Duties

Summary

About the Position: This position is in the Department of Pathology, Anatomic Pathology. The lead technician offers laboratory support for Surgical Pathology for the medical center and other institutions. The work environment and level of testing provide daily challenges due to the diverse patient population of the joint operational area and research support provided in this setting.

This position's tour of duty will be 3rd shift.
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Responsibilities

• Provide direction to the daily operations throughout the laboratory. Direct the work of civilian employees engaged in performing histopathology technician duties and provide on-the-job training to new employees.
• Integrate and monitor the standard adherence to methods and protocols to maintain continuous work flow and quality within the unit.
• Resolve daily problems in a timely manner to insure uninterrupted quality service to customers and patients.
• Perform non-routine, advanced, and complex technical work involved in preparing human biological material (tissue and cell blocks) for specialized microscopic, cellular, and molecular diagnostic analyses.
• Perform all advanced technical work throughout the Section to include immunohistochemistry special stains, histology quality assurance, and other tasks as needed to ensure continuity of laboratory operations.
• Monitor and implement laboratory safety protocols to insure that processes conform to current rules and regulations as specified by appropriate regulatory entity (The Joint Commission, College of American Pathologists, CLIA, etc.).

Travel Required

Not required

Supervisory status
No

Promotion Potential
None

Requirements

Conditions of Employment

• This position requires the incumbent be able to obtain and maintain a determination of eligibility for a Tier 3 security investigation or access for the duration of employment. A background investigation and credit check are required.
• This position requires the incumbent to have tuberculosis testing.
• Appointment may be subject to a suitability or fitness determination, as determined by a completed background investigation.
• This position requires the completion of a pre-employment Physical Examination and an annual examination thereafter to ensure the continued, required level of physical health and ability or fitness to perform the duties of the position.
• This position may require the incumbent to work on any day or shift, including PMs, nights, weekends, holidays, or on an "on call" basis, necessary to meet mission requirements.
• This position has been designated "Mission Essential". In the event of severe weather conditions or other such emergency type situations the incumbent is required to report to work or remain at work as scheduled to support mission operations.

Qualifications

Who May Apply: Only applicants who meet one of the employment authority categories below are eligible to apply for this job. You will be asked to identify which category or categories you meet, and to provide documents which prove you meet the category or categories you selected. See Proof of Eligibility for an extensive list of document requirements for all employment authorities.

• 30 Percent or More Disabled Veterans
• Current Civilian Employees of the Defense Health Agency (DHA)
• Current Civilian Employees of the National Capital Region Medical Directorate
• Current Permanent Department of Defense (DoD) Civilian Employee
• Domestic Defense Industrial Base/Major Range and Test Facilities Base Civilian Personnel Workforce
• Interagency Career Transition Assistance Plan
• Land Management Workforce Flexibility Act
• People with Disabilities, Schedule A
• Priority Placement Program, DoD Military Spouse Preference (MSP) Eligible
• Veterans Employment Opportunity Act (VEOA) of 1998
• Veterans Recruitment Appointment (VRA)

In order to qualify, you must meet the experience requirements described below. 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). You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. Your resume must clearly describe your relevant experience; if qualifying based on education, your transcripts will be required as part of your application. Additional information about transcripts is in this document .

Specialized Experience: One year of specialized experience which includes applying histopathology concepts and methodology in areas such as tissue processing, embedding, microtomy of all types of tissues including very small biopsies, staining and microscopic tissue identification within a clinical laboratory; assisting in on-the-job training to personnel in all areas of the Histology laboratory (embedding, microtomy of all types of tissues including very small biopsies, and quality control preferred); and leading others in special projects or tasks. Although not required, management prefers applicants with experience in the performance of special stains, immunohistochemistry, direct immunofluorescence, and in-situ hybridization techniques. This definition of specialized experience is typical of work performed at the next lower grade/level position in the federal service (GS-09).

Some federal jobs allow you to substitute your education for the required experience in order to qualify. For this job, you must meet the qualification requirement using experience alone--no substitution of education for experience is permitted.

You will be evaluated on the basis of your level of competency in the following areas:

• Leadership
• Problem Solving
• Technical Credibility
• Technology Application

Time in Grade Requirement: Applicants who have held a General Schedule (GS) position within the last 52 weeks must have 52 weeks of Federal service at the next lower grade or equivalent (GS-09).

