When it Comes to Civilian Jobs... Veterans Get IT
Information technology industry plugs into military talent.
By Andrea Downing Peck 

After a decade of headlines warning that technology and telecommunications jobs are being shipped overseas, news that the Information Technology (IT) industry remains flush with entry-level jobs may be a surprise to military job seekers.

The technology industry runs the gamut from computers, networking and Web design services to semiconductors, fiber optics and telecommunications systems. People working in the industry fill a myriad of roles as network administrators, project managers, IT consultants, help desk professionals, software developers, security professionals and salespeople.

While the technology industry has experienced its bumps and bruises during the current recession – the high-tech industry lost 245,600 jobs in 2009, according to the Cyberstates 2010 report published by the TechAmerican Foundation – it remains ripe with opportunities for well-trained service members transitioning into the civilian workplace.

“A lot of people are under the impression that the entry-level jobs in IT have been off-shored,” said Gretchen Koch, senior director of workforce development at CompTIA, a nonprofit trade association. “That they are being done by people on help desks in places like India. In fact, if you look at the Bureau of Labor Statistics, if you look at survey data, you see the areas of most growth in IT are in the entry-level jobs – network administrators, help desk technicians or desk top technicians.”

That’s good news for veterans, many of whom leave the military with IT certifications, leadership skills and a work ethic that make them prime candidates for jobs in the technology industry.

SEAMLESS TRANSITION AT AT&T
“When they come to work for us, we find there is an easy transition, especially in some of our technical jobs,” said Jennifer Terry-Tharp, director of staffing talent acquisition and analytics at AT&T. “There is a level of dedication, there is a level of service intuitiveness that they have from their military experience that they translate into business experience.”

In an average month, AT&T fills 1,500 to 2,500 job openings and at any time there could be as many as 2,500 openings worldwide, Terry-Tharp said.

After leaving active duty in the U.S. Navy, Jim Drouillard used the GI Bill to earn an associate degree in telecommunications/electronics. When AT&T came to the campus, Drouillard took the technician’s test and was hired two months later. His military experience and college degree allowed Drouillard to join the company near the top of the union pay scale as a network center technician.

Drouillard said his naval training as a mechanic in the nuclear engineering program has paid off in the civilian workplace.

“A portion of my naval training was very intense trouble-shooting,” he said. “They spent a great deal of time teaching trouble-shooting principles. They taught principles that can be applied no matter what system you were working on, be it water, electricity, electronics, gas, anything. Those trouble-shooting principles are some of the best things that have kept me going in this company.”

INDUSTRY VALUES ‘SOFT SKILLS’ TOO
While service members with high-tech backgrounds are obviously good fits for the technology industry, veterans with outstanding “soft skills” also can find a home in the business.

“Many of our (AT&T) entry-level jobs well-suited to veterans are technical, but many vets do well in customer service and retail positions as well,” Terry-Tharp said. “It really is kind of limitless. It depends on what their military classification was and what they are interested in doing.”

Army veteran Will Ketchen joined AT&T’s Leadership Development Program in 2008 after obtaining a master’s degree in business administration. The two-and-one-half year program rotates employees through three different aspects of the business, teaching them technical and leadership skills.

So far, Ketchen has managed technicians working with AT&T’s U-verse video product, managed teams at a customer care center and worked as a manager in emerging communications.

MILITARY FLEXIBILITY SERVES VETS WELL
Ketchen, who as an Army officer held positions ranging from platoon leader to serving on the staffs of the U.S. III Corps and the Multi-national Corps in Iraq, said his military training has served him well.

“From an industry standpoint, the technology and telecom industries need people who are going to be honest and they are going to make great decisions in a gray area,” Ketchen said. “The telecom industry moves quickly. You have 3G today. You will have 4G tomorrow. You need some people who are going to be adaptable and can move quick and have great velocity in the things they do.

“Soldiers do that every day,” he added. “You give them one order and by the time you cross the line of departure, it has already changed. To me, that’s what makes the technology industry very similar to what we do in the military. It moves at a rapid pace.”

LOVING A NEW WORK ENVIRONMENT
Veteran Elwood S. Leary, now a local manager in customer operations for Verizon, ended his 20-year Air Force career overseeing loadmasters at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. His first civilian job was working as a cable splicer for Verizon. He said he had no problem switching into a job where his only concern was the quality of the work he did.

