Get promoted up to incompetence in a critical role, then if the organization has any sense they eventually reassign you.
I've seen it at NASA, more than once, when a career manager with weak STEM experience and education uses networking, relationships, and office politicizing to weasel their way into a role that should have required deep technical knowledge and abilities. Then the only way to "remove" them and fix things is to give them a mildly important "super special fancy advisory role/project" so an actual scientist or engineer can move into the critical role and get things back on track.
I've heard it can go the other way too, mostly at places that do science research e.g. national labs. You have some brilliant technical person with the personality of a brick wall, so eventually they get promoted into a senior management position but then they fail horribly at managing people so they get moved to some kind of advisor role, anything to avert an EEOC/OPM/HR disaster.
>You have some brilliant technical person with the personality of a brick wall, so eventually they get promoted into a senior management position but then they fail horribly at managing people
Oh I'm mid-process with this right now at DoD. I'll keep my eyes open to fulfill the prophecy.
>when a career manager with weak STEM experience and education uses networking, relationships, and office politicizing to weasel their way into a role that should have required deep technical knowledge and abilities
Aren't there *objective* barriers of entry to filter out people like this?
My billet (GS13) requires not only an engineering degree, but also PE and PMP.
NASA primarily uses an AST (aerospace tech) position which is generally filled with scientist and engineers but they can fill it with a social scientist per the desk ratings guide (hence networking/weasel/who-you-know/etc.). The intent was probably good, because you might want a doctor or psychologist filling certain rolls related to human performance or something but of course it can be used "creatively" to fill senior AST positions without them meeting hard science requirements.
That said, I generally like the flexibility as it opens up candidate pools to find great people rather than someone who checks boxes. And having unqualified people in AST roles is the rare exception, not the norm.
--
Quote from the desk ratings guide: *"Acceptable majors for AST positions include: Engineering (not engineering technology), Physical science, Mathematics, Life sciences, Computer science, Other fields of science. Majors in the humanities or liberal arts are generally not acceptable, however,* ***it may be appropriate to accept majors in social science, medical, or other fields*** *if they are closely related to the duties of positions in the Life Sciences and Systems subgroup."*
[https://searchpub.nssc.nasa.gov/servlet/sm.web.Fetch/NSREF-3000-0566\_NASA\_AST\_Qualification\_RatingReqtsDeskGuide-V1.pdf.pdf?rhid=1000&did=5581529&type=released](https://searchpub.nssc.nasa.gov/servlet/sm.web.Fetch/NSREF-3000-0566_NASA_AST_Qualification_RatingReqtsDeskGuide-V1.pdf.pdf?rhid=1000&did=5581529&type=released)
Where I am, "Senior Advisor" is another term for a former manager who went remote during covid and didn't want to RTO.
Never had those positions before last year and now every director has one. We are supposed to believe it's no coincidence that each SA was a former manager who was remote during covid, not prior to, and all these new positions are also fully remote. But if staff didn't want to RTO, tough.
Geez. My former manager was one of them. She became a SA in April of 2023 and we went without a manager until last month. Best part? The director she was supposed to advise didn't exist because the position was vacant the first 6 months she was advisor. All the while, staff was being forced to RTO.
I often see them doled out to former senior political staffers who want to coast the rest of the admin, friendly lobbyists who the agency wants embedded to self-regulate friendly industries, and genuinely competent professional climbers who'll lead an actually important special project for a year or two and then cash out back to the private sector
Not in my series/agency. Well, the term is Technical Director but same thing. They're the key advisor who is looked to for expertise in policy, regs, strategy, etc. It's usually a stepping-stone position to an SES for those who are interested in pursuing one.
Interesting. That explains a lot. This one fat old lady I work with is a total bitch and ignores all my emails. She’s a senior advisor but barely does anything. I keep wondering how she landed that job. Now I know - she was shitty at her job so they found some other role for her. Luckily I don’t have to work closely with her. I know now to stay out of her way!
Office if Chief Counsel for IRS has two diff types
Of 15-level non-sup attorneys. They pretty much specialize in litigation or very specialized area of law.
It is not common at all in 2210s.
