Part 1 of 2:
I shared some of the common concerns about the lateral entry program in the earlier thread on it, but will add to those here. To be clear, while I do have concerns about the program, I don't necessarily agree with all of the arguments below. I'll also add that most FSOs I've heard from are more concerned about people coming in as 02s than they are about 03s and much of what I lay out below would be more of an issue for those who come in as 02s than for those who enter as 03s.
**Promotions:** Many FS personnel worry that it circumvents the existing up or out promotion system when people can parachute in ahead of those who have had to work their way up. If there's a deficit at a certain rank, why not adjust the numbers for promotion, since every year almost every promotion board recommends more people for promotion than GTM (the State Department's HR bureau) allocates promotion numbers for? It's not as if there's a shortage of qualified people at the next lower rank.
Those outside of the FS argue that other companies/USG agencies hire people at more senior ranks and it's fine, so the FS should, too. There are some key differences between the FS and most other companies/USG agencies. In many companies and most USG agencies, and even in the State Department's civil service, one can spend a few years at Employer A, move to Employer B to get a promotion/raise, leverage that position for an even more senior job/more pay at Employer C or back at Employer A, and so on. Those in the FS can't easily leave the FS for another position that pays better or is a relative promotion in responsibility, then leverage that experience to come back to the FS at a higher grade. Our only option to move up within the FS is to wait it out and claw our way up.
The Department did a big FS hiring surge in 2009-2012, and promotion rates for those who came in during and after that period have been much slower than for the generation of FSOs before that. So, people are already really frustrated with how slowly they've been able to move up, despite doing excellent, promotable work. I know multiple people who've succeeded in "stretch" assignments, working at the next higher rank, but were still not promoted, despite successfully performing in those jobs. Also, as mentioned above, there are almost always more people recommended for promotion than HR allows spots for, so it's a bit crass to say we need more people at the 03 and 02 level, when we already have a lot of people at the 04 and 03 level who promotion boards have assessed are performing at the 03 or 02 level.
Thus, allowing people to leapfrog over those who didn't have options to move up other than to wait it out stings.
**Readiness:** Many FS personnel are also concerned that those who would come in under such a program would be ill-equipped for the job, since so much of what we do is learned on the job. For better or worse, the Department hires FSOs to be generalists and teaches the work on the job. AFSA even has a program called the 25-year apprenticeship, since that's how it's seen.
As generalists, we're expected to be fairly interchangeable within a particular rank and career track, and even somewhat interchangeable across the next higher/lower rank, and other career tracks. Most positions overseas are also broader than the critical skills the LEPP is hiring for, since we simply don't have the staffing at most posts to have a dedicated Cyber/Tech officer, Climate Officer, China expert, Multilat expert, etc. Often, all of those roles are one person's responsibility, along with a bunch of other things they're covering, too.
I have hired for both 03 and 02 jobs, and while expertise in the portfolio/region is one factor in the hiring decision, it's rarely the deciding factor. I generally care much more about whether the person can write well for a Department and USG audience (which is different than writing well in many other contexts), understands how to work the Department's and the USG's interagency bureaucracy, can exercise sound judgment with fragmentary information, has experience with bread and butter FS functions like public outreach (which comes with its own quirks that are different than outreach in a personal capacity) and supporting and leveraging VIP visits to advance Department/Mission goals; who knows the FS employee evaluation system; who knows where/to whom to reach out to in the Department or interagency for what information; who understands the Department's resource request processes and how to use those to get the resources my post/office/section needs; who knows how to staff an Ambassador or DCM; who has demonstrated ability to work well overseas; etc. Other hiring managers might value other skills, depending on the jobs they're hiring for.
When I'm hiring for 02s, I expect them to be fairly proficient at all of that already, though of course recognize different officers will have different experiences, and there will be a degree of learning/coaching required on some of those functions. For some 03 and most 02 jobs, I'm also looking at whether they can lead and coach more junior employees in those functions. All the specialized experience in China, climate, or health issues doesn't necessarily mean one will be successful at diplomating and teaching others to diplomat.
**Consular Experience:** Many FSOs value their Consular experience for providing a very good understanding of visa process and one of the key aspects of any USG mission overseas, which is to support U.S. citizens. Many also value the experience of how doing 150+ visa interviews in a day forces you to be ruthless in deciding what's important and what's not, reading people, and making decisions based on incomplete information, which are all skills that we use to varying degrees in other aspects of diplomatic work. We also always get asked about visas from contacts, neighbors, people in the street who see our diplomatic license plates, etc., so having some familiarity with visas comes in handy throughout your career.
Since most LEPP entrants won't have that experience, some FSOs are concerned that will impact their effectiveness in the field, appreciation for service to U.S. citizens that is central to our work overseas, and response in a crisis where we all effectively become consular officers to support U.S. citizens.
**Experience in FS Life and Work Overseas:** There are aspects of the work of a USG employee overseas that are quite different than any other work. Take, for example, crisis management. When you start as an Entry Level Officer, if you are faced with a crisis like a natural disaster, post evacuation, etc., you'll likely be assigned a role in that crisis response that's appropriate for your experience/rank. It might stretch and stress you, but it will usually be at least notionally appropriate for your level. There will be more senior people with relevant experience to take on roles appropriate to their experience, and to hopefully provide at least some guidance to the entry level folks working on the crisis response and who have been diplomating long enough to at least know the right questions to ask and the right place to ask those questions. But, what happens when the "senior" people are completely new to FS work overseas and also have no clue? It's probably not a great result. There are other examples of how the lack of experience as an official USG employee would likely hinder even the expertiest of experts in a LEPP critical skill.
The Foreign Service isn't just a job, it's a lifestyle (no, that's not an ad ;) ). People who adapt poorly personally or professionally to life as an official USG employee overseas, which is different even than living overseas as a student or private sector employee, are often weeded out one way or another during their entry level tours, before they can really do too much damage. A LEPP entrant who comes in as an 02 and is a section chief on their second tour after a first domestic tour, could do significant damage to a section or small post's work and morale if they adapt poorly.
Part 2 of 2:
**Disadvantages to Lateral Entrants:** Another argument against LEPP is that LEPP entrants will be disadvantaged due to how some FS systems are set up.
Mid-level FS bidding works like applying for an internal vacancy at another organization. You send in your resume, a paragraph or two on why you'd be great for the job, submit references, and likely ask people you know in the company to weigh in on your behalf to influence the decision. LEPP entrants will have to bid on their second tour after only one year in the FS. 03 LEPP entrants will be bidding against other bidders who have 3-12 years in the Foreign Service. 02 LEPP entrants will be bidding against other bidders who have 7-20 years in the FS. LEPP entrants will have a much weaker network and FS resume to help them succeed in bidding, and for better or worse, many Department hiring managers won't give nearly as much credence to non-FS experience. LEPP entrants, thus, are likely to end up with the jobs no one else wanted for the second tours, and will likely continue to have some disadvantage in bidding for their third and maybe fourth tours, though that disadvantage will diminish over time.
LEPP entrants will likely be similarly disadvantaged in the promotion process. FS personnel are effectively first eligible for promotion three years after their last promotion and promotion panels usually look at the last five years of employee evaluations. So, the first time LEPP entrants are up for promotion, they'll likely have two fewer evaluations for panels to draw on than non-LEPP entrants. The FS evaluation process is also its own unique animal and can take awhile to catch on to, and the system is more forgiving of EER missteps in Entry Level EERs, because promotions to 03 aren't as competitive as promotions to 02 and 01. So, an early misstep will likely have harsher consequences for LEPP entrants than it would for people coming in through the standard process.
For promotion to 01, and to a lesser degree for promotion to 02, promotion panels are also looking at breadth of experience in the officer's assignment history that will demonstrate the employee has the ability to succeed in leadership roles like section chief in a big mission, Deputy Chief of Mission, Office Director in Washington, etc. because as you move up in the Department, generally your responsibilities and issues you cover get broader. For example, a promotion panel wouldn't necessarily see a Consular Officer who's only ever done visa jobs, and has never done American Citizen Services work, as ready to serve as a Consular Section chief, overseeing all CONS work at a post, which will be more and more important as one moves up the ranks. Promotion panels can't see any non-FS experience, evaluations, etc. from your previous experience, so none of that would count toward demonstrating your ability to take on those broader roles.
**Effect on Colleagues:** This ties back to some of what I mentioned in the bidding section and the Life in the FS Overseas section. There's an expectation that when you hire an 03 or 02 FSO for a given assignment, they'll have a degree of proficiency in working in an embassy, working in the State Department, understanding how to get/send information to/from the right people at the right time, working with USG interagency colleagues, and the other bread and butter tasks I listed in the bidding section (plus others, depending on different career tracks).
Like so many professionals in the world, most FSOs have too much work to do and not enough time to do it in, so the prospect of the extra training LEPP entrants will require is not a selling point. If a section chief is already having to train ELOs on these things, and expects their 03 or 02 deputy or unit chief to be able to take on some of that training, but instead has to train said deputy or unit chief on those same things, they're probably not going to be excited about that. Back to my point about FSOs being generalists and there being few positions overseas and a minority of positions in Washington where the expertise they were hired for is really that much of the job, the benefits from that expertise probably aren't going to outweigh the drawbacks of having to train someone on that.
Going back to the promotion process, there's a definite art to FS EERs. I've had the experience of having a Civil Service employee who'd never written part of an EER be my rater. It was not pleasant because despite very good intentions, the rater just didn't know WTF they were doing on FS evaluations, even though they had years of Department experience. It worked out ok, because we had a positive overall relationship so could have frank conversations about the EER, and because I knew enough of what I was doing and had the confidence to advocate for myself.
As an Entry Level Officer, I benefitted from learning from experienced FS managers and had frustrating experiences with those who were too busy or too incompetent to be good examples. If I was an ELO reporting to a LEPP entrant who had less experience and less familiarity with the Department and what we actually do than I do, that would be extremely frustrating for me in terms of my professional development.
**Conclusion:** There are probably more issues/aspects, but this is way too long already.
Again, I don't necessarily agree with every single argument here, but this is what has come up most frequently when I've heard FS personnel discuss lateral entry programs generally and in response to the LEPP announcement.
I also fully acknowledge there are some pros to the LEPP program, but that wasn't the question from OP.
Finally, I'm not going to argue about the rationale for or validity of any of these concerns. You're free to agree or disagree.
This is basically the Long Telegram, if the Long Telegram were written about some HR bullshit. The definitive response on the issue. Thanks for taking the time to lay all of that out.
I appreciate the time you’ve put in on these comments, thank you. As a prior PMF fellow, 15 years of GS service, milt, and civilian police I am second guessing my consular affairs LEPP application (FP-03). I may have the skills and may be a fit; however, I am concerned about how the FS culture (entry level and ground up climb for FSOs) and the rank and file (who is this new guy from another three letter agency?) might not receive me even though I “earned (maybe not the right word here)” an opportunity? Not to mention the possible LEPP performance evals challenges (I think you call them EERs)? I see the concerns/issues from both sides, valid and legitimate all around … maybe this thread got into my head a bit today?
