Chapter helps retiring service members: Anchorage HR pros work with DOL to assist in transitions to civilian jobs

In Anchorage, Alaska, HR professionals are offering job hunt advice to some of the civilian workforce's newest members--military men and women who are separating from military service and looking for a new career. For some, this is their first job hunt in the civilian workforce in more than a decade.

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The project started after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Searching for a way to help the chapter express its sense of patriotism, Sharon Chriss, PHR, the 2001 president-elect of the Anchorage Society for Human Resource Management (ASHRM), and manager of employment and training at the Anchorage Gambell Job Center of the Alaska Department of Labor, turned to co-worker Gary Darby, employment and training services manager for the Anchorage Midtown and Eagle River job centers. Darby was the coordinator for the Transition Assistance Program (TAP) at nearby Elmendorf Air Force Base.

The U.S. Department of Labor's Veterans' Employment and Training Service (VETS) oversees TAP, which helps service members make the transition from military service to the civilian workplace. Three-day workshops are facilitated at military installations nationwide by the State Employment Services, military family support services, Department of Labor contractors or VETS staff.

However, Darby told Chriss that he had trouble finding employers to talk to the service members about job searches, resumes, filling out applications and other skills. Chriss approached the ASHRM Board of Directors with a proposal to provide three ASHRM members each month for the seminars. One would represent a small employer, one a medium-sized employer and one a large employer.

"It was overwhelmingly accepted," Chriss said.

"Everyone everywhere was touched by 9-11," said Janet Waldron, PHR, HR director at Harbor Enterprises and ASHRM 2004 president. "We wanted to do something. This was a great way to jump in and help out."

Waldron added that the project is a continuing commitment, not a one-time-only event. The project is announced at monthly chapter meetings, e-mailed to all members and put in the quarterly newsletter. Slots are filled months in advance.

Plus, the one- to two-hour programs give Anchorage employers the opportunity to promote themselves to potential employees and business contacts, as well as give ASHRM a voice in the community, Waldron said.

"The employers/HR validate the information that we provide in the workshops, which is absolutely great and essential because the service member then understands that it's not just 'book learning' or our personal opinion that we've given in the seminar, but that this is how it really is 'out there' in the labor market," Darby said.

Service members ask pointed questions about their chances, as former military members, of finding a job in the civilian workforce, Darby said. For some, the experience of searching for a job this way--filling out applications online, describing work history in a way that a civilian would understand--is completely foreign.

"What I found most interesting was the cultural difference," Waldron said. "The military has a hierarchical culture. Everything is based on seniority. There's not an emphasis on promoting yourself or your skills.... [But] there are ways to phrase your skill sets. Even though [a service member's] experience is repairing tanks, he has skills that could fix my fuel trucks."

Many choose to stay in Anchorage after leaving the service, Waldron said, while other former military personnel come back after finishing their careers stationed at other bases.

"When [they] leave the military, the civilian workforce is a very different pace, a very strange environment," Waldron said. Some military members would leave jobs within months of being hired because of misunderstandings and mismatched expectations on the part of the employee and employer.

For information on participating in a local military installation's TAP, visit www.dol.gov/vets/programs/tap/main.htm.

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