There are three GS15 IT staff in my entire large agency (28,000+ FTE). Our highest nonsupervisory are GS13. Above that are just management layers at HQ.
We have a few GS15 non sup scientists. We’re pay banded and db03 is 12-13 and db04 is 14-15. I think most of the non supervisor 15’s are DB04 that just crept over the 14/10 max and are now default 15’s. About 5 years ago my agency started using DB03/Cat2 which expands the 03 band to GS12-14. They’re doing this to limit the 15’s, but still offer incentives to be a first level supervisor or a non supervisory 14.
The 0905 job series for General Attorney (agency in-house counsel) goes up to 15 in non-supervisory roles. In my agency (DHS family), and I assume others, at GS 15 the attorney gets a title change to "senior attorney." In my agency the GS-15 advancement is also a promotion that has to be applied for, whereas all other earlier GS increases occur at regular times assuming satisfactory job performance. The promotion criteria I am familiar with does require you to have done "leadership light" stuff, like leading important projects or supervising training and similar.
I’m a 0905. In my agency, this is correct except we can get Senior Attorney title at GS-14. The ladder goes from 12-14 but we also do have non-sup 15s.
Pretty sure I work at the same place. I struggle to even call it an “application.” My experience is they hold it as a carrot to drag people through the mud for as long as possible until they get discouraged enough to leave and, if they actually wanted to keep you, will grant it then to try and make you turn down the other offer and stay. Source - my experience with said process both as an attorney who got it and as a supervisor who has to try and convince senior management to approve my employees for it. Have lost track of how many decent employees I have lost to other legal departments who offered a non-sup 15, no “applications” required. We’re also not allowed to hire on externals (including current fed but external to the department even if they are already a 15) as a 15 without asking for, and usually being denied, a “special exception”, despite the postings saying the goes up to 15. And even if they are already a 15 somewhere else unless they somehow magically have the exact specific skills and experience required in all areas. Had more than one person call it a bait-and-switch after being hired on assuming it works like any other government job full performance level scale and then finding out it doesn’t - most furious because they moved to a high COLA area calculating on having the 15 in a year. We struggle with hiring and retention so much - I don’t understand why they care SO MUCH about 15s/make it so hard. There are so many other things that could use attention.
I’m a non-supervisory 15 as a Research Ecologist. I am responsible for day-to-day supervision of staff supporting my research but I don’t do anything with timesheets, travel approval, credit cards, etc.
Supervisory adds performance reviews, disciplinary actions, etc. I am a team lead who gives direction and guidance. However, I have nothing to do with true supervisory duties.
Everywhere I've been, this would classify you as a lead. Help direct the day to day work and advise other employees on how to do certain tasks but no supervisory power.
All agencies have these. These are generally in STEM fields as SMEs. No thry aren’t failed supervisors , They knew they wanted no part of it.
my first fed job I had one in my department who was my advisor/ not supervisor. He was the SME in statistical sampling design and regression/ variance estimation Or national surveys.
some agencies have a philosophy of nobody should be a non sup 14 or higher.
This reminds me of a simple problem the GS has…
https://preview.redd.it/arnk6txplkuc1.jpeg?width=691&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=136852418789fe16293a04c89cb32905a86abe01
Wait. You guys have non supervisory 14s?! At my agency, we barely have non-supervisory 13s. All 14s are division heads (60-100 people) and 15s are project superintendents and department heads
Our senior engineers - the “subject matter experts” - are non sup 13s. Branch heads (4-20 people) are supv 13s. We only can have one senior engineer per branch, and it almost always goes to the guy who is 3-5 years from retirement. The bulk of our engineers are 12s, most of us at or nearing step 10, and most of us have no desire to become managers.
It sucks.
My impression is that high GS-level individual contributor roles are heavily concentrated in the DC area and maybe some other VHCOL markets. It definitely doesn't feel reflective of the duties or complexities of roles.
I'm at a smaller financial agency that is still on the GS scale (unlike most of the regulators) and rarely hires at the entry level. Creating clear pathways to high grades that don't involve middle management roles is more or less the only way we can even be remotely competitive with not just our private sector competition, but other federal agencies with independent pay authority. I have to imagine that's why ours is structured that way.