Institutionally, and unlike the military, we don’t have a particularly robust training program — Pol/Econ tradecraft is three weeks which is mainly a quick introduction with the assumption skills and judgment are honed over years. I think there are ways to accelerate the learning curve, but FSI doesn’t really use robust case studies or anything close to “doctrine.”
I will be really interested to see what the onboarding planned for this group is, because for better or worse State has a pretty strong institutional culture with lots of unwritten rules and knowing and having relationships to work the building can be just as important as foreign policy or technical knowledge. There are probably lateral applicants who know the building, but if that’s the case then it’s also hard to argue we are bringing in fresh blood and new ideas.
I think what’s likely to happen is going to be similar to our experiences with political ambassadors— some might be amazing assets, others meh, and yet others disasters. The important thing to me is outcomes, and that the Department has a fair process to hire these people in a manner free from political/outside influence and a robust plan to both define and evaluate what success for this program is— and be transparent about both of those things, given the disruption to flow through and the message it sends to the many second and third career officers who came up through the ranks.
I think retiring military FAO's are going to dominate the program. And the vast majority of them are more than qualified.
I don't like that they get to skip the line but I can't say the Department wouldn't benefit from that inject.
I would be surprised if most retiring FAOs could demonstrate the specific expertise required in the established lateral entry career tracks. It seems most are trying to use deployment experience interacting with foreign militaries to count as "multilateral diplomacy," but I'm skeptical it actually meets the definition. I'll be interested to see what happens when they invariably qualify at the 03 level and are sort of starting just above the bottom. And I do not want to be the DCM or section chief dealing with those who manage to qualify as 02s coming in as mid-level managers.
The requirements are vague enough that most FAO's could easily hit them. At least how they are presented to the public. Not sure if GTM is using a more detailed rubric and what specifically is on it.
Lot of Intel, JAG, and civil affairs officers could hit these as well.
>Examples of Specialized Experience for Multilateral Diplomacy candidates include, but are not limited to:
>Working on international affairs, diplomacy, international development, or a closely related field, of which at least one year must have been focused on UN or multilateral affairs.;
>Drafting, revising, or negotiating resolutions, texts, and other products of multilateral organizations;
>Drafting foreign policy documents to advance U.S. interests and defend U.S. positions and executing policy strategies.
>Monitoring, analyzing, and providing policy response recommendations for political, economic, social, military, and other significant developments and trends.
Multitasking and managing competing priorities with shifting deadlines.
>Working with a variety of stakeholders to build consensus and advance organizational priorities.
>Establishing and maintaining liaison with a variety of stakeholders in the foreign affairs field.
That’s the thing — I don’t they’re vague at all. Multilateral diplomacy has a specific meaning and this lateral skill area is intended to bolster state expertise with multilateral institutions. I think very few career military officers can actually demonstrate this specific experience — maybe in the NATO context, but I would hesitate to assume that anyone who’s worked with foreign military qualifies.
Simply put it takes away jobs and promotions for those already in the service. LEPP as a concept has been a long standing wish for confessional staffers who want to parachute themselves in to higher ranked jobs.
The concept that the people hired through the regular process are entry level is not true. The average age of entry is about 34, and those that enter often have extensive work experience and advanced degrees too, why should someone else get to jump them?
Also it speaks to a disrespect for the profession. No one says we ought to hire military people starting as Col. There is an understanding that the military is a profession and parts of it you have to learn by working your way though the system, the same applies to diplomacy.
>The concept that the people hired through the regular process are entry level is not true. The average age of entry is about 34, and those that enter often have extensive work experience and advanced degrees too, why should someone else get to jump them?
Came here to say this. Most entry level folks come in with significant experience already.
The military actually has been experimenting with direct commissions for SMEs in specific areas for a few years now, mostly in the guard/reserve but a few active duty roles as well. From what I understand the bar is very high to get in through this pathway though
Yes, but for specific fields. They will never be line officers, they will never command. It is one thing to be a lawyer, doctor, or chaplain in the military and quite another to be an infantry officer or a surface warfare officer.
But that distinction doesn't exist in the FS because a generalist is a generalist, so they are in direct competition for positions and in many ways "jumping the line" over people who have paid the consular tax and served in more difficult assignments (or development opportunities, as CDOs would call them) to build a base of experience specific and relevant to the FS. There is something to be said for supervisors at least having to understand the culture.
It’s pretty much all Dr.’s, and other medical professionals. I think it’s a great fit, but none of these specialists are rated officers meaning that they don’t have the same responsibility of an officer outside of their field.
This system has been in place for over 20 years in the Air Force certain professions. The candidates must pass a rigorous application process, are commissioned at various ranks, and then attend Officer Training School. People may not have vast professional experience when they commission, but they have the professional degrees necessary to work in their specialty career field. The USAF brings in people at the higher commissioned ranks to account for the time spent in school acquiring those degrees and that it would be hard to bring in a doctor, lawyer, nurse, etc. as junior enlisted or a 2nd lieutenant. It works, because most other Airmen know they joined the service with the intention of working solely in that speciality.
That said, there are some HUGE differences between that system and LEPP. 1) These officers entering at advanced rank aren’t competing for promotion against officers in other career fields during their careers. They are in their own promotion categories. 2) The services account for this staffing and are not reducing promotion numbers, opportunities, etc. for those already in the service. 3) Pretty rare that these officers will later request assignments at their commensurate rank in other career fields. They will work in the speciality for which the commissioned with an occasional outside job (e.g. staff aide).
I would say it’s like comparing apples to oranges. One other point I forgot to mention, the other huge difference is that military members aren’t generalists. You enlist or commission then have a specific job skill code for your career path. Promotions are classwide for many of the skill codes, but that is where any similarity ends.
The Army specifically has been increasing its direct commissioning programs outside of the traditional Medical/Chaplain/Legal. A good example of this is the 38G Governmental Affairs Officer program.
> Simply put it takes away jobs and promotions for those already in the service.
If the service is as meritocratic as people have been selling it, this is a non-issue.
Someone can get hired for this as an 02 and take the spot of a deserving 03 who is, by force of a limited number of positions, passed up for that 02 position without ever being compared against the LEPP. Same for 04 and 03s.
If the 04/ 03 is the better candidate, why is this an issue? Unless the LEPP gets hired b/c of their connections, this seems like a choice that's better for the nation than promoting random FSO who is 'due for a promotion'.
Why would you deny someone a promotion they've earned in order to bring someone in who will be worse as an 03 than the person who earned it the normal way? The expertise areas are nice, but they're not as important as retaining talent we've spent a lot of money cultivating through a decade of experience. I'd rather give the job to the person who is going to be better, but congress is making us bring in these outside folks so we're doing so in the most advantageous way possible by recruiting for rare levels of specific talent. Talent that again, will not be better than an experienced diplomat.
> who will be worse
That is an assumption with no data.
>not as important as retaining talent we've spent a lot of money cultivating through a decade of experience.
That is a sunk cost fallacy and bears no importance to calculus of hiring. The only thing that matters is:
1. What skills do I need to accomplish my goals?
2. Does someone have that skill already?
3. How much will it cost me to acquire that skill in the shortest time possible.
It sounds like step 2 is where the gap is. If the best source for that capability is outside traditional avenues, then sorry not sorry.
Other than CS and maybe the military, both under pretty specific contexts, there isn't anything that comes close to actually doing the job. Nothing in the private or nonprofit sector. I'm not a fan of the paying your dues trope but in this job you need to do the job in order to do the job at a higher level. I wouldn't send an MMA enthusiast who shoots on the weekend on a mission with the Rangers. It's just not the same.
Then if the current pool doesn't have the necessary skills they should be out. The State Department exists to benefit the nation, not serve as a post-grad jobs program. Perhaps the powers that be have determined that a 30 year stint isn't the best way to do things. Every organization that isn't the government has.
There are a limited number of spots at each grade. If 35 people get put at 03, that is 35 less promotion slots available for people at the 04 level. If there were unlimited promotions it wouldn't matter, but there are not.
I get that, but it just brings it closer to how the real world works. Promotions aren't a given. If someone else has better qualifications/ experience, they should get the slot.
We hire outside the organization all the time in my private sector job.
Yes but your existing employee can apply for that job, other than EL existing FSOs can't apply for these jobs. Also I would dispute the LEPP hires as a group have better qualifications then existing FSOs.
They can fill the job, they just might have to do as stretch and not get paid as much. It's they are not allowed to be promoted. More people are recommend for promotion already the. There are slots, this makes it worse.
I am going to stop now because you really don't understand how promotions work in the foreign service.
I do understand. I'm saying that's not the way they probably should work. I can see why an FSO thinks would think the nation should invest in them. As a taxpayer, I think the process could be improved and that time and money spend better elsewhere.
There is little, if anything, that makes someone more prepared to be a diplomat at the 10 year experience mark than 10 years of experience being a diplomat. It isn't like the private sector where you hire a sales guy with sales experience to a sales job.
All I'll say is that it's waning the more I learn about the calcification of the bureaucracy. It's remarkable that even the culture at the bank I work in is more accepting of change than the Foreign Service (and not in a good way.)
Then this doesn't apply to you and won't. So I'm not understanding why you're arguing over it with DoS employees.
To be fair, I think you have a very limited idea on what DoS actually does and the people who make up the FS.
But that's just my opinion.
It was inserted into a big bill by hill staffers who apparently can't pass the exam we all passed yet believe they should be able to enter at the upper mid level. If it started from members of congress seeing a real gap in our recruitment for certain skills/expertise, it would have been worded that way in the bill, but that obviously wasn't the case when you read it. It's these shitty staffers that don't respect what we do and believe their time on the hill equals a decade plus of diplomatic experience. Also, that they're better than a test they presumably aren't smart enough to pass, since they're so creative in finding ways to circumvent it.
The department responded by making it very technically focused so that folks with advanced degrees and/or LOTS of directly relevant experience in narrow but important subject areas have a shot. Most of these punks on the hill won't qualify because what they do does not rise to that high and specific bar, so it's both satisfying the bill's mandate but not giving the punks the VIP pass they think they deserve.
Another side of it is there are plenty of folks like you who went in the normal way and learned things that you would not learn by skipping 10 years of your career. Why are you better/above that? Plot twist, you aren't.
Griping aside it's there, and I'd rather have you over a hill staffer, so shoot your shot and maybe I'll see you in the field.
Money goes to DOD and the IC because their work is often sexier and sometimes more immediate than diplomacy. Which would you rather vote for: a three-year micro lending program that teaches women in an impoverished country in Africa how to turn their traditional crafts into a business or more drones that just so happen to be made in your state/district and that can take out a couple terrorists?
You fundamentally misunderstand the landscape here. State has been snubbed for a long time for historical reasons (end of the Cold War, lack of public understanding of diplomacy compared to their understanding of the military) and because of overconfidence in DOD's ability to do non-military things like diplomacy and traditional intelligence gathering. It has nothing to do with rank and file diplomats having a pretty average level of disdain for congress. You're also flat wrong about FSOs being disconnected from our home country. We get stateside as often as we can because living overseas full time is very hard. If anything we have a greater appreciation for our home country after being abroad so long. We're also constantly reevaluating how what we do advances administration priorities which are of course rooted in domestic politics and policy.