“I absolutely loved it,” Leary said. “When I left the Air Force, I was responsible for about 150 loadmasters at Dover Air Force Base because I sat at the top of the pyramid. When I came in as a splicer with Verizon, they gave me a work order and said, ‘Go to work.’ I had no other responsibility but to do my job on the road splicing cable. It was extremely enjoyable.”

Leary said the transition into the civilian workplace was easy because of the way he was “groomed in the military” starting from the age of 17.

“The military molded me as an adult with organizational skills,” Leary said. “In order to progress in the military, you have to go to leadership schools and take on more and more responsibility.”

CAMARADERIE TOUGH TO REPLACE
Leary, however, said his biggest surprise was the lack of camaraderie in the civilian workplace. Unlike his military days, Leary said his civilian co-workers rarely get together for cookouts, sporting events or impromptu gatherings.

“The military had such great camaraderie, and I really thoroughly enjoyed that,” he said. “The biggest surprise was that when people went home from their jobs here, they went home. There was very little interaction among the people.”

MANAGEMENT AND PLANNING SKILLS ARE GOLD
Army Reservist Neville Mckenzie, a systems administrator with Verizon, has spent 24 years experiencing the military and civilian worlds simultaneously. While he acknowledges some obvious differences, he said transitioning service members will succeed by putting their military values to work in the corporate world.

“There are a lot of things that happen in the military culture as far as discipline, hard work, willingness to get the job done at all costs and stick-to-it-ness, tough-mindedness that you learn,” said Mckenzie, who has done two tours in Iraq. “They should use that to their advantage when they get to corporate America.”

Mckenzie advises veterans whose military job experience is not tech-related to capitalize on the value their expertise in planning, managing and executing missions has to technology companies.

“You can teach someone how a telephone system works, but it is difficult to teach people how to be good managers and good leaders,” he said.

WHERE THE JOBS ARE
Louis F. Leo, Verizon’s executive director of global talent acquisition, said the growth areas of the company are in the wireless, Enterprise Solutions business, which provides networking, outsourcing and security solutions to corporate customers, as well as in the fiber optics area.

Verizon typically has 600 to 700 job openings worldwide. In the first five months of 2010, the company hired about 1,000 employees, with the bulk of those hired for the Enterprise Solutions space.

“The pace that we’ve been on,” Leo said, “there’s nothing I can see that would say we’re going to deviate from that based on what I know today.”

Verizon also is strengthening its military recruiting brand. The company is tapping into its Military Employee Resource Group for advice as it strengthens its recruiting of military Reservists and transitioning veterans. Marketing, branding, career paths and compensation are all under review.

MILITARY 2 MICROSOFT
Microsoft, a world leader in computer operating systems, software and entertainment, has launched a broad initiative called Military 2 Microsoft. The company has done “one to one job equivalency mapping so every military code or rating, based on military job descriptions, is correlated to jobs at Microsoft,” said Army veteran R.J. Naugle, lead program manager for Military 2 Microsoft.

The job matching system will be available via the Microsoft website portal www.westillserve.com. A veteran will be able to enter his or her military occupational classification and learn about the 10 to 15 jobs at Microsoft that best fit their experience. A second version of the job matching matrix is under development that will match military leadership experience and collateral duties to jobs at the software giant.

“We’ve done all the matches we can of jobs in the military that we thought were a good match to Microsoft, anywhere from administrative to IT security,” Naugle said. “We have a wide array of opportunities.”

Making it easier for veterans to find jobs at Microsoft also will benefit the Redmond, Wash.-based company, since six of its 12 largest accounts are military-related government accounts.

“We want to appeal to veterans and let them know that just because you transition from the military to a large corporation your service can continue,” Naugle said.

CONTINUING TO SERVE THE MILITARY
Robert Griffin, who retired from the Air Force in 2010, is among those at Microsoft who are continuing to serve the military in a civilian role. Griffin is now a Microsoft technical account manager to the U.S. Marine Corps.

Griffin provides the Marine Corps with project management, business advice, consulting services and account management.