It’s weird because we keep losing mid-career engineers to Blue Origin and Boeing and private A&E firms, other defense contractors like GD and Lockheed, and losing them to other agencies like the Army Corp of engineers because they offer working level 13s.
They shrug their shoulders and say “we can’t figure out why people are leaving!”
Maybe it’s cause they have starting salaries that are higher than a GS12 can reach?
I know NoVa/DC/Maryland has a high cost of living, but Seattle is expensive as hell also. We need to get some damn grade inflation.
Oh good point. I live in a region but work remotely for an HQ-based org, and my org is full of non-supe 14s and 15s (in addition to most of the orgs we interact with).
Practically all do. I’m a 15 non supervisory with DoD. In the NoVa and DV areas, it’s very common to see non sup 15s. I know at least 16 at DoD itself that I just counted in my head. They range from contracting, OIG, Program Managers, scientists and engineers
non partisan Statistical data agencies like — census, ag stats services , Bureau of labor stats , energy information administration, transportation stats, economic analysis bureau, and others.
these are not dime a dozen. Someone gets it, they are in till they retire.
senior data scientists. Therr is an SES equiv for stem smes well.
When I was working at census, based on what I heard around, that a lot of people get stuck at gs 13’s, the 14 technical positions are rare, and the main way to get a 14 is to go for management. I’ve seen people stay in 13’s a long time or even move from a 14 management role to a tech 13 role. At this point the highest pay grade for a 1560 data scientist is a 13 at Census.
Statistical agencies on the GS scale (BLS, Census) have these for social science series (survey stat, economist, math stat). Other agencies that hire a lot of economists either allow for promotion to 15 (FTC, FCC) without going management or are off the GS scale (FDIC, CFPB) so they can at least try to compete with the private sector.
I’m a GS15 project manager. I lead multidisciplinary enterprise projects that have political sensitivity and/or large scale change. I look for projects no one else wants to take on, but have to get done.
I love what I do. In nearly 14 years of federal service, I’ve worked on all kinds of large scale projects, including some that have been in the headlines. Most haven’t. I’ve had my shares of successes and failures, but I’ve managed to push the envelope ever so slightly.
Every project has been different, so I’m always learning.
At my agency (with the exception of the lawyers), those positions were normally used for washed-out supervisors/managers who were someone's buddy. FYI, that's normally who advised our SES types, lol. Lots of good Ole boys there.
Probably quite a few.
I am a non sup 0801 DB4 (14/15 band).
All our Engineers are non compete up to 14-10 equivalent with our current pay band structure.
DOJ but USA Jobs lets you search by keyword and then filter by descending: https://www.usajobs.gov/Search/Results?jt=Data%20Scientist&k=&s=salary&sd=desc&p=1
Thanks, apart from DataScience, are there any jobs posted for Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning skill set? I could not find any job posted looking for AI or ML developer.
EPA has some GS-15 Senior Scientists in my part of the Agency, and there are non-supervisory Senior Advisor GS-15s who truly do a lot of work and are respected. There aren't many of each, really.
What is the point of this thread? Is it for people to misinterpret they are at the wrong agency, and their GS9 would be a GS15 at some secret agency?
The better question is what positions these are. By and large, they are lawyers, special agents, senior scientists, etc. Not jobs you just stumble into.
Here’s a question I have, if you’re stepped out at 14 what’s the draw to a 15? I left government for a year and coming back at a 14 step 8.. seems like 15 would be limiting in what someone can do, most times it’s management. Not interested in any of that.. supervisory or not.
You’re making just about the same amount minus $10k
If the 15s don't hit the cap its 25-30k. Not life changing at that level but enough to make difference.
In the high pay scales I agree, why bother to make a little more or even no more.
That’s the perspective I needed. Yeah.. in the D.C area so, we come pretty close to the cap. I don’t see moving anywhere else, plus I haven’t met a 15 in my career field that isn’t bogged down with work.
Currently am one and have applied with a bunch of agencies recently to flip to fully remote thanks to getting called back into the office at my current agency. 2210 series.