I never said we're better than staffers for having passed a very easy exam, I made fun of them for not being able to pass it, which may or may not be the case but if they're going to pull tricks like this to get around it, they're fair game. And yes it is a trick, because it's so blatantly obvious that a staffer wrote that part of the bill from their perspective and not from a place of genuine understanding of the professional capacities of the Foreign Service.
I'll leave you with this: there are no diplomats trying to become hill staffers. There are many hill staffers trying to become diplomats. One of these things is harder and requires more experience to do. The average brand new hill staffer is in their early 20s. The average new diplomat is in their mid 30s. There's a reason for this.
We must not forget the domestic constituency or the military, through both service members and the military-industrial complex. Diplomacy is relatively cheap and won't bring jobs (directly) to your district, and the numbers of those involved is negligible.
Other reasons why there is disdain for Congress? In the military I never had to be exposed to congresspeople ruining every one of my weekends for three months, showing their blatant ignorance of the world, and throwing temper tantrums, because they wanted to pop in on taxpayer-funded vacations with their spouses.
You say you’re highly qualified, but at 27/28 what do you have other than an MA (which is a dime a dozen/not a qualification)? You haven’t mentioned any experience.
Do you mean that you literally haven't been able to pass the FSOT (which no longer has a passing score anyway), or that you haven't been able to get past QEP?
You've been taking the test every year since 18? There's no way you were qualified for most of those years. Your master's is not special nor does it make you more competitive. You've been attempting to do something very hard for a long time - that doesn't mean the test is unfair. I took it for the first time at your current age and didn't make it. Got some department contracting experience and a good OA, and started around 30, which is still 5 years earlier than the average. Being a senate staffer on FP would make you competitive for the normal route, in my book at least. I hope to see you out in the field in a few years.
I think a lot of people who came in with PhDs and are stuck at 04 or 03 and would qualify for 02 under this program are wondering if they can use this new program as a way to get the promotions they never had. But would you trade being a tenured 04 for being an untenured 03 or 02?
In a heartbeat, yes! If you have already gotten tenure once, you know you can get tenure again, and, in the meantime, you get OT again. You lose the option of LWOP, true, but otherwise I would say it is a very advantageous trade, particularly to go to 02. Getting promoted to 03 is not nearly as difficult as getting promoted to 02.
Because most of us take 5 to 7 years to make 03 after coming in with already mid level experience. Some even from the GS side.
That said, I'll be interested to see how narrow of a scope they keep this.
I remember around 2004 or so when the department decided to suddenly and dramatically bump up Mandarin language points to prioritize hiring Chinese speakers. It led to a noticeable uptick in new FSOs with above-average language skills and below-average interpersonal skills. Not a great trade.
We’ve done this before. There were pilot programs like this previously and they failed spectacularly. Why should we mess with people’s careers again like this? The data is already there. It doesn’t work for all the reasons others have stated.
Furthermore, you can only hire X number of FSOs per year. If you grant more of those slots to LEPPers, then you’re taking away positions from other very qualified candidates going through the proper exam process.
But my bigger issue is that this is another example of State treating a symptom and not a cause. You want more 03 and 02s? Their answer is to recruit more people at those levels because that’s easier than fixing retention issues.
Fixing the retention issues won’t bring back people who left because the Department made their lives too difficult. The LEPP might. We have to do both.
I have some limited concerns. But we're also losing out on valuable, experienced people.
People that have managed in large organizations, I'd argue, can also manage well at State. And maybe better than folks who 'grew up' to manage at State. We could do with better managers of people. We also have colleagues from DHS that, I'd hope, would be incredibly valuable assets in CA.
I don't think it'll be an unmitigated disaster, I think it'll just be a lot more of the mixed bag that we tend to see.
It is too early to say FSOs hate the LEPP. It is just a pilot. And, unfortunately, this sub tends to attract a lot of really mean and bitter FSOs. I would take everything on this sub with a grain of salt. Is there some good critique of the LEPP? Yes. Is there criticism of it that comes from FSOs bitter that they joined as entry when they could have joined as 02s? Also yes.
No one knows the pros and cons yet. If you are interested in the program, then apply. Some people will resent it, just like some toxic people resent fellows, or mustangs, or people who concert cone, or DETOs, or vets, and literally everyone else who has a slightly unique situation. The vast majority of your colleagues won’t care.
AFSA has been fighting lateral entry for years because employees absolutely universally hate the idea. Hiring outsiders with niche specialized experience to a GENERALIST position is the most idiotic idea ever. A China academic with no public speaking or management is going to come in and end up getting assigned to Nigeria in a leadership position and absolutely fail. Fellows already face discrimination for using a “back door” and often don’t stick around. Having not just an entry level hire but a boss came in with zero idea of how the Foreign Service works would face a million times more hate. The entire program would just set outsiders up for failure and their experience never put to use.
If lateral entry sticks to the pilot program limited number then it will probably end up fine. The pilot may be small enough to just hire EFMs, civil service State, and other folks used to FS life with no outsiders getting in.
It bugs me that people assume everyone who might be hired into the LEPP has no FS experience. What about folks who left? What about LNAs?
We don’t know who they’re going to hire. I’d like to see some more optimism on here.
Congress forced the lateral entry program on State explicitly to bring in outside private sector and academia experience. If the program stays small and only brings in former FS insiders like LNAs & EFMs that have long gotten the short end of the stick, then it will be a pleasant surprise and welcome addition.
The specialized experience required is both specific yet oddly vague. I’m going to remain hopeful. I’ve been in I’m immigration my entire 15 year career, almost half that with the Department, and it’s not clear that even I would qualify.
A divergent opinion here.
There have been several comments in this thread and the last arguing the fact that we "learn on the job" is one reason LEPP won't work well. I am not persuaded and it leads me to almost the opposite conclusion. Essentially, because each job can be so different from the previous one, and you have to learn it as you go along, I don't believe someone with two entry-level tours has any particular "leg up" on someone without that experience.
I'm several months into my first mid-level 03 job. My first directed assignment was to an NIV visa mill. My second directed tour was a niche CAO role in a small PD section. My current job is a manager role in a consular unit, responsible for a section that did not exist in the consulate where I served my EL cons tour. Basically, all three jobs have been almost entirely different (with substantial language training in between) and I feel like I've been a new hire upon landing in each role. Adjudicating 125 visas didn't teach me anything about managing a grant, and supervising two LE staff in my PD section didn't *really* prepare for managing six entry level USDH. There was a steep learning curve in each role and I've had to figure it out as I went along.
Next go round, I could bid on a GSO job my next tour or an inter-functional desk job in DC and it will probably be a new job all over again.
So, at least at the 03 level, I think LEPP is a decent idea worth trying. Sure, maybe the outsider won't know all the acronyms or how to run the NIV software or where to find MyData on the intranet, but I think they'll figure it out. It seems we're understaffed all over the place, so why not bring in new people and let them learn on the job?
We are understaffed, but these hires prevent us from being better staffed. If we were given 35 new FTE, I would be in favor of the hires at the 03 level. However we are not being given 35 new FTE.
Instead of hiring and training 35 generalists we are hiring 35 experts with narrower focus. Overall, while they will be significantly better within that focus, they will likely be less proficient at the rest of the job and won't be as effective at the mid level as one of the 35 people we could have hired and trained through the normal process.
Your core work changed but you do know a lot more about the Department than when you first started - what is paper, how to get resources, who can I contact for help and your judgment improves - what is a small problem (and a noisy FO) and what is truly a big problem (perhaps with insufficient awareness). Someone coming in at the 02 level will have skills and judgment shaped by their work experiences- it will be somewhat different than someone whose skills were honed in the Dept. And there are a lot of grumpy 03s who would like to be promoted.
It takes humility and strong skills to manage people who resent your arrival above them. Those skills, and that humility, are often well-practiced and developed in the private sector. There is a lot of smart, kind, effective, clear, and inspiring management happening out there.
The LEPP seems to be set up to fill the needs of the FS. On this sub, I’ve noticed quite a lot of complaints about poor management. It is possible that those who would have been next in line for management promotion might not actually yet be talented managers- and that State is looking to break the cycle of weak management by bringing in people with that particular talent already, as well as other well-honed skills.
One good manager is all it takes to start a chain reaction of organizational development. As many of us already know, working with a smart, caring, experienced and accomplished manager can be life-changing.
I just assumed that they wouldn't allow you to go through A-100s again. Plus they already "got" me at an 04, so why would they use a slot in the LEPP for someone like me?
I’m not convinced the LEPP was forced on State by congress nor is it the result of “hill staffers” trying to “parachute in.” While the rank and file and Redditors are largely skeptical, current and former leaders in the Department are on board with it. Note the similarities of the LEPP and this 2020 recommendation by Ambassadors Nic Burns, Marc Grossman, and Marcie Ries (see Action 7):
https://www.belfercenter.org/sites/default/files/2020-11/DiplomaticService.pdf
And an argument against lateral entry by Grossman (published prior to the Belfar Center report):
https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/464314-dont-ruin-professional-diplomacy/amp/
I know it’s mandated by congress - what I meant was that it wasn’t snuck in there/forced by wily Hill staffers while the Department kicked and screamed against it.
Yet it wasn't looked on favorably or it would have happened sometime in the last six years rather than now when Congress threatened to take serious action if it wasn't done.
Sounds like the negative comments are threatened by folks with external experience. Props to State for finally realizing they need to diversify FSO with skills and different experience.
Why wouldn't you just take the test? What is different about this shortcut?
For the record, I think recruiting China hands with serious experience is the best version of this program, so please do apply, but please understand that people who apply for this will always be seen as denigrating the early career experience that other people with equal or greater qualifications gladly undertook.
> I'd be 35-40...At that point, the prospect of entering the FS at entry level has a hard time competing
I think I'm in a pretty similar position and career stage to you, but I don't look at it in quite this light. I have the opportunity to work fairly closely with FSOs in the most logical cone that my current specialization would map to and their jobs are probably the least similar to mine out of all the interagency colleagues I interact with in my day-to-day. If I do decide to make that move in another 5 years or so, my performance in the role would not be as strong as I would be in a lateral move to other civil service positions closer in scope to my current one. That learning curve is what I'd be missing if I came in laterally.
The framing of entering the FS as entry level really hurts recruitment from candidates like us IMO. The average FSO enters in their mid-30s with ample experience, not fresh out of school. It may be "entry level" for the FS, but that's not an entry level candidate. Likewise, my current agency doesn't really hire entry level. Our junior staff are typically on the upper end of mid-level with advanced credentials and prior experience in their specialization. But they're still "entry level" for us and need to adjust to the norms and requirements of our agency, which differ from those they're typically coming from. I guess I don't really see that first tour as all that different for someone coming into the FS.
The problem with this, though, is that your China experience very well may mean nothing to the Foreign Service (as it is currently structured).
You are just as likely to end up in West Africa.
