Clarification from the agency

This position is being advertised under Direct-Hire Authority. Under this authority, competitive rating, ranking and veterans' preference procedures do not apply.

NOTE: This position serves as Chief of OSM's Strategic Planning Division (SPD), working under NTIA's Deputy Associate Administrator for Spectrum Planning and Policy to provide strategic and policy development for the agency's programmatic efforts to support U.S. economic and national security interests.

As a Supervisory General Engineer, you will perform the following duties:

• Provides overall authoritative leadership and direction for engineering efforts to achieve new and innovative capabilities. Initiates new projects or provides leadership for broad and complex programs/projects that are on the cutting edge of technology and that serve as models for other engineering programs. Serves as an authoritative resource on novel and challenging engineering problems, technical policy matters and latest developments.
• Communicates organizational updates and initiatives, ensuring alignment and consistent understanding across the team or
  division. Serves as a principal speaker or panel member in a wide variety of workshops, seminars, and conferences for trade and professional associations and interest groups to communicate the spectrum management and policy priorities and objectives.
  Participates in domestic or international meetings, conferences, and symposia of engineering and technical policy matters.
• Translates broad, general policies into specific policy direction and requirements for other organizational elements. Recommends and oversees appropriate technical (modeling/tool development) and policy improvements. Uses technical judgment and an understanding of national and international policies to recommend new or modified programs or the phasing out of old ones. Develops goals and objectives and advises management of relevant policy issues. Verifies that work plans adhere to policy, budget, and scheduling guidance provided by management.
• Prepares technical reports advocating for spectrum policy positions. Contributes to domestic and international policy development and advocacy. Coordinates with other federal agencies, private industry, and foreign administrations to resolve technical conflicts and ensure mission continuity.
• Plans work schedules, to ensure an even flow and distribution of work. Makes changes in organization of work or assignment of functions to positions to improve workflow and productivity Evaluates programs for progress against established goals and to identify potential problems and initiates, or recommends, as appropriate, corrective or preventive actions to avoid or minimize problems. Develops long range spectrum management plans with intermediate goals and resource requirements, taking into consideration financial and technical constraints. Develops operating plans, schedules and budgets for each assigned project or program.

Conditions of employment

• You must be a U.S. citizen to apply for this position.
• This position requires a SECRET CLEARANCE: Any required investigations and clearances must be completed before the selectee can be placed in the position.
• You must successfully pass a background investigation. This may include a credit check, a review of financial issues, as well as certain criminal offenses and illegal use or possession of drugs.
• A probationary period may be required.
• A supervisory probationary period may be required.
• Selective Service: Males born after 12/31/59 must be registered or exempt from Selective Service (see https://www.sss.gov/).
• If you receive a conditional offer of employment for this position, you will be required to complete an Optional Form 306, Declaration for Federal Employment, and to sign and certify the accuracy of all information in your application.
• All Federal employees are required to have Federal salary payments made by direct deposit to a financial institution of their choosing.
• Bargaining Unit Position: NO
• Confidential Financial Disclosure Report (OGE form 450): NO
• Permanent Change of Duty Station (PCS) Expense: WILL NOT be paid
• License required: NO
• Drug Test Required: YES, This position is subject to pre-employment drug testing and random drug testing thereafter.
• Recruitment Incentive may be offered (New Federal employees only)
• Relocation Incentive may be offered (Current Federal employees only)

Qualifications

Qualification requirements in the vacancy announcements are based on the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Qualification Standards Handbook, which contains federal qualification standards. This handbook is available on the Office of Personnel Management's website located at: https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/#url=Occupational-Series
Applicants must possess one year of specialized experience equivalent in difficulty and responsibility to the next lower grade level in the Federal Service. Specialized experience is experience that has equipped the applicant with the particular competencies/knowledge, skills and abilities to successfully perform the duties of the position. This experience need not have been in the federal government.

Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations e.g., professional; philanthropic, religious; spiritual; community, student, social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies; knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

To qualify at the GS-15 level, you must meet the following:

A. Degree: Engineering. To be acceptable, the program must: (1) lead to a bachelor's degree in a school of engineering with at least one program accredited by ABET; or (2) include differential and integral calculus and courses (more advanced than first-year physics and chemistry) in five of the following seven areas of engineering science or physics: (a) statics, dynamics; (b) strength of materials (stress-strain relationships); (c) fluid mechanics, hydraulics; (d) thermodynamics; (e) electrical fields and circuits; (f) nature and properties of materials (relating particle and aggregate structure to properties); and (g) any other comparable area of fundamental engineering science or physics, such as optics, heat transfer, soil mechanics, or electronics.

-OR-

B. Combination of education and experience -- college-level education, training, and/or technical experience that furnished (1) a thorough knowledge of the physical and mathematical sciences underlying engineering, and (2) a good understanding, both theoretical and practical, of the engineering sciences and techniques and their applications to one of the branches of engineering. The adequacy of such background must be demonstrated by one of the following:
1. Professional registration or licensure -- Current registration as an Engineer Intern (EI), Engineer in Training (EIT)1, or licensure as a Professional Engineer (PE) by any State, the District of Columbia, Guam, or Puerto Rico. Absent other means of qualifying under this standard, those applicants who achieved such registration by means other than a written test (e.g., State grandfather or eminence provisions) are eligible only for positions that are within or closely related to the specialty field of their registration. For example, an applicant who attains registration through a State Board's eminence provision as a manufacturing engineer typically would be rated eligible only for manufacturing engineering positions.
2. Written Test -- Evidence of having successfully passed the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE)2 examination or any other written test required for professional registration by an engineering licensure board in the various States, the District of Columbia, Guam, and Puerto Rico.
3. Specified academic courses -- Successful completion of at least 60 semester hours of courses in the physical, mathematical, and engineering sciences, including the courses specified in the basic requirements under paragraph. The courses must be fully acceptable toward meeting the requirements of an engineering program as described in paragraph A.
4. Related curriculum -- Successful completion of a curriculum leading to a bachelor's degree in an appropriate scientific field, e.g., engineering technology, physics, chemistry, architecture, computer science, mathematics, hydrology, or geology, may be accepted in lieu of a bachelor's degree in engineering provided the applicant has had at least 1 year of professional engineering experience acquired under professional engineering supervision and guidance. Ordinarily, there should be either an established plan of intensive training to develop professional engineering competence, or several years of prior professional engineering-type experience, e.g., in interdisciplinary positions. (The above examples of related curricula are not all-inclusive.)

-AND-

SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: You must possess one full year (52 weeks) of specialized experience equivalent to the GS-14 in the Federal service. Specialized experience is defined as:

• Managed or led a Science, Technology, Engineering or Multi-Disciplinary team within an agency or organization; AND
• Represented an agency or organization to a variety of stakeholders, i.e., senior leaders, international counterparts, or multi-lateral organizations; AND
• Served in a senior engineer or technical role as a subject matter expert in electromagnetic, including radio frequency (RF), spectrum; AND
• Developed implementing guidance for technically complex engineering spectrum-dependent systems, projects and programs designed to solve novel and challenging engineering management problems; AND
• Led or supported pilot projects, testbed initiatives, and proof-of-concept demonstrations to inform policy and engineering decisions.

How you will be evaluated

You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.

You will be evaluated based on how well you meet the qualifications listed in this vacancy announcement. Your qualifications will be evaluated based on your application materials (e.g., two-page resume, supporting documents), the responses you provide on the application questionnaire, and the result of the USA Hire assessment required for this position.

Overstating your qualifications and/or experience in your application materials or application questionnaire may result in your removal from consideration.

The assessments will evaluate you on the following general/technical competencies required to perform the job; please do not provide a separate written response:

• General Engineering
• Oral Communication
• Strategic Thinking
• Influencing/Negoitiating
• Planning/Evaluating

• Classified or government sensitive information
• Social Security Number (SSN)
• Photos of yourself
• Personal information, such as age, gender, religious affiliation, etc.