Employment Guidelines for Expert/Consultant Appointments

Qualifications Standards

To qualify for an appointment as an expert or consultant, an individual must have demonstrated by experience, training, or other evidence of mastery of the field, such as writings, inventions, or professional recognition, that:

• The individual has specialized knowledges and skills needed by the Department of Justice, which are clearly superior to those usually possessed by ordinarily competent persons in that field of activity;
   
• His/her qualifications exceed those prescribed by the Office of Personnel Management's Qualification Standards for General Schedule Positions for the particular occupation; and
   
• The individual clearly meets the definition of an expert or consultant.

Examples of Consultant Assignments

Consultants may confer periodically with operating officials in recommending solutions for problems of a highly technical nature; serve as technical advisers on projects essential to developing new and highly specialized methods or techniques of operations, or act in a consultative capacity in a specialized field of knowlede. Their function is to advise rather than to execute. Consultants may be assigned to operational activities only in rare and unusual cases when the information needed to formulate advice or recommendations cannot otherwise be obtained.

A consultant's sample work assignments may include:

• Furnishing advice and recommendations in connection with structural and other problems encountered in the construction of new buildings at prison installations, e.g., the type of construction, load and safety factors, and other related matters.
   
• Advising the Commissioner, Federal Prison Industries regarding the proposed establishment of new industries--e.g., the determination of the product to be manufactured, space requirements, equipment and personnel needed, training required for supervisors and workmen, availability of Government markets, the relationship, competitive burden or effects of the industry on private industry, and other related matters.
   
• Furnishing and interpreting for the Assistant Attorney General, Antitrust Division, the results of studies made to determine the economic effects of restrictive trade practices in a given field of trade or industry of which the consultant has acquired a specialized knowledge.
   
• Advising and making recommendations to the Director, Bureau of Prisons, regarding specific vocational and related training courses which would best accomplish the goal of rehabilitating Federal prisoners. Advice would include methods to ensure that the trainee received the best training with the least exploitation; that programs are in line with comparable State standards and other Federal activities; that the advantages of vocational versus academic instruction in the various professional or skill fields had been considered; and that the training is consistent with the level of educational achievement reflected by prisoner groups.

Examples of Expert Assignments

Experts contribute services such as developing solutions to problems of a highly professional, scientific, and/or technical nature in the particular field of expertise possessed by the person. They perform operating functions and may serve as project managers.

A consultant's sample work assignments may include:

• Directing the installation of a prison industry and its operations during initial phases, or correcting manufacturing operations of an existing industry to overcome production losses, defective products, delays in manufacturing, and other problems which may be encountered.
   
• Assisting and advising the Assistant Attorney General, Antitrust Division, in the development of data in the shoe machinery industry. Furnishing technical information on the industry in terms of manufacture, distribution, and sale of all types of shoe machinery. Normally, experts develop the patent background and licensing features of a given manufacturer or developer of techniques.
   
• In connection with the expert's medical specialty, perform certain surgical operations or render service on a part-time or intermittent basis to prison inmates.