Federal Jobs Hiring Reform

Federal government recruitment and hiring will be revamped and updated. On, May 11, 2010 President Obama signed a memorandum calling for federal government hiring reform.

The memo calls for removing the essay-style questions in the application process because of the lengthiness they present. It also called for increased involvement in the hiring process itself by managers.

In the memo Obama said, “To deliver the quality services and results the American people expect and deserve, the federal government must recruit and hire highly qualified employees, and public services should be a career of choice for the most talented Americans.”

“Yet the complexity and inefficiency of today’s federal hiring process deters many highly qualified individuals from seeking and obtaining jobs in the federal government,” he said.

This reform has been called a “historic opportunity” by Marilee Fitzgerald, the Pentagon’s acting deputy undersecretary of defense for civilian personnel policy, for its ability to finally get rid of the out-of-date system.

Currently the bureaucratic red-tape may limit talent because applicants may be deterred. This is first hiring reform act since the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 and will prompt widespread changes.

Here are some examples of current job openings with the Federal Government:

Title Pay Plan/Series/Grade Salary Range Agency Location Closing Date
Resolutions & Receiverships Spec (Contracts) CG-1101-13 Term CG-1101-13/13 $89,035-$147,312 US Other Agencies and Orgs/Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation TX-Dallas 07/29/2010
VOCATIONAL REHABILITATION SPECIALIST GS-1715-09/11 $51,995-$81,779 Department Of Veterans Affairs/Veterans Health Administration Chicago Metro area 05/26/2010
Occupational Therapist YH-0631-02 $40,695-$110,104 Department Of The Navy/Naval Medical Command Sigonella & Sicily, Ita 06/3/2010
SUPV MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIST YH-0644-02/02 $52,252-$67,931 Department Of The Army/Army Medical Command KS – Ft Riley & Manhattan 06/3/2010
Intelligence Specialist (COL REQ MGR) IA-0132-04/04 $59,158-$109,611 Department Of The Army/Joint Activities NC – Fayetteville 06/3/2010
LOAN ASSISTANT (AGRL), GS-1165 5/7 GS-1165-05/07 $31,315-$50,431 Department Of Agriculture/Farm Service Agency Throughout Nebraska 06/10/2010
Nutritionist GS-0630-12/12 $72,733-$94,551 Department Of Agriculture/Food and Nutrition Service TX-Dallas 06/11/2010
Financial Technician IA-0503-2 $42,209-$73,917 Department Of The Navy/Commander in Chief of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet Andrews AFB 05/27/2010
HISTORIAN GS-0170-13/13 $83,479-$108,521 Department Of The Army/Army Training and Doctrine Command VA – Fort Lee 06/9/2010
Public Affairs Specialist GS-1035-12/13 $73,848-$114,158 Department Of Labor/Office of Public Affairs CO-Denver 06/2/2010

source: executivegov.com

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Using LinkedIn in your job search

Recruiters use LinkedIn to search for, find, and contact potential candidates on a daily basis – in fact, there are over 1,000,000 sourcers, recruiters, and human resources professionals on Linkedin in the United States alone! While I typically write posts for sourcers and recruiters to show them how they can more effectively leverage social networking sites like LinkedIn to find candidates, in this post, I am going to show job seekers how they can use the exact same techniques and strategies to find jobs, perform company research, and how to find and contact recruiters and hiring managers – even if you only have 5 connections!

First we’ll start with the basics. I’m going to save the best for last.

Job Search

Many people are unaware of all of the great features on LinkedIn for job seekers.

Once you click on “Jobs” you can use the basic search interface, or click on the “advanced” job search:

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Once you get to the “Advanced Job Search” you have many self explanatory and standard job search options.  You can target specific companies, titles, industry, job function, location, etc. One thing to notice is the “Powered by SimplyHired” – I’ll get to that in a moment, it’s important.

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Let’s say you’re looking for a job as an accountant in NYC. When you enter your search criteria and hit “search” you will be taken to LinkedIn’s jobs. When I say “LinkedIn’s jobs,” I mean the jobs that people/companies have paid to post on LinkedIn. I bring this up because there are other job postings you can find through LinkedIn that are free to post as well as jobs that are posted to the Internet – not LinkedIn. First, let’s look at what you can do with LinkedIn’s jobs:

When you’re looking at LinkedIn’s jobs, you can see the people who posted the job if they happen to be in your network. If there isn’t a name under the “Posted By” column, then you are not connected to the person who posted the job.

If you click on the name of the person who posted the job, you’ll see that you may have a number of options. You can see who in your network “knows” (or at least is connected to) the person who posted the job, you can request a referral from someone in your network who is connected to the job poster, you can check your connections within the company that’s posted the job, and you can also request an introduction by people in your network who currently work at the company that posted the job. All great features and options!

source: booleanblackbelt

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Recession Proof Jobs

Despite the news of job losses and unemployment numbers, there is indeed strong employment opportunity in selected parts of this economy. In fact several industry segments have actually continued to add jobs throughout this whole recession. Indeed the jobs data shows bright spots — expanding industries that promise new, stable career opportunities.

• Health care

Hiring has continued non-stop at hospital, medical clinics and doctors’ offices.

Jobs in demand: nurses, lab technicians, physician assistants.

• Government

Cities, counties and school districts continue to add a great number of jobs — seven times as many as the federal government.

Jobs in demand: educators, police, firefighters and workers connected to infrastructure such as roads.

• Energy

Oil, gas, coal and electricity production have kept adding jobs, although the pace has slowed since energy prices declined last year. City utility jobs have also continued to increase.

According to BLS data, about 4.4 million people got hired into new jobs in January (2009), and 3 million more openings were available. Granted, those numbers are down sharply from the start of the recession, but don’t let anyone tell you there are “no jobs.”

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source: The Good News Economist

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