What to do when you ETS?

To all of you who are looking to ETS from your respective active component and haven’t made hard plans allow me to take a moment and give you some advice. A great tool to aid in transitioning back to civilian life, and give you a head up on that post Service career: the Reserves & National Guard (Air & Army) can offer you something few other part time jobs can, experience with a future employer, a new skill, a source for tuition, and a lot more. Now you may be wondering what I am talking about, so let me explain. In the Guard you will meet people from all walks of life, from truck drivers, teachers, IRS Agents, Border Patrol Agents, Federal Technicians, to just about anything you can imagine. Often times these people can give you advice on a position that is opening up, and tell you to add them as a reference to your application. It cannot be said how much having insider help can be when applying for jobs, “It’s not what you know, but who,” comes to mind
Getting a Federal Job can be a nightmare in paperwork and frustration. If you find someone in your unit who has a federal job, they mentor you through the process. Want to know something about a given career, ask a member of unit who performs that skill, time at a range or mandatory training session can often lead to making contact that can help you out.
How good is experience in the Guard? I can only speak from what I have seen. My El Paso, TX unit spent more than one tour on the Border of TX/Mexico. When their time was up the local Border Patrol Commander (Not sure if that was his actual title, but for this post it is) had arranged to have the those who applied from the Guard and worked with his people pushed to the top of the candidate list, as they were in his eyes, “experienced.”
Wrench turners, I know both the Army Reserve and Guard use a form of Federal Technicians who service military equipment. How do you get the Job? For the Guard, you almost always have to be a member of one of the units being support by that shop: For Example, Maintenance Shop 123 (MS 123) supports 1st BN 57th Infantry, 522nd Trans Company, 234th Quarry Unit, and A Battery 36th BN Field Artillery. This unit will have a variety of Mechanics, Supervisors, and Logistics support people. If you have one of those MOS’s you can apply for a position when it is open.
Reserve Officer Training Corp (ROTC), I will confess up front my knowledge in this area is limited, I know just enough to get myself in trouble. That said my roommate in Iraq was an ROTC Instructor at a College in Texas. Most of what I know I got from him in 2005 (things may have changed). There are ROTC people who can be a member of the Guard who are prior service and performing their ROTC functions and wear a Guard uniform once a month. They will get credit for their military time to become O-1E as opposed to O-1’s. How that works, I cannot say, and hope others can add to this discussion.

Both the Reserves and Guard have a variety of education programs, each is different, so check with the local recruiter for more definitive answers. Some states give you a free ride if you are a drilling member of the Guard in good standing (Good Standing being the key phrase). Lastly don’t sell your time in the military short, it can’t count for far more than you can have ever imagined.