Information Technology Specialist (APPSW)

Clarification from the agency

Open to Career/Career Conditional Employees Government-wide, including IRS and Non-IRS employees. Open to Treasury and IRS CTAP; Interagency ICTAP; Former Federal Employees with Reinstatement eligibility; Land & Base Management; Military Spouses; 30% or more disabled Veterans, Veterans Employment Opportunities Act (VEOA), Veterans' Recruitment Authority (for grades GS-11 & Below), Other Interchange Agreements, and Individuals with Disabilities Schedule A.

The following are the duties of this position at the full working level. If this vacancy includes more than one grade and you are selected at a lower grade level, you will have the opportunity to learn to perform these duties and receive training to help you grow in this position.

• Design, develop, test, deploy, and maintain secure application components that support IRS business and mission needs. Analyze and refactor codebases to derive undocumented requirements, modernizearchitecture, and align systems with current frameworks, accessibility and security standards.
• Work across multiple software layers and languages, including front-end, Application ProgrammingInterface (API), service, and data layers, potentially spanning multiple products.
• Collaborate across one or more delivery teams with technical and non-technical stakeholders to clarifyrequirements, triage issues, validate implementation plans, and ensure technical cohesion and consistentstandards across the enterprise.
• Participate in incident response and support operations, including proactive identification and correction ofsoftware defects through code inspection, telemetry analysis and log review. Conduct root-cause analysisand implement corrective actions to prevent recurrence.
• Solicit, refine, and document functional and technical requirements, and maintain reusable technicalpatterns, architectural decisions, and troubleshooting playbooks to support knowledge sharing across teams.

Conditions of employment

Qualifications

Federal experience is not required. Experience may have been gained in the public sector, private sector or through Volunteer Service. One year of experience refers to full-time work; part-timework is considered on a prorated basis. To ensure full credit for your work experience, please indicate dates of employment by month/day/year, and indicate number of hours worked per week, on your resume.

You must meet the following requirements by the closing date of this announcement.

QUALIFICATION REQUIREMENTS: To qualify for this position, you must meet the qualification requirements outlined below:

Basic Qualifications
Basic requirements, all grades. Applicants must have Information Technology related experience demonstrating each of the following four competencies: 1) Attention to Detail, 2) Customer Service, 3) Oral Communication, and 4) Problem Solving.

In addition to meeting the basic requirement above, to qualify for this position you must also meet the qualification requirements listed below:

Specialized Experience GS-13 Level: In addition to meeting basic requirements, to be eligible for this position at this grade level, you must have one (1) year of specialized experience at a level of difficulty and responsibility equivalent to the GS-12 grade level in the Federal service, specialized experience includes:
Independently applying IT principles, concepts, methods, and practices to plan, analyze, implement, maintain, troubleshoot, or enhance IT systems, services, hardware, software, applications, interfaces, scripts, or related technology environments. Performing computer projects, operational, or application-related assignments involving IT requirements and techniques, including resolving technical issues; validating system, application, or code testing and configuration; preparing technical documentation; and applying federal cybersecurity, privacy, or regulatory requirements. Working directly with customers, stakeholders, users, and technical teams to define business or technical requirements, advising on feasible IT approaches, and implementing secure, reliable, scalable IT solutions, including application enhancements where applicable. Assessing system, service, or application performance, availability, reliability, usability, and operational effectiveness; identifying risks, recurring issues, or defects; and recommending or implementing corrective actions consistent with established policies and procedures. Analyzing multiple technical alternatives and advising management or IT specialists on the selection, configuration, implementation, or improvement of IT solutions, including application components where applicable, to support mission and operational requirements.

• Applying software engineering principles, methods and practices to design, develop, modernize, integrate, test or maintain software applications and systems to analyze and resolve technical issues and improve IT systems and processes.
• Developing, integrating or supporting front-end, back-end, API, cloud-based, or enterprise application solutions using programming languages, frameworks and development tools.
• Applying software engineering, system development life cycles (SDLC), Agile, DevOps or CI/CD methodologies along with AI-powered tools, to improve development velocity, automate documentation, and increase overall engineering productivity.
• Evaluating and implementing emerging technologies, including cloud-based architecture, containerization, infrastructure-as-code, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) assisted development.
• Applying secure coding principles, cybersecurity requirements, technical standards or compliance requirements during software development, implementation or maintenance activities.
• Developing or implementing technical guidance, procedures or solutions related to software engineering, application modernization, systems integration or IT service delivery.
• Supporting IT software development projects by assisting with planning activities, defining milestones and deliverables, monitoring progress and communicating information or recommendations to customers, stakeholders and team members.
• Applying project management principles, methods, and practices including developing plans and schedules, identifying resource requirements, reporting project status and providing training to support IT projects or initiatives.
• Communicating technical information both orally and in writing to technical and non-technical audiences

AND

You must also meet the following requirement(s):

• PERFORMANCE RATING: Current federal employees must have at least a fully successful or equivalent performance rating to receive consideration.
• TIME AFTER COMPETITIVE APPOINTMENT (TACA): By the closing date (or if this is an open continuous announcement, by the cut-off date) specified in this job announcement, current civilian employees must have completed at least 90 days of federal civilian service since their latest non-temporary appointment from a competitive referral certificate, known as time after competitive appointment. For this requirement, a competitive appointment is one where you applied to and were appointed from an announcement open to "All US Citizens"
• TIME IN GRADE (TIG): Federal employees must meet time-in-grade requirements. For positions above the GS-05,applicants must meet applicable time-in-­grade requirements to be considered eligible. One year (52 weeks) at the next lower grade level is required to meet the time-in-grade requirements for the grade you are applying for. For positions at the GS-05, you cannot advance to the GS-05 if you have held a GS-02 in the past 52 weeks. There is no TIG restriction for GS-02, 03, or 04 positions.