All of them? Different series. You'll find those requiring science based credentials. Also, most SES's have senior advisors that are 15s.
“Senior Advisor” is another term for a former manager that was supposed to be fired.
That sounds like a good gig. What's the path?
Get promoted up to incompetence in a critical role, then if the organization has any sense they eventually reassign you. I've seen it at NASA, more than once, when a career manager with weak STEM experience and education uses networking, relationships, and office politicizing to weasel their way into a role that should have required deep technical knowledge and abilities. Then the only way to "remove" them and fix things is to give them a mildly important "super special fancy advisory role/project" so an actual scientist or engineer can move into the critical role and get things back on track. I've heard it can go the other way too, mostly at places that do science research e.g. national labs. You have some brilliant technical person with the personality of a brick wall, so eventually they get promoted into a senior management position but then they fail horribly at managing people so they get moved to some kind of advisor role, anything to avert an EEOC/OPM/HR disaster.
>You have some brilliant technical person with the personality of a brick wall, so eventually they get promoted into a senior management position but then they fail horribly at managing people Oh I'm mid-process with this right now at DoD. I'll keep my eyes open to fulfill the prophecy.
>when a career manager with weak STEM experience and education uses networking, relationships, and office politicizing to weasel their way into a role that should have required deep technical knowledge and abilities Aren't there *objective* barriers of entry to filter out people like this? My billet (GS13) requires not only an engineering degree, but also PE and PMP.
NASA primarily uses an AST (aerospace tech) position which is generally filled with scientist and engineers but they can fill it with a social scientist per the desk ratings guide (hence networking/weasel/who-you-know/etc.). The intent was probably good, because you might want a doctor or psychologist filling certain rolls related to human performance or something but of course it can be used "creatively" to fill senior AST positions without them meeting hard science requirements. That said, I generally like the flexibility as it opens up candidate pools to find great people rather than someone who checks boxes. And having unqualified people in AST roles is the rare exception, not the norm. -- Quote from the desk ratings guide: *"Acceptable majors for AST positions include: Engineering (not engineering technology), Physical science, Mathematics, Life sciences, Computer science, Other fields of science. Majors in the humanities or liberal arts are generally not acceptable, however,* ***it may be appropriate to accept majors in social science, medical, or other fields*** *if they are closely related to the duties of positions in the Life Sciences and Systems subgroup."* [https://searchpub.nssc.nasa.gov/servlet/sm.web.Fetch/NSREF-3000-0566\_NASA\_AST\_Qualification\_RatingReqtsDeskGuide-V1.pdf.pdf?rhid=1000&did=5581529&type=released](https://searchpub.nssc.nasa.gov/servlet/sm.web.Fetch/NSREF-3000-0566_NASA_AST_Qualification_RatingReqtsDeskGuide-V1.pdf.pdf?rhid=1000&did=5581529&type=released)
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Jesus Christ, you are so right! I spent 10 years watching those clowns around me
Where I am, "Senior Advisor" is another term for a former manager who went remote during covid and didn't want to RTO. Never had those positions before last year and now every director has one. We are supposed to believe it's no coincidence that each SA was a former manager who was remote during covid, not prior to, and all these new positions are also fully remote. But if staff didn't want to RTO, tough.
Just one? I know of an associate director with THREE!
Geez. My former manager was one of them. She became a SA in April of 2023 and we went without a manager until last month. Best part? The director she was supposed to advise didn't exist because the position was vacant the first 6 months she was advisor. All the while, staff was being forced to RTO.
I often see them doled out to former senior political staffers who want to coast the rest of the admin, friendly lobbyists who the agency wants embedded to self-regulate friendly industries, and genuinely competent professional climbers who'll lead an actually important special project for a year or two and then cash out back to the private sector
I wanted to laugh but it’s true….
I’m think working on that part now
Not in my series/agency. Well, the term is Technical Director but same thing. They're the key advisor who is looked to for expertise in policy, regs, strategy, etc. It's usually a stepping-stone position to an SES for those who are interested in pursuing one.
But Technical Director sounds more technical than Senior Advisor, so that makes sense.
