Are civilian employers ambivalent regarding the hiring of Military Veterans?

I have a master of science in human resource management and have had to do jobs that I could have quit high school to do. This is horrible considering only 1% of the country has what it takes to serve. I was once told by my state employment and training office that my writing was too powerful etc. I am sick of their excuses. A lot of us took more responsibility before we were 30 than most people ever will.

I've been a Recruiter and Resume Writer for 10+ years since getting out of the Navy.  My answer is, it really depends on the employer.  There are many employers out there that are very interested in recruiting military veterans, now more than ever.  However there is a disconnect between the employers and the veterans.  A lot of employers don't know how to reach veterans and don't understand a veterans qualifications.  On the flip side, many veterans don't know how to properly conduct a job search or know how to explain the value of their military experience and skills.

I don't think civilian employers are ambivalent but veterans come out of the service touting their leadership or management experience when employers are not looking to fill leadership or management positions. They are looking for people who can do the job with minimal ramp-up time. Veterans have to do a better job of highlighting how they can do the job and what value they will bring to the organization. Thinking that you will get a job solely because you are a veteran with management skills won't get you a job.

I don't have any experience per say. I retire next year and the thought of entering the workforce scares me. I keep hearing how places like Target or Wal-mart are pushing to hire vets, but I really don't know what to think about that. I am a member of a facebook page for Army retirees, its scary to hear from a retired Army CPT who was only offered a casher job at wal-mart. To me it feels like a slap in the face of all Vets when a company pushes to hire vets, (maybe for the tax breaks?) and hires vets to man the checkout lanes or to stock shelves. I stocked shelves and ran a register when I was 18 before I joined, 20 years later is that all I am good for? Is that all an Army CPT with a 4 year degree and managment skills from running a company (unit) of 150+ people? acountable for millions of dollars of property.

I am not saying every vet that leaves the service after 4 years as an E4 should be pushed into upper mangagement positions. But some of us have held many jobs with a huge amount of responsibility, and in charge of many people, not just for 8 hours a day, but for 24/7.

The post is a bit old, but I'll throw my 2 cents worth in; though after all this time, factoring in inflation, it's probably worth a bit less. Basically, most companies see nothing extra special about military service; certainly nothing more special than any other intrinsic aspect about the candidates that sit before them. Companies will hire or pledge to hire veterans because it sounds good; it's what employers "should" say and occasionally do. Do their actions match their talk? Sometimes. Sometimes not.

And don't even get me started on companies not wanting to hire those still in the Guard or Reserve!

So let me ask, what about Target? The company you work for as of the original posting. I live in Minnesota where the company is headquartered. It's presence is ubiquitous, and like many Minnesotans I have worked for the company in the past. I am not aware that it makes any special effort to hire veterans. I'm not authoritatively saying they do not, but I have friends who work for Target, and as an MBA student at Carlson (U of M), a lot of my classmates work for Target Corp, and I do not hear from any of them that Target actively looks for vets as employees. It follows then that one of two things is occurring--and really I don't know which is true--with respect to Target specifically, and perhaps speaks to larger issues of company's hiring vets:

1. Target doesn't actually DO anything special in order to hire veterans.
or
2. There is a mismatch between veterans knowledge of Target's desire to hire them and Target's outreach efforts.

If it's the 1st one, well, it is what it is I guess. If it's the latter and it's an issue for the company (not just that I didn't know about Target's efforts), then Target needs to revaluate how it searches for veterans and why it finds veterans valuable in the first place.

My question is what positions do you see those 25,000 veterans filling. If you are hiring for people to run a cash register it really comes off as insincere.

I once bailed on a company mid-interview. The interviewer actually said to me "Hey, I respect your service, but to us, you being gone for Army Reserve duty for two weeks is pretty much the same as you being gone because you wanted to hang out at the beach for two weeks"

I said to him "Wow. If you can say that, then you really don't respect my service, and we really don't need to continue this."....I then collected my notebook, took the copy of my resume out of the interviewer's hands, and without another word, turned around and walked out of there.

His jaw hit the floor and stayed there...at least while I was still within sight.

This depends on whether the veteran is working with veterans or others who are not veterans. I have seen it both ways.

I live in a Blue State progressive upper Midwest where there are no US Regular Army combat units, post, camps or installations. there are national guard and reserve components.

My views on politics are right-centered conservative, and a little more right leaning for military grass root issues, of which I do lobby for.

I say we need more veterans in politics because the civilian counter parts have no clue, do not understand the language and they are definitely ambivalent toward military veterans and the retiree. they just dont know how to read us.

it has been my quest to be readable. I believe that I am doing a good job at it.

Hope its still that way when I get out!

I would have to respond with my own personal experience in regards to civilian employers hiring Military Veterans. And after attending dozens of veteran job fairs since 2010 here in the bay area, CA. I tend to agree with the notion that it is a lot of lip service being paid to just sound good. I do agree that many newly separated veterans may not have the knowledge of how to put their numerous qualifications on a resume however on the flip side many civilian employers it seems have quotas on how many veterans they can get through a door to sign "I am a veteran" on a form and maybe allowed an interview out a courtesy for your service which leads to no job offer. Ironically, I have worked within the same career field I held in the USAF for nearly 20 years and still experience this practice today. The culture of ambivalence towards hiring military veterans has been around for quite some time and is only recently becoming slightly less so but by no means has it changed. I think the only way to get this changed would be through veteran owned businesses or veterans involved in actual hiring who not only set aside jobs with veterans preference in hiring but who understand and fill those positions with qualified veterans. More effort needs to be done to seek out talent with veterans and the only way to do that would be to hire more veterans to seek out the talent. At any rate this is just my two cents...