Lessons Learned for Vets
Lessons Learned for Vets
Military Transition Insights from Human Resources with Gary Steensgard
This episode features insights from Gary Steensgaard, a veteran who transitioned from military service to a civilian HR role. We explore strategies for translating military skills for civilian job markets and how to navigate the realities of the hiring process.
A few key highlights covered in this episode:
• Honest reflections on the transition process
• Importance of setting realistic expectations for civilian employment
• Strategies to refine resumes and highlight relevant skills
• Understanding the performance management systems in civilian HR
• Insights on translating military terminology to workplace language
• Deep dive into the hidden costs of employment and their implications
• Identifying the right moments for career moves
• The value of professional networking for continuing growth and support
• Importance of maintaining passion and happiness in career choices
You can connect with Gary Steensgard on LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garysteensgard/
Subscribe to our YouTube channel at https://tinyurl.com/llforvets22
Subscribe to the podcast and leave us a 5-star review. Please share this with other veterans who might need help as they transition from the military!
If you learned something valuable today, share it. Leave us a review and write a post on social media about the lessons that helped you today from this episode.
The Lessons Learned for Vets Podcast is sponsored by Seek Now and their Drive Academy. Seek Now is the property inspection industry's leading business and they created Drive Academy DoD SkillBridge and CSP internships to teach transitioning military service members and veterans skills that prepare them for lucrative and rewarding careers in the property inspection and insurance industries. You can learn more and apply today at www.internwithdrive.com.
Welcome to the Lessons Learned for Vets podcast, your military transition debrief. I'm your host, lori Norris, and I've helped thousands of military service members successfully transition out of the military since 2005. Thanks for tuning in to hear the after action reports and real stories of your fellow veterans, who are here to help guide, educate and inform you as you navigate your own military transition. By the way, if you find value from today's episode, please share it with others, leave us a review and post about us on social media.
Speaker 1:Welcome to the Lessons Learned from VETS podcast. I am so excited for my guest today. My guest is Gary Steensgaard. Gary retired from the U S army in 2015. He was able to go right into an HR role, leveraging his Army recruiting and HR experience. He's worked in HR for multiple organizations and he shares some really great information and pretty straightforward advice on LinkedIn about the differences and similarities of the military and private sector HR, and I think, though, even if human resources is not on your career path going forward, that's not even on your radar, I still know you're going to get some really good, valuable information listening to Gary's insights on this episode, because he's got a lot of great info to share. So, gary, thank you so much for being on here with me.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Laurie. I really appreciate the introduction and I look forward to sharing some of the things I did well and some of the things I didn't do so well.
Speaker 1:You know, I think it's good we got to be honest with those things, right. So we always start with transition and it sounded pretty easy in the intro right, you just went right from the military right into a job, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it sounded. It sounds a lot easier than it was.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:The first thing I had to do was level set my expectations. I was a first sergeant in the army, so I had a relatively high opinion of myself. I had a master's degree, I had an HR certification. Who doesn't want to hire me, right? Well, it turns out nobody wanted to hire me because I wasn't very good at translating to them the value I was going to bring to the organization and the results I was going to deliver.
Speaker 2:Once I learned how to do that and I honestly learned how to do that through a local SHRM group not the big overarching SHRM organization, but a local SHRM group and I joined them while I was on, while I was in terminal leave, and I asked one of the HR managers there. I asked her. I was like hey, you know I'm not getting any bites. Can you take a look at my resume? She looked at my resume and it says she said you seem very accomplished, but looking at this resume, you can't solve any of the problems that I have in my organization. Ouch, and the light bulb went off.
Speaker 2:So I really refined my resume and I honed in on relatable, relevant KPIs for the organizations that I was applying for and namely digging those out and peeling those out of job descriptions and I know that sounds really boring.
Speaker 2:But if the job description says you're going to be responsible, one of your key metrics is going to be retention. I had to demonstrate what my retention skills were on that resume in a quantifiable number either a percentage or a dollar figure and demonstrate that to the potential employer that I was looking to join and I thought I was going to be, you know, an HR director. I wasn't ready to be an HR director, so I took an HR supervisory role and I didn't supervise people, I supervised systems, and we'll probably talk more about that later. But that really allowed me to cut my teeth, learn civilian HR or public sector HR outside of the governmental world and learn what was important to them and that can vary from industry to industry, but drinking through that fire hose for the first six months was the most important thing I did as an HR pro since I retired 10 years ago.
Speaker 1:But, gary, hr people, they don't have metrics and measurables. That's what I hear all the time. I don't have those and we know that's not true, don't we?
Speaker 2:That's completely not true and that can vary again by organization to organization or industry to industry, and I can tell you, having worked at Amazon, everything that they do at Amazon is pretty much data driven and you have to learn to become a data focused person. It doesn't mean you discard the personal relationships and the outreach and the connections and then engagement, but it means that all of that stuff has to be quantifiable, some way to extend meaning and you know something relevant to the stakeholders and stockholders of that organization. So I had to learn that and I had to learn that very quickly.