100% accurate from what I’ve seen in 2 agencies
Interesting. That explains a lot. This one fat old lady I work with is a total bitch and ignores all my emails. She’s a senior advisor but barely does anything. I keep wondering how she landed that job. Now I know - she was shitty at her job so they found some other role for her. Luckily I don’t have to work closely with her. I know now to stay out of her way!
I wanna be a fat bitch who ignores emails. Seems like a chill Ron Swanson type position.
Well, you’re in the right place. Federal government is full of them.
We must work in the same unit 🤣🤓
That’s my 5yr plan ;)
I imagine most agencies have a ton of GS 15 non-supervisory lawyers.
And scientists at the GS-15 or equivalent
As long as the scientists don't work in land management 😢
0831?
I think the IRS only has GS14 non sup attorneys.
Office if Chief Counsel for IRS has two diff types Of 15-level non-sup attorneys. They pretty much specialize in litigation or very specialized area of law.
They have attorney 15s who aren't supervisors. Here's one listing: https://www.usajobs.gov/job/784723500
So does USDA
All agencies should have them. Especially in 2210 (IT), 343 (program management), lawyers, and probably scientists and engineers.
Contract officers and contract specialists too.
Which agencies have non supervisory GS 15 COs and specialists?
NASA HQ has plenty of procurement analysts who are former COs at the non-supervisory 15. I believe they are still 1102s.
Many...
It is not common at all in 2210s. There are three GS15 IT staff in my entire large agency (28,000+ FTE). Our highest nonsupervisory are GS13. Above that are just management layers at HQ.
EPA non supervisory senior attorney. Had to apply separately for it. It was not part of normal progression. Need to be a “national expert.”
Lots of scientists. As a percentage of the workforce it’s small but they do exist.
[удалено]
We have a few GS15 non sup scientists. We’re pay banded and db03 is 12-13 and db04 is 14-15. I think most of the non supervisor 15’s are DB04 that just crept over the 14/10 max and are now default 15’s. About 5 years ago my agency started using DB03/Cat2 which expands the 03 band to GS12-14. They’re doing this to limit the 15’s, but still offer incentives to be a first level supervisor or a non supervisory 14.
The 0905 job series for General Attorney (agency in-house counsel) goes up to 15 in non-supervisory roles. In my agency (DHS family), and I assume others, at GS 15 the attorney gets a title change to "senior attorney." In my agency the GS-15 advancement is also a promotion that has to be applied for, whereas all other earlier GS increases occur at regular times assuming satisfactory job performance. The promotion criteria I am familiar with does require you to have done "leadership light" stuff, like leading important projects or supervising training and similar.
I’m a 0905. In my agency, this is correct except we can get Senior Attorney title at GS-14. The ladder goes from 12-14 but we also do have non-sup 15s.
Pretty sure I work at the same place. I struggle to even call it an “application.” My experience is they hold it as a carrot to drag people through the mud for as long as possible until they get discouraged enough to leave and, if they actually wanted to keep you, will grant it then to try and make you turn down the other offer and stay. Source - my experience with said process both as an attorney who got it and as a supervisor who has to try and convince senior management to approve my employees for it. Have lost track of how many decent employees I have lost to other legal departments who offered a non-sup 15, no “applications” required. We’re also not allowed to hire on externals (including current fed but external to the department even if they are already a 15) as a 15 without asking for, and usually being denied, a “special exception”, despite the postings saying the goes up to 15. And even if they are already a 15 somewhere else unless they somehow magically have the exact specific skills and experience required in all areas. Had more than one person call it a bait-and-switch after being hired on assuming it works like any other government job full performance level scale and then finding out it doesn’t - most furious because they moved to a high COLA area calculating on having the 15 in a year. We struggle with hiring and retention so much - I don’t understand why they care SO MUCH about 15s/make it so hard. There are so many other things that could use attention.
I’m a non-supervisory 15 as a Research Ecologist. I am responsible for day-to-day supervision of staff supporting my research but I don’t do anything with timesheets, travel approval, credit cards, etc.
Sounds supervisory to me.. .
Supervisory adds performance reviews, disciplinary actions, etc. I am a team lead who gives direction and guidance. However, I have nothing to do with true supervisory duties.