For more information on qualifications please refer to OPM's Qualifications 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. Applicants who disqualify themselves will not be evaluated further.

You will be assessed on the following competencies (knowledge, skills, abilities, and other characteristics):

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

The USA Hire Assessments includes 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.

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

Rating: Your application will be evaluated in accordance with the Service's Merit Promotion Plan. A quality group rating will be used to rank and select eligible candidates. If qualified, you will be assigned to one of three quality level groups, Superior/Best Qualified, Highly Qualified and QualifiedCategory rating will be used to rank and select eligible candidates.

Referral: Eligible applicants rated in the highest quality group, may be referred to a selecting official for consideration.

Candidates, if required to participate in a selection interview (telephonic and/or in person at the discretion of the Selecting Official in accordance with hiring practices), will be interviewed in quality group order. We will not reimburse costs related to the interview such as travel to and from the interview site.

If you are a displaced or surplus Federal employee (eligible for the Career Transition Assistance Plan (CTAP)/Interagency Career Transition Assistance Plan (ICTAP), you must receive a rating of Highly Qualified orbetter to be rated as "well qualified" to receive special selection priority.

If you are selected, you may be subject to all requirements listed in the Requirements, Qualifications, and Additional Information sections of this announcement which includes, Prior Employment/Tax Checks, Fingerprint/Criminal History checks.

The following documents are required and must be provided with your application. All application materials, including transcripts, must be in English.
Incomplete or insufficient information may result in not being considered for the position or not receiving special consideration for which you may be eligible.
Please view Application Preparation or How to write a resume for federal job.

1. Resume
… Your resume should:

• Be limited to two (2) pages. Applicants with resumes exceeding two-pages will be removed from consideration. We recommend utilizing a standard 8.5x11-inch document size, a sans-serif font such as Arial or Calibri with a font size no smaller than 10-point for the main text, and page margins of 0.5 inches. Applicants that attempt to circumvent the 2-page limit page limit, for example by materially reducing readability, will be deemed ineligible. If you update your application, only the most recent resume received (uploaded under the "Resume" document type) will be considered to determine qualifications.
• Include your name and contact information.
• Include relevant work experience - Employer Name, Job Title, Employment dates (start to end date or present), number of hours worked per week, and a brief description of duties that clearly demonstrate your qualifications. To receive full credit for work experience, you must include specific MM/DD/YYYY start and end dates for every position.
• Include pay plan, series, and grade (e.g., GS-0301-09) for all federal service jobs.
• Not include photographs, classified or sensitive information, SSN, encrypted/digitally signed documents, or other inappropriate content. Resumes containing prohibited information will be deemed ineligible.
• Not include embedded links as they will not be opened or considered when determining qualifications.
• Not include personal information such as age, sex, religion, race, or disability.
• Not include specialized experience copied from the announcement or position description, as this is not a demonstration of your experience.

2. Education (if applicable) - Refer to Qualification and Education sections above for requirements

• For positions with an education requirement, or if you are qualifying for this position based on education or training, submit a copy of your transcript(s) or equivalent. An official transcript(s) will be required if you are selected.

3. Registration/License (if applicable) - Refer to Qualification sections above for requirements

4. Performance Appraisal/Awards (required for current federal employees)

• Submit the most recent completed annual performance appraisal.
• Submit copies of any incentive/performance awards received that may have an impact on the qualifications for the position to be filled.

5. Veteran or qualifying family members

• MUST submit a DD-214 (Member 4 copy), that shows dates and character of service (honorable, general, etc.). If you are serving on active duty and expect to be released or discharged within 120 days you must submit documentation related to your service which includes your rank, dates of service, character of service, and dates of impending separation.
• 10-point preference eligible - Submit an Application for 10-point Veteran Preference, SF-15, along with the required documentation listed on the back of the form if you are a 10-point preference eligible. For more information on claiming veterans' preference view here.
• Military Spouses - In addition to the documentation above you must also submit:
  • Verification of the marriage to the service member (i.e., a marriage license) AND
  • A copy of your spouse's active military orders OR Documentation of Service Connected Disability OR Death while on active duty (DD-1300/Death Certificate)

6. Career Transition Assistance Plan (CTAP) or Interagency Career Transition Assistance Plan (ICTAP) (if applicable) Selection priority program for displaced or surplus federal employees:

• Review and submit the required documentation as outlined under CTAP/ICTAP

7. IRS Reassignment Preference Program (RPP) (if applicable)

• Submit your RPP Notice and most recent performance appraisal.
• Appraisal must reflect Fully successful or higher overall rating.

8. Current and Former Federal Employees Documentation (if applicable)

• You MUST submit a copy of your most recent SF-50 (Notification of Personnel Action) (or equivalent) which shows your current grade and competitive service status, and Tenure.
• Provide an SF-50(s) (or equivalent) which demonstrates you meet the 52-week time-in-grade requirement (e.g., Promotion with an effective date more than one (1) year old, Within-Grade-Increase at the highest grade held).

9. Schedule A Appointing Authority for People with Certain Disabilities

• Submit a Disabilty Letter from your doctor or a licensed medical professional that proves your eligibility for Schedule A appointment.

Next steps

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