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Has anyone on here ever tried to get a job with the CIA?
I heard the CIA gets over a million applications a year.
The application process for all of the government jobs I've applied for is pretty rigorous. In 2008, I applied for a simple administrative assistant job with the city government. The first step was to fill out a grueling online application that asked you several questions about your experience. If you got past that stage, the next step was to take a two hour long exam. If your score was in the top 5, which mine was, you got a face-to-face interview with three of the department heads. The interview lasted about an hour and consisted of each of the dept. heads taking turns asking me questions from a standard interview questionnaire. I actually got a job offer (which I declined), but after seeing many of the applicants during the exam, I realized the competition wasn't that stiff.
I'm willing to bet that the CIA application process is much more rigorous than this.
I applied for a job with the CIA a few weeks back. I found the application process to be easier than other federal jobs that I have applied for. The CIA has it's own resume wizard & screening process, separate from USAJobs.
At least for the job I applied for, I didn't have to answer a bunch of banal and inane questions like typical USAjobs KSAs require. I uploaded my resume, and then answered some easy questions about my qualifications by selecting a 'radio button' to an answer that was most accurate for me. They had some optional questions which I was quite surprised by--why did you choose your college degree and your profession, have you ever considered other careers, how would you describe yourself, etc. These are questions a private employer might ask but federal jobs rarely make an applicant feel like a human being with unique qualities and traits that might distinguish me as a candidate.
I haven't heard one way or another about my application--like most federal jobs I assume the hiring process is lengthy and those who aren't chosen never hear one way or the other. And I don't know what might be the next steps in their hiring process. But at least my initial impression is that it isn't necessarily harder than getting a job with any other federal entity. But like every organization, the CIA has lawyers and engineers and IT staff and facility managers and HR people and admin assistants. They aren't all spies. I'm sure the difficulty of getting a job with them varies upon what you are applying for--like all organizations.
I am in the process of applying now. I have my fingers crossed. At the very least, the CIA actively recruits from my college and I have the perfect set of credentials given that I am a college senior with little work experience. I found the application quite fair.
And I don't know what might be the next steps in their hiring process. But at least my initial impression is that it isn't necessarily harder than getting a job with any other federal entity. But like every organization, the CIA has lawyers and engineers and IT staff and facility managers and HR people and admin assistants. They aren't all spies. I'm sure the difficulty of getting a job with them varies upon what you are applying for--like all organizations.
All CIA employees must pass very rigorous security investigations that can extend back to your undergraduate days -- and can delve pretty deeply into your life, including interviews with your former employers and neighbors, etc.
I wasn't talking about the background check process diorgirl.
I was responding to what you wrote earlier...
Quote:
Originally Posted by kodaka
But at least my initial impression is that it isn't necessarily harder than getting a job with any other federal entity.
So you didn't mean "getting a job" wasn't harder -- you meant "completing the on line application" wasn't harder?
Having been through the hiring process, I can tell you that it is much more difficult to qualify for a job with the CIA than most other federal entities.
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