The military person who is seperating from the services is faced with a special set of problems when entering the civilian job market. The Civilian World is a very different place from the military one and the longer away from it, the more alien it will feel! Regardless of the length of service, a service-member will have lost contact with the job market. The whole procedure of job search can seem like a mystery. There are many aspects to a good job search. We, at 21st Century CVs are specialists in helping former military personnel find their way in the civilian job market through good search techniques.

As with any campaign, planning is vital to a successful job search and the candidate must think, evaluate, research and direct efforts to premeditated targets. Good timing is essential. The most valuable search technique is the preperation of the perfect CV as this is an objective snapshot of the applicant's skills and competencies. The purpose of a CV is to present the candidates qualifiactions, experience and skills in a written form to secure employment through an interview.

There is much information and facts contained in this website on how to write a CV, but with the best will in the world it is very difficult to write a good CV oneself, as the more objective the CV is the better it becomes. There are few people, in any walk of life, who truly know themselves and more importantly know how other people see them. The skill of a good interviewee is to project the image that is required by the potential employer. Likewise a good CV is targetted to the reader and it usually takes a professional to ascertain what employers want to see and to couch the CV in language that an employer understands. The same CV should not be used for each job application. A quality CV with proper emphasis is essential if the applicant really wants to get the deserved employment. Your CV can be a powerful ally in a job search only if it is a quality document that will enhance your chances of getting the right employer.

Luckily military personnel are highly trained in a miriad of specialised skills and a good CV can show off all these competencies but is is very important to use the language and terms of the modern job market. A quality CV has a distinctive non-offensive, factual style. Outstanding accomplishments should, of course, be included in the CV but they should be stated factually and not combined with superfluous, ego-building language. Military experience is very valuable to an employer.

Civilians do not understand all the acronyms used in the Forces and orgaisational designations are confusing to them. Universal terms should be applied in a CV and if used properly can really sell the applicant as many military skills create excitement and curiosity, but the language has to be on a business (not military) level. Military experience can be easily marketted but much research is required to make the best use of it. However, as an example, a company grade officer of an infantry unit is going to have a difficult time getting a civilian employer to understand the role because there are few direct analogies in the civilian world.

In many cases, it is wise to use the military title of the job and then cite management responsibility in the description of duties. Most civilians understand titles such as commanding officer and can glean analogies which apply to business. The problem with having purely military skills is that they usually lack the profit and loss responsibility and evn these days with costs ruling everything it is almost impossible to convince a civilian that a military person had financial responsibility. Being a manager in civilian life implies profit and loss.

Civilan employers rarely truly understand military responsibilities and the ex-military applicant rarely has sufficient understanding of civilian industry until it is actaully experienced.

Almost without exception, there is no reason an ex-military person has to be long in the job market. The training, knowledge and skills the seperating military person possesses are in demand in cvilian industry. The only thing that the ex-military lack is an upto date experience and knowledge of the civilian job market and modern search techniques. Both of these short-comings can be overcome by planning and research. All though-out and executed plan can reduce the strss and anxieties accompanying a search and bring results in a timely manner.

The evaluation section of pre-seperation planning consists of a hard look at the knowledge and skills possessed by the applicant and to include them in a language and style that the employer is comfortable with. In private business there is a decided tendency to view experiences in the perspective of there own industry. A good job candidate will know how to get around these biases. The problem, usually, with an ex-military person doing this is to couch experiences in the military perspective, using military terms. If the potential employer is himself ex-forces then he may understand all this, but even so, his knowledge of the military may be dated. Again, the good candidate will be able to write about his/her experiaces in entirely civilian and universal terms as no one knows the experience and personality of the interviewer.

The ultimate test of a good CV is to ask the question as to whether a civilian employer, completely unfamiliar with the military, would fully understand what the applicant has done and achieved in the services. Military jargon may be a complete foreign language to the reader and the applicant is not given the time to interpret it. This becomes a problem only for the applicant as his CV will end up in the bin within a few seconds! The answer is not to completely civilianise the CV as this smacks of evasion of the facts, which is fatal. All that is needed is to use universal terms to summarise duties undertaken, responsibilities, authority, skills and knowledge while stating clearly and proudly that it was in a military command. Military experience has a comparable civilian application at all times and in no way should be covered up or evaded.

 

 

 

 

 

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