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Ignoranceisbliss88 posted:I've been researching 1811 jobs for quite some time and talked to a number of recruiters/agents on and off the record. From what I've gathered, these positions are extremely competitive. A JD isn't an entrance ticket, or even much of a boost. Agencies have an idea of what they want an agent to be and look at the person and a person's life as a whole. I've heard of countless 30+ year old current Police detectives, former military, with a JD types who get passed over in favor of a 22-25 year old with little or no experience who fit the mold. In doing all this research a common denominator is an outraged graduate degree toting civilian with a feeling of entitlement. I'm not saying that this is you, but that the process is very different from the civilian sector. I'd also venture to say that 1811 positions are more competitive than the vast majority of civilian sector jobs. Not many professions offer you amazing career stability, 100k+ a year (GS-13) with great benefits and retirement, and a chance to do some pretty exciting/interesting/abnormal/difference making work. I'm probably more familiar with 1811 hiring than the vast majority of applicants. My problem isn't so much with not getting hired (though I certainly do have a problem with it), but not even being allowed to start the process is dumb, and it's hard to see how I'm not at least a good enough candidate for that. The opacity of the process makes it even worse, since you get no feedback on why exactly they felt you weren't even worth looking at.
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Jul 10, 2013 03:13
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VideoTapir posted:When did you graduate? Maybe they figure if you entered a JD program after 2008, you must not be very bright. Applied in 2007, entered Fall 2008. Right on that borderline of "that was dumb" and "I'm willfully destroying myself." Ignoranceisbliss88 posted:I'm not saying that this is you You pretty much did, but sure, I'll play along. It's not outrage, it's disappointment I'm in employment limbo five years out of undergrad and the realization that I could've gone farther with 4 years in the Peace Corps supervising irrigation canal projects or whatever, rather than wasting three years cramming for a field that's in a downward spiral 
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Jul 10, 2013 04:59
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Ignoranceisbliss88 posted:I've been researching 1811 jobs for quite some time and talked to a number of recruiters/agents on and off the record. From what I've gathered, these positions are extremely competitive. A JD isn't an entrance ticket, or even much of a boost. Agencies have an idea of what they want an agent to be and look at the person and a person's life as a whole. I've heard of countless 30+ year old current Police detectives, former military, with a JD types who get passed over in favor of a 22-25 year old with little or no experience who fit the mold. In doing all this research a common denominator is an outraged graduate degree toting civilian with a feeling of entitlement. I'm not saying that this is you, but that the process is very different from the civilian sector. Now I am even more confused as to why I got to take the entrance exam, though, so that is a plus. I guess it must be related to the fact that I wrote an award-winning (not as impressive as it sounds) master's thesis on surveillance and identity documentation, heavily focusing on the USA, which certainly seems right up the "detecting fraudulent identities" part of the Secret Service's alley. But yeah, Feed Me A Cat, the federal government is the only employer(-writ-large) outside of academia that actually seems to care about education, and I feel like other agencies' Special Agents listings often specifically mention law degrees as a useful potential avenue (I went the LSAT route once upon a time in hopes of taking that route to federal law enforcement, actually; I mean, they have a specific type of entry job just for law degree possessors, do they not?).
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Jul 10, 2013 07:00
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Quarex posted:But yeah, Feed Me A Cat, the federal government is the only employer(-writ-large) outside of academia that actually seems to care about education, and I feel like other agencies' Special Agents listings often specifically mention law degrees as a useful potential avenue (I went the LSAT route once upon a time in hopes of taking that route to federal law enforcement, actually; I mean, they have a specific type of entry job just for law degree possessors, do they not?). Not sure about the entry level job, but that's probably just me never having seen it. Applied for FBI special agent back in March on a Monday, got a reply e-mail that I was qualified for the next round of testing that Thursday, got super excited. Then the following Monday was notified that the application process was suspended due to lack of funds  On the bright side, I'm scheduled for a round of testing for a Border Patrol Agent position with CBP on the 16th. Feeling pretty good about it since the Logical Reasoning portion is a scaled-down LSAT and I did well enough on the sample test for that and the artificial language battery.