Speaker 1:I really like how you went through the like you know, know, kind of that peeling away of the military and finding the meat that was in the middle, that really it related to the private sector, um, and and I think that sometimes we over complicate it, like I have to learn a new language and I have to, you know, translate everything, and sometimes it is really just learning like what's important to who I'm speaking to? To you know where I'm focusing. To the employers, I want to read my like what's important to who I'm speaking to? To you know where I'm focusing. To the employers, I want to read my resume what's important to them and how can I speak language that makes them see that I have exactly what they're looking for, right?
Speaker 2:And not just even if it's not exactly the bulk of it. Right, I always like to. I always, you know, when I talk to transitioning veterans and military spouses that are seeking HR or thinking about HR, I always tell them you're never going to have 100% and the roles that I thought. I hit every metric. I didn't even get an interview.
Speaker 2:So find the things towards the top of the job description, because typically the top of the job description is the most important part. The top of the job description, because typically the top of the job description is the most important part. Find as many things as you can hit and if you're in the 70, 80% range, give it a shot. You'll never know. If you don't Now, if you don't hit 50% of them, you may be wasting their time and your own time, especially when you're taking the time to tailor a resume and all those things. So yeah to me. Once I realigned my expectations, what I knew I was capable of, what I knew I needed to learn and how to quantify all that and demonstrate that to a potential employer, my prospects looked up very quickly from there.
Speaker 1:I'm going to tell you right now like, if you're not connected to Gary on LinkedIn I don't know where you're at with your connections and if you can, but if at least follow him, because I think that you share some really great info on HR, on the hiring process, and it's not just for people that want to be in the human resources world, I think it's. You've got a lot of really really good posts about just like you said I'm going to be me, I'm going to say who I am, and that's really who you show up as on LinkedIn as well.
Speaker 2:I love. I tell people all the time I'm the same person that you'll meet at a bus stop. I'm the same person you'll meet at the grocery store that you see on LinkedIn. I may be a little more polished or a little less polished depending on the environment, but that's who I am. And an interesting fact I think I talk more people out of HR than I talk people into HR, because a lot of people I'll ask why HR? Because that's where it starts, why do you want to be in HR? And some will say well, I think that's where my skill sets align.
Speaker 2:Coming from the military or the famous one, I like people and some organizations. I've spent 80 to 90% of my time with probably some of the least comfortable employees to be around and I'll put it that way. So I was helping people, but I wasn't working with the people. I was helping. I was really doing investigations and helping managers learn how to do write-ups and performance evaluations. And the good employees and this is going to sound bad typically take care of themselves. You give them a little bit of feedback, you set expectations and the ones that have that drive they're going to soar. But not everybody is like that and I will tell you, the plurality of the people that you work with are not like that, at least in my experience.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know, and that's you, it's kind of like the principal of a school, right, they typically don't see the great students. Yes, yes, you know, that's another way of thinking about it, because you do get the underperformers, the people that just for some reason aren't fitting in right, and that is something you have to deal with.
Speaker 1:So you know, one of the things I want to talk to you about is like the transferability from military HR to private sector HR, and I get that a lot Like I want to do HR, private sector HR and I get that a lot Like I want to. I want to do HR and there are some career fields in the military that are very easily transferable and so I thought it would look, it would be a good idea for us to talk through that. So let's do that now. Let's. So let's kind of talk, go through a couple of things. So, first of all, what are the easiest skills for someone in human resources or even a manager who wants to have some impact in HR? What are the easiest skills for someone in human resources or even a manager who wants to have some impact in HR? What are the easiest skills to transfer from the military to the private sector?
Speaker 2:For me, number one is performance management. Everywhere in the military, performance management is a thing, whether it's a non-commissioned officer evaluation report, whether it's a fit rep in the Marine Corps, whether it's an OER. You are used to doing those things both on the receiving end and the giving end and at least way back when, when I was in the Army, we were really learning how to better quantify the bullets that we put on those evaluation reports. Right, that's really, really important because the same pitfalls that we experienced in the military a lot of fluff, but, you know, a lot of sizzle, but not a lot of steak A lot of performance management out here in the real world is the same way. So you know that that is an easy one right off top Employee relations.
