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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I graduated grad school in 2011 and many of my friends received PMF. In fact, our program is one of the largest recipients of PMF awards (upwards of 35 in my graduating class of 300).

At this point, it's a fairly useless designation if you're a civilian. Two reasons:

1. Veterans preference: the only people PMF can actually help is veterans. If you don't have veterans preference, it's extremely difficult to get a job. The whole point of PMF is that you're supposed to use the designation to shop around at various agencies and complete rotations. It's next to impossible to get a job as a civilian via random applications to agencies. You need to intern or otherwise have a strong connection pulling for you, if you're not a veteran. PMF will help a veteran candidate stand out.

2. Dwindling budgets: For many hiring mangers, PMF is actually seen as a bad thing in this era of tightening budgets. PMF forces the agencies to give you promotions and raises on a set schedule without much flexibility. Why hire a PMF at a higher salary and guaranteed raises, when I can hire another new grad for cheaper and gives me more flexibility with my budget into the future? During times of shrinking budgets, the PMF guidelines act as a perverse incentive to NOT hire the best candidate. That's bureaucratic efficiency for you. [/quote]

This post ignores a major reason people at agencies hire through PMF: the normal hiring preferences for veterans and current federal employees don't apply and the hiring rules are much less restrictive overall. As a result, agencies looking to hire can actually choose who they want to hire by hiring a PMF rather than posting to USAJobs. There is a preference for veterans through PMF hiring but it is not as strong as for publicly posted fed positions -- I know lots of PMFs with good jobs who aren't veterans. I'm a current PMF who has now worked at two different agencies. Both agencies pretty much only hire from the PMF program for GS 9 or 11 type positions -- it's virtually impossible for a non-PMF to get hired into one of those jobs.

There are also no forced raises or promotions. After 2 years you do have to be converted into a permanent position, but it doesn't have to be at a higher grade. Promotions are based on the agency's criteria.

It's true that many agencies have budget crunches and, as a result, aren't hiring many new PMFs. But they're not hiring into other positions either -- that's not a problem with the PMF program, it's a government-wide reality.[/quote]

Thank you for correcting me. It seems that this thread doesn't have a ton of current PMFs responding (mostly people who did it 10+ years ago), so I was trying to pass along the recent tidbits of info that friends gave to me as they went through the process.[/quote]

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