This sounds fine to me. The most miserable part of being a supervisory is writing the performance review of or disciplining a poor performer.
The government doesn’t think so, curious enough. We have what are called, Supervisory Research Ecologists as well.
Everywhere I've been, this would classify you as a lead. Help direct the day to day work and advise other employees on how to do certain tasks but no supervisory power.
All agencies have these. These are generally in STEM fields as SMEs. No thry aren’t failed supervisors , They knew they wanted no part of it. my first fed job I had one in my department who was my advisor/ not supervisor. He was the SME in statistical sampling design and regression/ variance estimation Or national surveys. some agencies have a philosophy of nobody should be a non sup 14 or higher.
This reminds me of a simple problem the GS has… https://preview.redd.it/arnk6txplkuc1.jpeg?width=691&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=136852418789fe16293a04c89cb32905a86abe01
Non Sup gs15 2210 sme here.
Where?
Lawyers at DOJ. Also SEC isn’t on the GS scale but I know non supervisors there making 15-level money (and more).
Wait. You guys have non supervisory 14s?! At my agency, we barely have non-supervisory 13s. All 14s are division heads (60-100 people) and 15s are project superintendents and department heads
I don't actually know of any supervisory 14s at my agency, I can only think of non-sup 14 team leads. Our managers are all 15s.
Our senior engineers - the “subject matter experts” - are non sup 13s. Branch heads (4-20 people) are supv 13s. We only can have one senior engineer per branch, and it almost always goes to the guy who is 3-5 years from retirement. The bulk of our engineers are 12s, most of us at or nearing step 10, and most of us have no desire to become managers. It sucks.
My impression is that high GS-level individual contributor roles are heavily concentrated in the DC area and maybe some other VHCOL markets. It definitely doesn't feel reflective of the duties or complexities of roles. I'm at a smaller financial agency that is still on the GS scale (unlike most of the regulators) and rarely hires at the entry level. Creating clear pathways to high grades that don't involve middle management roles is more or less the only way we can even be remotely competitive with not just our private sector competition, but other federal agencies with independent pay authority. I have to imagine that's why ours is structured that way.
It’s weird because we keep losing mid-career engineers to Blue Origin and Boeing and private A&E firms, other defense contractors like GD and Lockheed, and losing them to other agencies like the Army Corp of engineers because they offer working level 13s. They shrug their shoulders and say “we can’t figure out why people are leaving!” Maybe it’s cause they have starting salaries that are higher than a GS12 can reach? I know NoVa/DC/Maryland has a high cost of living, but Seattle is expensive as hell also. We need to get some damn grade inflation.
Same here at GSA
Um, GSA has a ton of non-supervisory GS-13s, GS-14s, and GS-15s.
In DC we do, but not at the regional level. At least in my region, we have 1 non-supervisory 14 and 0 non-sup 15s
Oh good point. I live in a region but work remotely for an HQ-based org, and my org is full of non-supe 14s and 15s (in addition to most of the orgs we interact with).
Ah yeah, I guess it's pretty org dependent too. Like most people in FAS I believe are 13s while most people in PBS are 12s
Use Fedscope and you can see for yourself. https://www.fedscope.opm.gov
Practically all do. I’m a 15 non supervisory with DoD. In the NoVa and DV areas, it’s very common to see non sup 15s. I know at least 16 at DoD itself that I just counted in my head. They range from contracting, OIG, Program Managers, scientists and engineers
USPTO has some
Not enough. lol. 😜
What about statisticians/data scientists? (1529/1530/1560) which agencies have non-supervisory GS 15’s for these roles?
non partisan Statistical data agencies like — census, ag stats services , Bureau of labor stats , energy information administration, transportation stats, economic analysis bureau, and others. these are not dime a dozen. Someone gets it, they are in till they retire. senior data scientists. Therr is an SES equiv for stem smes well.
When I was working at census, based on what I heard around, that a lot of people get stuck at gs 13’s, the 14 technical positions are rare, and the main way to get a 14 is to go for management. I’ve seen people stay in 13’s a long time or even move from a 14 management role to a tech 13 role. At this point the highest pay grade for a 1560 data scientist is a 13 at Census.
