#1: You’ve forced it to fit onto one page

You’ve reduced your font size to eight, eliminated margins altogether and left out key information about yourself, all to conform to that age-old “one page resumé” rule. Big mistake. After all, would a recent college grad really need the same amount of resumé real estate as someone who’s been in the workforce for 20 years? Of course not.

Don’t get me wrong: Your resumé should be concise. Recruiters are busy people – they don’t have time or the patience for long-winded career chronologies. But if your experience warrants two pages, by all means, don’t limit yourself to one.

#2: You list an objective

Of course you’re looking to gain more experience in the field/sector/type of company to which you’re applying. Your interest in the job implies that. Do you really need to say it at the very top of your resumé?

At this point in the selection process, hiring managers are far more interested in what you can do for them than what they can do for you.

If you want to explain why you’re applying for the job, say so in your cover letter. Resumé space is far too valuable to waste on information that is both redundant and inconsequential.

Continue reading on next page →

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#3: You write “References available upon request” at the bottom

Once again, a waste of valuable space. Do you really need to say so? The hiring manager can only assume that if they ask you for references, you’ll provide them. What, are you going to say “no?”

Instead, prepare a list of references with contact details and your relationship to each. Hold onto it until you’re further along in the selection process — you don’t want to annoy your references with repeated contact by employers who are less than serious about you. Most respectable employers wouldn’t bother to contact a reference until they are fully ready to make you an offer.

#4: You attach it to your email as a Word document

While you’re unlikely to be penalized for emailing a Word document, there’s a lot to be said for converting it to a PDF before sending.

A PDF document just looks neater. And even if you’ve gone crazy with the formatting, it will show up correctly on the hiring manager’s computer no matter what their settings, Word version, or font inventory. Besides, do you really want those squiggly red lines showing up under your former company’s name?

Stick to PDF. It’s the only surefire way to display your resumé exactly as you intended it.

#5: You list every job you’ve ever had in chronological order

In the olden days, the person with the most experience got the job.

Nowadays, the person who’s most talented, has the most relevant skill set, and has proven to be most valuable to his or her former employers gets the job.

If you want to be that person, make sure your resumé says so. Don’t list jobs that are irrelevant to the one you’re applying for just to fill up space. Instead, expand on the jobs that are relevant. Focus on measurable achievements in each role as opposed to a play-by-play of your daily responsibilities.

Learn More: 10 Worst Time Wasters at Work

10 Worst Time Wasters at Work

Tania Khadder — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 06:31:00 -0700

Time flies when you're wasting it

These days, no one can afford to waste time at work.

Thanks to widespread downsizing, workloads are piling up. Unfortunately, extra hours in the day are not.

Maximizing your time at work can mean the difference between leaving at a reasonable hour (i.e. holding onto your sanity) and staying late unnecessarily. You’ve got a life outside work. Don’t you want to live it?

There are countless ways you waste time on the job.

Sometimes, it’s unavoidable. Other times, it can be overcome with a minor shift in your approach. Either way, the first step to addressing time wasters is to identify them.

Here are the 10 most common time sucks and some tips on how to defeat them.

Time Waster #1 →

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Culprit #1: Instant Messaging

While instant messaging can be a useful intra-office tool, its generally informal (and instant!) nature can also make it productivity’s worst enemy. How many times has a discussion about something work related quickly degenerated into a half-hour gossip session? And there’s always someone with a lot less to do who will tempt you into a chat marathon.

The solution: If you can’t disconnect completely, at least set your status to “Busy” for a good portion of the day. This will help deter frivolous chatter. If someone insists on bothering you with non-work related chit-chat, tell them (politely) that you are in the middle of something and ask if you can pick up the conversation another time (maybe during your lunch break?). Don’t feel bad about it – no one will fault you for your silence if you’ve got work to do. If they do, you probably don’t want to be chatting with them anyway.

Time Waster #2 →

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Culprit #2: Over-Reliance on Email

We’ve all become addicted to email as a form of communication. It’s convenient. It's also a great way to keep an electronic trail of your correspondence (helpful if you’re ever challenged on a decision or occurrence). But a lot of time is wasted on back and forth emails that would be more easily resolved as a verbal conversation. Don’t even get me started on the oh-so-common "reply-to-all" debacle.

The solution: If there’s something that needs to be discussed, opt for a face-to-face conversation. Is the person you need to speak to on the other coast? Call them. And if you still want a written record, write up a quick email after the conversation outlining where things left off and send to all relevant parties. On the surface it seems like more steps, but it can mean the difference between an hour of work and a two-day back and forth email discussion.

Time Waster #3 →

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Culprit #3: Meandering Meetings

“Meetings about meetings.” You know the kind –- you get together for an hour and all you end up with is a list of what should be discussed in yet another meeting. Sure, meetings are an essential part of the workplace. But if run poorly, they can be a colossal waste of time.

