The federal government instigated a new “most wanted list” of the future hiring needs for government agencies.

The report, released last week, and carried out by the Partnership for Public Service and the National Academy of Public Administration, listed the top five areas the government will be making a hiring push in the next two years.

Security and enforcement areas will hire the most people, followed by public health, engineering and sciences, program management and administration, accounting, budget and business.

With an employee base of about 1.9 million, the federal government is the largest employer in the nation. A total of 117,409 federal jobs are projected to open up in these areas in the next two years. This represents more than a 6 percent turnover.

“The federal government is in triple jeopardy,” said Max Stier, president and CEO of the Partnership for Public Service, in a press release. “Baby boomers are retiring in record numbers, and the pipeline of available talent to replace them has run dry.”

BYU Career Advisor Richard Cox agreed.

“Half of the nation’s federal employees are eligible to retire in the next five years,” he said.

Cox said BYU is heavily involved in attracting government recruiters. The CIA, FBI, National Security Agency and the Army continually recruit BYU students.

“We’re one of the leading schools for federal recruiting for securities,” Cox said.

He also said the interest in BYU students is because of their high moral values, language skills and a great work ethic.

However, governmental jobs are not usually heavily advertised.

“The biggest problem with federal jobs for young people is lack of information,” said Joshua Fay-Hurvitz, spokesman for the Partnership for Public Service. “We’re trying to fill that void.”

To help fill the increasing numbers of federal jobs, the “Call to Serve” network was launched in 2002 to help the national government find responsible employees and raise awareness of available government jobs. BYU is one of more than 550 colleges and universities that belong to this network, raising the degree of cooperation between BYU and government employers.

“We obviously want people to pick the federal government as an employer,” Fay-Hurvitz said. “Having it as an option on their radar screen is obviously a great step.”

INFO BOX:

Projected hires in next two years

Security/Enforcement – 37,515 (criminal investigators, police officers, airport screeners, etc.)

Public health – 25,756 (physicians, nurses, pharmacists, medical technicians, etc.)

Engineering/Sciences – 23,806 (physicists, chemists, biologists, botanists, veterinarians, etc.)

Program Management/Administration – 17,353 (public affairs and human resources specialists, Congressional affairs officers, etc.)

Accounting/Budget/Business – 12,985 (IRS revenue agents and tax examiners, contract managers, etc.)



Copyright Brigham Young University 10 Feb 2005