The Black Nonprofits and Business Podcast · K. Holmes

How To Get A Job With The Federal Government

·38 min·2 clips

Federal resumes can be disqualified for missing month-year dates, a picture, or a Social Security number.

Kimberly Holmes opens by naming a real need. She asks where people turn when they cannot pay rent, cannot find food for their children, or need direction for starting a business. The show answers with a practical kind of care. Holmes describes the podcast as a place that connects listeners to nonprofit leaders and business owners who can offer services, products, and information that are often hard to locate. This time, the focus narrows. She brings on an HR specialist to talk through how people can get a job with the federal government, and she frames the conversation around her own path from welfare into information technology and the book she wrote, Increase Your Income. The tone stays direct. Holmes says she wants to get straight to the point, and the guest matches that energy by focusing on what applicants can do before they ever submit a resume. The advice starts with the posting. Applicants are told to read the job announcement closely, pay attention to the knowledge, skills, and abilities listed there, and use those exact needs as the guide for their own materials. Specificity matters. The guest explains that people often doubt themselves and forget they already have more relevant experience than they realize, so the first job is to name it clearly. A trusted second set of eyes helps. He suggests calling a friend or family member, walking through the requirements together, and letting another person help identify the work, tasks, and strengths that belong on the resume. Persistence gets respect. The guest compares the process to earlier days in downtown D.C., when he had to walk from agency to agency during lunch, search for personnel offices by hand, and keep going until he got a yes. Holmes keeps the exchange human. She asks what makes a candidate stand out and whether there is advice that can help a resume rise above the others in front of a hiring committee. The answer stays simple. Match the application to the posting, use concrete language, and make sure nothing important is left for the reader to guess. The conversation does not rush the listener. It lets the long path from searching to getting hired feel understandable rather than mysterious. That matters here. The show keeps returning to the idea that people deserve access to information, whether they are looking for a job, a service, or a way forward. The ending stays warm. Holmes closes with holiday wishes, points listeners to blackamericacares.org for more resources, and leaves them with the reminder that there may be something out there just for them.

As heard by us

A practical guide to making a federal application match the posting.

The Black Nonprofits and Business Podcast treats a federal job search like work that rewards patience and a careful eye. Kimberly Holmes lays out a simple method: read the vacancy posting, line it up against the knowledge, skills, and abilities, then make the resume match.

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