Federal Job Hunt Stats

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an attorney with a 10 year career at a non profit. From March through June, he applied to about 10 federal jobs, mostly at one agency. He got an interview for every job at that agency (none at the others, where he has no subject matter expertise). He got a tentative job offer in July for a GS-14 position. The background check dragged out and he didn’t get the final offer until recently. He is starting in mid Sept.

Unfortunately, you are less likely to be hired at this point because agencies rush to spend their hiring budget in the summer. They need to start new employees before the fiscal year ends Sept 30. Some hiring will still happen throughout the year but if you’re feeling burned out, you may want to give it a break until next spring/summer.

Good point here. Don't get discouraged if nothing pans out this year. Hiring should ramp back up after the holidays.

Would this apply to jobs that were recently announced? I applied to a few that were open for 7-8 days and just closed. Why would they announce now if they can’t fill them by Sept 30?

[Anonymous]

You are getting referred very often. How dis you feel about the interview you had?

[Anonymous]

*did

[Anonymous]

I think attorneys may as well not respond to these posts, re: hiring for fed jobs. It's just such a different, specific hiring situation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You are getting referred very often. How dis you feel about the interview you had?

I felt great and was excited about it but the panel clearly didn’t feel I was a good fit. In fact, they reposted the vacancy a month later, which really shook my confidence. But it looks like the team has been trying to fill this position for a year and it’s a huge monster of a job. I was disappointed at first but now I’m relieved. It was a GS14 supervisory advancement position involving recruitment, team management, contract oversight, executive budgeting, and raising $10-15M/year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an attorney with a 10 year career at a non profit. From March through June, he applied to about 10 federal jobs, mostly at one agency. He got an interview for every job at that agency (none at the others, where he has no subject matter expertise). He got a tentative job offer in July for a GS-14 position. The background check dragged out and he didn’t get the final offer until recently. He is starting in mid Sept.

Unfortunately, you are less likely to be hired at this point because agencies rush to spend their hiring budget in the summer. They need to start new employees before the fiscal year ends Sept 30. Some hiring will still happen throughout the year but if you’re feeling burned out, you may want to give it a break until next spring/summer.

Good point here. Don't get discouraged if nothing pans out this year. Hiring should ramp back up after the holidays.

Would this apply to jobs that were recently announced? I applied to a few that were open for 7-8 days and just closed. Why would they announce now if they can’t fill them by Sept 30?

Jobs that are only open for a week or so are usually already filled with someone they want to hire in-house. That's like the bare minimum they have to advertise. They will be able to process those quickly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You are getting referred very often. How dis you feel about the interview you had?

I felt great and was excited about it but the panel clearly didn’t feel I was a good fit. In fact, they reposted the vacancy a month later, which really shook my confidence. But it looks like the team has been trying to fill this position for a year and it’s a huge monster of a job. I was disappointed at first but now I’m relieved. It was a GS14 supervisory advancement position involving recruitment, team management, contract oversight, executive budgeting, and raising $10-15M/year.

I’ve done all of these things but at a much smaller nonprofit scale. And not all at once. I was honest about that in my interview and said I was looking forward to the challenge. I’m not surprised they kept looking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an attorney with a 10 year career at a non profit. From March through June, he applied to about 10 federal jobs, mostly at one agency. He got an interview for every job at that agency (none at the others, where he has no subject matter expertise). He got a tentative job offer in July for a GS-14 position. The background check dragged out and he didn’t get the final offer until recently. He is starting in mid Sept.

Unfortunately, you are less likely to be hired at this point because agencies rush to spend their hiring budget in the summer. They need to start new employees before the fiscal year ends Sept 30. Some hiring will still happen throughout the year but if you’re feeling burned out, you may want to give it a break until next spring/summer.

Good point here. Don't get discouraged if nothing pans out this year. Hiring should ramp back up after the holidays.

Would this apply to jobs that were recently announced? I applied to a few that were open for 7-8 days and just closed. Why would they announce now if they can’t fill them by Sept 30?

Jobs that are only open for a week or so are usually already filled with someone they want to hire in-house. That's like the bare minimum they have to advertise. They will be able to process those quickly.

Some also have a number limit. In my agency, that's often 100 resumes. If that happens in 20 minutes, oh well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an attorney with a 10 year career at a non profit. From March through June, he applied to about 10 federal jobs, mostly at one agency. He got an interview for every job at that agency (none at the others, where he has no subject matter expertise). He got a tentative job offer in July for a GS-14 position. The background check dragged out and he didn’t get the final offer until recently. He is starting in mid Sept.