Speaker 2:If you're a commander or first sergeant, that employee relations part is huge. Some portions of the military you may even be versed in investigations. That is also one that has a really direct, relatable hey, I've done this. Things like personnel records management, updating those personnel records, maintaining those, safeguarding PII, applying state laws and federal laws to your DOD employees, working with the unions that may house those DOD employees those things are all very relatable. So there are some things that are directly oh, this doesn't look too weird to me, or this doesn't look too foreign to me, and you'll pick up relatively quick. It's really just learning formats and processes versus the how-to, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:I think some of it also is terminology, you know, like billeting versus like staffing allocation or you know, personnel records versus in the databases that you use in the military, and really those are human resource information systems. They're just called something different, right.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I always use the example leave, the word leave, leave in the Army and leave in the real world, as I call it, are two hugely different things, and I always use the story. My first job, the one we just talked about I had to order flu shots for the entire workforce, and that's the way I heard it. But guess what? In the real world, people can voluntarily take a flu shot. In the army, everybody was voluntold to take a flu shot. So that's sort of where my that was my aha moment. I was like okay, gary, you're not in Kansas anymore. You need to start paying a little bit better attention to the nuances and the differences between where you were and where you're sitting now.
Speaker 1:That is a very good story. I like that you don't get to make people do things in the private sector, do you Not very often? Every once in a while you do, you know, and I would talk to people about. So in the private sector you have FMLA right. That's the Family Medical Leave Act. It's what governs the fact that if I have a baby or if I have a death in the family, like the leave that I can take and how that is paid out of the system. Well, the military doesn't have FMLA, but they have a version of it and so we can say you manage the equivalent of FMLA, right.
Speaker 1:So I think there are so many things that there are those similarities. We just call them something different. And so learn the new terminology.
Speaker 2:That's true and you have to listen very carefully. And again, if you can get in those local SHRM groups prior to transitioning out of the military, you will hear that and most of the people in the SHRm group will love you to ask a question hey, what do you mean by STD? Because STD in the army and STD in my world now are really, wildly, two different things, and I know that sounds a little bit racy or maybe just a little bit smarmy, but it's the truth. Short-term disability is the mechanism we use if I break my ankle cutting my grass. That's how I can continue getting paid. Well, I had a spinal fusion when I was in the Army. My pay didn't change, my benefits didn't change and they just said, hey, when you get released for your doctor we'll see you then. It's the same out here, but the mechanisms to manage it are much different.
Speaker 1:Okay, so that gives us a good segue. So what were you lacking? From military to private sector, hr Wow.
Speaker 2:From the concrete portions of HR. Number one was payroll, because DFAS did all that for us and I didn't have to worry about it. The closest I got to payroll is if I had DOD employees. I had to prove their time cards right If they were not really employed. Beyond that, I didn't do any of that. I didn't go into Kronos and reconcile payroll to ADP I didn't, you know. Apply bonus amounts? I didn't, you know. Do you know change deductions? So that was huge. But once you get the first time you have to reconcile payroll and it takes a day and a half. The next time you do it it takes a day and then the next time you do it it takes a half day and then pretty soon you're on a cadence.
Speaker 2:Not all HR roles do payroll. Sometimes payroll is housed by finance and you never even see it. But that was the biggest one for me Learning benefits. You just mentioned FMLA. I mentioned short-term disability. You know there's so many different things in the things we call them and the way that they're managed, whether it's managed internally, whether it's managed by a third-party vendor and everything in between. I had to learn those things. Those were very, very transactional things Transactional HR, strategic HR.
Speaker 2:There's not a lot of difference. Are you creating the command environment where people want to stay Right? We did that in the military as leaders, whether you're a company commander, a brigade commander, a post commander, a first sergeant, a sergeant major, a senior chief petty officer you wanted to create the environment in your unit where people wanted to raise that right hand again and stay Very same out here. But the mechanisms you do to do that are a little bit different. Command climate surveys just like a stay survey at work, right. Command climate surveys just like a stay survey at work right. So those similarities exist. Again to your point, how do you explain that to the hiring manager? How do you explain that to the board that you're sending in front of at you know xyz company, that once you're there you just have to show that you belong there, because you wouldn't be at the interview if they didn't think you had a chance to be there yep, and again, like you said, it's just about how you tell that story on your resume.
Speaker 1:Um, you know, if you use what would you call command climate survey, like the air force has a deox right, like all those different, like you know, if you're like increased deox scores, 22 or command climate, so you know, I think that people are gonna go. I think I know what that means, but I'm not sure. Yes, just figure out what they call it and that's. That's the thing is, I think that, um, yes, there are going to be some places where you're going to need to get up to speed, it's just. But I do believe, like, even in the military, you, if someone had a payroll issue or they got, they added a stripe and their pay wasn't right. The next, you know the next pay grade or pay period, who are they going to come to? First? Probably you, right, and you had to go figure out who to who to figure it out. And so, yeah, you didn't oversee compensation and benefits, but you had a, you played a role in it.
Speaker 2:You were, you really were the customer facing role right, and I always try to tell people, depending on which role you're going into, of course you know the higher you go in any function, the more strategic you become and less transactional you become. But if they're looking at an HR manager role, I would say my job, even currently, is maybe 40% transactional and 60%. You know transformational, slash strategic. You know coming up with new ways to track exit survey data. You know coming up with, you know dynamic ways to increase retainability during onboarding, those sorts of things. And even, to your point, we do onboarding in the military too. We call it. You know you're going to one stop, you're going through that. But what if you're a sponsor? Right, you have to show people the ropes. You have to show them what's going on. So, depending on what you're exposed to in the military, you may even have total relevant experience with that as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think the more we talk about it, the more I see these crossovers.
