Duties

Summary

Securing Travel, Protecting People - At the Transportation Security Administration, we serve in a high-stakes environment to safeguard the American way of life. In cities across the country, we secure airports, seaports, railroads, highways, and public transit systems, thus protecting our transportation infrastructure and ensuring freedom of movement for people and commerce.
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Responsibilities

The Senior Liaison Officer serves as the Security Operations, Transportation Security Administration's (TSA) principal liaison, advising the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) officials on TSA budget planning, formulation and execution activities as it relates to cybersecurity. In this position you will ensure that TSA and the CISA both have continual situational awareness of current financial and budgetary plans, programs, and strategies impacting cybersecurity. As needed, you will forward or produce written and oral all-source products between the CISA and TSA which can be used to drive operations and mitigate risk. You will participate in meetings/working groups that bring together key players from across the policy, planning, strategy, and homeland security communities to ensure TSA partners and customers have the most up-to-date information available to complete their mission. This position advocates and defends TSA equities with the Department, ensuring a "win-win" scenario for all parties involved.

High level duties include:

• Overseeing information sharing, policies, plans, programs, strategies, initiatives, efforts, and activities that promote cybersecurity and coordinates with CISA partners to develop a seamless, integrated capability.
• Coordinating with CISA on program/project resources, allocation plans, workforce development plans, budget forecasts, initiatives, and policies that impact TSA equities.
• Coordinating with CISA to incorporate TSA input on post incident reviews of major cybersecurity attacks involving transportation sector assets.
• Overseeing and/or participating in all critical infrastructure protection activity between TSA and CISA, with a focus on surface, information technology, and cyber related initiatives.
• Supervising a team of personnel dedicated to cyber security infrastructure protection efforts.
• Overseeing the Aviation Cyber Initiative (ACI) and associated work with Idaho National Labs.
• Overseeing the Trusted Agents under the Framework for Improved Cyber Information Sharing and Interagency Coordination.
• Supporting ACI's work as the DHS ACI lead.

Travel Required

Occasional travel - Position requires occasional travel.

Supervisory status
Yes

Promotion Potential
02

Requirements

Conditions of Employment

• You must possess U.S. Citizenship or be a U.S. National.
• You must complete a favorable Tier 5 Background Investigation (T5).
• You must pass Drug Screening, subject to random drug tests.
• You must be able to obtain and maintain a TS/SCI clearance.
• Disclosure of your financial information is required.

You must meet the qualification requirements of this position no later than the closing date of the job opportunity announcement.

Qualifications

As a basic requirement, applicants must demonstrate progressively responsible leadership experience that is indicative of senior executive level managerial capability and directly related to the skills and abilities outlined under the Professional/Technical Qualifications and Executive Core Qualifications listed below. Typically, experience of this nature will have been gained at or above the equivalent of the GS-15 grade level in the Federal service or its equivalent with state and local government, the private sector, or non-governmental organizations.

To meet the minimum qualification requirements for this position, you must show in your resume that you possess the five Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) and the Professional/Technical Qualifications (PTQs) listed below. We recommend that your resume emphasize your level of responsibilities, the scope and complexity of programs managed, and your program accomplishments, including results of your actions. Please refer to the Office of Personnel Management's website, https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/senior-executive-service/reference-materials/guidetosesquals_2012.pdf for additional information about ECQs.

The application process used to recruit for this position is RESUME-ONLY. Therefore, evidence of each ECQ and PTQ must be CLEARLY REFLECTED in your resume.

If you are a current or reinstatement eligible Career SES/TSES member or a graduate of an Office of Personnel Management (OPM) approved SES Candidate Development Program (CDP) and your ECQs have been previously certified by OPM's Qualifications Review Board, you are not required to address the ECQs. However, you MUST address all PTQs in your resume.

Current and reinstatement eligible SES/TSES members please include with your application a copy of your SF-50 (Notification of Personnel Action) documenting your career appointment to the SES/TSES. SES CDP graduates, please include a copy of your OPM certificate.

Professional/Technical Qualifications (PTQs) :

1. Knowledge of theories, practices, and emerging issues to plan, develop, and coordinate information assurance, information security or cybersecurity programs and strategies.

2. Experience in the transportation industry and knowledge of laws, regulations, and/or policies that govern aviation, mass transit, rail, pipeline or other transportation operations and security programs.

3. Knowledge of the relationships between Department of Homeland Security components and programs and private sector organizations and/or other governmental departments, bureaus, and equivalent organizations in monitoring, networking, and managing cybersecurity.

Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) :

ECQ 1 - LEADING CHANGE. This core qualification involves 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.

ECQ 2 - LEADING PEOPLE. This core qualification involves 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.

ECQ 3 - RESULTS DRIVEN. This core qualification involves 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.

ECQ 4 - BUSINESS ACUMEN. This core qualification involves the ability to manage human, financial, and information resources strategically.

