Helping Veterans to Find Employment

Managing Diversity: U.S. Military Veterans
Introduction
As Hazle, Wilcox and Hassan (2012) point out, U.S. military veterans re-entering civilian life often face numerous challenges that can be difficult for to overcome. In many cases a total mental and social adjustment is required, a support system is needed, and guidance or direction must be provided to help prepare veterans for life outside the military. The order and functioning system that they are used to in the military is not present in civilian life, and the hierarchical chain of command in which they have worked is typically not the enforced with such rigor in whatever workplace they end up joining in civilian life. U.S. companies also face the challenge of addressing the needs of this population: it is a significantly large talent pool, with skills and knowledge—but tapping into the pool can be difficult for businesses as well because of the readjustment process that veterans must go through, which can often be discouraging and upsetting for all stakeholders. Wenger and Snyder (2000) have argued that bringing veterans back into the fold of civilian life, including helping them obtain work, is a community challenge that requires assistance from everyone no matter their station in life. U.S. companies, however, can play a particularly strong role in helping U.S. veterans develop their skills so that they are more oriented towards civilian-style work and achieve employment. This paper will discuss precisely what companies can do to help veterans develop their skills and become employed. First it will compare the different typical skill sets of veterans and non-veterans to show how there is a difference. Second, it will look at the strategic management process and the challenges that employers face with respect to a veteran workforce. Then it will assess the competitive advantage that businesses can gain by working with veterans, describe best practices, provide a brief case analysis, and finally offer recommendations that U.S. companies can use to address this issue.
U.S. Military Veterans vs. Non-Veterans (Skills)
Many U.S. veterans entered into military service right out of high school. They never held a job in civilian life and never acquired the skills needed to look for work, interview, or build a resume. The work-related skills they acquire in the military may be narrowly defined by the occupation they hold while in service—for instance, working on military helicopters, serving a general, passing orders down the chain of command and so on. Non-veterans, on the other hand, typically go on to college out of high school: they obtain training and education in the area they want to pursue in business. They can train to be engineers, teachers, business managers, doctors, nurses and so much more. While veterans are off defending the country, non-veterans are spending their years learning the skills they need to obtain a job in the field of their choosing. U.S. military veterans upon returning home and re-entering civilian life are at a major disadvantage because they have not had the opportunity to complete their education in some cases; they have not acquired the college-level business skills and education needed to serve as an effective manager. They may have managed groups and departments in the military, but military experience differs from civilian workplace experience in fundamental ways. For instance, in the military, if an employee fails to do his or her duty, they can very likely be sent to the brig. That is a powerful incentive to get workers to fall in line. In civilian life, the threat of the brig simply does not apply—which means managers and leaders have to be more creative in terms of how the incentivize and motivate their employees (Gerhart & Fang, 2015).
Strategic Management Process—Challenges that Employers Face with Veteran Workforce
The strategic management process is all about defining goals, identifying areas for growth as well as problem areas or issues that need to be addressed, formulating strategies for achieving the goals, growing the company in as many benevolent ways as possible, addressing the issues, developing and implementing a strategy, and evaluating and controlling the outcome (Daspit, Chrisman, Sharma, Pearson & Long, 2017). Successful U.S. companies employ the strategic management process year round, constantly assessing where they are, where they want to be, and how they can get there. When it comes to employing the veteran workforce, there are a few challenges that businesses must address in order to successfully implement their strategic management process.
The biggest challenge is simply helping the veteran to adapt to the civilian world of business. This includes assisting the veteran with social and professional acclimation. One way businesses can facilitate this transition period is to engage in an extended onboarding process with veterans. Onboarding is a strategic tool that businesses can use when training new hires. Typically, a new hire will be brought into a company, be given a few days or weeks’ worth of training and be let loose to do his or her job. The onboarding process is much more extensive: it provides the new hire with a mentor who can give the worker support at any time, answer questions, serve as a kind of guide, and assist the new hire simply in feeling more comfortable in the workplace (Hamburg & Harris-Thompson, 2017).
Competitive Advantage
The competitive advantage that comes with U.S. companies choosing to work directly with the veteran workforce, find solutions to their issues and hire them long-term is that it boosts the company’s reputation and standing among the community. No community wants to see its veterans treated poorly upon returning home from their service abroad. One of the things that companies have learned in recent years is that consumers want to patronize companies that care about communities. For this reason, companies have developed the corporate social responsibility platform. On this platform, companies will define the values and ideals that they hold dear, and commonly those values will reflect ones that are important to their communities. For instance, Tesla’s platform is sustainability: the company makes taking care of the environment its number one priority and sells electric vehicles specifically so that the next generation of consumers will not have to live a polluted environment. This type of corporate social responsibility appeals to consumers and helps companies to boost their brand and develop brand loyalty. By focusing solely on sustainability, Tesla has been able to develop a competitive advantage over other auto manufacturers in the field (Bohnsack, Pinkse & Kolk, 2014).
U.S. companies that focus on hiring veterans and employing the veteran workforce can do the same: they can build their brand around a corporate social responsibility platform that, instead of putting the environment as the core value, puts helping the veteran community as its core value. By doing so, the company gives itself a competitive advantage in the marketplace. It can tout its good deeds as a company that looks out for those returning home from their tours where they themselves were looking out for America.