Speaker 2:And I just think it's all about how we present it and you know like we call it. New hire orientation and employee onboarding in an organization had nothing to do with hiring that person. The hiring manager hired Lori and said hey, onboarding team Lori's going to be here on February. Let me look at my calendar. February 3rd is her start date. I need you all to be ready. I've already put in the order ticket for her tech packet, whether it's a laptop screens, you know, headsets, whatever that case may be. That's all done.
Speaker 1:I just need you to deliver the hr portion, and it can vary again from organization to organization okay, so you've been in the hr career field in the private sector for you know, coming up on 10 years, right and so hard to believe, isn't it so?
Speaker 2:It really is.
Speaker 1:Tell me some tools, some strategies, some education, some certifications Like how did you adapt?
Speaker 2:Um, oddly, I'm talking a lot here, but I adapted a lot by learning to listen, and learning to listen without having to respond and seeing the HR leaders in the different organizations I was a part of and the different groups I was a part of, and who did I want to emulate, who really stood out to me, who made an impact on me, who made an impact on the organization, and really just sort of grab those pieces Again very similar to people in the military when they're working with those great leaders and they're like man, he or she really does that good, or I can't believe how well she presents this topic when it's a very controversial or difficult topic to talk about and we pick those things and we try to emulate those and we try to work them into our authentic self. That's hard to say, but that's really how I got there A lot of professional reading and I will tell you some very, very key people on LinkedIn helped me when I hit roadblocks, when I hit those obstacles Charity Hughes, bill Kiefer, don Herman, people that I interact with all the time on there that are HR pros that have forgotten more about HR than I'll ever know, but I can literally DM them and say, hey, this is my issue, here are my intended courses of action that I'm pondering, what do you think? And they typically answer my question with more questions. Right, but by the end of that conversation I have more confidence, uh, and that confidence always exudes from you as you're approaching especially difficult, uh conversations or difficult situations, and typically that's when I reach out to them. I don't reach out to them for something that's easy or fun I'll figure that out along the way like a service award. I don't need them for that. But I need them for, hey, I have a sexual harassment complaint. Or hey, you know, somebody's trying to. One of my leaders is trying to put somebody on a PIP before they've ever even been counseled or talked to about their performance. How do I approach this leader with some good coaching and strategies to improve that employee's performance, those sorts of things.
Speaker 2:So your network is huge, not just getting the job, but doing well at your job. And so many people you've seen them I need a job. Military community jumps in, gets them a job. And so many people you've seen them I need a job. Military community jumps in, gets them a job. They disappear. They come back a year later on LinkedIn, because we've been on LinkedIn for a while. Hey, I need a job when you been. How many people could you have helped or interacted with in that period? I know life's busy, but my life's busy too. I make sure that I make time and I make sure that I try to live a value to value mindset in everything that I do, because eventually I'm going to need to cross the bridge with my hands out, but I don't always want to come on my hands out. I want to go like this and give back, and HR works that way, but all functional leaders good ones work that way.
Speaker 1:You mentioned SHRM, that's, the Society of Human Resource Managers. So who? For those of you that don't know any, did you pursue any certifications, any formal training?
Speaker 2:I did.
Speaker 2:I did, you know. I went through the O2O program through Syracuse University and did the prep course for the SHRM CP, got that, didn't maintain my continuing education hours, but I am currently studying for my SCP, not because Blue Halo says that I need to have it. This is going to sound really corny, but I want the certificate. I want the thing that says you are technically proficient to do this job. Whether you're good at it or not, it's another story for another day, but at least you have the certification. I'd like to do that and I would like to do probably a project management certification, simply because I need to know the mechanisms and correct ways, because soon I'm going to be diving into bigger and more strategic projects for the human capital function where I work. Having that knowledge would be huge and I don't think it would be unused. I'm definitely not a just get a cert to get a cert, but if you can practically apply it and know you can leverage it to deliver a quality product, super yep and I think that you're right, like it's about.
Speaker 1:It's not about going out and collecting all the certifications. It's like looking at strategically what will help me be a better employee, what will help me adapt for you know quickly and add more value to my organization.
Speaker 2:I think that's a great test so you said it much better than I did, absolutely true.
Speaker 1:So you? I remember um on LinkedIn, you said the most difficult part of your post-military career was different than you thought it would be. You, you thought it was going to be like learning those differences and navigating the the the challenges between translating your skills, but it's actually been about adapting your communication style, hasn't?
