Defense Contract Audit Agency Reviews

Pros

• Independence.
• Training opportunity.
• Travel opportunity around the globe
• Tele-working.
• Supervisor and coworkers help.
• Benefits
• Job Security
• The opportunity to create any pretext to, get out of the office an visit a contractor.

Cons

• Felling lost during the first year.
• Guidance varies by region, office, supervisors, and teams.
• You may not get clear guidance for every answer.

Advice to Senior Management

• Provide more time for reading and comprehending the regulations.
• Centralize guidance from HQ.
• Mandatory team training meetings once per week.

Pros

Good Health care, TSP, Transit subsidy , Decent Pay,

Cons

Very little training, you will be expected to come to the right audit conclusions, based on others work and audit manuals. If you ask questions of supervisors you will be given few to no answers. When your performance review comes you will be judged exactly by what your answers are on to the questions you asked of your supervisor.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more hands on, give more of a mentorship

Pros

The pay and benefits are good, as with any Federal Government agency. The work hours are generally good. Most fellow workers are friendly, we are all in the same boat. Using DCAA as a springboard to another job might be good, except that most Government agencies, companies and professional auditing and consulting firms do not view the DCAA workforce in a good light.

Cons

The main downside is the overall incompetence and horrible personnel practices of DCAA management, especially at the regional level. As a result, staff members are rarely empowered. Almost everything is subject to constant second guessing by managment. Rework is never-ending. DCAA management is deathly afraid of finishing anything as the risk of them being criticized by the GAO or IG dominates everything. As a result, most staff members rarely have a feeling they accomplished anything.

Compounding the problem is promotions, even routine promotions to the GS-12 level, are usually based on the whim of a manager. People are rarely promoted based on ability. Rather they are promoted based on their ability to provide cover for the management team.

I worked for DCAA for over thirty years. For most of those years, DCAA was a great place to work. Sadly since 2008 or so, DCAA became a miserable place. I would not recommend anyone accept employment with DCAA. While the pay and benefits are good the work environment is very poor.

Advice to Senior Management

I would advise DCAA managment at the branch and regional levels to simply quit. I would advise DCAA managment at the HQ level to open their eyes and see what is really going on. All the people who have left over the last couple of years should tell you something. Most of us didn't leave because we could not do the job. Most of us left because we could. No organization can lose the number of quality people DCAA has lost and continue to operate well.

Pros

Once you make it past the probation period, job security is very good because they need more people to work here.

Cons

The Management is not helpful and they do not let the employees know what is going on. The training is not that great and management doesn't encourage training.

Advice to Senior Management

Management should train their employees and keep them informed of what the expectations are. They should find a way of doing something and stick to it.

Pros

Great benefits, great job security, and an excellent work life balance. Ability to pay for college courses and/or license classes and fees.

Cons

As with all government jobs, you cannot accept fancy meals out or gifts are conferences. There are lots of forms to fill out.

Advice to Senior Management

Management seems to be on the ball as of late and I am very satisfied with my current experiences with the DCAA.

Pros

You will be free to work independently. You are guaranteed promotion every year on the GS-07, 09, 11, 12 track. This is a great place to gain experience in the auditing field, performing contract audits ranging from small contractors, to fortune 500 companies.

Cons

Your first year can be stressful depending on the office you work in. Some new hires feel that they do not get the supervisory guidance necessary to learn the job. If you don't mind reading, and asking for help from other auditors, you'll survive, and years 2, 3, and 4 are no problem.

Advice to Senior Management

Sometimes its difficult for employees to express their true frustrations with an office. Try implementing a confidential "comment box", perhaps on the agencies intranet.

Pros

Teleworking is possible after probationary period depending on your work location, flexible work schedules, and regular pay increases during early career. Since it's a government job, you'll know what your pay will be, and you'll know what your peers earn. You can get a lot of responsibility in a short amount of time

Cons

The agency is chronically understaffed because a good auditor can be trained at DCAA and move on to more money at other agencies. This results in a heavy workload for most auditors.

Advice to Senior Management

Top management needs to support the field staff.

Pros

Teleworking, 9/80 schedule, and good career advancement. Very competitive pay compared to those in the same industry. Generally can advance one level per year and even if max level, there are ten steps for each level. Get all the holidays and four hour sick and vacation are accrued per pay period.

Cons

Rigorous on the job training without adequate supervision. Will end up worrying about finishing audits within the time limit given to you by your supervisor. Even after the GAO report that was issued, employees are still worried about metrics and not going over the time limitations. There are different audit styles for each supervisor so need to learn to adapt with each change in supervisor and/or team. The auditor has no input regarding supervisor performance whereas their performance is wholly determined by the supervisor.

Advice to Senior Management

No more metrics

Pros

flexible schedule and supportive of work life balance but, the whole agency has its clicks

Cons

group think, unwritten rules like do not work to much or work to little. No real desire

Advice to Senior Management

give positive feedback to those that work the hardest and promote working hard not the status quo

Pros

Money, Benefits, Time off, Experience

Cons

Promotions are not always based on merit. Little guidance for staff auditors.

Advice to Senior Management

Interact with staff.