“I obviously understand the military structure from being in the Air Force,” he said. “I understand rank structure. Knowing how the government works has been invaluable to me. The contracting part of it has allowed me to understand the huge landscape of how the industry deals.”

CERTIFICATIONS ARE TECH INDUSTRY’S CALLING CARDS
Griffin, who passed up promotion to chief master sergeant to accept the Microsoft job, said he obtained certification in Lean Six Sigma as well as project management to make himself more marketable in the civilian workplace. “Microsoft is great and I am having a blast!”

“Companies nowadays are looking to cut back so anytime you can bring quality and at the same time process improvement, you automatically are bringing value to your company,” he said.

Many service members leave the military with professional certifications ranging from CompTIA’s A Plus to Motorola’s Six Sigma. In the technology field, such designations can be key to landing a civilian job.

“Probably the best thing to do coming out of the service – if they don’t have certification in IT – would be to use the resources available to them to go back and get training for IT certifications,”  said Koch of CompTIA. “That really helps them rise to the top of any group of résumés. They need to have the certifications that provide the validation that they have the skill sets and knowledge required to do the jobs that are the high-growth jobs.”

KNOW YOUR VALUE
Marlon Hammond, a Microsoft consulting services senior consultant, spent 11 years on active duty in the Navy before entering the Navy Reserve in 2003.

Hammond’s first job after leaving active duty was with a Northern Virginia-based contracting company. He describes himself as a “little naive” when accepting the company’s job offer, knowing now that he undervalued his worth.

“Now that I look back, I think they took advantage of people coming out of the military and not really knowing their value,” Hammond said. “They kind of undercut them.”

While a civilian salary may appear larger than your military pay, Microsoft employees Hammond and Griffin said the numbers may not be all that they seem. When targeting a civilian salary, Griffin recommends multiplying your military salary by 20 percent to determine an amount that will offset the loss of tax-free benefits, housing stipends, and medical and dental coverage.

NETWORKING CAN LEAD TO JOB OFFERS
Cecil Sidwell, a Microsoft program manager who has served in the Army, National Guard and Army Reserve, credits networking and an improved skill set with landing his first full-time job at Microsoft as a tester.

Sidwell’s career path took him from Egghead Software to a job in technical support at VOLT, a global provider of talent, technology and consulting services, before he landed a contract job with Microsoft. When his contract position was up, he used his contacts with Microsoft recruiters to get an interview for a full-time position.

“From there, it was all about doing good work,” Sidwell said. “I did get caught in a RIF(Reduction In Force). Because of the work I had done, people here recognized that and someone reached out to me several months later when they had an opening on their team.”

COMPANY BENEFITS PAY OFF
Microsoft, like AT&T, Verizon and other large corporations in the technology sector, provides its employees with a strong benefits package, including health care, dental and vision coverage, health club memberships or discounts, adoption assistance, tuition assistance and matching contributions for charitable giving. A 401(k) retirement savings plans that includes a company match, as well as employee stock purchase plans, also are common.

Sidwell advises veterans not to overlook the importance of a company’s benefits package. In comparison to other corporations, Sidwell said Microsoft’s benefits program is “phenomenal.” He said his first civilian job experience made him appreciate what Microsoft offers.

Upon leaving active duty in 1992, he said he “drained all his investments” because he failed to take into account the added costs of civilian living such as health and dental insurance, utilities, trash collection, etc.

USE TRANSITION TOOLS
For today’s veterans, a wealth of transition tools exists. The military’s Transition Assistance Program gets high marks from veterans who have made the move from the military to civilian work force. Verizon and other companies also participate in programs such as American Corporate Partners that offer free career counseling and mentoring to veterans.

“There is a lot of mentoring going on that helps those who are transitioning,” said Michael Noa, a Marine Corps veteran who joined Verizon as a cable splicer and now is a long-range planner for the Verizon FiOS system. “Mentoring programs aren’t for hiring per se but to help veterans write a résumé and collect their thoughts on how their military service translates to civilian.”

Creating Futures
Veterans who want to enter the IT industry or enhance their skills should investigate CompTIA’s Creating Futures program, which provides free IT training and certification. This year more than 1,000 people will receive training through the program. Veterans, veterans’ spouses and disabled veterans represent about 70 percent of those trained.