Unfortunately, you are less likely to be hired at this point because agencies rush to spend their hiring budget in the summer. They need to start new employees before the fiscal year ends Sept 30. Some hiring will still happen throughout the year but if you’re feeling burned out, you may want to give it a break until next spring/summer.

Good point here. Don't get discouraged if nothing pans out this year. Hiring should ramp back up after the holidays.

Would this apply to jobs that were recently announced? I applied to a few that were open for 7-8 days and just closed. Why would they announce now if they can’t fill them by Sept 30?

Jobs that are only open for a week or so are usually already filled with someone they want to hire in-house. That's like the bare minimum they have to advertise. They will be able to process those quickly.

The quick closing made me think it’s an internal hire too. But then they asked for the USA Hire Assessment, which seems risky if they already know who they want because maybe that person won’t test well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an attorney with a 10 year career at a non profit. From March through June, he applied to about 10 federal jobs, mostly at one agency. He got an interview for every job at that agency (none at the others, where he has no subject matter expertise). He got a tentative job offer in July for a GS-14 position. The background check dragged out and he didn’t get the final offer until recently. He is starting in mid Sept.

Unfortunately, you are less likely to be hired at this point because agencies rush to spend their hiring budget in the summer. They need to start new employees before the fiscal year ends Sept 30. Some hiring will still happen throughout the year but if you’re feeling burned out, you may want to give it a break until next spring/summer.

Good point here. Don't get discouraged if nothing pans out this year. Hiring should ramp back up after the holidays.

Would this apply to jobs that were recently announced? I applied to a few that were open for 7-8 days and just closed. Why would they announce now if they can’t fill them by Sept 30?

Jobs that are only open for a week or so are usually already filled with someone they want to hire in-house. That's like the bare minimum they have to advertise. They will be able to process those quickly.

This is not true in my agency. It's just HR trying to limit the number of applications due to their staffing capacity issues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think attorneys may as well not respond to these posts, re: hiring for fed jobs. It's just such a different, specific hiring situation.

And wives of attorneys even less so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an attorney with a 10 year career at a non profit. From March through June, he applied to about 10 federal jobs, mostly at one agency. He got an interview for every job at that agency (none at the others, where he has no subject matter expertise). He got a tentative job offer in July for a GS-14 position. The background check dragged out and he didn’t get the final offer until recently. He is starting in mid Sept.

Unfortunately, you are less likely to be hired at this point because agencies rush to spend their hiring budget in the summer. They need to start new employees before the fiscal year ends Sept 30. Some hiring will still happen throughout the year but if you’re feeling burned out, you may want to give it a break until next spring/summer.

Good point here. Don't get discouraged if nothing pans out this year. Hiring should ramp back up after the holidays.

Would this apply to jobs that were recently announced? I applied to a few that were open for 7-8 days and just closed. Why would they announce now if they can’t fill them by Sept 30?

Jobs that are only open for a week or so are usually already filled with someone they want to hire in-house. That's like the bare minimum they have to advertise. They will be able to process those quickly.

Not true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think attorneys may as well not respond to these posts, re: hiring for fed jobs. It's just such a different, specific hiring situation.

And wives of attorneys even less so.

How about husbands of attorneys? Can they post here?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think attorneys may as well not respond to these posts, re: hiring for fed jobs. It's just such a different, specific hiring situation.

And wives of attorneys even less so.

How about husbands of attorneys? Can they post here?

No. I don’t want to hear any spouses opining on the federal hiring process based on their spouse’s experience. Now that H 1 B guy is gone, it is perhaps my biggest pet peeve in this forum when spouses think they are experts because of where their spouse works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think attorneys may as well not respond to these posts, re: hiring for fed jobs. It's just such a different, specific hiring situation.

And wives of attorneys even less so.

How about husbands of attorneys? Can they post here?

No. I don’t want to hear any spouses opining on the federal hiring process based on their spouse’s experience. Now that H 1 B guy is gone, it is perhaps my biggest pet peeve in this forum when spouses think they are experts because of where their spouse works.

I’m the PP. I’m a federal attorney too so I’m aware of how the hiring works. In fact DH negotiated more favorable terms because of my advice. I was sharing his experience as a recent lateral hire since the OP was asking how many applications it takes to get a job. Perhaps it’s a fair point that attorney hiring is different; I did not know that.