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Jul 10, 2013 18:02
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You guys are making me feel a bit discouraged. I know some FBI Special Agent positions require two/three years of professional work experience besides the education component which I've just recently completed. I was hoping to start the application process soon and (hopefully? maybe?) get in with a couple years. I know the sequester isn't helping matters here but I was still remaining hopeful...am I deluding myself or should I just expect an uphill battle?
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Jul 10, 2013 18:24
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Everybody wants to be Fox Mulder but nobody wants to deal with the ridicule/rejection.
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Jul 10, 2013 18:42
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Seamonster posted:Everybody wants to be Fox Mulder but nobody wants to deal with the ridicule/rejection. Thanks for the advice? Who is being ridiculed here besides myself and the other people hoping to get these jobs, and by your post. I can't imagine anyone who goes through the application process to these types of jobs thinks it's going to be a cakewalk and they're guaranteed a spot. I suppose I probably shouldn't have even posted my previous question/concerned since I already know the answer: it's a popular and appealing job with a lot of very qualified individuals applying for it. It's not impossible to get those jobs but it will take time and patience if you want to be successful. Good luck Kase Im Licht, Quarex, Ignoranceisbliss88 and Feed Me A Cat in your 1811 job searches.
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Jul 10, 2013 18:53
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Sirotan posted:You guys are making me feel a bit discouraged. I know some FBI Special Agent positions require two/three years of professional work experience besides the education component which I've just recently completed. I was hoping to start the application process soon and (hopefully? maybe?) get in with a couple years. I know the sequester isn't helping matters here but I was still remaining hopeful...am I deluding myself or should I just expect an uphill battle? Sorry, FBI Special Agent apps are closed until a yet to be determined date. When I applied in March, the hiring period started March 1st and ended March 15th I believe? The form e-mail I got implies that my application was not tossed out, but frozen in place until the Sequestersaurus goes away. quote:Due to the budgetary issues which are currently affecting the federal government, Special Agent application processing has been suspended. My guess is there won't be another batch of hiring until they process the block of "you're not a drug-using, felony-having member of a hate group, yay" candidates I was in. Better luck next year
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Jul 10, 2013 20:14
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Quarex posted:But considering I basically fit "outraged graduate degree toting civilian with a feeling of entitlement" myself, I am even more confused now. Well, except for the entitlement part, but you could probably argue that even for having the gall to apply for this position I was acting fairly entitled. Look at how your resume and online application is written. I talked extensively with a higher level customs recruiting agent who took the time to come talk to my veterans group. He was adamant that you had to tailor your government resume to the computer system that all these agencies use to screen their applications. The computer just scans and picks up key terms and rejects/passes your resume before it even gets to human eyes. He said that basically everything you learn on how to write a civilian resume (concise, quantitative, short) doesn't apply to government agencies. It's pretty common for 1811 jobs to get 30 or 40 applicants for every position. They don't possibly have the time to look at every resume with human eyes. Finally, veterans and current government employees can really crush you too (depending on the agency). Say there's 10,000 applicants for 250 spots at an agency and 4,000 of them are veterans or get preference for already being a government employee. Say the agency rates 2,000/10,000 of the applicants as most qualified based on experience, education, whatever but for logistical reasons can only interview 750 people for the spots. Well of those 2,000, 800 will be veterans or current government employees and will usually get preference. I think its the ATF or DEA that basically has ONLY hired veterans in the last like 5 years. They have literally so many highly qualified people that they don't, or sometimes legally can't, bring in non-veterans. Think of it this way. You may have graduated from a T14 law school, won a bunch of awards, and have five years of experience, but there's someone else who graduated from a T14 law school, won a bunch of awards, has five years of experience, AND is a veteran/current gov. employee. I'd also consider that once you become an 1811 it's relatively easy to transfer between agencies. Most of the rules are the same, and the retirement/benefits are identical. I know it's quite common to have agents switch between 2 or 3 agencies (and sometimes back and forth) over their careers. Look at some of the less well-known agencies. Once you have that 1811 on your resume you're in the system.
