Clarification from the agency

Current Smithsonian Institution Internal Employees/Agency Employees Only may apply including current Smithsonian Institution employees with Federal career/career-conditional status or eligibility. More than one selection may be made from this announcement.

The General Engineer acts both as a principal advisor to the Deputy Director CMD and other members of the executive leadership of the Institution on all matters related to construction management program initiatives for the physical plant and as the supervisor to staff within the Construction Management Division.

In this position, you will:

• Provides technical expertise and advice concerning all construction management matters.
• Ensures there are adequate control systems established, implemented, and evaluated to monitor expenses of the construction management initiatives and services.
• Advises and counsels employees about communications and work related matters.
• Oversees the development and implementation of new concepts, theories, systems, and methods to improve the quality and effectiveness of operations.

Conditions of employment

• Requires career/career-conditional status or eligibility.
• Males born after 12/31/59 must be registered with Selective Service.

Conditions of Employment

Qualification requirements, including one year time-in-grade at the next lower grade level for promotion candidates, must be met within 30 days of the job announcement closing date. See the 'Required Documents' section for additional information.

For information on qualification requirements, see Qualification Standards Handbook for General Schedule Positions viewable on OPM Website.

Qualifications

You must meet these Basic Education Requirements: (You must submit a copy of your transcript to show evidence of meeting this requirement in order to receive further consideration)

1. 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

1. 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:
2. 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 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.
3. Written Test -- Evidence of having successfully passed the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE)2 examination or any other written test required for professional 1 For more information about EI and EIT registration requirements, please visit the National Society of Professional Engineers website at: http://www.nspe.org. 2 The FE examination is not administered by the U. S. Office of Personnel Management. For more information, please visit: http://www.nspe.org/Licensure/HowtoGetLicensed/index.html. 2 registration by an engineering licensure board in the various States, the District of Columbia, Guam, and Puerto Rico.
4. Specified academic courses -- Successful completion of at least 60 semester hours of courses in the physical, mathematical, and engineering sciences and that included the courses specified in the basic requirements under paragraph A. The courses must be fully acceptable toward meeting the requirements of an engineering program as described in paragraph A.
5. 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.)

In addition to the basic qualification requirement above:

Experience: You qualify for this position if you have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GS-14 level in the Federal Service.  For this position specialized experience is defined as providing technical support, oversight and direction on the Smithsonian Institution’s construction management program initiatives which includes planning, design and construction of major and other revitalization, exhibits, maintenance and Smithsonian Enterprises projects; experience in conflict resolution and negotiation activities associated with the administration, execution, and inspection of multi-million-dollar complex projects in cultural facilities that are historic in nature; and experience supervising construction projects with budgets exceeding $75 million.

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.

Part-time and/or unpaid experience related to this position will be considered to determine the total number of years and months of experience. Be sure to note the number of paid or unpaid hours worked each week.

Special Instructions for Foreign Education: If you are qualifying by education and/or you have education completed in a foreign college/university described above, it is your responsibility to provide transcripts and proof of U.S. accreditation for foreign study. For instructions on where to fax these documents, see the "Required Documents" section of this announcement.

Time-in-Grade Requirements: Under competitive merit promotion procedures, any individual who is currently holding, or who has held within the previous 52 weeks, a General Schedule position under a non-temporary appointment in the competitive or excepted service, must meet "time-in-grade" requirements (have served 52 weeks at the next lower grade of the grade for which you are applying).

How you will be evaluated

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

Your application will be evaluated first for the basic qualifications described above. The applications that meet the basic qualifications will be evaluated further against the following criteria:

1. Ability to provide executive direction to a team of professionals with various disciplines.
2. Skill in managing constrained resources, such as contracts, finances, staff, and information systems by applying contracting policies and procedures (Federal, State, etc.).
3. Ability to communicate in writing to produce policies, procedures, guidelines, contract specifications and technical reports.
4. Ability to direct major architectural/ engineering projects (new construction and major renovations) from inception to completion and evaluation with multidisciplinary teams.

Important Note:

Your resume and supporting documentation will be compared to your responses to the occupational questionnaire or other assessment tool for consistency. If a determination is made that you have rated yourself higher than is supported by your resume, you will be assigned a rating commensurate to your described experience. Your resume should provide detailed information regarding how your education and experience relate to this position, including the major duties and qualifications criteria listed.