Best Practices
Best practices for U.S. companies include being mindful of where the veteran is coming from and what particular assistance the veteran is likely to need. Numerous organizations have developed over the years to assist with this process, including the National Association of American Veterans and the Wounded Warrior Project. U.S. companies can work together with these organizations to better understand the needs of the veteran workforce, develop strategies to help that population achieve its potential and become valuable members to companies in civilian life.
Faurer, Rogers-Brodersen and Bailie (2014) recommend that businesses work with the Transition Assistance Program (TAP) to help veterans develop their skills and achieve employment. The Transition Assistance Program, like the National Association of American Veterans provides guidance, workshops, seminars, training, and myriad other useful instruments and interventions that veterans can use to prepare for entering the civilian workforce. Moreover, companies can work directly with the Program to connect with the veteran workforce, provide and obtain feedback, and facilitate the overall development of veterans’ skills. There are other ways that companies can help, too. Faurer et al. (2014) state that “the use of talented facilitators and local HR professionals to co-facilitate the scheduled TAP classes and workshops, encouraging employers to standardize their own job descriptions to better convey job requirements, and enhanced understanding of the skills translators on Military.com as a useful tool could evoke greater participation by soon to be veterans and enhance the program’s effectiveness” (p. 57). In other words, by adopting standard formulas for describing jobs and requirements and taking steps to be more appealing and accessible for veterans, U.S. companies can make the hiring process smoother. From there, they can engage in the onboarding process to help ensure that new hires know what is expected of them, what their duties are, how to accomplish their assigned tasks, and where to go with questions or to find support.
Case Analysis
Hazle et al. (2012) note that there is a common misconception in the public that all veterans suffer from PTSD; the reality is that many veterans actually have a great many skills that can easily be used in theworkplace: “Honorably discharged veterans often possess excellent leadership skills that translate well into the civilian work environment, in addition to experience working in diverse work environments” (p. 232). The Returning Heroes Tax Credit is one example of an incentive that the government is giving to employers to help them realize that, yes, many veterans are qualified leaders and can manage departments quite well. Lockheed Martin is an excellent example of a company that faithfully hires veterans to work among its many engineers, laborers, technicians, managers and leaders. As a result, Lockheed Martin routinely benefits from significant tax credits that it uses to enhance its own bottom line while serving the veteran community be always acting as a company where they are not only welcome but wanted. As Hazle et al. (2012) state, “it will be important to ensure employees are aware of the benefits of hiring veterans and that veterans are aware of ways to translate their military skills into a civilian context” (p. 232). U.S. companies can follow in Lockheed’s example and take advantage of the great incentives that the U.S. government gives to employers who will hire veterans. The incentive is there because the U.S. government knows that these veterans are more than qualified to hold their own—all that is needed is a little support, which can easily be established by an excellent onboarding process.
Recommendations
U.S. companies should work with TAP and National Association of American Veterans as well as the Wounded Warrior Program to help better understand the veteran community and workforce so that they can identify ways to assist veterans in developing the skills they need (like writing a resume, translating their military knowledge and experience to the civilian world, and so on). Additionally, companies should take advantage of the generous tax credit they can receive from the government simply by hiring veterans. Lockheed Martin is an example of a company that routinely takes advantage of the Returning Heroes Tax Credit and enjoys the reputation of putting veterans to work as well. By focusing on helping the veteran workforce, companies can enhance their own brand and appeal to consumers who want to patronize companies that care about their communities and the men and women who have served. Finally, companies can realize that not every veteran suffers from PTSD—most of them, on the contrary, are fully qualified to lead and take charge of a department. All that companies really need to do is develop an appropriate onboarding process to facilitate the transition process and standardize their job descriptions and requirements.
Conclusion
Veterans are returning home from service abroad. Many of them have the skills required to lead—but don’t know how to translate them to civilian life on a resume. Groups like TAP are there to help, but U.S. companies have to be willing to work with these groups and with veterans in order to ensure that veterans are developing their skills and achieving employment. By standardizing their job postings, creating an onboarding process, and taking advantage of the tax credit, companies can both serve the veteran population and enhance their own brand at the same time.



References
Bohnsack, R., Pinkse, J., & Kolk, A. (2014). Business models for sustainable
technologies: Exploring business model evolution in the case of electric vehicles. Research Policy, 43(2), 284-300.
Daspit, J. J., Chrisman, J. J., Sharma, P., Pearson, A. W., & Long, R. G. (2017). A
strategic management perspective of the family firm: Past trends, new insights, and future directions. Journal of Managerial Issues, 29(1), 6.
Faurer, J., Rogers-Brodersen, A., & Bailie, P. (2014). Managing the re-employment of
military veterans through the Transition Assistance Program (TAP). Journal of Business & Economics Research (Online), 12(1), 55.
Gerhart, B., & Fang, M. (2015). Pay, intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation,
performance, and creativity in the workplace: Revisiting long-held beliefs. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 2, 489-521
Hamburg, J., & Harris-Thompson, D. (2017). Get on board with performance solutions 
that perform. Training, (4), 33.
Hazle, M., Wilcox, S. L., & Hassan, A. M. (2012). Helping veterans and their families
fight on!. Advances in Social Work, 13(1), 229-242.
Wenger, E. C., & Snyder, W. M. (2000). Communities of practice: The organizational
frontier. Harvard business review, 78(1), 139-146.