Speaker 2:it. It really has, and it was really brought into focus three months ago when I joined my current organization, because I had been in manufacturing and distribution operations. Those operations have a tendency to be more earthy, they're more closer aligned to the infantry than they are to military intelligence. Right, and I'm not saying smarter people, I'm just saying a different makeup of people. Now I'm in a building where I have engineers and doctors and just high-level professionals and I'm having daily conversations with vice presidents and presidents.
Speaker 2:I can't carry myself the same way that I carried myself with, you know, the lead supervisor on third shift. That that's making widgets. Yeah, those are different sorts of nuances and I've always been very direct, but I needed to learn how to become direct with polish. The word polish was not in my vernacular, it wasn't in the way I operated. I was like this is the way I am and this is the way I'm going to be and take it or leave it.
Speaker 2:Well, that's great if you can afford to go find another job, because you're not going to last long in some environments. That's just the way it is and you can either own that, like I'm trying to do, or you can be you and let the chips fall where they may. Neither way is right nor wrong, but for me the correct way is to learn how to adapt to my audience, learn how to speak their language so where they hear what you need them to hear accurately one time and a message being delivered and received well, not received, off-putting, or received purse, or received, you know, sometimes just poorly, and I have to practice that and do everything with intentionality to get there.
Speaker 1:I think you know a lot of people are like well, this is who I am, you're going to have to figure it out, and that's okay. But no that won't be okay for all people, like that's not going to fit in all environments, right?
Speaker 2:I think my buddy, alfredo Torres, said it best. You know, you can be authentic without being too authentic, and I think that is is. You see where I'm dressed now, but yesterday I had a vest and a collared shirt on, uh, but when I worked in manufacturing t-shirt and jeans and work boots, because that's the way my my tribe dressed, I wanted to be with my tribe. Well, my tribe carries themselves a little bit different here and now. Not that they think they're more important, because we have technicians that get dirty too Building drones, building just some of the most mind-blowing technology that I didn't even know existed to make the battlefield very unsafe for our adversaries. But in the building that I'm at now, it's a very, very different sort of feel to it and three months in I can tell you I love it.
Speaker 2:I've yet to wake up and dread coming to work. We are very quality focused versus quantity focused. So instead of being go, go, go now, now, now, move, move, move, it's okay. What are we dealing with? What does right look like? What do we want our final product to be, and who do I need to partner with?
Speaker 1:to get it done, Manufacturing a lot of it didn't operate that way because of the frenetic pace. So that's been really my challenges, not just currently, but moving through the whole transition into HR from the military. We're taking authenticity advice from Alfredo. I don't know that that that's pretty authentic.
Speaker 2:But he, but he knows, you know, there's an old phrase in a dirty harry movie where clint eastwood says a man's got to know his limitations. And I don't think that's, you know, just for men, I think that's for all of us, all of us, folks, folks, right. And I know that seven years ago I couldn't walk into a boardroom and deliver a presentation without just an immense amount of rehearsal and immense amount of feedback, whereas now, if my director, if she came over to my office and said, gary, I need you to go talk to the president about this, this or this, I could take my notes, I could go over there and have a good, cordial even if it's a frank conversation and deliver it confidently, professionally and even in a more friendly way than I could have seven, eight years ago.
Speaker 1:You've got to decide where you want to go, Like where do you want to go in your career?
Speaker 2:Exactly what you know. There's some people that want to have tattoos up to their ears and if I had my sleeves up you could see I was covered in tattoos. But you know some places, yeah, it's not the look that they want, that's not the customer facing look that they want. Well, you might say, well, we don't want those customers anyway. But nobody that's responsible for a P&L says we don't want those customers, at least usually. So I have to take into account not just what I feel is going to make me comfortable being authentic, but what my organization, what are the mores, what are the values and what's important to them. And if I can't meet that halfway well, then maybe I need to look for a different role or a different organization and that's important to them. And if I can't meet that halfway well, then maybe I need to look for a different role or a different organization, and that's OK. But everybody has to make that decision for themselves or somebody else will make it for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know what that is. The beauty of post-military employment is you can make that decision.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:This doesn't work for me anymore. Which we're going to talk about in a minute for you and the choices you've made Right.
Speaker 2:So very, very true. And I don't think there's a month that goes by where, you know, I think to myself. You know, if I didn't want to go to work today, I can just turn around and go home Because I could be fed up like Michael Douglas on falling down. I'm done with it, all Right, but I have that freedom. But with that freedom also comes the consequences of that freedom. So it's really a game of balance.
Speaker 2:And again, if you need an exit plan, you can meet with the people. If you've got a good network. I know if I needed to leave here, I could reach out to Mike Quinn hey, mike, I have a problem. You know, this is what I'm feeling. Where am I missing? I can reach out to Charity and say I credit her a lot her and Josh Hicks, as a matter of fact, meeting him on Alfredo's Coffeehouse for giving me the courage to look at myself and figure out what made me happy and where did I want to spend the final 10, 15 years of my career, god willing, and be able to come home every day, not mad at the world. And I found it. So I'm very, very fortunate, but it took me a long time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's okay to keep looking until you find it.
