SUPERINTENDENT, OPTICAL SCIENCES DIVISION Job in Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC

Vacancy No. DE-12401554-24-RBS Department Office of Naval Research
Salary $193,819.00 to $221,900.00 Grade 00 to 00
Perm/Temp Permanent FT/PT Full-time
Open Date 5/1/2024 Close Date 5/31/2024
Job Link Apply Online Who may apply Public
Locations:
Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC


Job Description (Please follow all instructions carefully)

Summary

You will serve as the Superintendent, Optical Sciences Division, Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC.

The Optical Sciences Division is concerned with discovering and understanding the basic physical principals and mechanisms involved in optical devices and phenomena; extending this understanding to advanced operational techniques and engineering devices, subsystems and systems; and exploiting the research and development for optical solutions of military problems.

Duties

  • You will be responsible for the conception, planning and formulation of the scientific program of the Division in pursuance of the needs of the Navy and national defense.
  • You will provide comprehensive scientific and technical leadership of the Division, including fiscal integrity and administrative operations.
  • You will define research goals, budgetary requirements, and resources for a staff of approximately 130 personnel including scientists, engineers, technicians and administrative professionals.
  • You will plan, direct, and regularly review the prosecution of broad programs in the optical sciences, which includes formulating and developing innovative scientific and technology program proposals in optical sciences research.
  • You will be a recognized authority in the field of optical sciences and, serve as scientific consultant to the Navy, other departments of the Government, and leading universities in matters related to optical sciences.
  • You will represent NRL in matters pertaining to research and development in optical sciences and make arrangements for cooperative research with other government agencies or laboratories where it is beneficial to the nation.

Requirements

Conditions of Employment

  • Must be a US Citizen.
  • Must be determined suitable for federal employment.
  • Must participate in the direct deposit pay program.
  • New employees to the Department of the Navy will be required to successfully pass the E-Verify employment verification check. To learn more about E-Verify, including your rights and responsibilities, visit e-verify.gov
  • You will be required to complete ethics orientation within three months of appointment and submit a Public Financial Disclosure Report, OGE-278e within 30 days of appointment.
  • You will be required to sign the Reassignment Rights and Obligations Agreement as a condition of appointment into the SES in accordance with DoD Directive 1403.03.
  • Within the Department of Defense (DoD), the appointment of retired military members within 180 days immediately following retirement date to a civilian position is subject to the provisions of 5 United States Code 3326.
  • Males born after 12-31-59 must be registered for Selective Service.
  • May be required to successfully complete a 1-year SES probationary period.
  • You will be required to obtain and maintain an interim and/or final security clearance prior to entrance on duty. Failure to obtain and maintain the required level of clearance may result in the withdrawal of a job offer or removal.
  • Successful completion of a pre-employment drug test (including marijuana) is required. A tentative offer of employment will be rescinded if you fail to report to the drug test appointment or fail the test. You will be subject to random testing.
  • This position may require travel from normal duty station to CONUS and OCONUS and may include remote or isolated sites. You must be able to travel on military and commercial aircraft for extended periods of time.
  • Supervisors in the executive branch have a heightened personal responsibility for advancing government ethics. You will be required to review the 14 General Principles of Ethical Conduct at 5 CFR 2635.101.
  • This position is considered Key/Emergency-Essential. You will be required to provide immediate and continuing support to ensure the success of combat operations or the availability of combat-essential systems.

Qualifications

QUALIFICATIONS REQUIREMENTS: Applicants will be assessed against qualifications which fall into two areas: Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) and Mandatory Technical Qualifications (MTQs). Failure to provide a separate narrative statement which describes fully and concisely how your experience meets the competencies described in the Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) and Mandatory Technical Qualifications will eliminate you from consideration.

EXECUTIVE CORE QUALIFICATIONS: You will be assessed against the Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs).They are designed to assess executive experience and potential - not technical expertise. They measure whether you have the broad executive skills needed in a variety of senior executive positions. Failure to meet a qualification requirement will disqualify an applicant. (Each must be addressed separately in your Supplemental Narrative Statement. The ECQs must not exceed 10 pages.)

More information on these core qualifications are available at http://www.opm.gov/ses/recruitment/ecq.asp

The ECQs describe the leadership skills needed to succeed as an SES; they also reinforce the concept of an "SES corporate culture." Refer to the OPM Guide to SES Qualifications for specific information and guidance on the ECQ requirements, the C-C-A-R model, and examples of good qualifications statements at the website: http://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/senior-executive-service/reference-materials/guidetosesquals_2012.pdf

(Note: Current career Senior Executive Service (SES); former career Senior Executive Service (SES) who are reinstatement-eligible; and graduates of OPM-certified Candidate Development Programs are not required to address the ECQs, but must address the Mandatory Technical Qualifications.)

