Nicole Schultheis is a licensed attorney (Maryland) and Certified Federal Job Search Trainer and Career Coach. She serves as a Program Director of The Resume Place’s SES 2-Page Resume and ECQ Interview Training. Nicole also helps individual SES candidates address OPM’s new Executive Core Qualifications and prepare their new, 2-page SES resumes, used by the hiring agency’s Executive Review Board and then, post-selection, forwarded for review as part of OPM’s new Qualifications Review Board (QRB) interview process.
Nicole uses her trial advocacy skills to help candidates prepare and deliver compelling answers to interview questions, sharing their leadership accomplishments orally in the required C-C-A-R (Challenge-Context-Actions-Results) format, while addressing the new ECQs’ sub-competencies during their structured interviews.
Since 2010, Nicole has helped nearly 1,000 aspiring senior executives attain OPM certification, enabling them to take on senior leadership roles across the executive branch.
In addition to assisting individual candidates, Nicole has provided SES consulting and/or editorial services to DHS Human Resources, DHS Science & Technology Directorate, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Professional Development Center, HUD Office of the Inspector General Human Capital Management Division, and NIH Center for Scientific Review. She has trained SES leadership development candidates at the Environmental Protection Agency, the Naval Ship Yard in Washington, D.C. and the Air Force (in Southbridge, Massachusetts and at the Pentagon). She has led workshops or served as a speaker in federal resume and/or ECQ writing at the US Secret Service, USDOT, TSA, the U.S. Marine Corps at Quantico, Virginia, the NIH Office of Intramural Training and Education, the American Medical Writers’ Association, and Civil Justice Works.
Her articles have been published in The Maryland Daily Record, Maryland Bar Journal, Maryland Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues, and other professional and lay publications.
Most recently, she has co-authored, with Kathryn Troutman, the all-new SES training materials and curriculum used by The Resume Place in its new 1- and 2-day online SES preparation courses, offered to federal agencies as a cost effective way to implement succession planning, supporting the retention of emerging leaders by enabling them to advance successfully into executive roles.

Recognitions

  • As an attorney, Nicole is rated AV-Preeminent (5.0 out of 5) by Martindale-Hubbell (a rating which includes the judiciary as well as the bar; only 5% of all women attorneys attain this rating, which reflects skill as well as ethics).

Education

  • J.D. from Boston University School of Law
  • B.S. in biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • Kathryn Troutman’s Certified Federal Job Search Trainer/Certified Federal Career Coach (CFJST/CFCC)