Speaker 2:Right, that's right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you, I want to talk about something that's kind of off topic. Yeah, you, I want to talk about something that's kind of off topic, but I saw it on your LinkedIn and I think it's really important. So one of the things I always teach when I teach you know job searching processes is like hiring you is not an employer's top priority right, they have a business to run, and so, while getting hired is your top priority, hiring you is not always their top priority. And you brought up a really interesting topic of the cost of employment and so, like, how much does it cost to screen? You know, hire onboard train and retain an employee, and retain an employee? And so would you break that down for us?
Speaker 2:Sure, we all, as employees, see our total compensation. If we can see past our regular paycheck, we can see total compensation. Hey, I'm only paying $100 a month for medical care, for medical insurance, whatever the case may be, whatever your benefits package for medical insurance, whatever the case may be, whatever your benefits package, bonuses, reload to your point and your salary, that all sort of makes up your total compensation. But the cost of employment has hidden costs in there that we don't, as new hires don't even examine. Yes, the bulk of your benefits are paid for by the company, but there's also workers' comp insurance, there's unemployment insurance. The standard formula is to take your salary and multiply it by 1.2 to 1.45. So if you make $100,000 a year, it can literally cost the company $145,000 to maintain you as a valuable employee. So when we look at an HR, when we look at headcount, we don't look at just what somebody's earning. We look at what it costs to company to maintain that person in that seat, in that position, in that role. And that matters because one of the huge controllables of business is your labor cost. It's one thing you can control and it's a constant push and pull right. Too much labor and your margins shrink, you know, not enough labor and your customer service suffers.
Speaker 2:Good businesses and good HR leaders partner with their functional partners, usually in operations and finance. But it can vary and help them design how they're going to maximize their labor cost dollars while delivering the products and services to their customers. And that's really what we do. We don't write people up. We don't even hire people unless we're hiring HR people. We may guide processes, we may advise on processes, we may sit in on interviews just to make sure our managers are learning the proper way to do interviews and are delivering our interview processes correctly, but we don't hire them. We advise Whether our've made those networks both internally and external to your organization. Your word will carry meaning as long as you're measured with your words and know when to speak and when to just kind of yeah and move on.
Speaker 1:I think that that I really liked that kind of metric of the 1.25 to 1.45? Um percent of you know your times, your salary, because you know what I, when I teach people, is. You've got to find a way to demonstrate what makes you cost effective and it's not about getting the cheapest employee, because that's not always cost effective, right not at all, it's not about getting the most qualified employee, because that may not always be cost effective.
Speaker 1:It's about who can bring the biggest return on investment to the company. That's right. Companies want to make money or save money, and you that's what you really have to start thinking about, and I know you really haven't had to think about that in the military. You haven't had to prove your value or your worth um, in that kind of way to think monetarily or return on investment in those terms, and so it's something that you really got to change your mindset when you're marketing yourself as a potential employee, because that cost effectiveness is a game changer. Once you take the focus off of yourself and you say instead here's how I'm going to add value to you, this is how I'm going to make you the money, or how I'm going to earn the money you pay me, that's when I think that it really turns on a light bulb in the employer's eyes as they're looking at your resume.
Speaker 2:It does. You know, in the military we always talked about end strength. What is the end strength of a small unit, a battalion size unit, a brigade size unit, an army or corps size unit? Those are given to us so well, we're supposed to be at 25. We're at 23. I guess building one's going to send us two more, you know, next month, and that's how it worked. We didn't have to worry about that. But out here we do, and it's the right person, the right role, the right time to deliver that right ROI that you just spoke to. And that's the secret sauce and everybody's working on it.
Speaker 2:I can tell you, in the defense industry we have a lot of purple squirrel roles, people that do really weird things but they're really smart and they're really good at it. And guess who else wants them? Lockheed, guess, who else wants them? Bae, guess who else wants them? You know RXT. All these companies were all fighting for this little, small, you know, pool of fish to fill and deliver for our customers.
Speaker 2:And sometimes it's money, sometimes it's flexibility, sometimes it's environment, location, sometimes it's just what you call a role. Hey, if you call me a scientist, I'm hired. Ta-da, you're a scientist. I don't know how you define that, but you're a scientist and every person's kind of wired differently and part of the HR manager's role is to help managers, functional managers and hiring managers find what motivates their team, what motivates that new hire, what motivates that candidate to want to be part of the team. Of course we want a competitive salary, that's a given, yeah. But what beyond that? And good HR leaders help those functional leaders develop those skills and it comes over amount of time for sure and I, you know, it's something else to think about.
Speaker 1:Just I love that, that idea, what you just threw out there. But you know, think about how much an employer has on the line when they hire somebody. How much? What are they investing in you as a new employee? Like, obviously it's money, but the beyond that, their reputation, yes, or other employees, their customers, you know, I mean one, one employee, one bad hire, if the company's not set up very well, can take it down right so I think absolutely.
