I applied online in early September and it took over a month before I was contacted to schedule an interview that took place in late October. They use a structured interview format, which can be quite anxiety producing if you have never encountered it before. There were about 6 individuals around the table, only one of whom would have been my co-worker/supervisor. There was someone from HR and then the rest were just random supervisors they pulled in from other departments. I was asked 11 prepared questions and told that 10 would be graded. All were read to me verbatim--if I needed clarification or something repeated, they would repeat the question word for word. The questions were poorly written in that each question/statement would have several components that I was asked to address. Rather than breaking the question down, all parts of the question were asked together, and again if you wanted additional clarification, the entire question was simply repeated. The questions were all very past experience focused--describe your experience doing x, y and z. While experience is one important part of finding a good candidate, I believe the vast majority of what you do at a job, you learn while doing that job, so work style, work ethic, interaction with clients and other staff, time management, ability to independently problem solve and learn new skills etc. are equally if not more important that specific tasks you may or may not have done at a previous job. There wasn't an opportunity to discuss these other aspects of being a good candidate and good employee in the interview. The entire interview took about 45-50 minutes. After the interview I heard nothing until late December when I finally reached out to the hiring manager. From application to un-official rejection, the process was 3.5 months. The official rejection email came in late June (6 months later)! Although I was well-qualified for the position, and as a DC resident I claimed residency preference, I was not selected. I later found out the person they hired was not a DC resident, received both a BA and MPH degree from a questionable for-profit institution, and had previously worked for the DC government. All of which further marred my opinion about DC government and its hiring processes.