CompTIA is a nonprofit trade association advancing the interests of IT professionals and companies.

Top 10 IT Skills in Demand
By Linda Leung 

In the Global Knowledge/TechRepublic 2010 Salary Survey, conducted at the end of last year, one of the questions put to respondents was “What skill set will your company be looking to add in 2010?” Here’s the complete list, with the No. 1 skill listed being in the highest demand. 

1. PROJECT MANAGEMENT:
   Project management skills often appear in top 10 skills lists, perhaps because some organizations got their fingers burned in the 1990s through the poor implementation of IT projects such as enterprise resource planning initiatives.
2. SECURITY:
   Despite the economic challenges of ‘09, organizations continued to hire security pros. The most sought-after security skills were information risk management, operations security, certification and accreditation, security management practices, and security architecture and models.
3. NETWORK ADMINISTRATION:
   Networking administration skills never lose their luster.
4. VIRTUALIZATION - CLOUD:
   The projected cost savings and efficiencies are no-brainers for organizations seeking to implement virtualization and cloud computing. With the cloud computing space now taking shape it’s difficult for enterprises to find pros with substantial relevant experience.
5. BUSINESS ANALYSIS:
   Factors such as the economic downturn and regulatory compliance have forced companies to take a step back and to think through business problems and their solutions, and business analysis is making a comeback, as a result.
6. BUSINESS PROCESS IMPROVEMENT:
   Business process improvement and business analysis go hand-in-hand. Business analysts identify areas for improvements to business processes, while business process improvement or management pros use BPM techniques and technologies to help companies optimize their business processes.
7. WEB DEVELOPMENT:
   If you are – or you know friends who are – addicted to the FarmVille game on Facebook you’ll know the power of Web development. In just a few short months, FarmVille’s popularity has spread across the globe as Facebook fans tend to their farms and purchase virtual goods.
8. DATABASE MANAGEMENT:
   Databases are the hearts of key business systems that drive payroll, manufacturing, sales, transaction processing, and more. Programmers must be able to build programs that quickly and efficiently interface with the database management system (DBMS), while database administrators “must be able to bring the full power of database features to bear on business problems”, writes Oracle- and IBM-certified DBA Howard Fosdick in his whitepaper Database Skills Availability: Critical to Your Selection of Database.
9. WINDOWS ADMINISTRATION:
   Microsoft shops are expected in 2010 to upgrade to Windows Server 2008 R2 and the Windows 7 client, and perhaps install Exchange Server 2010 and SharePoint 2010 as well. Windows administration skills are going to be key for many enterprises implementing and maintaining existing and upgraded systems.
10. DESKTOP SUPPORT:
    In Global Knowledge’s 2010 salary survey, desktop support was named as the 10th most sought-after skill this year. In the June article, we quoted Robert Half Technology Executive Director Dave Willmer as saying that businesses will need desktop support personnel to support new workers as organizations begin hiring as the economy improves.

Did You Know?
AT&T will waive pre-employment testing requirements for technician jobs involving splicing and repair for service members who have held certain Military Occupational Specialties or ratings.

“Specific to some entry-level and mid-level technical jobs, we’ve gone so far as to evaluate the military classification against our prerequisites for the job and waived some of our pre-employment testing for specific military classifications,” said Jennifer Terry-Tharp, director of staffing talent acquisition and analytics at AT&T.

Transition Tips
How to make yours smooth

• Start planning your transition at least a year in advance of leaving the military because it may take at least two or three months to find a job.
• Take advantage of mentoring/transition organizations such as G.I. Jobs, American Corporate Partners and the military’s Transition Assistance Program (TAP).
• Be certain you can document any civilian IT certifications you have earned while in the military such as CompTIA A+, CompTIA Network+, Cisco Systems Design Associate or Microsoft Certified Desktop Support Technician.
• Use your GI Bill benefits or CompTIA’s Creating Futures program to obtain training leading to certification in networking, security, support or project management.
• Educate yourself about the technology industry and learn how your military skills translate into civilian jobs.
• Create an “exploratory committee” made up of veterans who have made successful – as well as less successful – transitions into the civilian workplace. Learn what others did right and wrong.