IT Specialist

Clarification from the agency

ALL US CITIZENS DIRECT HIRE AUTHORITY: This position is being filled using Direct-Hire Authority (5 CFR 337.201) for this occupation. This position is not remote. OI&T operates multiple worksites, and selected individual(s) may be assigned to any federal government location. This announcement will not be used to change duty locations. Current OIT employees selected who are not on an approved exemption will continue reporting to their current duty station.

• Install, configure, update, maintain, customize, and support enterprise operating systems, hardware, system software, and vendor software in production environments.
• Formulate, maintain, and enforce system maintenance schedules and operational procedures required to sustain reliable production computing services.
• Manage system and server resources, including performance, capacity, availability, serviceability, and recoverability, and initiate corrective actions when requirements are not met.
• Troubleshoot, diagnose, and independently resolve complex operating-system, hardware, system-software, vendor-software, and production-application malfunctions.
• Plan, test, document, coordinate, and implement operating-system and vendor-software changes, patches, fixes, upgrades, and production installations using established change-management controls.
• Communicate complex technical information clearly and concisely to management, administrators, programmers, analysts, vendors, contractors, and users during planning, implementation, and troubleshooting.

This is a Bargaining Unit Position.

This position is primarily aligned to the following NICE Cybersecurity Workforce Framework work roles:

NCWF Code: 651 Category. Work in this category includes performing OPM GDS Cybersecurity Category / Specialty Area: Research and Development Specialist [SP-TRD-001] tasks, as defined by the NIST SP 800-181 National Cyber skills Workforce Framework (NCWF). Develops and maintains business, systems, and information processes to support enterprise mission needs; develops information technology (IT) rules and requirements that describe baseline and target architectures.

For more information about these work roles, where they fit within the larger Cyber Workforce, and how they can support your unique career journey, please visit the Cyber Career Pathways tool on the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Careers and Studies website: https://niccs.us-cert.gov/workforce-development/cyber-career-pathways

Work Schedule: Monday-Friday, 8 am-4:30 pm
Compressed/Flexible: Available at Supervisors discretion.
Telework: ADHOC, as determined by Agency Policy.
Virtual: This is not a virtual position.
Position Description/PD#: IT Specialist/PD20171A
Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not Authorized
Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized
PCS Appraised Value Offer (AVO): Not Authorized

Conditions of employment

• You must be a U.S. Citizen to apply for this job
• Selective Service Registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959
• Subject to background/security investigation
• May serve a probationary period.
• Physical Requirements: The work required does not inherently include any physical requirements essential for successful job performance that could not otherwise be performed with accommodation or workplace adjustment. A pre-placement physical examination is not required.
• A complete application package; Resume, SF-50s, etc.
• Only resumes up to TWO total pages will be accepted. Resumes must be legible so they can be reviewed for position requirements listed in the job announcement. File size must not exceed 5MB.

Selected applicants will be required to complete an online onboarding process. Acceptable form(s) of identification will be required to complete pre-employment requirements (https://www.uscis.gov/i-9-central/form-i-9-acceptable-documents).

Effective May 7, 2025, driver's licenses or state-issued dentification cards that are not REAL ID compliant cannot be utilized as an acceptable form of identification for employment.

As a condition of employment for accepting this position, you will be required to serve a 1-year probationary period during which we will evaluate your fitness and whether your continued employment advances the public interest. In determining if your employment advances the public interest, we may consider:

• your performance and conduct;
• the needs and interests of the agency;
• whether your continued employment would advance organizational goals of the agency or the Government; and
• whether your continued employment would advance the efficiency of the Federal service.

Upon completion of your probationary period, your employment will be terminated unless you receive certification, in writing, that your continued employment advances the public interest.

Qualifications

To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 10/09/2026.

You must meet the Basic Requirements (Individual Occupational Requirement), Specialized Experience, and the Selective Placement Factor to qualify for this series as described below.

Basic Requirements (Individual Occupational Requirement):

Applicants must have IT-related experience demonstrating each of the four competencies listed below at a proficiency level equivalent to the next lower grade level in federal service:

1. Attention to Detail - Is thorough when performing work and conscientious about attending to detail.
2. Customer Service - Works with clients and customers (that is, any individuals who use or receive the services or products that your work unit produces, including the general public, individuals who work in the agency, other agencies, or organizations outside the Government) to assess their needs, provide information or assistance, resolve their problems, or satisfy their expectations; knows about available products and services; is committed to providing quality products and services.
3. Oral Communication - Expresses information (for example, ideas or facts) to individuals or groups effectively, taking into account the audience and nature of the information (for example, technical, sensitive, controversial); makes clear and convincing oral presentations; listens to others, attends to nonverbal cues, and responds appropriately.
4. Problem Solving - Identifies problems; determines accuracy and relevance of information; uses sound judgment to generate and evaluate alternatives, and to make recommendations.

