Most Common Military Transition Failures (and How to Avoid Them)

Most military servicemembers take off the uniform with 20+ working years ahead of them and still desire a rewarding second career. Any mid-career transition is difficult and coming from an insular community like the military creates an even greater challenge. Making the shift from the unique environment of the military back into society involves very unique challenges regardless of rank, experience or education. It should come as no surprise that many fail to make this transition smoothly, and for some this becomes the first step in a downward spiral that can result in substance abuse, family issues, financial difficulties and other complications that contribute to the increased veteran suicide rate. I have always felt that one of the most promising things that can be done to mitigate veteran suicide is focusing on how to mitigate potential failures in transition. Over the past decade of working with the LinkedIn Veteran Mentor Network (VMN) Group, I’ve come to identify a number of common failures in Military Transitions as well as some recommendations on how to mitigate each.?

1.??????Failure to Accept Full Personal Responsibility for Your Own Transition. Responsibility in the military is generally shared by the group, team and unit.?Seniors always have the responsibility to ensure that subordinates are taken care of in all aspects of their lives, both on and off the battlefield.?After 10, 20 or 30 years of service we are surprised, frustrated, and disillusioned when there is no one at the exit gate to usher us into the new environment.?There is no Career Counselor to tell us what we should do to get ready for the next promotion, no Detailer/Monitor/Occ Field Sponsor to explain what our options are for follow-on duties, no Commander or Sergeant Major to advise us and no Sponsor waiting at the next duty station to help us coordinate housing and get integrated into the new environment.?No other organization in the world takes care of its employees like the US Military and when that has been your norm for your entire working adult life, you get used to it. It’s all too easy to expect that others will help guide us out the door to a rewarding second career but that rarely happens. This one is on us, and our family’s livelihood is at stake.

Recommendation: Whatever career we want for ourselves is ours for the earning (not taking) but we have to get ahead of the power curve and understand that no one else is responsible for helping us to meet our own individual personal desires in transition. Until we have begun to own our own transition, it is hard to plan for and allocate the time required to adequately execute the transition.?In many ways, this has to come first before all else. There are more resources available to support today's transitioning military members than ever before - hundreds of Veteran Service Organizations, VA programs that pay for education and certifications, local face-to-face networking groups and social media networking groups like LinkedIn's Veteran Mentor Network (VMN) where thousands of veterans strive to help others find their way.?

2.??????Failure to start Transition Planning Early Enough. It’s common for military servicemembers to make the decision to get out in response to unfavorable results from a promotion board, command selection board, or unfavorable orders. This puts us already 6-12 months from taking off the uniform when we first begin to think of planning and can set us up for failure. This is the most common failure and usually also includes at least a few of the others below to compound the issue. When we fail to start planning early, we leave inadequate time for research and networking, much less pursuit of degrees and certs once we discover their importance. This severely limits our options and often results in our grabbing whatever is available, with long-term career implications. If you are a 30-year retiree with no kids in the house and no desire for a follow-on rewarding career, this may be fine. However, for the 20-year retiree with kids to put through college and aspirations of a long and rewarding second career, it can start you on a path from which recovery is long and painful.

Recommendation: Commit to the transition deliberately at the start of a final duty station.?To do this, I declined my eligibility for command and school selection upon promotion to LtCol so I could force myself to focus on Transition. Most want to keep options open for the military career, but it is impossible to be equally committed to your military career and your follow-on career.?I knew that I wanted a follow-on career that would potentially be more rewarding than my military career, and that was worth a commitment. My resume was ready at the 3 year mark and that gave me time to research gradually, have casual conversations, and shape my expectations and network so that in the final year (albeit while deployed to Iraq) my networking was focused. I started interviews 2 weeks after return from deployment, had 3 offers in-hand a month before I took off the uniform, and started working at a new job (in a new state) the day after I retired. It sounds easier than it was – it took a lot of time, effort and commitment well in advance. ?Although I personally experienced many of the below “failures”, I had the time to mitigate them and still transition relatively smoothly – all because of doing this one thing right. ??????