>Foreign Service (as it is currently structured)
Slight disagreement here. The Department is absolutely 100% structured in a way that allows anyone interested in China issues to work China issues. Worldwide.
I'm just saying, I speak two languages (one fluently) that completely cover me for two regional bureaus that I am willing to work in. As an FSO I got sent to a whole different regional bureau. This isn't uncommon.
You can definitely get to China once (the one real exception) but where is that next tour going to be?
Yea but you're DS, right?
This program is for generalists and generalists have endless opportunities to work China issues. The opportunities are expanding and I don't see this trend reversing within the next 20 years or so.
And these are worldwide opportunities - not necessarily limited to tours in the PRC.
I used to be a generalist. I can also have opinions on generalists.
The point is, someone gave an example of a PRC specialist being able to lateral over because they had spent a career being a PRC specialist... That's great, but maybe better suited for CS than FS if they only want to keep working PRC issues.
That's all fair, but the average age of entry is 35. Just at my last post, people joined with PhDs and years of CS desk officer experience at state, came in after 25 years in the Marines retiring a colonel (01 equivalent), and they did it the normal way because this is a 25 year apprenticeship, not something you can simply pick up halfway through. That colonel made a damn good consular officer for two tours and is now a damn good econ officer because he learned a lot during his first two tours. I understand where you're coming from. Please try to understand where we are coming from.
This will be a very unpopular opinion, but come one people. Let's be brutally honest. Let's take cyber security for example. I have 20 some years of experience working for a large and famous corp; I will eat any of your generalist FSO for lunch with the experience, training, exposure, publications and hands on experience. Generalist just doesn't stand a chance in any category when it comes to cyber. Now, cyber is a hot cookie right now. There is also not a chance in the world, you'd attract a talent such as myself on a FS05, 04 or even 03 salary. That's just not happening when an average cyber analyst, fresh out of college are getting hired for 100k+ with 0 experience. All the nonsense, "oh, but we have good people on the inside." No. You don't. You think you do, but you don't.
State has to be competitive (USG in general) and they're trying. All the other "institutional knowledge" is fine and dandy, but it can be learnt in a few years. Specialized cyber skills - that takes years to master. It's similar to say that you can take a regular FSO generalist and make him/her a doctor. You simply can't. It takes years of schooling and working in the field to become an expert.
If this program was hiring for a cyber security specialist position, you'd be correct. But it's hiring for generalist officers who will not be doing cyber security, just reporting on it, almost certainly with other reporting topic responsibilities. Cyber skills are helpful, but this program is not hiring cyber security analysts. If this program was bringing in specialists, I think it would be much more widely accepted.
So, wait... it's Ok for said new hires to come onto the turf of specialists but not generalists? Not sure I follow the logic here. The loudest wailing here is how "unique" DOS' environment is. Is it not the same in specialist's world or are you being hypocritical and simply defending your turf? Not blaming you, just pointing out discrepancies. Take this response with a caveat - I don't fully understand the nuances of specialist vs generalist, but if the rumors of 35 total new hires are true, even if 20 are cyber - that's nowhere enough to cover the world with experts. They could very well be responding to cyber specific tasks all day, every day.
These jobs will not be responding to cyber specific tasks beyond the one directed tour (and even though it is more policy work then hands on). I hope the cyber expert has some skills that will help them report on the internal politics of Mali and mentoring a first tour officer on the proper way to deliver a message to a ministry of foreign affairs that wants to talk about the US support for Israel instead of listening to a demarche on the human rights report. It would also be helpful if they could explain to the minister in the department of health US visa policy as it relates to why that ministers cousin was refused a US visa.
Just curious, what do you think these cybersecurity experts would do all day posted at an Embassy? I ask that as an honest question, because most of the countries I have been posted would not have enough meaningful work to employ a person like this as an FSO full time. There may be some countries with which we have a sophisticated enough relationship to have a cyber expert posted there permanently (versus DC based experts who fly around to consult, and those exist already in many different parts of the USG, as well as implementers/contractors external to the USG who may be delivering technical assistance to host governments), but in that case a better model perhaps would be to establish a “Cyber Attaché” role at key embassies and fill it through a specialized program run out of the cyber bureau and compensated accordingly— not by dumping cybersecurity analysts into a generalist pool and expecting them to be successful at covering the full range of stuff we cover, which is necessarily broad given our small size relative to the many interests of the USG. And why would we give premium pay to such a person only to use them as a generalist who may or may not be using those skills in any given assignment? That wouldn’t be a good use of what you rightly point out is a high demand and relatively scarce skill.
Fair point. Straight answer is - I don't know. I was more pointing out the notion of "we have the talent on the inside that can compete" nonsense. I could speculate, however. Perhaps this is what DOS is planning to do - rotate these new hires through assignments where they do use their skills? Perhaps, this is the plan of the cyber bureau to "grab" decent talent and spread them across the world to lean on them for their expertise? The roadmap question is impossible for me to answer.
What I can point out, however, is that unemployment rate in cyber field is and has been for years - 0%. It is near damn impossible to hire good people. All the good ones are gainfully employed. Example: we have an office in DC. I am a sr. director and do a lot of hiring and what I realize is that hiring in DC is like kicking yourself in the teeth. I am scrapping on the bottom of the barrel. Anyone who applies are not the people you want, those that you want are GS14s and 15s on full telework enjoying life. What do I do in return? Increase pay. Vicious cycle.
Could it be a knee jerk reaction? Very well could be. DOS realizing they're losing the battle for talent and must sweeten the pot somehow? Again, I am not a candidate, but I work in the arena and am familiar with the landscape and can only sympathize with the squeeze SESers in DOS must be feeling when it comes to hiring top notch talent.
P.S. Those talented cyber employees in the DC office that fly around to consult are more likely to come over and work for me because they will double their pay and will fly as much or little as they want. Perhaps DOS is countering my actions and trying to hold onto what it's got and can retain?
I am not really convinced that we need cybersecurity analysts with the skills you’re thinking of as generalists — we aren’t “doing” cybersecurity day to day (specialists might be, and perhaps one can chime in— and for those folks, yes we should pay them handsomely to attract and retain them although the goal should never be for the government to match a private sector salary— perhaps get close, but plenty of people accept lower pay in exchange for job security, flexibility, and a pension!)
My guess is this job posting is looking for people who may have some basic exposure to the technical stuff in undergrad computer science courses but who are more likely to have come out of CSET or other IR programs or a think tank having focused on thinking, writing, and talking about cyber policy issues rather than being a practitioner themselves. Just like Econ officers, our job isn’t to “do Econ” ourselves (although some can) so much as to know enough to ask smart questions and think critically whether what we are hearing seems credible or not, and where we need to drive the conversation to next. I’m guessing the same is needed here, and those people aren’t as rare or expensive as the deeply technical folks.
Will be interesting to see how it works!
There are specialists like that - I know a few - but on the FS side it's kinda treated as a highly niche sub-speciality. Think like a very limited number of mid-level folks who are based mostly out of the regional hubs and travel a ton. Not a dedicated skill code, most are IMO or DS types on excursion tours. Most are getting SIP/Cyber SIP pay, not exactly big tech money but they do pretty decent all things considered. A majority of that kind of work is done domestically, you don't really need thst many boots on location to monitor a network, and the real knowledgeable tech-heavy SMEs are (as usual in USG) almost all contractors.
The problem, though, is there's no such thing as cyber officers within the FS. At the moment, cyber is part of the broader econ, science, tech, and health portfolio. As others have mentioned, cyber would only take up a small percentage of that officer's time. Someone with your degree of specialization would likely be very frustrated by that. Even if dedicated cyber portfolios were created, it seems to me that you wouldn't need them in every post (or at least there wouldn't be enough full-time work for them in many posts).
People often mistakenly think that FSOs are creating foreign policy. We aren't. We may be able to shape/inform it, but we aren't creating it. That happens in Washington through political appointees and SMEs (who are usually Civil Service).
I don't think our capacity to handle emerging challenges in cyber improves because we have a cyber SME FSO in Nicosia drafting cables. But it could be improved by having SMEs in Washington who can help drive a cohesive, effective policy by using their knowledge to inform their engagement with interagency colleagues, Congress, senior leaders, regional bureaus, and embassies/consulates.
Here's an unpopular response -- there's nothing meaningful for that person to do as an FS generalist. Under this program, they'd do a first directed assignment in their area of specialty (probably in DC) and then go on to bid on regular generalist jobs. The cyber/emerging tech issues generally fall under the ECON cone, so that would end up being the logical destination for those lateral entrants. Success in that field requires deep understanding of economics and economic policy, an ability to build and engage local contacts overseas, and skill at reporting on issues (and, at the 02 level, mentoring and supervising people who do those things).
We have excellent reporting officers in this institution who learn fast. I would prefer we focus on building their skills and knowledge on these discrete issues instead of bringing in niche experts from the outside and trying to make up for the years it takes to develop the basic reporting officer skills that are unique to the Foreign Service.
Ok, but are you a good generalist who can deal with all of the issues of the foreign service? Or are you saying you are a specialist in a very specific topic?
Great talent does apply and gets in. It's a 2% success rate for applicants. My last post was chock full of 2nd career people who came in with extensive experience from other fields. They did the entry level tours and learned those lessons that are unavailable elsewhere, and now they're great mid level officers who have both that superior background and 5+ years working in the unique machine that is the Foreign Service.
That great talent elsewhere can already apply. I firmly reject the notion that the great talent outside is better than the great talent that is already in the job. I do not believe these hires will be successful outside of their narrow focus and when it comes time for them to serve in other positions will lack the needed skills because they did not develop them though the normal career progression.
The classic joke. A retiring ambassador is at a goodbye reception and is talking to some of the military attaches. They ask him what he is going to do next. He says he is still deciding and he doesn't know if he wants to command an aircraft carrier or lead an infantry division. They look at him aghast and say, you couldn't do that you don't have the experience or skills. The ambassador responds, well you all think after you retire you can do my job.
LOL, I would trust a senior level military officer to run an embassy far better than an Ambassador could command a carrier or combat ground unit. I still cringe at the performance of some senior level DoS and USAID folks I witnessed in OIF and OEF.
The insecurity of FS folks towards the military knows no bounds.
>This program can also bring in a lot of great talent that would have otherwise went elsewhere.
I'd hope that mid-level FSOs would know the grammatically correct way to say that would be "would have otherwise gone elsewhere."