-AND-


Specialized Experience: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade, GS-12, in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Specialized Experience is defined as experience serving as a senior systems administrator, infrastructure administrator, technical lead, or subject matter expert responsible for the administration, sustainment, security, performance, and modernization of enterprise Linux operating systems and associated infrastructure in on-premises, hybrid-cloud, or multi-cloud environments. Qualifying experience must include independently installing, configuring, patching, upgrading, securing, troubleshooting, and optimizing Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) or equivalent Linux systems; administering Linux workloads and their associated compute, storage, networking, identity, monitoring, backup, and recovery services within AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, or comparable enterprise cloud platforms; managing system performance, capacity, availability, serviceability, and recoverability; planning, testing, implementing, documenting, and validating operating system, software, configuration, and production changes; developing or using automation and configuration-management technologies such as Ansible, Red Hat Satellite, shell scripting, Git-based repositories, or cloud-native automation services; implementing cybersecurity hardening, privileged-access controls, vulnerability remediation, security patching, and configuration compliance; diagnosing and resolving complex operating system, infrastructure, authentication, storage, networking, application-interface, and performance incidents; supporting disaster recovery, contingency, backup, restoration, and continuity-of-operations activities; developing technical standards, operating procedures, implementation plans, run-books, and system documentation; and providing authoritative technical guidance to administrators, engineers, application teams, cybersecurity personnel, contractors, vendors, customers, and management to evaluate complex requirements, mitigate operational and cybersecurity risk, and ensure the availability, security, reliability, performance, and recoverability of mission-critical enterprise Linux and cloud infrastructure.


-AND-

Selective Placement Factor: In addition to the minimum qualifications described above, you must meet the following requirement(s) to be considered qualified for the position: Direct, hands-on experience performing production-level Linux administration and engineering duties (not including application support, oversight-only, training, or certifications alone), where you independently managed, troubleshot, and maintained complex Linux environments in a business or operational setting and executed independent judgment, immediate operational contribution, and direct coordination with assigned customers and technical stakeholders.

PLEASE NOTE: General IT experience, Linux administration, application support, training, certifications, or oversight-only responsibilities are not sufficient substitutes for direct, production-level Linux administration and engineering experience. Applicants must clearly demonstrate qualifying experience in their resume by describing the duties personally performed, level of responsibility and independence, complexity and scale of the supported environment, and measurable results achieved. Merely listing technologies, certifications, training, or generalized familiarity will not satisfy the requirement. may be required to support planned or emergency maintenance, respond to production outages, participate in disaster-recovery activities, and perform occasional after-hours or on-call work

Evidence of the selective placement factor must be reflected in your resume.


For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

How you will be evaluated

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

Your qualifications will be evaluated based on your application materials (e.g., resume, supporting documents), your responses on the application questionnaire, and your responses to all assessments required for this position. You will be assessed on the following Competencies for this position:

• Accountability
• Attention to Detail
• Customer Service
• Decision Making
• Flexibility
• Influencing/Negotiating
• Integrity/Honesty
• Interpersonal Skills
• Learning
• Reading Comprehension
• Reasoning
• Self-Management
• Stress Tolerance
• Teamwork

USA Hire Assessments include a cut score based on the minimum level of required proficiency in these critical general competencies. You must meet or exceed the cut score to be considered. You will not be considered for the position if you score below the cut score or fail to complete the assessment.

Assessment Update Policy: Please be advised that once your application is submitted, the assessment responses cannot be revised or updated. The numerical rating (score) from your initial submission will be final and used for all rating purposes. You may, however, update your eligibility information and submit additional supporting documents (e.g., SF-50s) for this vacancy after your initial submission but BEFORE the closing date of the announcement.

Your experience must be fully documented on your resume and must include job title, duties, month and year start/end dates AND hours worked per week. A full year of work is considered to be 35-40 hours of work per week. Part-time experience will be credited on the basis of time actually spent in appropriate activities. Applicants wishing to receive credit for such experience must indicate clearly the nature of their duties and responsibilities in each position AND the number of hours a week spent in such employment.