Education

This job does not have an education qualification requirement.

Additional information

• Male applicants born after December 31, 1959 must complete a Pre-Employment Certification Statement for Selective Service Registration.
• You will be required to provide proof of U.S. Citizenship.
• Two year trial/probationary period may be required.
• Direct Deposit of Pay is required.
• Selection is subject to restrictions resulting from Department of Defense referral system for displaced employees.
• If you have retired from federal service and you are interested in employment as a reemployed annuitant, see the information in the Reemployed Annuitant information sheet.
• You may claim military spouse preference (MSP).
• Salary includes applicable locality pay or Local Market Supplement.
• If you are unable to apply online or need to fax a document you do not have in electronic form, view the following link for information regarding an Alternate Application .
• Payment of Permanent Change of Station (PCS) costs is not authorized, based on a determination that a PCS move is not in the Government interest.

How You Will Be Evaluated

You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.

Once the announcement has closed, a review of your application package (resume, supporting documents, and responses to the questionnaire) will be used to determine whether you meet the qualification requirements listed on this announcement. If you are minimally qualified, your résumé and supporting documentation will be compared against your responses to the assessment questionnaire to determine your level of experience. If, after reviewing your résumé and/or supporting documentation, a determination is made that you have inflated your qualifications and/or experience, you may lose consideration for this position. Please follow all instructions carefully when applying, errors or omissions may affect your eligibility.

You should list any relevant performance appraisals and incentive awards in your resume as that information may be taken into consideration during the selection process. If selected, you may be required to provide supporting documentation.

Interagency Career Transition Assistance Program (ICTAP). If you are a Federal employee in the competitive service and your agency has notified you in writing that you are a displaced employee eligible for ICTAP consideration, you may receive selection priority for this position. To receive selection priority, you must: (1) meet ICTAP eligibility criteria (2) be rated well-qualified for the position and; (3) submit the appropriate documentation to support your ICTAP eligibility. To be considered well-qualified and receive selection priority applicants must satisfy all qualification requirements for the position and receive a score of 90 or above. Additional information about the program is on OPM's Career Transition Resources website .

Background checks and security clearance

Security clearance
Not Required

Drug test required
No

Required Documents

The documents you are required to submit vary based on the authority you are using to apply (i.e., applying as a veteran, applying as a current permanent Federal employee, applying as a reinstatement, etc). Please review the following links to see which documents you need to provide to prove your eligibility to apply: Applicant Merit Checklist and Proof of Eligibility .

As described above, your complete application includes your resume, your responses to the online questionnaire, and documents which prove your eligibility to apply. If you fail to provide these documents, you will be marked as having an incomplete application package and you will not be considered any further.

1. Your resume:

• Your resume may be submitted in any format and must support the specialized experience described in this announcement.
• If your resume includes a photograph or other inappropriate material or content, it will not be used to make eligibility and qualification determinations and you may not be considered for this vacancy.
• For qualifications determinations your resume must contain hours worked per week and the dates of employment (i.e., HRS per week and month/year to month/year or month/year to present). If your resume does not contain this information, your application may be marked as incomplete and you may not receive consideration for this position.
• For additional information see: What to include in your resume .

2. Other supporting documents:

• Cover Letter, optional
• Most recent Performance Appraisal, if applicable
• Proof of Eligibility to Apply: Your application must include the documents which prove you are eligible to apply for the vacancy. The Proof of Eligibility document describes authorities commonly used in merit promotion recruitment and what document(s) are required to prove you meet the requirements of the authority. You must meet the requirements of at least one of the authorities listed in the Who May Apply section above to receive further consideration.
• Time-in-grade documentation: If you are applying for a higher grade and your SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you meet the one year time-in-grade requirement so you will need to provide an SF-50 which clearly demonstrates you meet the time-in-grade requirements (examples of appropriate SF-50s include Promotions, Within-grade Grade/Range Increases, and SF-50s with an effective date more than one year old).

NOTE: Documents submitted as part of the application package, to include supplemental documents, may be shared beyond the Human Resources Office. Some supplemental documents such as military orders and marriage certificates may contain personal information for someone other than you. You may sanitize these documents to remove another person's personal information before you submit your application. You may be asked to provide an un-sanitized version of the documents if you are selected to confirm your eligibility.