While Elon Musk The so-called government’s efficiency department (DOGE) brought an ax to the federal workforce, the group itself hires.
The US DOGE Service, formerly US Digital Service (USDS), has interviewed potential candidates in recent weeks and months, even offering wages at the highest end of the government’s remuneration scale. Wired spoke with a person who succeeded in part of the interview process on what it was.
According to the person interviewed, there seem to be five phases in the Doge’s hiring process, all executed rapidly over a period of two to three weeks. The first step in the process is a short 15 -minute screening call with a recruiter, followed by a technological assessment that candidates have three days to finish. If the candidates succeed in this projection, they will be asked to participate in two different technical interviews with the Doge staff. The fifth and last interview is an investment interview, if necessary, candidates would learn more about the types of work they would be affected if they were hired.
“I think it is fair to call him a dream job,” said the interviewee, who asked not to be appointed in order to protect their privacy, about the USD in its pre-trump form. The interrogated person says they were “impressed” by an interview of December 2023 with Mina Hsiang, then the USDS administrator, on The penis Decoder podcast. She described how the ministry, since its creation in 2014 by former president Barack Obama, brought together a small group of technologists to improve technological services through the federal government. The interviewed had applied to work at the USDS in previous years, and the reappearance of Hsiang’s interview “was the inspiration to apply again,” they say.
The questioned person knew several federal workers who had already been dismissed as part of the incursion of DOGE in federal agencies, and although it was “high -end”, they say that they were still “delighted to obtain an interview”.
During the initial 15 -minute call, the recruiter described some of the possible projects that Doge could undertake. These include, in particular, the interviewed person says: “Take advantage of AI to improve medical services for veterans”, “rationalize requests for federal aid from Americans who experience natural disasters such as floods, hurricanes and tornadoes” and “Improvement of free demand for the help of federal students (FAFSA) and the widening of access to the Americans for higher education ”.
These details on the possible projects were also presented in an email that the questioned person received before the telephone call, inviting them to speak to the recruiter. The person interviewed, who had applied to the USDS several times before and shortly after the new Trump administration, said that he did not know how or why their request had attracted the attention of the new Doge Service. “Maybe they just looked for a coder,” they say.
USDS seeing “US DOGE SERVICE”, said the interviewee, made them “want to barf” because “it represented the hollow of the organization that I appreciated. I did not know what to do with it, because I applied on an lark and hates what Doge was doing. But I was ready to learn what they wanted and to explore what impact I could have. ”