Speaker 2:I think that is one of the most under discusseddiscussed topics in the employer-employee relationship. If you hire somebody and the employee don't like it, he or she can just be like I'm done, or they can be so soured that they come in and they make a situation bad for a very large customer. I haven't lived that, but I think we've all read enough articles where we know that's a very, very real possibility. So, yes, the hiring process probably couldn't be improved through maybe 90% of the organizations that I see, but it could be streamlined. But the company is making a huge gamble and taking a large amount of risk on hiring a person. They're not doing them a favor Okay, I don't see it that way but they are accepting risk and with that risk, I think an employee should have a lot of responsibility in owning some of that and really delivering for their teams and the good organizations. That's just an expectation. They set it early and it's part of the culture that they build Amazon.
Speaker 2:Non-performance is not a thing you cannot hide from your performance at Amazon and that's great. Look how successful it's made their company because they take care of their people. They compensate their people. Well, take care of their people. They compensate their people well, but they also demand results and a bias for action and having the spine to disagree but then recommit to things. Their leadership principles aren't just things on a wall, they're things that they demand in your daily actions, and to me that's very dynamic and it's very rare.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I just think it's something to again change your mindset about, like, remember how much that employer has on the line and really the onus is on you as a candidate to show why you're valuable, and that's why I talk about it so much, because that's really I feel like what sets candidates apart is when they take the time to really think about demonstrating that cost effectiveness and showcasing like here's how I'm going to help you.
Speaker 2:Yes, I think one of the things I'm most proud of. And then we'll probably go to the next topic. But my first one-on-one with my new manager. She's director, hr director, and she's like Gary, I like really how you've just jumped in. Well, in the military we didn't really have a choice. You jump in right, that's what you do, so that's kind of how we're put together. But I didn't jump in with both feet To me. I was taking my time and going slow Again, changing environments, changing how I carry myself, changing that communication style. But I thought maybe I was falling behind and she's like no, you're doing just fine. You're taking control of what's in your purview right now. You understand and ask for expectations and you deliver. I'm not all that in a bag of chips, but to me, if somebody can come into an organization and make those incremental impacts in a good way, you set yourself up for a very, very good career path and it's really no more complicated than that.
Speaker 1:So you've talked about a couple of different employers, right, and we alluded to it. So you've changed companies six times in your yep, so six times in ten years since you retired.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:So it's not really all that uncommon in the private sector or, you know, with military service members, you know in their post, post-military career. But can you give a little bit of advice to the people who are kind of listening about how do you know when it's time to leave and also from an HR perspective, like how do you handle that when it's time for a career change?
Speaker 2:For me it was about being happy. So for a lot of years in the army I was professionally happy, but I was personally miserable. Since I've got out of the military, I was personally happy, but I was professionally miserable. It doesn't mean the organizations were bad. In fact, I haven't worked at a bad place since I've been out of the military. Okay, I just wasn't a fit. I was the square peg and the organization was the round hole. Okay, and I know that sounds like a cop-out, like when you're trying to break up with somebody you're dating it's not you, it's me, right, but it really was true. Look at all the people that have thrived and flourished and we'll use an example. We've already used Amazon, amazon successful. For a reason. I wasn't going to be a fit, just for a variety of reasons, and that's OK. But you have to be honest when you're talking about that in interviews, because people do see you as a job hopper. If you look at my resume, I am the quintessential job hopper.
Speaker 2:Most of my roles were growth oriented, either in salary or size and depth of organization and function, meaning I had more direct reports or I had more scope of responsibility. It got to the point to where manufacturing, and specifically 24-7 manufacturing, was just not enjoyable anymore, because even when you're off, you're not off, because the operation never shuts down and it's at full throttle all the time. To me, I was having trouble developing a work-life balance but, more importantly, what we were doing as a company didn't scratch the itch of what my passion was. So working with Josh Hicks, who transitioned into a cybersecurity role in defense, and talking with Charity Hughes again, and her doing that making me do that mental inventory I reflected back to when I was a kid. My dad worked at McDonnell Douglas and everybody who knows me knows my dad was my hero. He designed fighter jets and I thought, as a little itty-bitty Gary, that that was the coolest thing in the whole world. Well, I thought any manufacturing would scratch that itch and it doesn't. I needed to be in an organization, in a company, that was really equipping the green suitors, our men and women in the armed services, to go into the modern battlefield and succeed. I don't have the skill set nor the desire to make the technology, but I have the skill set and the desire to support those who make that technology. And that's the story I told during my interview and I could tell it with passion and looking you know, my now manager right in the face, because it was true. I didn't have to make anything up. Some people would buy it, Some people may not. She apparently bought it and now she's got somebody that they're going to have to throw out of this building because the people here are just really top notch and the culture is really cool. So authenticity is important.