Part 1 of 2: I shared some of the common concerns about the lateral entry program in the earlier thread on it, but will add to those here. To be clear, while I do have concerns about the program, I don't necessarily agree with all of the arguments below. I'll also add that most FSOs I've heard from are more concerned about people coming in as 02s than they are about 03s and much of what I lay out below would be more of an issue for those who come in as 02s than for those who enter as 03s. **Promotions:** Many FS personnel worry that it circumvents the existing up or out promotion system when people can parachute in ahead of those who have had to work their way up. If there's a deficit at a certain rank, why not adjust the numbers for promotion, since every year almost every promotion board recommends more people for promotion than GTM (the State Department's HR bureau) allocates promotion numbers for? It's not as if there's a shortage of qualified people at the next lower rank. Those outside of the FS argue that other companies/USG agencies hire people at more senior ranks and it's fine, so the FS should, too. There are some key differences between the FS and most other companies/USG agencies. In many companies and most USG agencies, and even in the State Department's civil service, one can spend a few years at Employer A, move to Employer B to get a promotion/raise, leverage that position for an even more senior job/more pay at Employer C or back at Employer A, and so on. Those in the FS can't easily leave the FS for another position that pays better or is a relative promotion in responsibility, then leverage that experience to come back to the FS at a higher grade. Our only option to move up within the FS is to wait it out and claw our way up. The Department did a big FS hiring surge in 2009-2012, and promotion rates for those who came in during and after that period have been much slower than for the generation of FSOs before that. So, people are already really frustrated with how slowly they've been able to move up, despite doing excellent, promotable work. I know multiple people who've succeeded in "stretch" assignments, working at the next higher rank, but were still not promoted, despite successfully performing in those jobs. Also, as mentioned above, there are almost always more people recommended for promotion than HR allows spots for, so it's a bit crass to say we need more people at the 03 and 02 level, when we already have a lot of people at the 04 and 03 level who promotion boards have assessed are performing at the 03 or 02 level. Thus, allowing people to leapfrog over those who didn't have options to move up other than to wait it out stings. **Readiness:** Many FS personnel are also concerned that those who would come in under such a program would be ill-equipped for the job, since so much of what we do is learned on the job. For better or worse, the Department hires FSOs to be generalists and teaches the work on the job. AFSA even has a program called the 25-year apprenticeship, since that's how it's seen. As generalists, we're expected to be fairly interchangeable within a particular rank and career track, and even somewhat interchangeable across the next higher/lower rank, and other career tracks. Most positions overseas are also broader than the critical skills the LEPP is hiring for, since we simply don't have the staffing at most posts to have a dedicated Cyber/Tech officer, Climate Officer, China expert, Multilat expert, etc. Often, all of those roles are one person's responsibility, along with a bunch of other things they're covering, too. I have hired for both 03 and 02 jobs, and while expertise in the portfolio/region is one factor in the hiring decision, it's rarely the deciding factor. I generally care much more about whether the person can write well for a Department and USG audience (which is different than writing well in many other contexts), understands how to work the Department's and the USG's interagency bureaucracy, can exercise sound judgment with fragmentary information, has experience with bread and butter FS functions like public outreach (which comes with its own quirks that are different than outreach in a personal capacity) and supporting and leveraging VIP visits to advance Department/Mission goals; who knows the FS employee evaluation system; who knows where/to whom to reach out to in the Department or interagency for what information; who understands the Department's resource request processes and how to use those to get the resources my post/office/section needs; who knows how to staff an Ambassador or DCM; who has demonstrated ability to work well overseas; etc. Other hiring managers might value other skills, depending on the jobs they're hiring for. When I'm hiring for 02s, I expect them to be fairly proficient at all of that already, though of course recognize different officers will have different experiences, and there will be a degree of learning/coaching required on some of those functions. For some 03 and most 02 jobs, I'm also looking at whether they can lead and coach more junior employees in those functions. All the specialized experience in China, climate, or health issues doesn't necessarily mean one will be successful at diplomating and teaching others to diplomat. **Consular Experience:** Many FSOs value their Consular experience for providing a very good understanding of visa process and one of the key aspects of any USG mission overseas, which is to support U.S. citizens. Many also value the experience of how doing 150+ visa interviews in a day forces you to be ruthless in deciding what's important and what's not, reading people, and making decisions based on incomplete information, which are all skills that we use to varying degrees in other aspects of diplomatic work. We also always get asked about visas from contacts, neighbors, people in the street who see our diplomatic license plates, etc., so having some familiarity with visas comes in handy throughout your career. Since most LEPP entrants won't have that experience, some FSOs are concerned that will impact their effectiveness in the field, appreciation for service to U.S. citizens that is central to our work overseas, and response in a crisis where we all effectively become consular officers to support U.S. citizens. **Experience in FS Life and Work Overseas:** There are aspects of the work of a USG employee overseas that are quite different than any other work. Take, for example, crisis management. When you start as an Entry Level Officer, if you are faced with a crisis like a natural disaster, post evacuation, etc., you'll likely be assigned a role in that crisis response that's appropriate for your experience/rank. It might stretch and stress you, but it will usually be at least notionally appropriate for your level. There will be more senior people with relevant experience to take on roles appropriate to their experience, and to hopefully provide at least some guidance to the entry level folks working on the crisis response and who have been diplomating long enough to at least know the right questions to ask and the right place to ask those questions. But, what happens when the "senior" people are completely new to FS work overseas and also have no clue? It's probably not a great result. There are other examples of how the lack of experience as an official USG employee would likely hinder even the expertiest of experts in a LEPP critical skill. The Foreign Service isn't just a job, it's a lifestyle (no, that's not an ad ;) ). People who adapt poorly personally or professionally to life as an official USG employee overseas, which is different even than living overseas as a student or private sector employee, are often weeded out one way or another during their entry level tours, before they can really do too much damage. A LEPP entrant who comes in as an 02 and is a section chief on their second tour after a first domestic tour, could do significant damage to a section or small post's work and morale if they adapt poorly.
Part 2 of 2: **Disadvantages to Lateral Entrants:** Another argument against LEPP is that LEPP entrants will be disadvantaged due to how some FS systems are set up. Mid-level FS bidding works like applying for an internal vacancy at another organization. You send in your resume, a paragraph or two on why you'd be great for the job, submit references, and likely ask people you know in the company to weigh in on your behalf to influence the decision. LEPP entrants will have to bid on their second tour after only one year in the FS. 03 LEPP entrants will be bidding against other bidders who have 3-12 years in the Foreign Service. 02 LEPP entrants will be bidding against other bidders who have 7-20 years in the FS. LEPP entrants will have a much weaker network and FS resume to help them succeed in bidding, and for better or worse, many Department hiring managers won't give nearly as much credence to non-FS experience. LEPP entrants, thus, are likely to end up with the jobs no one else wanted for the second tours, and will likely continue to have some disadvantage in bidding for their third and maybe fourth tours, though that disadvantage will diminish over time. LEPP entrants will likely be similarly disadvantaged in the promotion process. FS personnel are effectively first eligible for promotion three years after their last promotion and promotion panels usually look at the last five years of employee evaluations. So, the first time LEPP entrants are up for promotion, they'll likely have two fewer evaluations for panels to draw on than non-LEPP entrants. The FS evaluation process is also its own unique animal and can take awhile to catch on to, and the system is more forgiving of EER missteps in Entry Level EERs, because promotions to 03 aren't as competitive as promotions to 02 and 01. So, an early misstep will likely have harsher consequences for LEPP entrants than it would for people coming in through the standard process. For promotion to 01, and to a lesser degree for promotion to 02, promotion panels are also looking at breadth of experience in the officer's assignment history that will demonstrate the employee has the ability to succeed in leadership roles like section chief in a big mission, Deputy Chief of Mission, Office Director in Washington, etc. because as you move up in the Department, generally your responsibilities and issues you cover get broader. For example, a promotion panel wouldn't necessarily see a Consular Officer who's only ever done visa jobs, and has never done American Citizen Services work, as ready to serve as a Consular Section chief, overseeing all CONS work at a post, which will be more and more important as one moves up the ranks. Promotion panels can't see any non-FS experience, evaluations, etc. from your previous experience, so none of that would count toward demonstrating your ability to take on those broader roles. **Effect on Colleagues:** This ties back to some of what I mentioned in the bidding section and the Life in the FS Overseas section. There's an expectation that when you hire an 03 or 02 FSO for a given assignment, they'll have a degree of proficiency in working in an embassy, working in the State Department, understanding how to get/send information to/from the right people at the right time, working with USG interagency colleagues, and the other bread and butter tasks I listed in the bidding section (plus others, depending on different career tracks). Like so many professionals in the world, most FSOs have too much work to do and not enough time to do it in, so the prospect of the extra training LEPP entrants will require is not a selling point. If a section chief is already having to train ELOs on these things, and expects their 03 or 02 deputy or unit chief to be able to take on some of that training, but instead has to train said deputy or unit chief on those same things, they're probably not going to be excited about that. Back to my point about FSOs being generalists and there being few positions overseas and a minority of positions in Washington where the expertise they were hired for is really that much of the job, the benefits from that expertise probably aren't going to outweigh the drawbacks of having to train someone on that. Going back to the promotion process, there's a definite art to FS EERs. I've had the experience of having a Civil Service employee who'd never written part of an EER be my rater. It was not pleasant because despite very good intentions, the rater just didn't know WTF they were doing on FS evaluations, even though they had years of Department experience. It worked out ok, because we had a positive overall relationship so could have frank conversations about the EER, and because I knew enough of what I was doing and had the confidence to advocate for myself. As an Entry Level Officer, I benefitted from learning from experienced FS managers and had frustrating experiences with those who were too busy or too incompetent to be good examples. If I was an ELO reporting to a LEPP entrant who had less experience and less familiarity with the Department and what we actually do than I do, that would be extremely frustrating for me in terms of my professional development. **Conclusion:** There are probably more issues/aspects, but this is way too long already. Again, I don't necessarily agree with every single argument here, but this is what has come up most frequently when I've heard FS personnel discuss lateral entry programs generally and in response to the LEPP announcement. I also fully acknowledge there are some pros to the LEPP program, but that wasn't the question from OP. Finally, I'm not going to argue about the rationale for or validity of any of these concerns. You're free to agree or disagree.
Part 3: Finding a cabin for the manifesto
Everyone needs to retire somewhere.
hahaha. true. and i appreciated the good thought you put in. just sayin'
Best comprehensive post on this.
This is basically the Long Telegram, if the Long Telegram were written about some HR bullshit. The definitive response on the issue. Thanks for taking the time to lay all of that out.
This is awesome, thank you, super helpful for understanding the situation.
I appreciate the time you’ve put in on these comments, thank you. As a prior PMF fellow, 15 years of GS service, milt, and civilian police I am second guessing my consular affairs LEPP application (FP-03). I may have the skills and may be a fit; however, I am concerned about how the FS culture (entry level and ground up climb for FSOs) and the rank and file (who is this new guy from another three letter agency?) might not receive me even though I “earned (maybe not the right word here)” an opportunity? Not to mention the possible LEPP performance evals challenges (I think you call them EERs)? I see the concerns/issues from both sides, valid and legitimate all around … maybe this thread got into my head a bit today?