3.??????Failure to Shape Expectations Accurately. We tend to make assumptions about our market value based on the numbers of servicemembers we manage and how many degrees we have, and these are irrelevant metrics unless the experience and degrees are both directly related to the future positions we pursue. We also like titles (feels like rank) so we try to equate our military duties to senior positions that we are not qualified for (Senior Advisor, Director, VP, C-level). We typically do not understand that our military experience is going to lose relevance the farther we get from our MOS skills. I fell into this trap myself, assuming that as a LtCol with multiple advanced degrees including MBA, and having managed over 1000 Marines, that I should be qualified for at least a Director role, if not a VP role.?Fortunately, I had begun Transition Planning 3 years in advance (see #2 above), which left me ample time to adjust and regroup. Having held those roles years later, I can now see how na?ve I had been in failure to assess the impact of my lack of business experience. ?

Recommendation: You need to spend time researching open positions at various levels, assessing the requirements against your experience/degree/skills mix, and having conversations (Informational Interviews) with many people at comparable levels in Industry.?It will take a thousand data points to have accurately shaped expectations, and the research and conversations represent commitment over time. ?If you have not already started planning early (per #2 above), this is a trap you are almost certain to fall into because it takes commitment over time to mitigate this one and adjust accordingly.

4.??????Picking a Location without Regard for the Labor Market (commonly called “moving back home”). Only in the military will someone assume they can pick any location they want and find a rewarding second career there without matching their skill sets to the market. Servicemembers tend to make promises to family members that they will go “back home” after service, and they make plans without even a cursory look at the job market for that area and whether it matches with their experience/degree/skills mix. This may work well for the 30+ year military retirees who are not looking to work, or maybe just looking for a low-impact job. However, those who are hoping to trade on 20+ years of military experience and transition at a senior level may need to land in a city with a strong Defense/Aerospace Industry, which narrows it down considerably and rules out many cities.?Those who choose cities with no defense market should plan to take several steps back due to loss of relevance of their experience.?This can be the single most costly failure in Transition, because once you take the last (military-funded) move, you need to be able to lay down roots at that location or plan to fund your own relocation later to a better job market for your skills. Additionally, no one envisions themselves returning home to experience career failure in front of long-time family and friends. Doing so brings a disproportionate adverse impact on the individual’s understanding of their self-worth, which can be extremely dangerous for veterans in transition.

Recommendation: We all have an idea of where we want to live after the military, but those who plan in advance (See #2 above) have time to test the waters on their initial desires and adjust as need be. Once you have a concept of the types of positions your experience/degree/skill mix qualifies you for, use online resources (LinkedIn, Indeed, etc.) to see if your desired area shows openings for those roles.?You can do a search by city and narrow it down by job opening to see this. You should also do a simply search by city to see what most of the openings in that area are for.?Then do a search for your target role, not defined by city, to see which cities have the greatest number of open positions for your target. You will need to discuss this with various mentors and connections to get their recommendations.?Most of out here have grown familiar with various markets and can tell you where the best market is for your skill set. In my own transition, I had initially aspired to move back home but a few months of research and discussions with contacts showed me that I had much better opportunity in stronger defense industry cities. Since maximizing long-term career potential was my most important consideration, I had to go where the money was. Over the course of many months, I was able to better scope my target areas toward the best job prospects. Because I wanted to maximize the second career, I chose to relocate to a city I had no family in but had a strong defense industry. Like most military families, I found that mine easily adjusted to a new area – more seamlessly because of the higher quality of life I could provide.

5.??????Spending Too Long on the Resume. We tend to assume that the resume is the crux of the entire transition effort rather than simply an enabler for interviews. Spending months on the resume without having already engaged in networking will cost you valuable time, even if you have started planning well in advance. The result can be “analysis paralysis” that makes “perfection” the enemy of “good enough”.?The trick is knowing when the resume is “good enough” and getting it in play.

Recommendation: First of all – own your own resume and do not pay anyone to do it for you. The resume is a simple document to portray your experience in a clear and concise manner – nothing more, so do not let it intimidate you if you have never written one before. Take a couple weeks to look at the resumes of some networking connections to get an idea of appropriate content for the roles and levels you seek.?Use a format template that is simple and has some eye-appeal. Ensure you have solid detail on previous roles, craft a summary paragraph, and stick to a two-page length. To stick to 2 pages, roll any other detail into your LinkedIn Profile. Do not stress the window-dressing of formatting, font or pitches in your resume. Just get the resume into play as quickly as possible with former peers and networking connections in your target roles. You will get recommendations, but they are simply opinions so do not worry about changing to suit anyone other than yourself. You will likely maintain numerous versions over time, maybe one longer “master version” and other versions tailored to different roles. The focus should be on the content – and matching that content to the requirements of the target roles.?The resume is the enabler for discussion to generate an interview – and nothing more. You will continue to develop and alter it throughout your career as you earn and adapt to the new environment, so just assume the resume will be a living document and never result in perfection.

