Approximately once a month, I get an email from a family member or friend that goes something like “My cousin/neighbor/babysitter is really interested in getting a federal job. S/he can’t figure out the process. Can you give her some inside guidance?” Whether OPM wants to admit it or not, the process is still way tooRead… Read more »
Here’s a FABULOUS ARTICLE for future Govies! Reprint of an article on LinkedIn by Elizabeth A. Medina I’ve been trying to get into Civil Service ever since I left my campus work study job as a Biology and Chemistry lab assistant 14 years ago. Obviously, all that changed less than a month ago and IRead… Read more »
I recently heard a segment on the radio in which listeners submitted questions that they would ask their spouse or significant other anonymously. The submissions ranged from, “What’s the biggest lie you’ve ever told your spouse?” to things much more scandalous. My first reaction was that if you have to ask your spouse anonymously, thenRead… Read more »
As a career counselor, I get a lot of eye-rolls when I talk about self-assessment as a part of the career development planning process. And yet, when I ask my graduate students what they do best, they don’t have very descriptive words. “Multitasking” or “problem-solving” or “building strategies”—interesting concepts but not particularly useful in jobRead… Read more »
According to this recent article by Rachel Feintzeig in the Wall Street Journal, the percentage of federal employees under the age of 30 hit an eight-year low of 7% in 2013. It’s not a new problem, but it’s part of a consistent trend – the number has been steadily dropping since the late ’70s, whenRead… Read more »
I’ve been participating in a young professional women’s group. Recently we discussed and worked through Lois Frankel’s Nice Girls ^Still Don’t Get The Corner Office. Frankel’s book offers an assessment to help identify areas the reader self-identifies as performing well and areas the reader self-identifies as needing improvement. One common area improvement amongst the groupRead… Read more »
It’s well known that federal employee spirits are low, but how low? Record low? Seems like that could be the case.The Office of Personnel Management recently surveyed the 2.1 million workers across the government about their satisfaction at work and the results were troubling. The Best Places to Work in the Federal Government Report foundRead… Read more »
The great truism that underlies the civic technology movement of the last several years is that governments face difficulty implementing technology, and they generally manage IT assets and projects very poorly. It can be tempting to view this lack of technology acumen as a symptom of a larger disfunction. Governments are thought to be large,Read… Read more »
Governing Magazine featured a short article today citing a new survey by InternMatch.com, an online internship matching service. The article has a slightly gloomy tone, lamenting that only 14% of college students surveyed want to intern in government, compared to 66% who want to work in for-profit businesses and 20% in non-profit organizations. I thinkRead… Read more »
Acquisition Reform – Industry experts have compared it to Groundhog Day and a complicated system of pendulums shifting between priorities. The descriptions may differ but one thing most agree on is that with federal acquisition becoming ever more complex, fixing it isn’t getting any easier. In fact, Frank Kendall, the Under Secretary of Defense forRead… Read more »