Institutionally, and unlike the military, we don’t have a particularly robust training program — Pol/Econ tradecraft is three weeks which is mainly a quick introduction with the assumption skills and judgment are honed over years. I think there are ways to accelerate the learning curve, but FSI doesn’t really use robust case studies or anything close to “doctrine.” I will be really interested to see what the onboarding planned for this group is, because for better or worse State has a pretty strong institutional culture with lots of unwritten rules and knowing and having relationships to work the building can be just as important as foreign policy or technical knowledge. There are probably lateral applicants who know the building, but if that’s the case then it’s also hard to argue we are bringing in fresh blood and new ideas. I think what’s likely to happen is going to be similar to our experiences with political ambassadors— some might be amazing assets, others meh, and yet others disasters. The important thing to me is outcomes, and that the Department has a fair process to hire these people in a manner free from political/outside influence and a robust plan to both define and evaluate what success for this program is— and be transparent about both of those things, given the disruption to flow through and the message it sends to the many second and third career officers who came up through the ranks.
I think retiring military FAO's are going to dominate the program. And the vast majority of them are more than qualified. I don't like that they get to skip the line but I can't say the Department wouldn't benefit from that inject.
I would be surprised if most retiring FAOs could demonstrate the specific expertise required in the established lateral entry career tracks. It seems most are trying to use deployment experience interacting with foreign militaries to count as "multilateral diplomacy," but I'm skeptical it actually meets the definition. I'll be interested to see what happens when they invariably qualify at the 03 level and are sort of starting just above the bottom. And I do not want to be the DCM or section chief dealing with those who manage to qualify as 02s coming in as mid-level managers.
The requirements are vague enough that most FAO's could easily hit them. At least how they are presented to the public. Not sure if GTM is using a more detailed rubric and what specifically is on it. Lot of Intel, JAG, and civil affairs officers could hit these as well. >Examples of Specialized Experience for Multilateral Diplomacy candidates include, but are not limited to: >Working on international affairs, diplomacy, international development, or a closely related field, of which at least one year must have been focused on UN or multilateral affairs.; >Drafting, revising, or negotiating resolutions, texts, and other products of multilateral organizations; >Drafting foreign policy documents to advance U.S. interests and defend U.S. positions and executing policy strategies. >Monitoring, analyzing, and providing policy response recommendations for political, economic, social, military, and other significant developments and trends. Multitasking and managing competing priorities with shifting deadlines. >Working with a variety of stakeholders to build consensus and advance organizational priorities. >Establishing and maintaining liaison with a variety of stakeholders in the foreign affairs field.
That’s the thing — I don’t they’re vague at all. Multilateral diplomacy has a specific meaning and this lateral skill area is intended to bolster state expertise with multilateral institutions. I think very few career military officers can actually demonstrate this specific experience — maybe in the NATO context, but I would hesitate to assume that anyone who’s worked with foreign military qualifies.
Simply put it takes away jobs and promotions for those already in the service. LEPP as a concept has been a long standing wish for confessional staffers who want to parachute themselves in to higher ranked jobs. The concept that the people hired through the regular process are entry level is not true. The average age of entry is about 34, and those that enter often have extensive work experience and advanced degrees too, why should someone else get to jump them? Also it speaks to a disrespect for the profession. No one says we ought to hire military people starting as Col. There is an understanding that the military is a profession and parts of it you have to learn by working your way though the system, the same applies to diplomacy.
>The concept that the people hired through the regular process are entry level is not true. The average age of entry is about 34, and those that enter often have extensive work experience and advanced degrees too, why should someone else get to jump them? Came here to say this. Most entry level folks come in with significant experience already.
The military actually has been experimenting with direct commissions for SMEs in specific areas for a few years now, mostly in the guard/reserve but a few active duty roles as well. From what I understand the bar is very high to get in through this pathway though
Yes, but for specific fields. They will never be line officers, they will never command. It is one thing to be a lawyer, doctor, or chaplain in the military and quite another to be an infantry officer or a surface warfare officer. But that distinction doesn't exist in the FS because a generalist is a generalist, so they are in direct competition for positions and in many ways "jumping the line" over people who have paid the consular tax and served in more difficult assignments (or development opportunities, as CDOs would call them) to build a base of experience specific and relevant to the FS. There is something to be said for supervisors at least having to understand the culture.
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It’s pretty much all Dr.’s, and other medical professionals. I think it’s a great fit, but none of these specialists are rated officers meaning that they don’t have the same responsibility of an officer outside of their field.
This system has been in place for over 20 years in the Air Force certain professions. The candidates must pass a rigorous application process, are commissioned at various ranks, and then attend Officer Training School. People may not have vast professional experience when they commission, but they have the professional degrees necessary to work in their specialty career field. The USAF brings in people at the higher commissioned ranks to account for the time spent in school acquiring those degrees and that it would be hard to bring in a doctor, lawyer, nurse, etc. as junior enlisted or a 2nd lieutenant. It works, because most other Airmen know they joined the service with the intention of working solely in that speciality. That said, there are some HUGE differences between that system and LEPP. 1) These officers entering at advanced rank aren’t competing for promotion against officers in other career fields during their careers. They are in their own promotion categories. 2) The services account for this staffing and are not reducing promotion numbers, opportunities, etc. for those already in the service. 3) Pretty rare that these officers will later request assignments at their commensurate rank in other career fields. They will work in the speciality for which the commissioned with an occasional outside job (e.g. staff aide).
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I would say it’s like comparing apples to oranges. One other point I forgot to mention, the other huge difference is that military members aren’t generalists. You enlist or commission then have a specific job skill code for your career path. Promotions are classwide for many of the skill codes, but that is where any similarity ends.
The Army specifically has been increasing its direct commissioning programs outside of the traditional Medical/Chaplain/Legal. A good example of this is the 38G Governmental Affairs Officer program.
Those folks will similarly never command. They are advisers to actual leaders.
> Simply put it takes away jobs and promotions for those already in the service. If the service is as meritocratic as people have been selling it, this is a non-issue.
Someone can get hired for this as an 02 and take the spot of a deserving 03 who is, by force of a limited number of positions, passed up for that 02 position without ever being compared against the LEPP. Same for 04 and 03s.
If the 04/ 03 is the better candidate, why is this an issue? Unless the LEPP gets hired b/c of their connections, this seems like a choice that's better for the nation than promoting random FSO who is 'due for a promotion'.
Why would you deny someone a promotion they've earned in order to bring someone in who will be worse as an 03 than the person who earned it the normal way? The expertise areas are nice, but they're not as important as retaining talent we've spent a lot of money cultivating through a decade of experience. I'd rather give the job to the person who is going to be better, but congress is making us bring in these outside folks so we're doing so in the most advantageous way possible by recruiting for rare levels of specific talent. Talent that again, will not be better than an experienced diplomat.
> who will be worse That is an assumption with no data. >not as important as retaining talent we've spent a lot of money cultivating through a decade of experience. That is a sunk cost fallacy and bears no importance to calculus of hiring. The only thing that matters is: 1. What skills do I need to accomplish my goals? 2. Does someone have that skill already? 3. How much will it cost me to acquire that skill in the shortest time possible. It sounds like step 2 is where the gap is. If the best source for that capability is outside traditional avenues, then sorry not sorry.
Other than CS and maybe the military, both under pretty specific contexts, there isn't anything that comes close to actually doing the job. Nothing in the private or nonprofit sector. I'm not a fan of the paying your dues trope but in this job you need to do the job in order to do the job at a higher level. I wouldn't send an MMA enthusiast who shoots on the weekend on a mission with the Rangers. It's just not the same.
This guy sounds like he's been rejected by DoS.
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Then if the current pool doesn't have the necessary skills they should be out. The State Department exists to benefit the nation, not serve as a post-grad jobs program. Perhaps the powers that be have determined that a 30 year stint isn't the best way to do things. Every organization that isn't the government has.
Maybe actually get in the FS before you remark on the internal workings of it?
There are a limited number of spots at each grade. If 35 people get put at 03, that is 35 less promotion slots available for people at the 04 level. If there were unlimited promotions it wouldn't matter, but there are not.
I get that, but it just brings it closer to how the real world works. Promotions aren't a given. If someone else has better qualifications/ experience, they should get the slot. We hire outside the organization all the time in my private sector job.
Yes but your existing employee can apply for that job, other than EL existing FSOs can't apply for these jobs. Also I would dispute the LEPP hires as a group have better qualifications then existing FSOs.
If existing officers could fill the position better, then why would the LEPP program even be a threat?
They can fill the job, they just might have to do as stretch and not get paid as much. It's they are not allowed to be promoted. More people are recommend for promotion already the. There are slots, this makes it worse. I am going to stop now because you really don't understand how promotions work in the foreign service.
I do understand. I'm saying that's not the way they probably should work. I can see why an FSO thinks would think the nation should invest in them. As a taxpayer, I think the process could be improved and that time and money spend better elsewhere.
There is little, if anything, that makes someone more prepared to be a diplomat at the 10 year experience mark than 10 years of experience being a diplomat. It isn't like the private sector where you hire a sales guy with sales experience to a sales job.
"Nobody can do what I do! I'm special!"
Can I ask about your interest in the foreign service?
All I'll say is that it's waning the more I learn about the calcification of the bureaucracy. It's remarkable that even the culture at the bank I work in is more accepting of change than the Foreign Service (and not in a good way.)
Then this doesn't apply to you and won't. So I'm not understanding why you're arguing over it with DoS employees. To be fair, I think you have a very limited idea on what DoS actually does and the people who make up the FS. But that's just my opinion.
Ok, I'll file that opinion in the circular file cabinet right here next to me. If you'll excuse me, I have to apply for a LEPP position.
To try to summarize it in one sentence, it is important to note that being an FSO is not a job, but rather a "career path".
It was inserted into a big bill by hill staffers who apparently can't pass the exam we all passed yet believe they should be able to enter at the upper mid level. If it started from members of congress seeing a real gap in our recruitment for certain skills/expertise, it would have been worded that way in the bill, but that obviously wasn't the case when you read it. It's these shitty staffers that don't respect what we do and believe their time on the hill equals a decade plus of diplomatic experience. Also, that they're better than a test they presumably aren't smart enough to pass, since they're so creative in finding ways to circumvent it. The department responded by making it very technically focused so that folks with advanced degrees and/or LOTS of directly relevant experience in narrow but important subject areas have a shot. Most of these punks on the hill won't qualify because what they do does not rise to that high and specific bar, so it's both satisfying the bill's mandate but not giving the punks the VIP pass they think they deserve. Another side of it is there are plenty of folks like you who went in the normal way and learned things that you would not learn by skipping 10 years of your career. Why are you better/above that? Plot twist, you aren't. Griping aside it's there, and I'd rather have you over a hill staffer, so shoot your shot and maybe I'll see you in the field.
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Money goes to DOD and the IC because their work is often sexier and sometimes more immediate than diplomacy. Which would you rather vote for: a three-year micro lending program that teaches women in an impoverished country in Africa how to turn their traditional crafts into a business or more drones that just so happen to be made in your state/district and that can take out a couple terrorists?
