Are any government agencies actually hiring attorneys, or should I stop wasting time applying?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op here.
I meant to ask in my initial posting, which agencies are or are not hiring, if people feel comfortable saying the name?
Thanks.

OP, you have to go by USAJOBS, so I don't see the point of your question.

Yes because go through usajobs solely will yielded results. You are an ass PP. FBI had a brain drain with it's most recent leadership. A lot of spots are open including general counsel but there is a hiring freeze in place. FBI will probably need to try to my an exception to fill the vacant slots but who knows how long it will take and if it will be approved.

Please ignore typos***

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op here.
I meant to ask in my initial posting, which agencies are or are not hiring, if people feel comfortable saying the name?
Thanks.

OP, you have to go by USAJOBS, so I don't see the point of your question.

Yes because go through usajobs solely will yield results. You are an ass PP. FBI had a brain drain with its most recent leadership. A lot of spots are open including general counsel but there is a hiring freeze in place. FBI will probably need to try to make an exception to fill the vacant slots. Who knows how long it will take and if it will be approved.

I had to try to fix it. Couldn't take it!

[Anonymous]

Most agencies that I know that are hiring are looking for people with very specific experience. For example - like someone said, SEC is hiring, but only if you have very specific experience, and even then they've been receiving anywhere from 800-1000+ resumes per opening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most agencies that I know that are hiring are looking for people with very specific experience. For example - like someone said, SEC is hiring, but only if you have very specific experience, and even then they've been receiving anywhere from 800-1000+ resumes per opening.

Nonsense. It's not that competitive at all. If people at companies made false statements like this to boost their own reputations, they'd be sued for disclosure fraud.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most agencies that I know that are hiring are looking for people with very specific experience. For example - like someone said, SEC is hiring, but only if you have very specific experience, and even then they've been receiving anywhere from 800-1000+ resumes per opening.

Nonsense. It's not that competitive at all. If people at companies made false statements like this to boost their own reputations, they'd be sued for disclosure fraud.

Lol

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My agency has hired a ton of new attorneys over the past few months. Many of them are entry level that were interns the previous summer and a few are laterals with specialized experience.

Name the damn agency already.

PP here, SEC. Apologies, I dropped off for a bit.

[Anonymous]

CFPB but they are very selective.

[Anonymous]

VA and SSA seem to hire often. A few friends from law school have joined both as attys in recent years. Unsure if the jobs are all that exciting based on their feedback.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most agencies that I know that are hiring are looking for people with very specific experience. For example - like someone said, SEC is hiring, but only if you have very specific experience, and even then they've been receiving anywhere from 800-1000+ resumes per opening.

Nonsense. It's not that competitive at all. If people at companies made false statements like this to boost their own reputations, they'd be sued for disclosure fraud.

Lol

That is pretty funny. How hard it is to get hired at the SEC depends entirely on which Division you're applying to. Enforcement is the hardest to get into at the moment because of the huge number of litigators trying to leave firms and DOJ right now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op here.
I meant to ask in my initial posting, which agencies are or are not hiring, if people feel comfortable saying the name?
Thanks.

OP, you have to go by USAJOBS, so I don't see the point of your question.

I do go by usajobs. But in not sure if any or many of those postings are real. It takes a good ten twenty hours or so to complete most applications.

There is really no way of knowing which ones will end up hiring someone. The agencies themselves don't know as the budget environment is constantly shifting. If they are posting a job, they WANT to hire someone but circumstances may prevent it. My agency is talking about posting a job and I'm shocked because we are in a serious budget crunch. But we have had attrition and are short staffed. I'm not sure if it will really happen.

If you are spending 10-20 hours on each posting you are spending way too much time. Put together a standard resume and cover letter and then spend a little time customizing them for each posting. I never timed myself but even the most time consuming ones couldn't have taken more than an hour or two.

Huh? Which government attorney ey jobs did you apply for?? Most require far more tha a resume and cover letter. Despite opm's claim of "resume and do cover letters!", most still have multiple questions that require writing essays describing your skills and abilities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most agencies that I know that are hiring are looking for people with very specific experience. For example - like someone said, SEC is hiring, but only if you have very specific experience, and even then they've been receiving anywhere from 800-1000+ resumes per opening.

Nonsense. It's not that competitive at all. If people at companies made false statements like this to boost their own reputations, they'd be sued for disclosure fraud.

Lol

That is pretty funny. How hard it is to get hired at the SEC depends entirely on which Division you're applying to. Enforcement is the hardest to get into at the moment because of the huge number of litigators trying to leave firms and DOJ right now.

Op here. I would love to work at the sec, but have zero securities experience and the application often asks questions about your securities experience, so I'm assuming it is pointless to apply?

[Anonymous]

Yes, agencies are still hiring.

But, for a number of reasons, you may not have a great chance of landing any particular listing:

1. There are tons of applicants (my agency received 4,000 applications for its two entry level slots);

2. Government agencies are required to post job listings even for jobs where they have a dream candidate in mind. So some postings border on fake. Agencies are not always great about making this obvious from the posting. For example, I saw a recent DOJ listing that was essentially earmarked for a particular Supreme Court clerk that read "Federal clerkship helpful." They could have been a lot less subtle in that listing to waste fewer people's time.

3. Agencies also put up the listing because they badly need someone but don't yet have funding approval. So some listings never get filled. Or they open and close months before they are filled.

4. A corollary to #3 is that sometimes you can apply for a job months or years before you get an interview, so its possible you're still under consideration for some of the jobs you haven't been interviewed for.

All of these factors are annoying and mean you can apply for a number of jobs without any success. But the jobs do exist and the only way to get them is to submit a (lengthy) application.