ECQ 5 - BUILDING COALITIONS. This core qualification involves 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.

FAILURE TO MEET OR FULLY ADDRESS EACH EXECUTIVE CORE QUALIFICATION AND PROFESSIONAL/TECHNICAL QUALIFICATIONS IN THE RESUME WILL ELIMINATE A CANDIDATE FROM FURTHER CONSIDERATION.

CURRENT OR FORMER POLITICAL APPOINTEES: The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) must authorize employment offers made to current or former political appointees. If you are currently, or have been within the last 5 years, a political Schedule A, Schedule C, Non-career SES or Presidential Appointee employee in the Executive Branch, you must disclose this information to the Human Resources Office.

DRUG TESTING: You must pass a pre-employment drug test. In addition, you may be subject to random drug testing during employment.

SECURITY CLEARANCE: This position requires a TS/SCI (Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information) clearance that must be completed prior to appointment. You will be subject to a 5-year periodic investigation and must be able to obtain and maintain a TS/SCI clearance.

MOBILITY: The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) was created in the wake of 9/11 to strengthen the security of the nation's transportation systems while ensuring the freedom of movement for people and commerce. TSA employs a risk-based strategy to secure U.S. transportation systems, with nearly 50,000 Transportation Security Officers, each day at more than 450 airports nationwide. The agency continuously sets the standard for excellence in transportation security through its people, processes, technologies and use of intelligence to drive operations.

As a member of the TSES, you may be subject to frequent changes in posts of duty and positions. Mobility is a condition of employment, so you must be prepared to accept, without objection, the judgment of your superiors concerning reassignments for operational and/or career development purposes, or for other reasons determined to be in the best interest of the Transportation Security Administration.

Education

This job does not have an education qualification requirement.

Additional information

• The TSA, an excepted service agency, was established by Public Law 107-71, ATSA, on November 19, 2001. ATSA provides TSA with the authority to modify and develop its own human capital program, provided such modifications are consistent with 49 USC 40122.
• This is an excepted service position. However, there is an interchange agreement with the OPM and TSA that enables Career TSES members who have been approved by the Qualifications Review Board at OPM to qualify for Senior Executive Service (SES) positions without additional competition.
• You will be required to serve a probationary period of one year unless you previously completed the probationary period in a SES/TSES position.
• When you enter on duty, you will be required to complete a Public Financial Disclosure Report, OGE Form 278. You will need to provide this information annually.
• Veteran's Preference does NOT apply to SES/TSES positions.
• View common definitions of terms found in this announcement.

How You Will Be Evaluated

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

You will be evaluated on the quality and extent to which your resume shows that you possess the Professional/Technical Qualifications (PTQs) and Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) outlined in the "Qualifications" section of the Job Opportunity Announcement. Your resume may be evaluated by an SES/TSES rating and ranking panel, and afterwards, best qualified candidates may undergo an interview and a reference check. The TSA Executive Resources Council (ERC) will review results and make recommendations on final selections to the appointing authority. Only the selectee will be required to write Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) narratives. Unless you have already been certified by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Qualifications Review Board (QRB) in the past, your ECQs must be certified by the QRB before appointment can occur.

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Background checks and security clearance

Security clearance
Sensitive Compartmented Information

Drug test required
Yes

Position sensitivity and risk
Special-Sensitive (SS)/High Risk

Trust determination process
Credentialing , Suitability/Fitness , National security

Required Documents

Your Resume, which incorporates both Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs) and Professional Technical Qualifications (PTQs) responses.

Associated Questionnaire.

Current SES/TSES members: You must provide a copy of the specific SF-50, Notification of Personnel Action, which documents conversion or appointment, without time limitation, to the SES/TSES (except current TSA employees).

Reinstatement Eligible SES/TSES members: You must provide a copy of the specific SF-50 which documents conversion or appointment, without time limitation, to your formal SES/TSES position as well as any Federal agency document which confirms your successful completion of an SES/TSES probationary period. (Note: a second SF-50 dated more than a year after SES/TSES conversion or appointment, which documents continued unlimited assignment to the same SES/TSES position, will suffice to document completion of the SES/TSES probationary period).

Graduates of an OPM approved Candidate Development Program (CDP) which resulted in certification by the OPM QRB: You must provide a copy of a QRB endorsed program graduation certificate.

If you are a current or reinstatement eligible Career SES/TSES member or a graduate of an Office of Personnel Management (OPM) approved SES Candidate Development Program (CDP) and your ECQs have been previously certified by OPM's Qualifications Review Board, you are not required to address the ECQs.

Non-SES/TSES members: You must provide a copy of your most recent SF-50, Notification of Personnel Action (except current TSA employees). The SF-50 must demonstrate a tenure code of "1" or "2" in block 24, if it does not then your application may not receive consideration.

NOTE: An award SF-50 (i.e. cash or time off award) does not indicate grade, pay band or level and will not be accepted.