Hello All,
I accepted a job offer for a DCSA contract holder and I should hopefully be getting my clearance soon! I’m new to the industry and wanted to see what New Investigator Training (NIT) entail, what to expect, how are exams, assignment, etc. For my contract company, they do 5 weeks classroom and 2 weeks actually working cases with a mentor. Just wanted to see if anyone could offer any insight!
Thanks
It’s a lot to take in. Don’t get discouraged it will sink in over time. In my opinion it takes a good 3 years working cases to have a solid foundation and you’ll still continue to learn. Many years later and I’m still learning. Good Luck!
NIT is a full time plus commitment…don’t think that it’s a 9 to 8 classroom type of thing.
It’s intense, a lot of information, and (at least from my experience) role plays (my personal hell). Don’t focus so much on memorizing coverages and policies, learn how to FIND the information when you need it.
Good luck, and welcome aboard!
We were just talking about this yesterday. NIRT is like taking a class to learn how to bake a cake, in which you spend large amounts of time discussing eggs and flour (no mention of butter, sugar and passing references to vanilla), and have deep discussions about measuring instruments. Then: now go bake those cakes and good luck!!
You will come out of training mostly unprepared for the job, but with the knowledge of how/where to find answers.
You will feel stupid. You will be overwhelmed. You will get reopened. This is all normal. There is an overwhelming amount of information and it just takes time in the field.
Make friends. You will have a zillion questions once you start, and having people to bounce questions off of is invaluable.
Throw away your misconceptions about other peoples memories and what they should and should not remember. Everyone has different levels of memory and different levels of reading abilities. Brush up on your knowledge of common lifestyle financial terminologies: bankruptcy, eviction, foreclosure, short sale, worker’s compensation, unemployment benefits, alimony, child support, loan deferment, etc. etc. Having a basic knowledge of these issues will help you understand and explain a lot of the hardship stories you hear in interviews.
DCSA is concerned with short sales and bankruptcy? Interesting. Also interesting that they are doing FOIA’s now which is probably why so many are denied and 99.99% redacted if allowed.
Great advice. I would also add brushing up on the military. When I started, I had no clue about the difference between active duty vs reserves vs inactive reserves etc. Maybe that’s just me though.