Researching Changing Career Field to Govt.

[GreenScoutII]

Well, I don't know anything about Federal law enforcement work. I will say I wouldn't mind working for the government though. I have had a similar thought, but for more selfish reasons. I'm tired of being laid off.

One would think the government, on either the state or federal level would need competant, licensed plumbers for maintenence and repair of their facilities.

I'm not sure who to ask or how to apply. Maybe I should do some homework.

Good luck on your endevor. I hope you find something you enjoy which will have meaning.

[iamhunter]

Well, I don't know anything about Federal law enforcement work. I will say I wouldn't mind working for the government though. I have had a similar thought, but for more selfish reasons. I'm tired of being laid off.

One would think the government, on either the state or federal level would need competant, licensed plumbers for maintenence and repair of their facilities.

I'm not sure who to ask or how to apply. Maybe I should do some homework.

Good luck on your endevor. I hope you find something you enjoy which will have meaning.

You'd be suprised, more often than not the government contracts that kind of work out....

your best bet is to find a contractor that gets alot of government work, or start your own contracting business, which is what I would suggest. Working for other people sucks.

[10x]

www.usajobs.gov has a listing of federal job openings by state. That might a place to start to see what interests you. Perhaps something in Homeland Security.
I worked for the Federal government right out of college. One thing I will tell you is that there is a lot of politics throughout. In a lot of agencies you are rewarded for the processs and not the result. You are rewarded for making the boss look good and not have something uncomfortable or controversial to deal with.

[Troublco]

www.usajobs.gov has a listing of federal job openings by state. That might a place to start to see what interests you. Perhaps something in Homeland Security.

USAJobs is the best place to start. I will say that the Federal jobs process is COMPLETELY different than on the outside. Civ resume is 1 or 2 pages. Government resume is as long as it takes to show everything they want. I mean multiple pages, 6 - 8 or more is not uncommon. Also, you need to tailor the contents of what you did for each job to be as close as you can to what the job description is without BS'ing. You need to be able to support what you say you did, but you need to have them be able to see the same things in your resume as are in the job announcement position description/duties/KSA's. (Knowledge, skills, and abilities.) There are software filters that sort out the 'chaff', so if you don't have key words and phrases that match you'll wind up in the recycle bin. The closer, the better. If you can look at things you've done and match them up to what they want, match up the wording too.

[SA Friday]

How old are you?
What's your prior and current work experience?
What education do you have?

I ask these questions, because they are not provided in the above and are the three main factors that will impact your possibility of getting picked up by a Fed LE agency. If you are over 46 years of age, forget it without enough experience they want to do an age waiver and it has to be a lateral from another Fed LE agency. Past work experience and education are the only things that are going to get you an interview. If you have a bachelors degree in basket weaving and been a local sheriff for the last 10 years, they might talk to you. You have a bachelors degree in public accounting and no LE experience, they might interview you if they are looking for fraud agents. You have an associates degree in (insert anything here) and no LE experience, the computer review will denote your application as non-qualified and you will get a "you are not qualified" bulk email response. A BS in a non LE major and no LE experience? Nope. There are too many applicants out there right now that are better qualified and Fed LE agencies all have different hiring criteria. For example, the FBI won't even look at you unless you have a BS in a major they want, at least two years LE street experience, and other experiences in your background that are very impressive. They had 250,000 applicants for their last bulk hiring of 3,000 just this year. Most other Fed LE agencies hire experienced agents from other agencies, but do hire a small amount of agents as long as they have the right educational requirements. Crim Justice, Pre Law, Criminalistics, Political Science, Public Accounting, Counterintelligence; these are the BS majors they are looking for. Then you have to pass the background investigation and psychological aspects of the hiring process. You can have a 'too perfect' psychological profile to be an agent. Fed agencies look for the profile of criminals that have high enough morals to not acually commit a crime.

Physically, you have to be 100% also, no getting around this especially if you are looking at going through an academy. If you can't make a 3 mile run, 50 push ups, 50 sit ups, then you are not ready for the academy.


If you have the basic qualifications but no LE experience, your best bet is getting picked up by one of the MCIO's (Military Criminal Investigation Org's). They are willing to put an inexperienced applicant through the training. AFOSI, NCIS, Army CID, DCIS. Next is Dept of Homeland Security; BATF, ICE, and some other secret squirrel offices. Then Dept of Treasury, Secret Service. FBI, Postal Inspectors, BLM, and DoT IG offices; will not hire without prior LE experience and prefer prior Fed experience 1811 laterals.

Be as positive as you want and as literate as your first post, and you probably won't get a single call. It's professional HR and Agents that review your package. They both get lied to more than any other jobs in the world. They want to see you qualify right off the bat. If you don't, they go to the next applicant in the stack. Ths stack of applications is very thick.