6.??????Focusing on Online Applications. Because applying online feels like the “Easy Button” for those who may be introverted and/or underconfident in networking abilities, this can feel like progress. Sometimes you may even get a return email from a recruiter that may result in some engagement. However, applying in the blind – without the benefit of networking connections in the company – is just like firing indirect weapons over a hill without a spotter or Forward Observer. No matter how many times you fire, you are simply hoping to get lucky, which is a bad course of action. It still seems that the first question every transition asks upon joining VMN is “when should I start applying?” – as if the entire transition was simply a matter of loading up your lethal resume and waiting for the command to Fire For Effect.

Recommendation: Take the time to first cultivate relationships in target companies (spotters) before every applying to any openings.?Internal employees can often tell you if the posted position is a real immediate (funded) opening, or contingent on a contract award, or maybe just posted pro forma while internal candidates are being interviewed. They may be able to give you insight not posted, like preference being for some specific skill or degree. They may get a referral bonus if they refer you internally, which they can only do if you list them by name on an application. In any event, an internal resource (spotter) can help you craft your resume & application, can help walk your package through the internal process, and has a tangible incentive to do so in the case of referral bonuses. I would serious recommend spending 90% of your time networking and 10% applying – applying selectively when guided by your network will yield far greater results. Again, this takes time (See #2 above). ?

7.??????Poor Grasp of Networking. Networking is not transactional and needs to be done well before you find yourself desperate for employment. However, many military servicemembers consider networking what you do when you are actively looking for a job. Networking is not what you do when you need something – that would be panhandling. Instead, networking is what you do continuously throughout your career to build relationships, and these relationships will facilitate your career advancement. Your networking will not be effective when connections feel that you are putting pressure on them to help you with an immediate need. Similarly, you need to actively maintain a network consistently throughout your career rather than trying to leap back into networking only when you again find yourself in job transition. Networking is an exchange of information and can be viewed like a potluck dinner. ?The guest who shows up with an empty plate probably does not get invited back.

Recommendation: The essence of networking when in transition is the “Informational Interview” where you ask for a call with a connection with the goal of learning about their job, their company, what it took for them to get that job in that company, and (ideally) whether they think you might be qualified for such a role. This interaction requires an exchange of information and a mutual learning one of another’s’ backgrounds but has no expectation of anything being offered besides the building of the relationship. Once you maintain these relationships over time, it might end up with a recommendation on a position or a referral to another person, but that is not the immediate goal of the first engagement any more than one might hope for marriage to result from a first date. ?Like many of the other Transition Failures, networking takes time (See #2 above) and failure to allocate enough time will result in panhandling. ??

8.??????Failure to Recognize and Mitigate the “Loss of Status”. You can see the effects of Loss of Status in how many of us define ourselves through our previous military careers years after taking off the uniform. The business cards and email signature lines with "COL RET/CSM RET" illustrate this, as do the cubicles and offices adorned with plaques, coins, and pictures of the past life. The fact that there is such a market for "I Served" gear illustrates this as well. Some of us can mitigate the feelings of loss with such simple things but others feel the loss more deeply and have trouble adjusting to a world without their previous military status.

Recommendation: Most of us will not land a second career that immediately matches the status we enjoyed in uniform, so we need to assess our needs and augment them with other activities that provide the satisfaction of some status. Getting involved in volunteering opportunities can be a game-changer for your second career. You see this every day with the veteran turned Little League Coach whose satisfaction in coaching and mentoring youth mitigates what was lost in uniform. Scout Leading also provides a similar opportunity for both uniform and status as a mentor/leader. Local Professional Organizations provide great venues for engagement as well - and serving on a Board of Directors will provide great challenge as well as status. I personally took the Scout Leader route as well as involvement with PMI, eventually becoming Chapter President and later Region Mentor. Still, the view from behind the multi-screen computer pales in comparison to the view of a newly opened parachute canopy. However, I found I could let go of some status, mitigate the loss of others, and derive new status enough to feel fulfilled in the new lifestyle. We all have different journeys, but we have to recognize the status we lost, determine what it takes to replace that, and move forward in an engaged manner to adjust.