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Jul 11, 2013 00:31
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I've been a Supervisor at UPS for the past 5+ years, have 60 college credits and have been accepted to a large state university for this fall. I don't trust UPS to let management keep its pension by the time I retire so I'm looking at jobs on usajobs , but I dont know what I would be qualified for? My major at College is information systems, but staring down probably 3 years of 17k tuition I wonder if I could just skip it for a cushy .gov job. Any advice?
WS6 97 fucked around with this message at 06:41 on Jul 12, 2013 |
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Jul 12, 2013 06:31
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Ignoranceisbliss88 posted:Finally, veterans and current government employees can really crush you too (depending on the agency). Say there's 10,000 applicants for 250 spots at an agency and 4,000 of them are veterans or get preference for already being a government employee. Say the agency rates 2,000/10,000 of the applicants as most qualified based on experience, education, whatever but for logistical reasons can only interview 750 people for the spots. Well of those 2,000, 800 will be veterans or current government employees and will usually get preference. I think its the ATF or DEA that basically has ONLY hired veterans in the last like 5 years. They have literally so many highly qualified people that they don't, or sometimes legally can't, bring in non-veterans. Think of it this way. You may have graduated from a T14 law school, won a bunch of awards, and have five years of experience, but there's someone else who graduated from a T14 law school, won a bunch of awards, has five years of experience, AND is a veteran/current gov. employee. ^Summary of my USAJobs experience to date. I've lost track of how many rejection e-mails I've gotten from all sorts of agencies and positions that said they couldn't even look at my application because of the number of qualified veterans. The frustrating bit for me is all the people I know who flat out don't believe me when I tell them I'm not getting into the US Foreign Service, ATF, DEA, etc. because there are vets with JDs or other grad degrees applying in large numbers. "BUT MY AUNT'S FRIEND'S KID GOT INTO THE FOREIGN SERVICE WITH JUST A MASTERS." Sure they did, in 2003.
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Jul 12, 2013 18:30
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Feed Me A Cat posted:"BUT MY AUNT'S FRIEND'S KID GOT INTO THE FOREIGN SERVICE WITH JUST A MASTERS." Sure they did, in 2003. Have you been paying attention to your scores? Well, I suppose that suggests you are applying to the kinds of jobs that give you scores. As I mentioned a bit earlier in the thread, I suddenly noticed that the job types I thought were most right for me (program analyst/management analyst) were actually giving me reliably poor scores and clearly I needed to stop thinking they wanted me just because I have, in fact, analyzed programs and management.
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Jul 12, 2013 20:25
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Does anyone work at the Jackson Federal Building in Seattle? I'm trying to find out how much employee parking is or if it's free?
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Jul 13, 2013 20:06
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Quarex posted:Have you been paying attention to your scores? Well, I suppose that suggests you are applying to the kinds of jobs that give you scores. As I mentioned a bit earlier in the thread, I suddenly noticed that the job types I thought were most right for me (program analyst/management analyst) were actually giving me reliably poor scores and clearly I needed to stop thinking they wanted me just because I have, in fact, analyzed programs and management. Citizenship and Immigration Services were the only agency to provide me a score, I believe it was a 78? Based on the rejection that followed a bit later, I'm guessing that's not even close.
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Jul 14, 2013 05:00
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mcpringles posted:Does anyone work at the Jackson Federal Building in Seattle? I'm trying to find out how much employee parking is or if it's free? There is no parking at all period except for bicycles and motorcyclists (both free). Public transportation or pay to use a commercial garage.
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Jul 14, 2013 18:05
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Feed Me A Cat posted:Citizenship and Immigration Services were the only agency to provide me a score, I believe it was a 78? Based on the rejection that followed a bit later, I'm guessing that's not even close. The subtext there seems to be "if you cannot justify answering 'E' almost every time, do not bother applying." (I checked recently and found that I have quit out of about 1 in 4 applications when I realized by the end of the second page of questions that there was no chance I would make the 90s) Of course, then there are the applications that want to know things like whether you were in an honor society in high school that make me want to put my head down on my desk and stop applying.
