A Veteran

The term “veteran” is widely misunderstood today. Sure, it indicates someone who served in the Armed Forces, but not much more is known about who and what veterans are. This lack of understanding is what makes finding a decent job a tremendous challenge for veterans entering the workforce. Employers – particularly HR managers – have been inculcated in civilian methodologies and so apply unwritten standards when screening applicants. This typically puts veterans at a disadvantage.

But what if employers were told a veteran, regardless of service branch, was “a person who organizes and manages any enterprise, usually with considerable initiative and risk?” That’s the definition of an entrepreneur, by the way! Service members are taught leadership, management, responsibility, and accountability from the moment they enter military service. The military academies and boot camp instill these qualities from day one. Ask any service member if he or she was ever held accountable during his or her indoctrination process, or if he or she is currently responsible for essential task completion. The answer will be a resounding “yes.”

Service members are placed in leadership positions on a regular basis. They are not given a choice in many cases. They are instructed to take charge of people and tasks without question and get the job done on time, often surmounting many obstacles in the process. At an age when most young adults are attending fraternity parties, service members are maintaining million dollar weapons systems that are critical to our national defense and launching the missiles whose destruction is frequently featured on newscasts. They are clandestinely being inserted behind enemy lines where the price for error is the difference between life and death.

Yet, for all this ability, leadership potential, and responsibility, they aren’t easily employable in the civilian job market. The problem doesn’t lie with them. It lies with employers who simply don’t understand what it means to serve in the military. For those who do know, hiring veterans is a no-brainer. Service members can easily show up for work on time, lead diverse teams, and maintain a high level of accountability and responsibility. Once you’ve been shot at, spent weeks in the searing desert, or gone to general quarters for real, civilian employment is a walk in the park. Furthermore, they bring real-world experience with them that is not remotely captured in today’s college experience, which is predicated on an unrealistic idea of football games, overvalued popularity, and an undeserved sense of entitlement. There is no entitlement on the battlefield; no one cheers for your success on game day; and who you are doesn’t matter nearly as much as how well you do your job.

It’s a thankless job that makes college experience pale in comparison, and it demands more than any civilian job will ever require. To become a veteran, all you have to do is be willing to abandon all that you are in order to become all that is needed. Veterans are people who were willingly deconstructed to be rebuilt upon the foundation of potential so they could rise to the challenge when necessary. Statistics indicate only 1% of the population serves in the military. That sounds like a pretty exclusive club to me. I’d be willing to bet more people carry the elusive American Express Centurion Card than serve in the military. With the limited number of veterans available, there should be a shortage of them to go around. They shouldn’t make up the majority of the unemployed. What a disgrace! Employers should be competing to hire them. So, why wouldn’t anyone want to hire a veteran? The answer is simple: Employers, like most of the population, “don’t get it.”