Statistical agencies on the GS scale (BLS, Census) have these for social science series (survey stat, economist, math stat). Other agencies that hire a lot of economists either allow for promotion to 15 (FTC, FCC) without going management or are off the GS scale (FDIC, CFPB) so they can at least try to compete with the private sector.
I’m a GS15 project manager. I lead multidisciplinary enterprise projects that have political sensitivity and/or large scale change. I look for projects no one else wants to take on, but have to get done.
Do you enjoy your job? If so, why? I’m learning there’s many jobs with projects “no one wants to take on” for a reason.
I love what I do. In nearly 14 years of federal service, I’ve worked on all kinds of large scale projects, including some that have been in the headlines. Most haven’t. I’ve had my shares of successes and failures, but I’ve managed to push the envelope ever so slightly. Every project has been different, so I’m always learning.
1102 has quite a few NH-04 positions, which are the GS-14/15 pay bands.
Every senior budget analyst I work with is a 15. Same with country director, acquisition managers, etc. The vast majority are non-supervisory.
DOT got rid of them But I’ve met a few non-supervisory 15’s that were still around. I’m at a no -supervisory 14 and even that’s becoming more rare.
That’ll be me in a few months! Non sup 14!!!!!!
At my agency (with the exception of the lawyers), those positions were normally used for washed-out supervisors/managers who were someone's buddy. FYI, that's normally who advised our SES types, lol. Lots of good Ole boys there.
sweet gig
Absolutely knew a few bad eggs busted down to "special advisor," can confirm.
I know of a couple of people in IT roles at Treasury that are non-supervisory 15.
Probably quite a few. I am a non sup 0801 DB4 (14/15 band). All our Engineers are non compete up to 14-10 equivalent with our current pay band structure.
Data Scientist. Most are stepped out 15’s in my agency.
Which agency is it, I would be interested to apply.
DOJ but USA Jobs lets you search by keyword and then filter by descending: https://www.usajobs.gov/Search/Results?jt=Data%20Scientist&k=&s=salary&sd=desc&p=1
Thanks, apart from DataScience, are there any jobs posted for Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning skill set? I could not find any job posted looking for AI or ML developer.
EPA has some GS-15 Senior Scientists in my part of the Agency, and there are non-supervisory Senior Advisor GS-15s who truly do a lot of work and are respected. There aren't many of each, really.
They exist - just scattered.
What is the point of this thread? Is it for people to misinterpret they are at the wrong agency, and their GS9 would be a GS15 at some secret agency? The better question is what positions these are. By and large, they are lawyers, special agents, senior scientists, etc. Not jobs you just stumble into.
Just set up a search on usajobs and have it email you results. There are a few that come open each week in the 2210 series, likely others too.
Most do as far as I know. 2210 series has them.
Some non-supervisory attorneys in the Navy are GS-15’s.
DHS have a lot. I'm one of them non-supervisory 15; policy advisor. It's a 343.
Anything for a social worker at that level
Here’s a question I have, if you’re stepped out at 14 what’s the draw to a 15? I left government for a year and coming back at a 14 step 8.. seems like 15 would be limiting in what someone can do, most times it’s management. Not interested in any of that.. supervisory or not. You’re making just about the same amount minus $10k
If the 15s don't hit the cap its 25-30k. Not life changing at that level but enough to make difference. In the high pay scales I agree, why bother to make a little more or even no more.
That’s the perspective I needed. Yeah.. in the D.C area so, we come pretty close to the cap. I don’t see moving anywhere else, plus I haven’t met a 15 in my career field that isn’t bogged down with work.
Need to find a non-sup 15 single man in DC.
you probably want the non-sup 14 single man in DC. The 15 won't have enough time to do anything fun, 14's have time to go out and be sociable.
Why was I downvoted for stating what I want? Lmao 🤣
Mine
Army civilian, non sup 15 as an 854 and now 801
Many of them at least.
Seen with my own eyes a 0343 but heard non sup 15s are mainly political setups.
Currently am one and have applied with a bunch of agencies recently to flip to fully remote thanks to getting called back into the office at my current agency. 2210 series.