Posted on May 25, 2016

What was the craziest thing you ever did to get an applicant to commit and/or ship?

SFC Josh Billingsley

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Posted 9 y ago

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Responses: 11

SFC Josh Billingsley

Posted 9 y ago

Not looking for any illegal stories so don't self-incriminate. I had a candidate once that I worked on since he was in the 9th grade. I spent two years joking with this fool, and when the time to sign up came he got cold feet. I took his entire family out to dinner, told them my fears when i first joined, and let them pick my brains for 4 hours. After he signed up, he almost didn't ship. I spent 5 hours driving around my area trying to find this guy. I found out this guy was 4 hours away in another city. I drove out there, asked him why he was scared. After all this, he couldn't even tell me, other than fear of the unknown. We drove back to get his bags packed. He shipped the next day.

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SFC(P) John McLaughlin

Posted 9 y ago

I was doing an interview with a female applicant at her grandparents home. Her grandfather was a Vietnam vet. I went through my usual course of the interview. Told her about the National Guard and comparable of other branches. The girl was completely interested and ready to sign until her grandfather opened up. He berated about war and other stuff because he was a Vietnam Vet. Needless to say I went off on the old man to give him insight of myself and my background and experiences in a stern respectful tone. I then sucked down the rest of my beer and said have a good day. The next day the grandfather called me to say is granddaughter was going to enlist. I was surprised to say the least especially how I left the conversation.

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SFC(P) John McLaughlin

9 y

I was lucky. I tried the recruiting gig. Worked my ass off. I just couldn't bullshit or lie to them. I explained everything in full detail. My best was when I did have an applicant I directed him to active duty. The kid needed it. His home life was a wreck. But in my last deployment I was with several of my recruits. They loved it.

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PO1 Edward Spencer

9 y

He was probably testing you to see if you were full of it or not. You proved you weren't, and that you could handle a little bit of pushback, and most likely earned an immense of respect from him in the process. In short, you did it the right way.

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SFC(P) John McLaughlin

9 y

PO1 Edward Spencer - yeah I couldn't bullshit a recruit. Especially if they saw me at the unit or some other function. I'm the one that has to look them in the eye.

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PO1 Edward Spencer

9 y

SFC(P) John McLaughlin - me either. I got threatened with being written up maybe... 3 or 4 times because of that. At the end of the day however, I knew I'd done right by my kids, and still keep up with most of them, 8-9 years after they shipped for boot camp. Had I gone back to the fleet, I undoubtedly would have served with several of them, and I always kept that in mind when I was working with them when they were considering joining.

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MSgt Christopher Schaefer

Posted 9 y ago

Had a guy walk in on the day before the last day of the month and I was rolling a doughnut. This guy needed to test, needed medical clearance for pyloric stenosis, and was not schduled for MEPS. Got him medically cleared, stayed in office did all the paperwork and took them to his house to sign at 2200 hrs. Told him to take papers with him to MEPS in the morning. So he was a walk-on, and records hand carry at MEPS and needed to test. Booked that same day. A few weeks later he got married and his new wife wasn't sure she wanted him to go. Told him he was married to the Air Force before he was married to get.

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