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Jul 15, 2013 04:55
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Quarex posted:Of course, then there are the applications that want to know things like whether you were in an honor society in high school that make me want to put my head down on my desk and stop applying. Have you mastered a hobby well enough to the point where other people have paid you to do it?  I've applied to three Department of Labor jobs that required that wall of radio buttons to be filled out. Couple of weeks after the first rejection I had the option of using a previous score. I remember thinking to myself "Man, why would I want to re-use such a low score, I mean I got rejected- wait, I had a 92? Sheeeeeeeeit."
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Jul 15, 2013 17:46
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HAMAS HATE BOAT posted:There is no parking at all period except for bicycles and motorcyclists (both free). Public transportation or pay to use a commercial garage. The building on 2nd and Madison? I could have sworn there was was parking under the building with an entrance on the north side of the building? I'm thinking of transferring to Seattle and would be in that building.
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Jul 15, 2013 18:01
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Feed Me A Cat posted:Have you mastered a hobby well enough to the point where other people have paid you to do it?
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Jul 15, 2013 22:44
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Historically, how quickly do positions begin appearing after a hiring freeze ends? I'm a non-GS civilian contractor and may be getting downsized after October, which coincidentally is when the new fiscal year begins and the hiring freeze will (please God, please) come to an end. Expecting a bonanza of jobs to materialize the very next day isn't realistic, but is there a typical timeframe for positions to start showing up on USAJobs?
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Jul 19, 2013 05:02
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Suntory BOSS posted:Historically, how quickly do positions begin appearing after a hiring freeze ends? I'm a non-GS civilian contractor and may be getting downsized after October, which coincidentally is when the new fiscal year begins and the hiring freeze will (please God, please) come to an end.
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Jul 19, 2013 14:22
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Anyone else have a crapload of both non-eligible and retirement eligible people leaving? Since the start of the year, it seems that a bunch of people are either retiring or getting out of government service entirely in my agency. We've lost quite a few in my job series in the last year and a half to resignation and retirement and haven't really replaced them.
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Jul 20, 2013 20:35
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Evil SpongeBob posted:Anyone else have a crapload of both non-eligible and retirement eligible people leaving? Since the start of the year, it seems that a bunch of people are either retiring or getting out of government service entirely in my agency. Nearly half the people I work with are retirement eligible or within 5 years of it. Those who are younger have been looking for promotions in other agencies, and we have had about five jump ship to other agencies, or left the agency altogether. Since I transferred here last September, they only have hired one new person, and we have four empty manager spots.
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Jul 21, 2013 13:56
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Sounds like it's about time to get out the drowning tub.
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Jul 21, 2013 14:36
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Evil SpongeBob posted:Anyone else have a crapload of both non-eligible and retirement eligible people leaving? Since the start of the year, it seems that a bunch of people are either retiring or getting out of government service entirely in my agency. State is doing a 1:2 replacement right now, although my office has actually brought in more federal employees since the sequester started so I don't know.
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Jul 21, 2013 15:39
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Evil SpongeBob posted:Anyone else have a crapload of both non-eligible and retirement eligible people leaving? Since the start of the year, it seems that a bunch of people are either retiring or getting out of government service entirely in my agency. Which agency is your agency?
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Jul 21, 2013 22:47
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NintyFresh posted:Nearly half the people I work with are retirement eligible or within 5 years of it. I wish I had the exact statistic but I remember being told at one of our quarterly meetings that something like 50-60% of our workforce is within 5 years of retirement; we have a ton of boomers, very few people in their forties or late 30s, and then a small blip of twenty-to-early-thirtysomethings. Which makes it really nice for promotion potential for me; I'm already a GS-13 at age 29 and basically everyone above me is already eligible for retirement. How we're going to handle the workload is another issue; I'll be taking over a new program in a few weeks that needs a lot more attention than my current one, but they still don't have anyone to replace me on my current one, so guess who's still going to be supporting the old one, too. And all that in my mandatory 32 hours per week for the rest of the fiscal year. I absolutely love being busy, but it's immensely frustrating to have work to do and not be allowed to do it. P.D.B. Fishsticks fucked around with this message at 14:32 on Jul 22, 2013 |
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Jul 22, 2013 13:43
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At the age of 30, I am the single youngest full time staff member in my agency. The average person who works here has between 25 and 30 years in and can retire soon.