IN DESCRIBING YOUR EXPERIENCE, PLEASE BE CLEAR AND SPECIFIC. WE WILL NOT MAKE ASSUMPTIONS REGARDING YOUR EXPERIENCE.

Overstating your qualifications and/or experience in your application materials or application questionnaire may result in your removal from consideration. Cheating on the online assessment may also result in your removal from consideration.

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; religions; 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.

During the application process you may have an option to opt-in to make your resume available to hiring managers in the agency who have similar positions. Opting in does not impact your application for this announcement, nor does it guarantee further consideration for additional positions.

Veterans and Transitioning Service Members: Please visit the VA for Vets site for career-search tools for Veterans seeking employment at VA, career development services for our existing Veterans, and coaching and reintegration support for military service members.

To apply for this position, you must provide a complete Application Package which includes:

• Resume

Beginning September 27, 2025, Federal agencies will only accept resumes up to two pages in length to comply with the Merit Hiring Plan. Resumes longer than two pages will result in ineligibility for further consideration for the position. USAJOBS will not allow you to upload or build resumes longer than two pages, and you will need to update the resumes in your profile before applying for a job. Resumes should include information relevant to the knowledge, skills, abilities, and competencies of the position to which you are applying. VA is unable to make assumptions about qualifications if not clearly listed.

Resumes must be legible so they can be reviewed for eligibility, minimum qualifications and other position requirements listed in the job announcement.

Resumes longer than two pages will result in ineligibility for further consideration for the position.

Your resume must be 5MB or less. We recommend saving and uploading your resume as a PDF to maintain formatting and number of pages. We also accept GIF, JPG, JPEG, PNG, RTF, TXT, PDF, ODT or Word (DOC or DOCX). We do not accept PDF portfolio files. We recommend using a sans-serif font size like Lato, if available. Other widely available options are Calibri, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, Open San Source Sans Pro, Roboto or Noro Sans. Make your page margins 0.5 inches. Consider using 14-point size font for titles and 10-point for the main text in your resume. The resume builder can help you create a resume using these recommendations and uses the information in your USAJOBS profile to help you get started.

Helpful Hints for Creating a Two-Page Resume:

• Prioritize most relevant and recent experience
• Use concise, results focused language
• Align language from the job announcement
• Focus on demonstrating skills and competencies
• Remove outdated or unrelated experience
• Use the USAJOBS resume builder

Additional guidance on this new requirement and resume building tools can be found at:

• https://help.usajobs.gov/faq/application/documents/resume/page-limit.

https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/hiring-information/merit-hiring-plan-resources/applicant-guidance-on-the-two-page-resume-limit/

Other accepted documents:

• Cover Letter
• Other (1)
• Performance Appraisal
• Resume
• Separation Notice (RIF)
• SF-50/ Notification of Personnel Action

If your application is rated as well-qualified (score 85 or above) and you are claiming special priority selection rights under the Interagency/Career Transition Assistance Program (I/CTAP) submit:

• a copy of your agency notice,
• a copy of your most recent performance rating, and
• a copy of your most recent SF-50, Notification of Personnel Action, noting your current position, grade level, and duty location.

Please review the above list(s) to ensure you have included all necessary documents required for your application. Not every applicant will require the same documents, therefore it is the applicants responsibility to ensure that their application package includes all necessary documents to determine qualifications and eligibility for appointment, such as a copy of your SF-50, transcript, ICTAP/CTAP documentation (for displaced Federal employees). Applicants will be deemed ineligible if supporting documentation is not submitted. You will not be contacted for additional information.

Veterans' Preference: Since the Direct-Hire Recruitment Authority is being used, traditional Veterans' Preference rules do not apply. Qualified veterans will, however, be given full consideration for this position.

It is the policy of the VA to not deny employment to those that have faced financial hardships or periods of unemployment.

Special Employment Consideration: VA encourages persons with disabilities to apply, including those eligible for hiring under 5 CFR 213.3102(u), Schedule A, Appointment of persons with disabilities [i.e., intellectual disabilities, severe physical disabilities, or psychiatric disabilities], and/or Disabled veterans with a compensable service-connected disability of 30% or more. Contact the Agency Contact for information on how to apply under this appointment authority via the Selective Placement Coordinator.

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