Secretary (Office Automation)

Summary

The person in this position serves as the Secretary for the Fiscal Service at the VA Medical Center in, Lexington, KY.

Duties

• ***THIS IS NOT A VIRTUAL POSITION, YOU MUST LIVE WITHIN OR BE WILLING TO RELOCATE WITHIN A COMMUTABLE DISTANCE OF THE DUTY LOCATION*** Major duties include, but are not not limited to. Serves as the initial point of contact for visitors and callers to the Fiscal Service. The incumbent establishes the nature and importance of the contact. Maintains the calendar for the Chief and schedules appointments and conferences based upon knowledge of current issues of importance and workload. Coordinates calendar of the Chief, and has exclusive control and complete authority for commitment. Anticipates and prepare any materials the Chief may need prior to any scheduled meetings. Reminds the Chief of appointments and briefs them on important matters to be discussed. Arranges for meetings, makes reservations for meeting room, and notifies participants. Maintains the Chief's personal file of correspondence, investigations, information, effectiveness reports, and similar subjects. Manages all travel arrangements for the Chief (includes plane and hotel reservations, travel orders, and procurement of a government car). Receives telephone calls and visitors, screening calls, handling problems of a procedural and general nature, tactfully referring calls and concerns to appropriate areas of the medical center, resolving these issues independently. Receives and listens to complaints and grievances from patients or from individuals on behalf of patients (family members, congressional aides, etc.), investigates the complaint or refers to the appropriate section, initiates action or changes necessary to rectify the situation, and reports corrective action taken to patient and/or representative after informing the Chief of the outcome. Serves as the primary timekeeper for the Fiscal Service. Performs other duties as assigned. Work Schedule: Monday - Friday; 7:30 am - 4:00 pm Recruitment & Relocation Incentives: Not authorized Telework: This position may be authorized for ADHOC telework. Telework eligibility will be discussed during the interview process.

Qualifications

SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: At least 1 year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GS 5 grade level in the Federal Service that equipped the applicant with the particular knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA's) to perform successfully the duties of the position, and that is typically in or related to the position to be filled. Specialized experience includes: performing a variety of secretarial responsibilities that involve office planning, correspondence control, screening calls and visitors and resolving issues; managing leadership calendar, coordinating meetings, conferences, and events and making travel arrangements; preparing agendas and taking meeting minutes; utilizing various types of office equipment, and computer software programs, including Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint to prepare correspondence, reports, presentations, etc.; and training personnel on administrative functions. AND TYPING PROFICIENCY: This position requires the skills of a qualified typist. In addition to meeting the experience and/or education requirements, you must be able to type at least 40 words per minute. Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religions; spiritual; community; student; social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

Requirements

You must be a U.S. Citizen to apply for this job To be considered for this position, you must complete all required steps in the process. In addition to the application and questionnaire, this position requires an online assessment. The online assessment measures critical general competencies required to perform the job. Selective Service Registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959 Physical Requirements: The work required does not inherently include any physical requirements essential for successful job performance that could not otherwise be performed with accommodation or workplace adjustment. A pre-placement physical examination is not required. Subject to background/security investigation Selected applicants will be required to complete an online onboarding process. Acceptable form(s) of identification will be required to complete pre-employment requirements (https://www.uscis.gov/i-9-central/form-i-9-acceptable-documents). Effective May 7, 2025, driver's licenses or state-issued identification cards that are not REAL ID compliant cannot be utilized as an acceptable form of identification for employment. Participation in the seasonal influenza vaccination program is a requirement for all Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care Personnel (HCP) - See "Required Documents" below for details. As a condition of employment for accepting this position, you will be required to serve a 1-year probationary period during which we will evaluate your fitness and whether your continued employment advances the public interest. In determining if your employment advances the public interest, we may consider: your performance and conduct; the needs and interests of the agency; whether your continued employment would advance organizational goals of the agency or the Government; and whether your continued employment would advance the efficiency of the Federal service. Upon completion of your probationary, your employment will be terminated unless you receive certification, in writing, that your continued employment advances the public interest.

Education

There is no educational substitution at this grade level.

How to apply

Please read the entire announcement and all the instructions before you begin an application. To apply for this position, you must complete the initial online application, to include the initial online assessment and submission of the required documentation specified in the Required Documents section above. The complete application package must be submitted by 11:59 PM (ET) on the closing date of the announcement to receive consideration. To preview the questionnaire, click https://apply.usastaffing.gov/ViewQuestionnaire/13060432. The application process is as follows: To begin, click Apply Online to create a USA JOBS account or log in to your existing account. Follow the prompts to select your USA JOBS resume and/or other supporting documents. Answer the questions presented in the application and attach all necessary supporting documentation. Click the Submit Application button prior to 11:59 PM (ET) on the announcement closing date, 09/18/2026. After submitting the online application, you will be notified whether or not you are required to take additional online assessments through the USA Hire Competency Based Assessment system. This message will be delivered to you via email notification. The email may be routed to your "Spam" or "Junk" folder. IMPORTANT: If you are asked to take the USA Hire Competency Based Assessments, you will be presented with a unique URL to access the USA Hire system. Access to USA Hire is granted through your USAJOBS login credentials. Be sure to review all instructions prior to beginning your USA Hire Assessments. Click here for Computer System Requirements. Set aside at least 3 hours to take the USA Hire assessments; however, most applicants complete the assessments in less time. If you need to stop the assessments and continue at a later time, you can re-use the URL sent to you via email and also found in your USAJOBS account under the "Track my application" link for the corresponding application. Your responses to the USA Hire Assessments will be reused for one year (in most cases) from the date you complete an assessment. If future applications you submit require completion of the same assessments, your responses will be automatically reused. Visit the USA Hire Applicant Resource Center for practice assessments and assessment preparation resources at https://support-usahire.opm.gov/hc/en-us. To view the announcement status or your application status: https://help.usajobs.gov/how-to. Your application status page is where you can view your application status, USA Hire assessment completion status, and review your notifications sent by the hiring agency regarding your application. Beginning September 27, 2025, Federal agencies will only accept resumes up to two pages in length to comply with the Merit Hiring Plan. Resumes longer than two pages will result in ineligibility for further consideration for the position. USAJOBS will not allow you to upload or build resumes longer than two pages, and you will need to update the resumes in your profile before applying for a job. Resumes should include information relevant to the knowledge, skills, abilities, and competencies of the position to which you are applying. VA is unable to make assumptions about qualifications if not clearly listed. Resumes must be legible so they can be reviewed for eligibility, minimum qualifications and other position requirements listed in the job announcement. Your resume must be 5MB or less. We recommend saving and uploading your resume as a PDF to maintain formatting and number of pages. We also accept GIF, JPG, JPEG, PNG, RTF, TXT, PDF, ODT or Word (DOC or DOCX). We do not accept PDF portfolio files. We recommend using a sans-serif font size like Lato, if available. Other widely available options are Calibri, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, Open San Source Sans Pro, Roboto or Noro Sans. Make your page margins 0.5 inches. Consider using 14-point size font for titles and 10-point for the main text in your resume. The resume builder can help you create a resume using these recommendations and uses the information in your USAJOBS profile to help you get started. Helpful Hints for Creating a Two-Page Resume: Prioritize most relevant and recent experience Use concise, results focused language Align language from the job announcement Focus on demonstrating skills and competencies Remove outdated or unrelated experience Use the USAJOBS resume builder Additional guidance on this new requirement and resume building tools can be found at: https://help.usajobs.gov/faq/application/documents/resume/page-limit.