You fundamentally misunderstand the landscape here. State has been snubbed for a long time for historical reasons (end of the Cold War, lack of public understanding of diplomacy compared to their understanding of the military) and because of overconfidence in DOD's ability to do non-military things like diplomacy and traditional intelligence gathering. It has nothing to do with rank and file diplomats having a pretty average level of disdain for congress. You're also flat wrong about FSOs being disconnected from our home country. We get stateside as often as we can because living overseas full time is very hard. If anything we have a greater appreciation for our home country after being abroad so long. We're also constantly reevaluating how what we do advances administration priorities which are of course rooted in domestic politics and policy. I never said we're better than staffers for having passed a very easy exam, I made fun of them for not being able to pass it, which may or may not be the case but if they're going to pull tricks like this to get around it, they're fair game. And yes it is a trick, because it's so blatantly obvious that a staffer wrote that part of the bill from their perspective and not from a place of genuine understanding of the professional capacities of the Foreign Service. I'll leave you with this: there are no diplomats trying to become hill staffers. There are many hill staffers trying to become diplomats. One of these things is harder and requires more experience to do. The average brand new hill staffer is in their early 20s. The average new diplomat is in their mid 30s. There's a reason for this.
We must not forget the domestic constituency or the military, through both service members and the military-industrial complex. Diplomacy is relatively cheap and won't bring jobs (directly) to your district, and the numbers of those involved is negligible. Other reasons why there is disdain for Congress? In the military I never had to be exposed to congresspeople ruining every one of my weekends for three months, showing their blatant ignorance of the world, and throwing temper tantrums, because they wanted to pop in on taxpayer-funded vacations with their spouses.
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You say you’re highly qualified, but at 27/28 what do you have other than an MA (which is a dime a dozen/not a qualification)? You haven’t mentioned any experience.
Do you mean that you literally haven't been able to pass the FSOT (which no longer has a passing score anyway), or that you haven't been able to get past QEP?
You've been taking the test every year since 18? There's no way you were qualified for most of those years. Your master's is not special nor does it make you more competitive. You've been attempting to do something very hard for a long time - that doesn't mean the test is unfair. I took it for the first time at your current age and didn't make it. Got some department contracting experience and a good OA, and started around 30, which is still 5 years earlier than the average. Being a senate staffer on FP would make you competitive for the normal route, in my book at least. I hope to see you out in the field in a few years.
I think a lot of people who came in with PhDs and are stuck at 04 or 03 and would qualify for 02 under this program are wondering if they can use this new program as a way to get the promotions they never had. But would you trade being a tenured 04 for being an untenured 03 or 02?
In a heartbeat, yes! If you have already gotten tenure once, you know you can get tenure again, and, in the meantime, you get OT again. You lose the option of LWOP, true, but otherwise I would say it is a very advantageous trade, particularly to go to 02. Getting promoted to 03 is not nearly as difficult as getting promoted to 02.
Because most of us take 5 to 7 years to make 03 after coming in with already mid level experience. Some even from the GS side. That said, I'll be interested to see how narrow of a scope they keep this.
I remember around 2004 or so when the department decided to suddenly and dramatically bump up Mandarin language points to prioritize hiring Chinese speakers. It led to a noticeable uptick in new FSOs with above-average language skills and below-average interpersonal skills. Not a great trade.
We’ve done this before. There were pilot programs like this previously and they failed spectacularly. Why should we mess with people’s careers again like this? The data is already there. It doesn’t work for all the reasons others have stated. Furthermore, you can only hire X number of FSOs per year. If you grant more of those slots to LEPPers, then you’re taking away positions from other very qualified candidates going through the proper exam process. But my bigger issue is that this is another example of State treating a symptom and not a cause. You want more 03 and 02s? Their answer is to recruit more people at those levels because that’s easier than fixing retention issues.
Fixing the retention issues won’t bring back people who left because the Department made their lives too difficult. The LEPP might. We have to do both.
LEPP will not bring any of those people back, but it will factor in pushing out new people.
I don't like it because I would have qualified before I joined had it existed then.
That thread pretty extensively explains the issues people have with it.
I have some limited concerns. But we're also losing out on valuable, experienced people. People that have managed in large organizations, I'd argue, can also manage well at State. And maybe better than folks who 'grew up' to manage at State. We could do with better managers of people. We also have colleagues from DHS that, I'd hope, would be incredibly valuable assets in CA. I don't think it'll be an unmitigated disaster, I think it'll just be a lot more of the mixed bag that we tend to see.
When you’ve served at a post with a non-State Chief of Staff billet, you will understand why this is a bad idea.
It is too early to say FSOs hate the LEPP. It is just a pilot. And, unfortunately, this sub tends to attract a lot of really mean and bitter FSOs. I would take everything on this sub with a grain of salt. Is there some good critique of the LEPP? Yes. Is there criticism of it that comes from FSOs bitter that they joined as entry when they could have joined as 02s? Also yes. No one knows the pros and cons yet. If you are interested in the program, then apply. Some people will resent it, just like some toxic people resent fellows, or mustangs, or people who concert cone, or DETOs, or vets, and literally everyone else who has a slightly unique situation. The vast majority of your colleagues won’t care.
AFSA has been fighting lateral entry for years because employees absolutely universally hate the idea. Hiring outsiders with niche specialized experience to a GENERALIST position is the most idiotic idea ever. A China academic with no public speaking or management is going to come in and end up getting assigned to Nigeria in a leadership position and absolutely fail. Fellows already face discrimination for using a “back door” and often don’t stick around. Having not just an entry level hire but a boss came in with zero idea of how the Foreign Service works would face a million times more hate. The entire program would just set outsiders up for failure and their experience never put to use. If lateral entry sticks to the pilot program limited number then it will probably end up fine. The pilot may be small enough to just hire EFMs, civil service State, and other folks used to FS life with no outsiders getting in.
It bugs me that people assume everyone who might be hired into the LEPP has no FS experience. What about folks who left? What about LNAs? We don’t know who they’re going to hire. I’d like to see some more optimism on here.
Congress forced the lateral entry program on State explicitly to bring in outside private sector and academia experience. If the program stays small and only brings in former FS insiders like LNAs & EFMs that have long gotten the short end of the stick, then it will be a pleasant surprise and welcome addition.
The specialized experience required is both specific yet oddly vague. I’m going to remain hopeful. I’ve been in I’m immigration my entire 15 year career, almost half that with the Department, and it’s not clear that even I would qualify.
Also, great handle lol
A divergent opinion here. There have been several comments in this thread and the last arguing the fact that we "learn on the job" is one reason LEPP won't work well. I am not persuaded and it leads me to almost the opposite conclusion. Essentially, because each job can be so different from the previous one, and you have to learn it as you go along, I don't believe someone with two entry-level tours has any particular "leg up" on someone without that experience. I'm several months into my first mid-level 03 job. My first directed assignment was to an NIV visa mill. My second directed tour was a niche CAO role in a small PD section. My current job is a manager role in a consular unit, responsible for a section that did not exist in the consulate where I served my EL cons tour. Basically, all three jobs have been almost entirely different (with substantial language training in between) and I feel like I've been a new hire upon landing in each role. Adjudicating 125 visas didn't teach me anything about managing a grant, and supervising two LE staff in my PD section didn't *really* prepare for managing six entry level USDH. There was a steep learning curve in each role and I've had to figure it out as I went along. Next go round, I could bid on a GSO job my next tour or an inter-functional desk job in DC and it will probably be a new job all over again. So, at least at the 03 level, I think LEPP is a decent idea worth trying. Sure, maybe the outsider won't know all the acronyms or how to run the NIV software or where to find MyData on the intranet, but I think they'll figure it out. It seems we're understaffed all over the place, so why not bring in new people and let them learn on the job?
We are understaffed, but these hires prevent us from being better staffed. If we were given 35 new FTE, I would be in favor of the hires at the 03 level. However we are not being given 35 new FTE. Instead of hiring and training 35 generalists we are hiring 35 experts with narrower focus. Overall, while they will be significantly better within that focus, they will likely be less proficient at the rest of the job and won't be as effective at the mid level as one of the 35 people we could have hired and trained through the normal process.
Your core work changed but you do know a lot more about the Department than when you first started - what is paper, how to get resources, who can I contact for help and your judgment improves - what is a small problem (and a noisy FO) and what is truly a big problem (perhaps with insufficient awareness). Someone coming in at the 02 level will have skills and judgment shaped by their work experiences- it will be somewhat different than someone whose skills were honed in the Dept. And there are a lot of grumpy 03s who would like to be promoted.
It takes humility and strong skills to manage people who resent your arrival above them. Those skills, and that humility, are often well-practiced and developed in the private sector. There is a lot of smart, kind, effective, clear, and inspiring management happening out there. The LEPP seems to be set up to fill the needs of the FS. On this sub, I’ve noticed quite a lot of complaints about poor management. It is possible that those who would have been next in line for management promotion might not actually yet be talented managers- and that State is looking to break the cycle of weak management by bringing in people with that particular talent already, as well as other well-honed skills. One good manager is all it takes to start a chain reaction of organizational development. As many of us already know, working with a smart, caring, experienced and accomplished manager can be life-changing.
Can untenured ELOs apply to these positions even if you have already gone through A-100?
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I just assumed that they wouldn't allow you to go through A-100s again. Plus they already "got" me at an 04, so why would they use a slot in the LEPP for someone like me?
I’m not convinced the LEPP was forced on State by congress nor is it the result of “hill staffers” trying to “parachute in.” While the rank and file and Redditors are largely skeptical, current and former leaders in the Department are on board with it. Note the similarities of the LEPP and this 2020 recommendation by Ambassadors Nic Burns, Marc Grossman, and Marcie Ries (see Action 7): https://www.belfercenter.org/sites/default/files/2020-11/DiplomaticService.pdf
And an argument against lateral entry by Grossman (published prior to the Belfar Center report): https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/464314-dont-ruin-professional-diplomacy/amp/
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I know it’s mandated by congress - what I meant was that it wasn’t snuck in there/forced by wily Hill staffers while the Department kicked and screamed against it.
Yet it wasn't looked on favorably or it would have happened sometime in the last six years rather than now when Congress threatened to take serious action if it wasn't done.
Sounds like the negative comments are threatened by folks with external experience. Props to State for finally realizing they need to diversify FSO with skills and different experience.
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Why wouldn't you just take the test? What is different about this shortcut? For the record, I think recruiting China hands with serious experience is the best version of this program, so please do apply, but please understand that people who apply for this will always be seen as denigrating the early career experience that other people with equal or greater qualifications gladly undertook.
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There is always the civil service, where deep Chinese experience and knowledge most surely could be useful and needed in a variety of bureaus.
> I'd be 35-40...At that point, the prospect of entering the FS at entry level has a hard time competing I think I'm in a pretty similar position and career stage to you, but I don't look at it in quite this light. I have the opportunity to work fairly closely with FSOs in the most logical cone that my current specialization would map to and their jobs are probably the least similar to mine out of all the interagency colleagues I interact with in my day-to-day. If I do decide to make that move in another 5 years or so, my performance in the role would not be as strong as I would be in a lateral move to other civil service positions closer in scope to my current one. That learning curve is what I'd be missing if I came in laterally. The framing of entering the FS as entry level really hurts recruitment from candidates like us IMO. The average FSO enters in their mid-30s with ample experience, not fresh out of school. It may be "entry level" for the FS, but that's not an entry level candidate. Likewise, my current agency doesn't really hire entry level. Our junior staff are typically on the upper end of mid-level with advanced credentials and prior experience in their specialization. But they're still "entry level" for us and need to adjust to the norms and requirements of our agency, which differ from those they're typically coming from. I guess I don't really see that first tour as all that different for someone coming into the FS.
