Sooner or later, just about every office is touched by a death in the family of a staff member. My Aug. 8 column provided tips on how to handle this type of sad situation. Here are more tips: • Express sympathy only if you are certain a colleague has already been informed of his loss. You could, for example, learn of your colleague’s loss before he does if you receive the news via a potentially fast information channel, such as Facebook, rather than a slower and more formal information channel that is carrying the news to him. Deaths that occur…
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What should you do when one of your colleagues has a death in their family? My personal experiences following my own losses and the experiences of bereaved feds with whom I have worked have taught me much about how to respond sensitively and helpfully to a colleague’s loss. The first thing to remember is that the period following a loss is usually a pivotal time for a bereaved person; your response to a colleague’s loss during this period may leave a deep, indelible impression on him. One fed put it this way: “A death in the family rearranges your Rolodex.…
So you landed a job interview. Congratulations! You probably beat out dozens, or hundreds, of competitors to rank among the best and the brightest. So go ahead and savor your victory, crank up the soundtrack to “Chariots of Fire” and run some victory laps around your cube. Then, start preparing for your interview. The paradox of practice: The more you prepare and practice for job interviews, the more spontaneous and intelligent you will probably sound. To prepare: Anticipate likely questions. Ask trusted advisers to help you do so, and Google “common interview questions.” Also, consider what the likely challenges of…
President Obama’s directive to improve federal hiring processes instructs managers to increase their input into the selection of new hires. One way for managers to do so is by improving their ability to interview job applicants. Some tips: Prepare. In order to design relevant questions that will reveal a job applicant’s strengths, you must understand your job opening, the applicant’s credentials and your selection criteria. So don’t recycle old, outdated job descriptions for your opening. Instead, take a fresh look at the opening by analyzing the tasks it will require, the credentials needed to fulfill those tasks, how you want…
If you have a mentor, remember that the only payback he receives for helping you is your gratitude and the knowledge that his advice has helped you in some way. To put it in street language: Nobody owes you nothing. You should effusively thank your mentors whenever they extend themselves for you. But even though your mentor deserves credit and gratitude for any of your successes that he helped catalyze, he does not deserve blame if any leads or advice he provides fail to pan out. It is your decision whether and how to follow up on your mentor’s suggestions,…
About one year ago, President Obama ordered improvements to federal recruitment and hiring processes. So how much progress have agencies made? First, some good news: • Many agencies have eliminated those odious KSA (knowledge, skills and abilities) essay questions from job applications. • Agencies now hire 42 percent of new employees within the 80-day time limit imposed by Obama. • Many agencies are posting shorter and clearer job applications. • A program for increasing the hiring of veterans was created. Now, some bad news: Much room for improvement remains, say many current job-seekers. Obama’s May 11, 2010, memo directed hiring…
Even though federal pay scales will remain frozen at least through the end of next year, you may still climb the federal career ladder or gain the qualifications to do so. Some strategies for moving up: • Despite the pay-scale freeze, you are still eligible for step increases that are typically awarded to successful feds every one, two or three years, depending on their current step. • If you are in good standing, ask your boss for a merit-based quality step increase. If he denies your request, ask him what you would have to do to earn such a promotion.…
Whether or not your boss requests from you a list of your achievements before he prepares your annual evaluation, you should submit one. Without your list, your boss will probably be more likely to accurately and completely remember what he achieved in sixth grade than what you achieved six months ago. How to convey your achievements in impressive terms: Begin with a concise description of your achievements; how your responsibilities increased; how you went the extra mile; obstacles you conquered, and any other overarching themes for the year. Use bullets, and start each bullet with an action verb — such…
The time to build your professional network is before you need it. Once you need help, it may be too late to find allies who are ready, willing and able to provide it. Among the tools that can help you grow your network is LinkedIn. com — a free, searchable database of professionals in virtually every field. Use LinkedIn to connect with current and former contacts, the contacts of your contacts and so on — just as you may use in-person opportunities to generate such connections. Also, use LinkedIn to initiate contact with strangers with whom you share common ground;…
If you are a supervisor, should you or shouldn’t you telecommute? The first question to ask is whether you trust your staff to keep working when you are out of the office. Think about whether your staffers maintain their productivity when you are on leave. If you don’t trust your staff to keep working, consider taking training for managers on leadership skills or on teleworking, which are already offered by some agencies and may soon be offered by other agencies under the new Telework Enhancement Act, which is designed to increase teleworking by feds. Such training may provide you with…