senior program assistant

program officer

research associate

senior program officer

finance partner

The National Academies

I can only speak to positions as program staff, no other functions (contracting, finance, HR, etc). If you don't have a PhD, your future here is extremely limited. Even if you do, the ceiling is very low.The organization is fairly flat, so once you've reached senior program officer (roughly GS13 pay) there is no room to advance. That can be daunting if you look at the remaining 20 years you may have in your career. They are extremely liberal with allowing folks to work from home. When the government shuts down for bad weather, we can work from home or take leave. (No free time off.) It's nice to be part of an organization with such a noble mission and history. But they go out of their way to remind the staff that we're only employed by the Academies, not members, so that diminishes the pride of belonging. In fact, program staff feels that they are viewed as "failed academics" by the members and volunteers.

Working at the National Academies includes many facets.  When working on a study, my day-to-day responsibilities run the gamut from attending study committee meetings, briefing the committee about research options available, running WebEx meetings for the committee, providing research support to the committee for data gathering, data analysis, contacting the study sponsor regarding study materials, requesting copyright permissions for materials for a report, report editing, and ensuring that the study is meeting all FACA requirements by maintaining the required information.
 
During my time at the National Academies, I have gained invaluable experience with policy research and the study publication process. Our office is one that supports the professional growth of all members by supporting our professional interests.

The hardest part of the job can be all of the travel that may be required.  The most enjoyable part of the job is seeing my name included in the completed and published report, knowing all the effort that went into making the report a completed project.

The National Academy of Sciences has built its cachet around Washington, D.C. on its federal charter from 150 years ago.

Regrettably, its core values of collegiality, tolerance, and respect have not been followed, especially when it comes to rewarding employees. Salaries have been choked at a 1 to 2 percent raise per year, even while some high-level officers are in the six figures.

There is also an organizational memory problem. Since the 2013 federal sequestration, the Academy has lopped off hundreds of staff members representing thousands of years of experience. If these employees are replace, they have had to learn all over again how to do simple things needed to do their jobs, such as booking meeting space or reimbursing travel.

Organizations needing research done on certain topics have found it much easier, less bureaucratic, and less expensive to go elsewhere -- to the National Institutes of Health, the Department of State, Brookings, the National Academy of Education, and even private think tanks run by former NAS employees. 

I worry for NAS and its future.

The National Academy of Sciences researches topics of interest to congress and other entities in the federal government. The Food and Nutrition Board is mainly staffed by nutritionists, but one project, the Food Chemicals Codex, is special. A typical day involves doing substantive edits for food additive monographs, creating graphics of chemical structures, and studying the Federal Register for notices about companies introducing new food additives for approval, and contacting those companies for information about their products. Letters, book chapters, and reports from the nutritionists may end up in the in box. Most work is fairly unsupervised because the second person on the two-person team (for an almost 1,000-page book) lives in Florida.

I started my career at The National Academies 12/04 at an entry Level position entering  in travel expenses, within 6 months I moved up to auditing and keying and kept moving up ladder until I was processing cash advances, wires reconciling company's Diners card, amongst a host of other job responsibilities.  

My coworkers and I were very close nit and worked well with one another and were able to work on task and complete it in a timely manner if it was a project that we all had to work on.  My supervisor was  very helpful throughout my career and always encouraged me to move further up. 

They wasn't a hard part of the Job because I knew my job very well and loved doing it.  The National Academies has taught me great customer service skills, provided me with different accounting courses and molded me into a Team Leader.

The National Academies has a very supportive culture overall, and will make an effort to shift around program staff whose contracts may be expiring.

Academies studies, roundtables, and workshops have generally the same workflow irrespective of the division you're working for, so experience transfers well from project to project. Given this, your best shot of advancing is by applying for positions in other boards/divisions. Promotion within a team is manager-dependent, and not guaranteed.

Management expects a lot of the rank-and-file and talks negatively about most of them behind closed doors. Management does not trust the competence of non-management staff, and staff do not trust the reliability of management. Managers expect other managers to carry water and resent staff who advocate for themselves. Toxic work culture that drives away the most capable staff. Pay is not competitive, though benefits are rather good. 

I enjoyed working on national engineering and medicine projects that have lasting impact. 
Upper management and leads can at time show bias.  I enjoyed being about of the publication process from start to finish. 

Work/life balance: This truly depends on the boards and committees that you are involved in. You will work long hours and travel.often. some of that is very exciting especially the field visits and writing sessions.

I love working for the the Academies. I feel respected by my colleagues in my unit and feel well supported in my role. Company promotes from within often.  I will mention the lack of diversity in the workplace. It does feel a bit intimidating at times but I know this is something they are trying to change. Another concern is compensation because there are people doing work outside of their normal job duties. Some things are a completely different job and you should be fairly compensated for doing extra work .

A typical day involved Quality testing of Lotus Notes and Domino applications developed in-house.  Notes Administration of servers, when backing up Notes administrators.  I learned about various applications developed using Lotus Notes.  Co workers were ok.  The hardest part of my job was writing up Quality testing results as there were a lot of egos involved.  The most enjoyable part of my job was coaching and mentoring the developers.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Senior program assistant 7 salaries reported	$25.92 per hour
Program officer 6 salaries reported	$86,868 per year
Research associate 3 salaries reported	$63,460 per year
Senior program officer 2 salaries reported	$132,199 per year
Finance partner 5 salaries reported	$86,602 per year

Working at The National Academies: Company Overview and Reviews

The National Academies

The National Academies Ratings

Popular jobs at The National Academies

Salary Satisfaction

Job Seeker Tools

Employer Tools

Browse

Stay Connected