{"id":34219,"date":"2024-06-26T14:36:53","date_gmt":"2024-06-26T14:36:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/uncategorized\/2024\/06\/26\/find-a-way-to-retain-cyber-pros-pentagon-personnel-guru-says\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T18:40:16","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T18:40:16","slug":"find-a-way-to-retain-cyber-pros-pentagon-personnel-guru-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/c4isrnet\/cyber\/2024\/06\/26\/find-a-way-to-retain-cyber-pros-pentagon-personnel-guru-says\/","title":{"rendered":"Find a way to retain cyber pros, Pentagon personnel guru says"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Mark Gorak<\/a> is a self-proclaimed \u201cresource guy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That means he knows \u2014 more or less \u2014 what he\u2019s got, and what he needs. And what he needs, is people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c[In the services], we\u2019re not having a problem recruiting cyber talent,\u201d he said at the 2024 TechNet Cyber conference<\/a> presented by the Armed Forces Communications & Electronics Association International in Baltimore. \u201cOur retention is where we\u2019re having a challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gorak, the principal director for resources and analysis for the Pentagon\u2019s Chief Information Officer, said DoD has 27,000 vacancies, down from 30,000 last year. <\/a>The total cyber defense workforce is comprised of roughly 225,000 service members, civilians and contractors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gorak said there is interest in working for the government or serve in the military. The public sector has always been able to emphasize a unique mission and a stable career. While that has been \u2014 and is \u2014 a selling point, leaders said they also need to use authorities to pay competitively and offer training. Otherwise, government will lose workers to the private sector or other agencies who are also competing for this great need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Messaging is a part of the problem, Gorak said, especially in the search for early career talent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI talk to students and I tell them, \u2018You can join the Department of Defense as a civilian,\u2019\u201d Gorak said. \u201cThey look at me like I\u2019m cross-eyed. [They say], \u2018I had no idea that we have 900,000 civilians in the DoD.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is some headway being made, with the department announcing on June 12 its new Cyber Academic Engagement Office,<\/a> led by Gorak. The goal is to have a dedicated office for coordinating and funding academic engagement programs for the department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The other aspect of solving the people problem is organizing all the different pay authorities, work roles, skill requirements and types of hires across the Defense Department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take, for example, the basic IT job in the government, called a \u201c2210.\u201d Gorak said there are 54,022 employees with this position description performing 72 different work roles, illustrating how one occupation can manifest into different work depending on the office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s part of what makes classification difficult, especially as technology constantly evolves to require new skills or training. The DoD Cyber Framework <\/a>originally had 54 distinct work rules; now it has 72.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, recruiters need to understand the actual work being done in order to look for it in the job market, classify it correctly, and then compensate it competitively, Gorak said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re a GS-12 and you\u2019re an expert, you should get paid a lot more than a GS-12 who\u2019s at a basic level,\u201d he added. \u201cPay for performance. Pay for what your actual expertise is. That\u2019s the system we have to get.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DoD has a number of authorities available that allow it to pay recruitment and retention bonuses, set higher starting salaries and reward high achievers. The department has direct hire authority to circumvent the USAJobs application process. The DoD Cyber Excepted Service offers a market-based pay structure that can offer as much as a 40% salary increase, Gorak said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So far, about 15,000 positions are eligible for CES, but only 9,000 of them have actually been converted. Gorak\u2019s team has worked to make some improvements to encourage conversion, including allowing individuals to convert instead of requiring that of an entire organization and letting the services delegate that process in-house instead of relying on one office process all conversion packets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The only combatant command that is fully eligible for CES is Cybercom. Army Cyber Command is the second biggest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, part of the reason available flexibilities haven\u2019t been used is they\u2019re expensive. In other cases, HR personnel don\u2019t know they exist or aren\u2019t trained on how to use them. That\u2019s also why time-to-hire even for positions that should be fast-tracked remains lengthy.<\/p>\n\n\n\t