Asking for advice, but only positive advice instead of the bare bones truth is NOT what Fed agencies are looking for. I know. I have helped review these packages for hire for AFOSI when I was stationed at their Headquarters. There is a difference between the power of positive thinking and refusing to accept fact because you may not like it. One of the core requirements for a good agent is having to deal with the truth no matter if you like the truth or not.

[KFinn]

Wow... Thanks for all the replies so far. Let me try to cover a lot of them.

.....

Well here is the pisser.... mildly embarressing too but its just part of the course my life has taken.

I have no college degree, some college but life took an odd turn and didn't finish.

Now to the slightly better points. :-)
I am 26
I have worked at current company for 7.5 years in the corp envmt. Everything from Technical email response, CSC command center, Project manager for Software engineering dept.
Good Corp intrapersonal skills etc.
I have a tiny bit of well rounded things, some petty some not:
Hunters Ed/NRA basic pistol, CCW, grew up with guns
Amatuer radio license
Motorcycle Safety Foundation /MOST Certifications (Motorcycle instructor on the weekends)
Long ago in H.S. and college I completed all 4 semesters of the CISCO CCNA courses and passed. I however never went and tested to get the CISCO Cert that would have expired after 2 years anyway.

I plan to get CPR/First aid and PMP Certs in the next couple months as they are required for my two jobs.

....

As for USAJobs.gov..... Thanks, I've been looking there but again, if you don't know what types of positions exist that would fit the type of satisfaction I am looking for, its hard to search. But yes I was looking under Homeland and justice and such.

I had already ruled FBI due to req to relocate and Education. I think CIA has these reqs as well. But Whatever I do go for, I understand at best, it will be entry level.

Not sure what info I have left off or what questions I haven't replied but lets start with that.

Thanks again everyone, I really do appreciate this. Again I understand I am shooting long shots but that is why I am researching and gathering as much intel as I can before applying for anythign so I can present my best.

[Irving]

Why is a political science degree something that the FBI is looking for? Not to take this thread off track.

[SA Friday]

Why is a political science degree something that the FBI is looking for? Not to take this thread off track.

Counterintelligence and Counterterrorism offices within agencies. Politics is the heart of both of these aspects of Fed LE.

A few other BS's they might look that I just remembered are psychology and sociology, although they prefer psych degrees to be masters or PHD's.

[SA Friday]

Wow... Thanks for all the replies so far. Let me try to cover a lot of them.

.....

Well here is the pisser.... mildly embarressing too but its just part of the course my life has taken.

I have no college degree, some college but life took an odd turn and didn't finish.

Now to the slightly better points. :-)
I am 26
I have worked at current company for 7.5 years in the corp envmt. Everything from Technical email response, CSC command center, Project manager for Software engineering dept.
Good Corp intrapersonal skills etc.
I have a tiny bit of well rounded things, some petty some not:
Hunters Ed/NRA basic pistol, CCW, grew up with guns
Amatuer radio license
Motorcycle Safety Foundation /MOST Certifications (Motorcycle instructor on the weekends)
Long ago in H.S. and college I completed all 4 semesters of the CISCO CCNA courses and passed. I however never went and tested to get the CISCO Cert that would have expired after 2 years anyway.

I plan to get CPR/First aid and PMP Certs in the next couple months as they are required for my two jobs.

....

As for USAJobs.gov..... Thanks, I've been looking there but again, if you don't know what types of positions exist that would fit the type of satisfaction I am looking for, its hard to search. But yes I was looking under Homeland and justice and such.

I had already ruled FBI due to req to relocate and Education. I think CIA has these reqs as well. But Whatever I do go for, I understand at best, it will be entry level.

Not sure what info I have left off or what questions I haven't replied but lets start with that.

Thanks again everyone, I really do appreciate this. Again I understand I am shooting long shots but that is why I am researching and gathering as much intel as I can before applying for anythign so I can present my best.

Everything I underlined will benefit you. Everything in bold is irrelevent. The technical services aspect of LE is huge right now and degrees in computer sciences get looked at hard. Cyber crime is new and growing. The LE agencies are playing catch up in some aspects. The top of the heap in this area right now is AFOSI. The FBI and CIA came to us to figure cyber aspects out in their investigations a lot. A BS in computer security would get your foot in the door.

You will have to be willing to move. No getting around that and I forgot to post that before. The LE positions in the front range are limited and highly saught after in every agency. I worked as a Fed at both Buckley and Peterson and had contact with almost every Fed agency on the front range. Trust me here, the positions in every office are HIGHLY fought over.

[KFinn]

Everything I put in itallics will benefit you. Everything in bold is irrelevent.

When you quote someone it looks like it makes the entire quote in italics. I got the bold part as that did work. So did you really mean that every single thing not bolded is important?