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Jul 22, 2013 15:56
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Dod downsizing in the 90s and a great economy left huge generational gaps in many depts. There were few hires, and jr people at the time were all rifd or bailed for better jobs elsewhere. Hence why so many of us made 13 so young, I think.
grover fucked around with this message at 16:31 on Jul 22, 2013 |
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Jul 22, 2013 16:29
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Hello Fed Goons, I will be graduating with a Masters in Accounting in spring 2015. I heard that the federal hiring process is notoriously slow (from application, to contact, to getting hired). When would be the best time to start applying to get a job sometime around my graduation? Secondary question if you can help, what agencies would be best for someone with an accounting/finance background who is not interested in the IRS? Some back story: I have a job at a small CPA firm, and would prefer to stay in the private industry after I finish college. However, I would like to keep my options open by exploring the public sector as well. Thanks in advance for any input.
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Jul 22, 2013 16:52
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FBI, if they're hiring and you're interested in that side of things.
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Jul 22, 2013 23:38
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Diplomat posted:Hello Fed Goons, When I got hired as a DOD librarian, I think I applied in May or June, interviewed in August or September, was selected in October, and began work in January. For librarians (federal or not), though, that's pretty standard. VideoTapir fucked around with this message at 07:23 on Aug 2, 2013 |
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Jul 23, 2013 02:37
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They told us it would be ten business days to get our results for the Secret Service exam. On one hand, I feel like I should not be surprised that nearly 20 business days later nothing has happened. On the other, I found that when they actually give deadlines they tend to mean them. How long is appropriate to wait before contacting the office to be all "uhhhhh, so, uhhhh"
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Jul 30, 2013 07:50
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Quarex posted:They told us it would be ten business days to get our results for the Secret Service exam. On one hand, I feel like I should not be surprised that nearly 20 business days later nothing has happened. On the other, I found that when they actually give deadlines they tend to mean them. How long is appropriate to wait before contacting the office to be all "uhhhhh, so, uhhhh" Three months.
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Jul 30, 2013 12:15
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Quarex posted:They told us it would be ten business days to get our results for the Secret Service exam. On one hand, I feel like I should not be surprised that nearly 20 business days later nothing has happened. On the other, I found that when they actually give deadlines they tend to mean them. How long is appropriate to wait before contacting the office to be all "uhhhhh, so, uhhhh" This is actually your first applicant test. You always multiply government estimates by a factor of 5. Adapting to Windows 7 in a year? No, we'll push it out in 5 years when it's not being sold any more.
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Jul 30, 2013 22:20
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Customs is hiring. Law enforcement mixed with customs, immigration work. Pay's good.
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Jul 31, 2013 05:54
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kys posted:Customs is hiring. Law enforcement mixed with customs, immigration work. Pay's good. Applied just now. I notice the pay band is a little low on the USAJobs posting, $31,315.00 to $38,790.00 / Per Year; are there other stipends, COLA, etc. they left out of that figure?
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Jul 31, 2013 19:54
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I don't think COLA is ever listed even though they know where the position is/will be.
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Aug 1, 2013 13:39
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Feed Me A Cat posted:Applied just now. I notice the pay band is a little low on the USAJobs posting, $31,315.00 to $38,790.00 / Per Year; are there other stipends, COLA, etc. they left out of that figure? AUO. Before the sequester, you could probably add in 25%. Now, I don't know if CBP is paying it.
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Aug 2, 2013 06:11
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Evil SpongeBob posted:AUO. Before the sequester, you could probably add in 25%. Now, I don't know if CBP is paying it. Assuming they're not paying AUO, how does that work out in practice? Go home because we can't pay you for more hours?
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Aug 2, 2013 17:38
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