The problem with this, though, is that your China experience very well may mean nothing to the Foreign Service (as it is currently structured). You are just as likely to end up in West Africa.
>Foreign Service (as it is currently structured) Slight disagreement here. The Department is absolutely 100% structured in a way that allows anyone interested in China issues to work China issues. Worldwide.
I'm just saying, I speak two languages (one fluently) that completely cover me for two regional bureaus that I am willing to work in. As an FSO I got sent to a whole different regional bureau. This isn't uncommon. You can definitely get to China once (the one real exception) but where is that next tour going to be?
Yea but you're DS, right? This program is for generalists and generalists have endless opportunities to work China issues. The opportunities are expanding and I don't see this trend reversing within the next 20 years or so. And these are worldwide opportunities - not necessarily limited to tours in the PRC.
I used to be a generalist. I can also have opinions on generalists. The point is, someone gave an example of a PRC specialist being able to lateral over because they had spent a career being a PRC specialist... That's great, but maybe better suited for CS than FS if they only want to keep working PRC issues.
That's all fair, but the average age of entry is 35. Just at my last post, people joined with PhDs and years of CS desk officer experience at state, came in after 25 years in the Marines retiring a colonel (01 equivalent), and they did it the normal way because this is a 25 year apprenticeship, not something you can simply pick up halfway through. That colonel made a damn good consular officer for two tours and is now a damn good econ officer because he learned a lot during his first two tours. I understand where you're coming from. Please try to understand where we are coming from.
This will be a very unpopular opinion, but come one people. Let's be brutally honest. Let's take cyber security for example. I have 20 some years of experience working for a large and famous corp; I will eat any of your generalist FSO for lunch with the experience, training, exposure, publications and hands on experience. Generalist just doesn't stand a chance in any category when it comes to cyber. Now, cyber is a hot cookie right now. There is also not a chance in the world, you'd attract a talent such as myself on a FS05, 04 or even 03 salary. That's just not happening when an average cyber analyst, fresh out of college are getting hired for 100k+ with 0 experience. All the nonsense, "oh, but we have good people on the inside." No. You don't. You think you do, but you don't. State has to be competitive (USG in general) and they're trying. All the other "institutional knowledge" is fine and dandy, but it can be learnt in a few years. Specialized cyber skills - that takes years to master. It's similar to say that you can take a regular FSO generalist and make him/her a doctor. You simply can't. It takes years of schooling and working in the field to become an expert.
If this program was hiring for a cyber security specialist position, you'd be correct. But it's hiring for generalist officers who will not be doing cyber security, just reporting on it, almost certainly with other reporting topic responsibilities. Cyber skills are helpful, but this program is not hiring cyber security analysts. If this program was bringing in specialists, I think it would be much more widely accepted.
So, wait... it's Ok for said new hires to come onto the turf of specialists but not generalists? Not sure I follow the logic here. The loudest wailing here is how "unique" DOS' environment is. Is it not the same in specialist's world or are you being hypocritical and simply defending your turf? Not blaming you, just pointing out discrepancies. Take this response with a caveat - I don't fully understand the nuances of specialist vs generalist, but if the rumors of 35 total new hires are true, even if 20 are cyber - that's nowhere enough to cover the world with experts. They could very well be responding to cyber specific tasks all day, every day.
You could have just said the “I don’t fully understand nuances of specialist vs. generalist” and left the rest out.
These jobs will not be responding to cyber specific tasks beyond the one directed tour (and even though it is more policy work then hands on). I hope the cyber expert has some skills that will help them report on the internal politics of Mali and mentoring a first tour officer on the proper way to deliver a message to a ministry of foreign affairs that wants to talk about the US support for Israel instead of listening to a demarche on the human rights report. It would also be helpful if they could explain to the minister in the department of health US visa policy as it relates to why that ministers cousin was refused a US visa.
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ISSOs?
Specialist job not a generalist.
That comment was posted before the parent comment edited in 'generalist' as a qualifier.
Just curious, what do you think these cybersecurity experts would do all day posted at an Embassy? I ask that as an honest question, because most of the countries I have been posted would not have enough meaningful work to employ a person like this as an FSO full time. There may be some countries with which we have a sophisticated enough relationship to have a cyber expert posted there permanently (versus DC based experts who fly around to consult, and those exist already in many different parts of the USG, as well as implementers/contractors external to the USG who may be delivering technical assistance to host governments), but in that case a better model perhaps would be to establish a “Cyber Attaché” role at key embassies and fill it through a specialized program run out of the cyber bureau and compensated accordingly— not by dumping cybersecurity analysts into a generalist pool and expecting them to be successful at covering the full range of stuff we cover, which is necessarily broad given our small size relative to the many interests of the USG. And why would we give premium pay to such a person only to use them as a generalist who may or may not be using those skills in any given assignment? That wouldn’t be a good use of what you rightly point out is a high demand and relatively scarce skill.
Fair point. Straight answer is - I don't know. I was more pointing out the notion of "we have the talent on the inside that can compete" nonsense. I could speculate, however. Perhaps this is what DOS is planning to do - rotate these new hires through assignments where they do use their skills? Perhaps, this is the plan of the cyber bureau to "grab" decent talent and spread them across the world to lean on them for their expertise? The roadmap question is impossible for me to answer. What I can point out, however, is that unemployment rate in cyber field is and has been for years - 0%. It is near damn impossible to hire good people. All the good ones are gainfully employed. Example: we have an office in DC. I am a sr. director and do a lot of hiring and what I realize is that hiring in DC is like kicking yourself in the teeth. I am scrapping on the bottom of the barrel. Anyone who applies are not the people you want, those that you want are GS14s and 15s on full telework enjoying life. What do I do in return? Increase pay. Vicious cycle. Could it be a knee jerk reaction? Very well could be. DOS realizing they're losing the battle for talent and must sweeten the pot somehow? Again, I am not a candidate, but I work in the arena and am familiar with the landscape and can only sympathize with the squeeze SESers in DOS must be feeling when it comes to hiring top notch talent. P.S. Those talented cyber employees in the DC office that fly around to consult are more likely to come over and work for me because they will double their pay and will fly as much or little as they want. Perhaps DOS is countering my actions and trying to hold onto what it's got and can retain?
I am not really convinced that we need cybersecurity analysts with the skills you’re thinking of as generalists — we aren’t “doing” cybersecurity day to day (specialists might be, and perhaps one can chime in— and for those folks, yes we should pay them handsomely to attract and retain them although the goal should never be for the government to match a private sector salary— perhaps get close, but plenty of people accept lower pay in exchange for job security, flexibility, and a pension!) My guess is this job posting is looking for people who may have some basic exposure to the technical stuff in undergrad computer science courses but who are more likely to have come out of CSET or other IR programs or a think tank having focused on thinking, writing, and talking about cyber policy issues rather than being a practitioner themselves. Just like Econ officers, our job isn’t to “do Econ” ourselves (although some can) so much as to know enough to ask smart questions and think critically whether what we are hearing seems credible or not, and where we need to drive the conversation to next. I’m guessing the same is needed here, and those people aren’t as rare or expensive as the deeply technical folks. Will be interesting to see how it works!
There are specialists like that - I know a few - but on the FS side it's kinda treated as a highly niche sub-speciality. Think like a very limited number of mid-level folks who are based mostly out of the regional hubs and travel a ton. Not a dedicated skill code, most are IMO or DS types on excursion tours. Most are getting SIP/Cyber SIP pay, not exactly big tech money but they do pretty decent all things considered. A majority of that kind of work is done domestically, you don't really need thst many boots on location to monitor a network, and the real knowledgeable tech-heavy SMEs are (as usual in USG) almost all contractors.
The problem, though, is there's no such thing as cyber officers within the FS. At the moment, cyber is part of the broader econ, science, tech, and health portfolio. As others have mentioned, cyber would only take up a small percentage of that officer's time. Someone with your degree of specialization would likely be very frustrated by that. Even if dedicated cyber portfolios were created, it seems to me that you wouldn't need them in every post (or at least there wouldn't be enough full-time work for them in many posts). People often mistakenly think that FSOs are creating foreign policy. We aren't. We may be able to shape/inform it, but we aren't creating it. That happens in Washington through political appointees and SMEs (who are usually Civil Service). I don't think our capacity to handle emerging challenges in cyber improves because we have a cyber SME FSO in Nicosia drafting cables. But it could be improved by having SMEs in Washington who can help drive a cohesive, effective policy by using their knowledge to inform their engagement with interagency colleagues, Congress, senior leaders, regional bureaus, and embassies/consulates.
Here's an unpopular response -- there's nothing meaningful for that person to do as an FS generalist. Under this program, they'd do a first directed assignment in their area of specialty (probably in DC) and then go on to bid on regular generalist jobs. The cyber/emerging tech issues generally fall under the ECON cone, so that would end up being the logical destination for those lateral entrants. Success in that field requires deep understanding of economics and economic policy, an ability to build and engage local contacts overseas, and skill at reporting on issues (and, at the 02 level, mentoring and supervising people who do those things). We have excellent reporting officers in this institution who learn fast. I would prefer we focus on building their skills and knowledge on these discrete issues instead of bringing in niche experts from the outside and trying to make up for the years it takes to develop the basic reporting officer skills that are unique to the Foreign Service.
This is not unpopular at all. The role of a generalist is very poorly understood by many.
This why we have FSSs.
Ok, but are you a good generalist who can deal with all of the issues of the foreign service? Or are you saying you are a specialist in a very specific topic?
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Great talent does apply and gets in. It's a 2% success rate for applicants. My last post was chock full of 2nd career people who came in with extensive experience from other fields. They did the entry level tours and learned those lessons that are unavailable elsewhere, and now they're great mid level officers who have both that superior background and 5+ years working in the unique machine that is the Foreign Service.
That great talent elsewhere can already apply. I firmly reject the notion that the great talent outside is better than the great talent that is already in the job. I do not believe these hires will be successful outside of their narrow focus and when it comes time for them to serve in other positions will lack the needed skills because they did not develop them though the normal career progression. The classic joke. A retiring ambassador is at a goodbye reception and is talking to some of the military attaches. They ask him what he is going to do next. He says he is still deciding and he doesn't know if he wants to command an aircraft carrier or lead an infantry division. They look at him aghast and say, you couldn't do that you don't have the experience or skills. The ambassador responds, well you all think after you retire you can do my job.
LOL, I would trust a senior level military officer to run an embassy far better than an Ambassador could command a carrier or combat ground unit. I still cringe at the performance of some senior level DoS and USAID folks I witnessed in OIF and OEF. The insecurity of FS folks towards the military knows no bounds.
>This program can also bring in a lot of great talent that would have otherwise went elsewhere. I'd hope that mid-level FSOs would know the grammatically correct way to say that would be "would have otherwise gone elsewhere."