This position is located in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Office of General Counsel (OGC), Incumbent is responsible for planning, directing, and supervising the work of a professional staff and furnishes legal, legislative, and litigation services in assigned subject-matter areas to the Secretary, other top officials, and program personnel of the Department, and cooperatively to other Government agencies, including the Department of Justice.

Duties

The position is located in the Office of General Counsel's Benefits Law Group and reports to the Deputy General Counsel for Veterans Programs. The responsibilities include, but are not limited to: Provide legal advice and assistance to senior department officials. Supervise, coordinate, and review provision of legal advice and assistance by OGC legal staff on a wide range of complex subjects. Lead legal staff in developing and implementing strategies to support VA's legislative program, defend VA policies in litigation, and assist clients in assessing legally available options and associated risks. Develop, oversee, and implement work process to effectively manage a high volume of varied legal work and overlapping deadlines related to litigation, legislation, regulations, and Departmental and Administration priorities. Maintain effective liaison with officials in colleague and stakeholder organizations, including Congress, Office of Management and Budget, Department of Justice, Department of Defense, Veterans Service Organizations, and courts. Develop, review, and implement plans to ensure effective execution of legal and operational tasks related to OGC's Accreditation, Discipline, and Fees program, to include processing applications, issuing decisions, and investigating complaints.

Requirements

• US citizenship is required.
• One year probationary period required for initial SES appointment.
• Males born after 12-31-59 must be registered for Selective Service.
• Incumbents of this position will be subject to a background investigation commensurate with the risk and sensitivity level of the position.
• Successful completion of drug screening required.
• Public Financial Disclosure Report (SF-278) is required within 30 days of appointment.
• May be subject to reassignment geographically or organizationally.
• VA structures its SES positions into pay bands. This is a Pay Band 2 position. The maximum salary for Pay Band 2 is $214,300. Exceptions to the cap may be made in some circumstances.
• License. MUST be a member in good standing of the bar of a State or Territory of the United States, or the District of Columbia.

Qualifications

To meet the minimum qualifications, applicants must possess the following technical and executive core qualifications. These qualifications would typically be gained through progressively responsible management or executive level assignments such as director of a regional office, medical facility or program manager. An individual's total experience, education and volunteer work experience must demonstrate the ability to perform the duties of the position. Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g. Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religious; spiritual; community, student, social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. MANDATORY EXECUTIVE CORE QUALIFICATIONS (ECQs): All applicants must submit a written narrative response to each of the following ECQs and include your name on each page. Your narrative must address each ECQ separately and demonstrate the underlying competencies in the narrative. Examples should be clear, concise, and emphasize your level of responsibilities; the scope and complexity of the programs, activities, or services you managed; program accomplishments; policy initiatives undertaken; level of contacts; the sensitivity and criticality of the issues you addressed; and the results of your actions. You should use action oriented leadership words to describe your experience and accomplishments and quantify your experience wherever possible to demonstrate your accomplishments (e.g., number of employees supervised; size of budget managed; amount of money saved, etc.). Applicants should use the Challenge, Context, Action and Results (CCAR) model below when responding to each ECQ: Challenge. Describe a specific problem or goal. Context. Describe the individuals and groups you worked with, and/or the environment in which you worked, to address a particular challenge (e.g., clients, co-workers, members of Congress, shrinking budget, low morale, etc). Action. Discuss the specific actions you took to address a challenge. Result. Give specific examples of measures/outcomes that had some impact on the organization. These accomplishments demonstrate the quality and effectiveness of your leadership skills. Your narrative response should not exceed 10 pages, be typed in 12 point font with one-inch margins. It is recommended that you include 2 recent (not older than 10 years) examples per ECQ and draft your ECQs in a Word document before uploading into the system to ensure these guidelines are met. Information that exceeds these guidelines will not be reviewed. Detailed information on each ECQ, the underlying and fundamental competencies, sample narratives and a tips sheet for writing effective ECQs are available in the "Guide To Senior Executive Service Qualifications" GUIDE (opm.gov) at: http://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/senior-executive-service/executive-core-qualifications/. 1. Leading Change: The ability to bring about strategic change, both within and outside the organization, to meet organizational goals. Inherent to this ECQ is the ability to establish an organizational vision and to implement it in a continuously changing environment. (Underlying Competencies: Creativity and Innovation, External Awareness, Flexibility, Resilience, Strategic Thinking, and Vision) 2. Leading People: The ability to lead people toward meeting the organization's vision, mission, and goals. Inherent to this ECQ is the ability to provide an inclusive workplace that fosters the development of others, facilitates cooperation and teamwork, and supports constructive resolution of conflicts. (Underlying Competencies: Conflict Management, Leveraging Diversity, Developing Others and Team Building) 3. Results Driven: The ability to meet organizational goals and customer expectations. Inherent to this ECQ is the ability to make decisions that produce high-quality results by applying technical knowledge, analyzing problems, and calculating risks. (Underlying Competencies: Accountability, Customer Service, Decisiveness, Entrepreneurship, Problem Solving and Technical Credibility) 4. Business Acumen: The ability to manage human, financial and information resources strategically. (Underlying Competencies: Financial Management, Human Capital Management and Technology Management) 5. Building Coalitions: The ability to build coalitions internally and with other Federal agencies, state and local governments, nonprofit and private sector organizations, foreign governments, or international organizations to achieve common goals. (Underlying Competencies: Partnering, Political Savvy and Influencing/Negotiation) TECHNICAL QUALIFICATION (TQ): In addition, all applicants must submit a written narrative response to the following specific TQ(s). Please label and include your name on each page. Please give examples and explain how often you used your skills, the complexity of the knowledge possessed, the level of people you interacted with, the sensitivity of the issues you handled managing a large public or private sector organization that administers complex, rules-based benefits or services, etc. It is recommended that you draft your TQ(s) in a word document and then upload into the system. TQ1: Ability to perform and supervise all legal work related to operation of veterans' benefits programs administered by VA, to include performing legal research, conducting litigation, crafting persuasive written analyses and arguments, drafting legislation and regulations, assessing risk, and advising non-attorney clients in matters relating to the substantive and procedural requirements in the following subject-matter areas: Disability Compensation Pension Dependency and Indemnity Compensation Education Benefits Veteran Readiness & Employment Insurance Fiduciary Matters Transition Assistance Cemetery Operations & Memorial Benefits Accreditation of Representatives Attorney Fee Reviews Complaints & Discipline Regarding Representatives

Education

This job does not have an education qualification requirement.

Contacts

• Address General Counsel - 1007 810 Vermont Avenue NW Washington, DC 20420 US
• Name: Lucrecia Murdock
• Phone: (202) 461-7887
• Email: [email protected]