Government jobs often look very different from private sector jobs. A lot of the differences show up in terms of bureaucracy; projects need more levels of approval, hiring and firing are done according to specific guidelines, and pay is often tied to a specific schedule or employee designation. These types of protocol tend to be fixed at either the state or federal level, with all of the associated agencies or local governments adhering to these policies and procedures.
There’s obviously been a reason that the United States does things this way, and governments and employees have been able to find success within the framework. As new agencies and positions are created, though, the talent pool is often more used to how things work in the private sector. The Department of Homeland Security is one of the first agencies that’s decided to break with traditional government compensation plans and explore other options available to them.
They’re making this move specifically for the cybersecurity workforce it employs. Comparatively to positions and departments in other organizations, this is a new field. It’s a group that was put together to keep our country safe in a forward-thinking manner, preventing electronic attacks rather than the physical ones our military has always protected against. With that in mind, Homeland Security is launching what they call CTMS, which stands for Cybersecurity Talent Management System.
While Homeland Security has been using traditional federal employee designations for salary and advancement, they feel that the structure should be looked at differently, and that it will help in attracting top talent to their cybersecurity defense team. To that end, DHS has issued an RFP, and is looking for feedback on it by today, March 9th, at noon. The final RFP will then be issued on March 16th.
The goal of the solicitation is to get outside help on how to structure this new plan. They’re not looking for technology to administer the plan, but are focusing more on how they can create equitable compensation for their talent and use methods that have been proven with other cybersecurity focused companies.
In addition to designing the overall plan, DHS has also included optional objectives that include how employee surge requirements should be handled, support for compensation analysis, and how day-to-day operations support will work.
For agencies that haven’t existed in the past or ones that are getting into first-time projects, the ability to look at more established groups, whether they be in the private sector or not, can eliminate some of the growing pains and headaches related to establishing these groups.
At Extract, we find that government organizations come to us when they want to do things like put records online. Rather than redacting sensitive information manually with either a redaction pen or by drawing boxes over the data, they use our ID Shield software. Since we’ve gone through any growing pains with previous customers, our clients can have confidence in our secure automated solution rather than trying to build their own or do things manually.
If you’d like to learn more about Extract’s products and services, or see a demo of our software, please reach out.
About the Author: Chris Mack
Chris is a Marketing Manager at Extract with experience in product development, data analysis, and both traditional and digital marketing. Chris received his bachelor’s degree in English from Bucknell University and has an MBA from the University of Notre Dame. A passionate marketer, Chris strives to make complex ideas more accessible to those around him in a compelling way.