1) Leading Change: This core qualification involves the ability to bring about strategic change, both within and outside the organization, to meet organizational goals. Inherent to this ECQ is the ability to establish an organizational vision and to implement it in a continuously changing environment.
2) Leading People: This core qualification involves the ability to lead people toward meeting the organization's vision, mission, and goals. Inherent in this ECQ is the ability to provide an inclusive workplace that fosters the development of others, facilitates cooperation and teamwork, and supports constructive resolution of conflicts.
3) Results Driven: This core qualification involves the ability to meet organizational goals and customer expectations. Inherent in the ECQ is the ability to make decisions that produce high- quality results by applying technical knowledge, analyzing problems, and calculating risks.
4) Business Acumen: This core qualification involves the ability to manage human, financial, and information resources strategically.
5) Building Coalitions: This core qualification involves the ability to build coalitions internally and with other Federal agencies, state and local governments, nonprofit and private sector organizations, foreign governments, or international organizations to achieve common goals.

MANDATORY TECHNICAL QUALIFICATIONS: (Each must be addressed separately in your Supplemental Narrative Statement. Each MTQ must not exceed 2 pages.)

1. Demonstrated competence in optical science and technologies that provide a broad and comprehensive knowledge and significant insight on problems of basic and applied research in optical devices and phenomena.

2. Ability to formulate and develop innovative scientific and technology program proposals in optical sciences research and "market" these proposals to sponsoring activities or executive level management. Included in this is the ability to gain acceptance of and execute highly complex technical programs.

Additional qualification information can be found from the following Office of Personnel Management website:
https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/#url=GS-PROF
and
08XX Professional Engineering Series
1310 Physics Series
1320 Chemistry Series

Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (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.

Education

Applicants must meet the following Basic Requirements of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Qualifications Standards Manual:

For 08XX Professional Engineering Series:
A. Degree: Engineering. Successful completion of a bachelor's or higher engineering degree from an accredited college or university. 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. Such education must demonstrate the knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary to do the work of the position.
-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:
(I) Professional registration or licensure -- Current registration as an Engineer Intern (EI), Engineer in Training (EIT), 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; or
(II) Written Test -- Evidence of having successfully passed the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) 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; or
(III) 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; or
(IV) 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.)


OR

For 1310 Physics Series:
A. Successful completion of a degree in physics; or related degree that included at least 24 semester hours in physics;
-or-
B. Combination of education and experience demonstrated by courses equivalent to a major in physics totaling at least 24 semester hours, plus appropriate experience or additional education.
In either A or B above, the courses must have included a fundamental course in general physics and, in addition, courses in any two of the following: electricity and magnetism, heat, light, mechanics, modern physics, and sound.

OR

For 1320 Chemistry Series:
A. Degree: physical sciences, life sciences, or engineering that included 30 semester hours in chemistry, supplemented by course work in mathematics through differential and integral calculus, and at least 6 semester hours of physics.
-or-
B. Combination of education and experience -- course work equivalent to a major as shown in A above, including at least 30 semester hours in chemistry, supplemented by mathematics through differential and integral calculus, and at least 6 semester hours of physics, plus appropriate experience or additional education.

An advanced degree of Master's or Ph.D. in one of the educational fields listed above is highly desirable.

Additional information

This position is in the Senior Executive Service (SES), a small elite group of top government leaders. SES members possess a diverse portfolio of experiences including strong skills to lead across organizations. As an executive, you will influence the direction of innovation and transformation of the federal government and lead the next generation of public servants.

Veteran's preference does not apply to the Senior Executive Service.

This position is not covered by the Department of Defense Priority Placement Program.

Additional vacancies may be filled by this announcement.

A tentative offer of employment will be rescinded if the selectee fails to meet the pre-employment requirements, including failure to report to any of the scheduled appointments.

Federal annuitant information: The selection of an annuitant is subject to the Department of Defense and Department of the Navy policy on the employment of annuitants. Policy information may be found at: http://www.secnav.navy.mil/donhr/Documents/CivilianJobs/FedCivAnnuitants.pdf.

Certain incentives (such as Recruitment, Relocation or Student Loan Repayment) may be authorized to eligible selectees.

A relocation incentive is generally a single payment intended to offset some of the relocation costs experienced by the selectee. A relocation incentive may be authorized.

Benefits

A career with the U.S. government provides employees with a comprehensive benefits package. As a federal employee, you and your family will have access to a range of benefits that are designed to make your federal career very rewarding. Opens in a new windowLearn more about federal benefits.

Review our benefits

Eligibility for benefits depends on the type of position you hold and whether your position is full-time, part-time or intermittent. Contact the hiring agency for more information on the specific benefits offered.

How You Will Be Evaluated

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

Applicants that meet the basic qualifications requirements will be evaluated based on the quality and extent of their experience, training, and/or education indicated on their resume and the qualification responses described in the separate narrative statement. Resumes will be evaluated by a rating and ranking panel, and highly qualified candidates may be invited to participate in a structured interview. The Ad-hoc Executive Resources Board (AERB) will review results and make recommendations on final selections to the approving authority.

If selected, you may be required to provide supporting documentation.

All qualifications requirements must be met by the closing date of this announcement.