The solution: Meetings should have a purpose; a set of tangible goals you want to accomplish. This should be realized by tackling a set agenda, which should be distributed to attendees before the meeting starts. Stay focused on the task at hand. If there are visual aides, have them set up and ready to go before the group enters the room. Finally, make sure you really need a meeting: if what you have to say can be just as easily shared in an email to the group, why get people up and away from their work?

Time Waster #4 →

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Culprit #4: Short Gaps Between Meetings

Speaking of meetings, what about those 15-30 minute gaps between them? What do you ever really accomplish in that time? Usually, very little. Sure, it gives you a bit of time to decompress, but it also takes you in and out of meeting mode for no apparent reason. If you have several meetings a day, that limbo time can amount to a couple hours of waste.

The solution: Schedule your meetings back-to-back if you can; you’ll knock them out more efficiently. The time in between is better clumped together at some point in the day so it can be used for productive endeavors.

Time Waster #5 →

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Culprit #5: Reacting to Interruptions

You’re in the middle of something when you get an “urgent” email. You reply, only to be accosted by a phone call shortly after. You hang up, only to be faced with yet another email that demands your response. And on and on. Before you know it, it’s 4pm and you still haven’t made a dent in what you’d started first thing this morning. Sound familiar? The average employee works for just 11 minutes before being distracted. No wonder we’re struggling to get things done.

The solution: It’s unavoidable – the hyper-connected workplace will throw constant interruptions at you. The trick is to learn how to react to them without taking away from the task at hand. If you’re busy, let your phone go to voicemail. Set aside three times a day where you manage your inbox. Of course, there are instances where an email demands an urgent reply. But more often than not, it doesn’t. Know the difference.

Time Waster #6 →

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Culprit #6: Ineffective Multi-Tasking

Everyone likes to think they’re great at multi-tasking. And maybe you are. But there’s a limit to how many things you can do at once without taking away from the quality of your work and, ultimately, slowing down the process. Shifting between five different projects at once? You’re probably wasting your time.

The solution: Prioritize and then break up your day accordingly. It’s the key to successfully completing any project. Write down everything you hope to achieve and assign a set time to do so based on importance. Don’t move on to the next task until you’ve really completed the previous one. Not only will you do a better job when you’re focused, you’ll also force yourself to finish something within the time allotted.

Time Waster #7 →

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Culprit #7: Disorganized Workspace

Your primary workspace might be the top of your desk, your desktop computer or most likely, a combination of the two. Either way, if it’s messy, you’ll end up wasting a lot of time looking for things.

The solution: A scattered workspace makes for a scattered mind. De-clutter, and you’ll manage your work more efficiently. Before you leave the office, clear your desk of cans, cups, food and paperwork. Use that file cabinet for something other than your box of saltines. Recycle paperwork you’re never going to use. And don’t add unnecessary items to your files – if you don’t need to print something out, don’t. Your company’s shared drive is perfectly capable of storing documents tidily.

Time Waster #8 →

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Culprit #8: Personal Communications

In the olden days, it was a little harder to get in the way with personal correspondence at work. Today, you can be constantly connected to friends and family without anyone really noticing. It’s no longer a question of “Will I get caught?” so much as “How much time am I wasting?” If you’re checking Facebook religiously, G-Chatting with friends or responding to personal emails the same way you do professional ones, the answer is: a lot.

The solution: These days, employers understand that you may spend some time at work doing personal things (after all, you spend so much time there). Leave your personal correspondence for your lunch break. You can check your various accounts all at once, guilt-free. Be firm with your friends and family about contacting you during work hours –- if they’re not reaching out to you between nine and five, you’ll be a lot less tempted to check in. You’ll also have a better time overcoming Culprit #5.

Time Waster #9 →

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Culprit #9: Web Surfing “Breaks”

You need to step away from what you’re working on so you search for reviews of that movie you’ve been dying to see. Before you know it, you’ve got six tabs open in your browser. You’re looking up concert tickets, shoes, today’s news and the etymology of a words. No need to ask where your afternoon went. Your browser history says it all.

The solution: Know your limits. If you’re tempted to look something up, wait until you’ve at least finished what you’re working on. Preferably, leave this type of search for your lunch break or the end of the work day. It’s just too easy to get sucked in when there’s endless information at your fingertips.

Time Waster #10 →

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Culprit #10: Cigarette/Coffee Breaks

Everyone needs to step away from their desk every once in a while. In fact, it’s been said that taking breaks can often make you more productive. But if you’re going out for a smoke or a coffee run every half hour (sounds extreme, but not totally unrealistic), you’re reducing your productivity to the bare minimum by never really getting into the groove of your work.

The solution: It’s a good idea to look away from your computer every fifteen minutes or so. But when it comes to breaks outside the office, reserve them to three a day: one mid-morning, one at lunch time, and one in the afternoon. Taking your full lunch break is key. If you’re out of the office for a solid hour mid-day, you’ll feel less of a need to step out for smaller breaks. And you’ll be able to get into the work groove – and stay there! – more often.