Speaker 2:The why behind moves are important. There are some people that I follow closely and dearly on LinkedIn that think if you change jobs two jobs within a three year period you're a job hopper. What if you got laid off? What if you saw a downsizing coming in that industry? What if you got divorced and had to move? What if you had a child that needed specialized care and you needed to move to Cleveland Clinic? Right, and your company doesn't have a role for you in Cleveland.
Speaker 2:Sometimes life happens and I leveraged for me post-military. They told you where to go. You might have a little bit of say with your career manager in the army, but at the end of the day, they're going to send you where they need you. Businesses are going to do the same thing, but you have some say whether you stay or you don't. And I leverage that because I know, as an employee, if I drop dead right now, I will not be room temperature before there's a job requisition to backfill me, because it's a critical position. And once you accept that, once you know that that's the rules of engagement, if you're not happy, then you need to set a professional, well-planned exit strategy for yourself to go where you need to be, whether it's a pivot into a whole new function, a new industry, from for-profit to non-profit, or maybe out of the workforce altogether. Every person's different. But you have to do that work. You have to ask yourself those hard questions and answer yourself truthfully. Doing so has got me here and now I'm not even worried about my resume, unless for some reason, I get terminated, for whatever that reason is, I'll have to dust it off, but for now I don't have to worry about that.
Speaker 2:I do look at jobs, and here's why I don't look at HR roles. I look at RF engineers, I look at radar engineers, I look at mechanical engineers, I look at, you know, robotic scientists, and I see what the market is doing in certain locales Albuquerque, Colorado Springs, all the places, dayton, all the places where our employees are at. So I know when I'm doing comp analysis that we're where we're supposed to be, because I don't want them to leave me for $10,000 to go to BAE. I don't want that to happen. So that's part of my job, but that's the only time I look at jobs anymore. But it's taken me 10 years to get here. I hope people it doesn't take them 10 years to get here. So that's sort of how I went about doing it. And again, truthfulness, honesty and being able to tell that story is so important.
Speaker 1:And I think you know, obviously, the days of 20 years at an organization and getting the gold watch and retiring. They're just not there anymore. And sometimes you have to move, to move up the ladder to, you know, get a higher salary, whatever it is, and so. But I really believe you've got to stop slow down and really, like you said, identify like what is it about me, that? Why am I not happy here? What do I need to be happy? What's important to me? What are my priorities?
Speaker 1:And those are going to change throughout your life right, you know kids grow up or you know, life changes or whatever the case may be, so you may have to re-analyze that again and again.
Speaker 2:I think you hit a great point. Your point is so huge. Sometimes the opportunity doesn't exist. So you read a lot on LinkedIn.
Speaker 2:People only quit bad bosses. I've quit a lot of bosses that were fantastic Okay, that I would follow anywhere because they knew what they were doing and they treated me well. But there's only X amount of roles in the HR hierarchy as you move up and if I want to grow, if I want to earn more money and that's not a bad thing if I want to move to a different location for whatever reason life throws at me, sometimes that great boss can't get it done for you because they just don't have the ability to. It's not that they don't want to, it's that they cannot. So since they cannot, you know, you have to.
Speaker 2:Last thing I'll say if you don't take care of your career, somebody else will yep, and I spent 23 years in hoping that an organization was taking care of me and they did, they really did. But out here, the pace of business, the flux of business and the winds of change are always around and because of that, your direct supervisor or your supervisor's supervisor really doesn't have time to focus their day-to-day life on your individual development plan. You have to work your individual development plan and that's yours to own. And I think Herb Thompson's book Own your Journey right. I think, while for some that may sound cliche, it's probably one of the most true statements that I've ever heard, because if you don't do it, somebody else can do it for you, and then you're just holding on for dear life, and that's no fun.
Speaker 1:I feel like I could just keep talking to you for the next three hours, but you might like to go home at some point. And so this has far exceeded the expectations I thought you were going to bring to the table. It has been an amazing episode and I think you might have to come back. I don't know why we waited so long to do this.
Speaker 2:Honestly, no, I am. So I am so flattered that you asked me. I try to give back every chance I can. I try to keep it 100% real and try to have fun doing it, because my whole thought philosophy is if we're not having fun, what's the point? And if we could have fun in some of the crazy things and dangerous things we did in the military, we can have fun in real business too, and that's what I try to bring every day. So thank you so much for having me and I would be glad to come back anytime.
Speaker 1:Love it. Thank you so much for all your insight, Gary. Thank you so much for having me and I would be glad to come back anytime. Love it.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for all your insight, gary. Thank you, have a good day. Rest of the day and good luck Lori. Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to today's episode. My goal is to give you actionable strategies to help you learn to market your military skills and smooth your transition to the next phase of your career. If you learned something valuable today, share it. Subscribe to our podcast and our YouTube channel, leave us a review and write a post on social media about the lessons that helped you today from this episode.