Required Documents

You are required to provide documentation that supports the eligibility and qualification claims made in your resume and assessment questionnaire. You must submit the applicable documents listed here and those listed with the eligibilities you select in the announcement questionnaire with your application package. Applicants who do not provide supporting documentation that fully support their claims will not be referred to the hiring manager. Cover letter is optional.

A complete resume is required. Your resume must show relevant experience, job title, duties and accomplishments. Your resume must show complete information for each job entry to support minimum qualifications. The following information should be provided in your resume, but it is acceptable to provide elsewhere in your application package: employer's name, starting and end dates (Mo/Yr), hours per week, and pay plan, series and grade level (e.g. GS-0201-09) for relevant federal experience.

Separate narrative statements are required. Your narrative statement must address the Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) and Mandatory Technical Qualifications (MTQs) listed above.

Are you a current or former SES Career employee appointed under Title 5 U.S.C. 3393? You must include a copy of your SES Career appointment personnel action or SF-50.

Are you a graduate of an OPM-certified SES Candidate Development Program? You must provide a copy of your certificate of completion.

Are you claiming membership in any professional organizations, or possession of a license, certificate or credentials? Check the Conditions of Employment section above to see if any are required. If you claim membership, license, certification, or credentials, you must submit a copy of said document in your application package.

Is there a basic education requirement for this position? Are you using education as a substitute for some or all of the experience requirement? Check the Education section above to see what is allowed and what is required. Any claims you make in your resume or assessment questionnaire regarding education or degrees MUST be supported by submitting with your application official or unofficial transcripts or a list of courses, grades earned, completion dates, and quarter and semester hours earned issued from your school. While unofficial transcripts are acceptable for initial application, an official transcript will ultimately be required if you are selected for the position. You may submit a copy your degree(s) if specific coursework does not have to be verified.

Are you an active duty service member? Active Duty Service Members are required to submit a statement of service printed on command letterhead and signed by the command. The statement of service must provide the branch of service, rate/rank, all dates of service, the expected date of discharge and anticipated character of service (Honorable, General, etc.).

Documents submitted as part of the application package, to include supplemental documents, may be shared beyond the Human Resources Office. Some supplemental documents contain personal information such as SSN and DOB and some documents such as military orders and marriage certificates may contain personal information for someone other than you. You may sanitize these documents to remove said personal information before you submit your application. You must provide an un-sanitized version of the documents if you are selected.

How to Apply

Click the Apply Online button to create an account or log in to your existing USAJOBS account.

To apply for this position, you must provide a complete Application Package which includes:
1. Complete resume with relevant experience, job title, duties and accomplishments. Your resume must show complete information for each job entry to support minimum qualifications. The following information should be provided in your resume, but it is acceptable to provide elsewhere in your application package: employer's name, starting and end dates (Mo/Yr), hours per week, and pay plan, series and grade level (e.g., GS-0201-09) for relevant federal experience.
2. Complete assessment questionnaire. For a quick preview of the assessment questionnaire click here: https://apply.usastaffing.gov/ViewQuestionnaire/12401554
3. Supporting documentation

Failure to submit a complete application package will result in an ineligible rating and loss of consideration.

Your complete application (resume, assessment questionnaire, and all supporting documents) must be received by 11:59 pm Eastern Standard Time (EST) on 05/31/2024. Applications received after 05/31/2024 will generally result in an ineligible rating and loss of consideration. If more than one resume is received, only the last resume received and processed will be reviewed.

Note: To check the status of your application or return to a previous or incomplete application, log into your USAJOBS account: https://mydon.usajobs.gov/Account/Login select Application Status, and click on the more information link under the application status for this position. Your uploaded documents may take several hours to clear the virus scan process so please plan appropriately.

You are encouraged to apply online. Applying online will allow you to review and track the status of your application.

Do not email or send hard copy resumes/applications to the Contact Information or Agency Information listed in this vacancy announcement. All resumes/applications received at the addresses listed in the Contact Information or Agency Information will be destroyed and will not be considered for this vacancy announcement.

It is the applicant's responsibility to verify that all information in their resume and documents are legible and accurate. HR will not modify answers/documents submitted by an applicant.

Agency contact information

Dept of the Navy Executive Hiring

Address

NAVAL RESEARCH LABORATORY
4555 Overlook Avenue SW
Washington, DC 20375-5324
US
Learn more about this agency

Next steps

When the application process is complete, your complete application (resume, assessment questionnaire, and all supporting documents) will be reviewed to determine if you meet the hiring eligibility and qualification requirements for which you requested consideration. You will be rated based on the information provided in your resume and responses to the questionnaire, along with your supporting documentation to determine your level of knowledge, skill, and ability related to the job requirements.

Generally, only best qualified candidates will be referred to the hiring manager. Sometimes well qualified andminimally qualified candidates are referred. Occasionally, candidates eligible for priority consideration are referred, and no other candidates are referred.

The hiring manager may choose to conduct interviews.

You will be notified of our rating and referral decision. If you are referred, you will be notified when a hiring decision is made.


Note: We cannot accept applications on behalf of Federal Agencies. Application instructions are listed within the Job Description.