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How Hiring Military Veterans Helps Your Company Save Money – Part 2: Staffing Hard-to-Fill International Positions and Assignments

Lisa Rosser — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 21:55:04 +0000

Many military veterans have lived and worked abroad during their military careers, and may be more receptive to your company’s international assignments than the average candidate. The military has assignments in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, South America, Australia, and Africa.

All service members who serve overseas are provided training on the local culture. A number of service members, by virtue of the time they spent overseas or as a result of the job requirements they had while stationed abroad, speak a second (or third) language. Most of the military services have even set up programs whereby their members can take free language training through Rosetta Stone. Online access to all 30 Rosetta Stone language training courses is free to all Army Active, Guard, and Reserve soldiers as well as Army civilian employees and contracted Reserve Office Training Corps (ROTC) and United States Military Academy (USMA) cadets. The Air Force has contracted for a similar program. The Marine Corps offers the Rosetta Stone courses for free, but for a select number of languages.

So why should recruiters and hiring managers care? Employers who are knowledgeable about hiring military know that service members begin exploring civilian career options as far as a year in advance of separation. So, if hiring for international positions is routine for your company, you should begin reaching out and building relationships with separating veterans as early as possible. You can describe the types of international positions and assignments you have and if those positions require a level of proficiency in a language, you can remind the service member that he or she can increase their level of hiring attractiveness by taking advantage of the free language training the military offers. Then, when the veteran is 1-2 months away from their separation date, they can apply for your position and already have the language proficiency requirement met. And that doesn’t cost the employer anything other than the time to build the relationship.

Some military officers have a job specialty called Foreign Area Officer which requires them to become regional experts on a geographic area and on the culture of the people who live there. Their military jobs require them to be able to communicate and interact with foreign militaries and organizations in their assigned regions. The Foreign Area Officer Association is made up of over 750+ current and formers military FAO’s from all services. The association allows employers to post positions and to review member resumes for free.

Posted by Lisa Rosser, Author of and Speaker/Workshop Leader on The Value Of a Veteran(TM): The Guide for Human Resource Professionals to Regarding, Recruiting, and Retaining Military Veterans

How Hiring Military Veterans Helps Your Company Save Money – Part 1: No-cost Relocation to Where the Job Is

Lisa Rosser — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 03:37:22 +0000

Did you know that service members separating from active military duty (due to retirement or end of their contracted service commitment) receive a one-time, government paid relocation to any where in the U.S? This means you can interview a service member at a military job fair in San Diego, California and offer him a position based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The government is going to pay to move him (and his family) to Pittsburgh. It is the very definition of a “Win-Win”: Your company gets skilled labor in a location where it’s needed and saves on relocation costs, and the service member gets a civilian job and a free move on Uncle Sam.

The veteran has up to one year from the date of separation to take advantage of this benefit. So, I encourage my clients to search for military members with the right skill sets where ever they may be and then ask them if they would be willing to utilize their final move benefit to relocate to where the job is. Roughly half of the over 225,000 veterans separating from military service each year are coming off of active duty tours, so that is a tremendous source of talent that can be relocated and utilized anywhere in the US.

Author, blogger, speaker, and guru of online marketing strategy David Dalka quoted me and this military relocation idea in his recent ERE.net article entitled How To Hire True Diversity and Get Beyond Hiring Only Local Candidates. In the article he offers five unique ideas for recruiters to find the talent they need without artificially limiting themselves to local candidates.

Do you want to know another veteran hiring secret? Some really fantastic military talent is “hiding” overseas. We have active duty service members stationed in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, South America and Africa, and a good percentage of them are within one year of separating from the military and are planning their transition from active duty AT THIS VERY MINUTE. They would love to hear about your company and how their skills could be a great fit. This overseas-stationed sub-population within the military gets ignored, mostly because companies and recruiters either haven’t figured out (1) they exist, and/or (2) how to reach them. And, now that you know Uncle Sam will foot the bill for relocation back to the good ole U-S-of-A, there really is no excuse not to pitch your positions to this group.

If you want additional ideas on how to build your company brand with the military job hunter, I encourage you to sign up for my web seminar “Marketing to Attract the Military Applicant”.

Let a Flat Daddy Show You Care

Lisa Rosser — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 21:48:05 +0000

Another fantastic suggestion that originates from Elaine Dumler’s book “I’m Already Home…Again - Keeping Your Family Close While On Assignment or Deployment“, is a Flat Daddy(TM). Since many deployments last anywhere from 6 months to 15 months, children of service members lose a sense of connection to the deployed parent. A Flat Daddy is a life-size photo (from the waist up) of the service member mounted on foam board and laminated for sturdiness. And, yes, of course, there are Flat Mommy’s too.

Military families really embrace these life-size dolls, taking them to events the service member is otherwise missing (like birthday parties, school recitals, trips to the zoo). Many will take a photo of the family with the Flat Daddy and send it to the deployed service member to let him/her know that he/she is missed. It’s also particularly effective for small children to use to remember what the deployed parent looks like. There are stories of families having Flat Daddy sit at his normal seat at the dinner table and the kids take turns telling him about their activities at home. Flat Daddy can also be present when the deployed parent calls and speaks to the children or when recordings are played of the deployed parent reading a bed time story.

Consider providing a mobilized employee’s family with a Flat Daddy. Here are two ways you can do it:

Subsidize the full cost of producing the Flat Daddy by arranging to give a gift of a Flat Daddy through the company that has been producing this product since 2006. The recipient receives an email message with a voucher code to redeem for the cost of the Flat Daddy. Complete instructions are found here.
Subsidize part of the cost by taking the service member’s photo and using your local resources to blow the photo up to life size (complete instructions are found here). Provide the poster to the family and they can arrange to have it mounted and laminated.

Supporting Mobilized Employees

Lisa Rosser — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 21:43:13 +0000

Do you have employees who also serve in the Guard or Reserve? These days it’s often not a question of “if” but “when” they will be mobilized for military service. You probably also have employees who are married to military members or who are the parent of a young service member. You may be wondering if there are ways you could show support for those employees when they are called up to serve.

Does your company currently acknowledge employees when they reach certain milestones, such as having a baby or attaining a certain number of years with the organization? Perhaps you provide the new parent with a gift of a company logo-ed diaper bag or bib and a parenting book? You can do something similar for the mobilized employee and his/her family.

A great resource I am happy to pass along is Elaine Dumler’s book “I’m Already Home…Again - Keeping Your Family Close While On Assignment or Deployment“. The book has 214 suggestions of ways for families and service members to stay connected before, during, and after a service member’s deployment. There is even a section with suggestions for employers, schools and community groups who want to be supportive of the veterans in their communities.

Consider purchasing a quantity of these books to have on hand. It’s a tremendous gesture of care to provide a copy of the book to the spouse or family member (or, directly to the service member to pass along) plus a letter of support from the company wishing the veteran a safe journey and hoping for a speedy return and the name and phone number of a point of contact in the company who can answer questions should any issues or needs arise during the employee’s mobilization.