Dominic Cristiano and Daniel Morales, NRT alumni, advised other NRT students this week how to get and keep federal and state jobs, starting with cover letters.
In his position as an ORISE fellow at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Cristiano has served on hiring teams and suggests students heed the specific skills employers ask for, be intentional about how they advertise themselves and tailor letters to jobs.
“It can make a huge difference just tailoring, even if you're not a perfect lineup and you don't have the exact right experience,” Cristiano said. “If you can pull from anywhere that you have somewhat similar experience that might be useful, that’s super helpful to know that you're trying, that you can sell yourself as someone who's able to at least come in and be willing to learn a certain skill or qualification.”
He said he searched for work three to four months before securing the ORISE interview in July 2022 but then “almost blacked out” during the interview.
“I know that I rambled on and that I couldn't remember the things that I was saying,” he said. “I was super nervous. I left the call, heartbroken, thinking, ‘There's no way I got that job. That was the worst interview I've ever had in my entire life.’”
When he was offered the position, he asked the interviewers why they chose him and they said he had written and spoken about One Health, the niche field the fellowship was in.
“I had the familiarity with what we were going to be doing even if I didn't have a giant resume full of really cool things and didn't have a ton of publications,” Cristiano said.
Morales said his interview and hiring as an environmental scientist in January 2023 with the Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy confirmed for him the importance of coming off as likeable to interviewers.
Read the full story and see more pictures at https://nrt.unl.edu/cristiano-and-morales-give-tips-government-jobs-nrt