Your steps to apply
Contract Specialist
Executive Director, Office of Acquisition, Logistics and Construction · Vallejo, California and 5 more · Closes in 2 days
Sign in to save your progress. Free, with just your email. You can read all the steps without an account.
1 Check you can apply You are here
Who can apply: Career transition (CTAP, ICTAP, RPL), The public.
Open to U.S. citizens, nationals, and people who owe allegiance to the U.S. Displaced federal employees may also get priority under career transition programs (CTAP, ICTAP, RPL).
Experience: For the GS-14 level, you need 1 year of specialized experience equal to GS-13 work. Examples include leading contract negotiation teams for architect-engineer and construction projects, or interpreting procurement laws to solve unusual contracting issues. The announcement also lists 4 years of contracting experience, with at least 1 year at the next lower level, under the requirements for GS-13 and above.
Education: A 4-year bachelor's degree with at least 24 semester hours in accounting, business, finance, law, contracts, purchasing, economics, industrial management, marketing, quantitative methods, or organization and management. Education cannot replace experience at this grade. Only degrees from schools recognized by the U.S. Department of Education count.
Licenses and certifications:
- Active Federal Acquisition Certification in Contracting (FAC-C) Professional at the time of application
Experience can be paid or unpaid, volunteer work included: if it matches the duties, it counts. The full rules are in the announcement.
2 Resume and documents
Write a federal resume for this job. For each job you held, give the month and year you started and ended, your hours per week and what you did, using the words of the experience the announcement asks for. Many announcements accept resumes of up to 2 pages: check this one.
3 Apply on USAJOBS
Closes in 2 days (November 5, until 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time).
You sign in to USAJOBS with a Login.gov account, answer the questionnaire and upload your documents, then you submit. Answer the questionnaire honestly: your resume must show what you claim.
How they rate you: You are rated on how well you meet the qualifications, based on your application, occupational questionnaire and online assessment. Applicants are referred in the order received, and missing information may lower your rating or make you ineligible.
4 After you apply
In USAJOBS, under Applications, you can see where your application stands: received, reviewed, referred to the hiring manager or not, then selected or not. It can take a few weeks.
For the interview, prepare three examples with the STAR method: the Situation, the Task, what you did (Action) and the Result.
If they choose you: a tentative offer, then a background check, then the final offer with your start date.
Tips for this job:
- Make sure your FAC-C is active when you apply, because applicants without it are found ineligible.
- Describe your experience clearly and specifically, with dates and hours per week, since the agency will not assume anything.
- Complete both the occupational questionnaire and the online assessment before the closing date, because the job requires all steps.
Kandidatu is an independent website: only the official posting counts. Read it before you apply.