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So you are thinking about getting out of the service and you are really trying to figure out what
you want to do. Obviously of course you are going to want
to go to your transition services and find out what they offer. But start first with
a plan. You need to be thinking about this a good year in advance. One of the reasons
for that is the amount of things you need to learn to be effective in your search for
a civilian job. The other is a basic economic fact. It takes about 3 months to find a $30,000
job, and about 2 months for every additional $10,000 over that, that you are seeking. So
you can see the job search especially in a slower economy takes a long time.
What do you need to do? Well first you need to think about what are your career choices?
What do you really love to do and want to do a lot more of, and how does that turn into
a job? You can do a lot of research online about this sort of thing, but you are also
going to want to have a plan to network with people in your field, to join professional
associations, and so on. So the first piece is make a plan set up that 12 month short
timers calendar and make that plan, What are you going to look for? What do you need to
learn? Do you need any new scales or any additional education? How will you in fact check out
jobs in locations where you may not be? So all of those things go on your 12 month plan.
In looking at the civilian needs you need to understand first of all what you are looking
for. Obviously enough when you joined the military one of the hardest things you had
to do was to learn the lingo of your service. The same thing is through transitioning back
to the civilian world. You need to understand not only the job lingo -- the things that
are important to your profession -- but also that of the companies that you are interested
in.
So you want to do that research and you'll want to be sure that you are talking to yourself
and to others about where might the jobs be, what organizations offer those jobs, and some
research on things like Rileyguide.com or the occupational outlook handbook. Even a
good job search on Monster just to find jobs that you can pick up those buzzwords from
will all help. But really you should look at what are the professional associations
in your field, what are the groups on social media that might offer more information about
the jobs you are interested in, so that you know the language and you can then translate
that correctly into the jobs you are interested in.
Finally you need to build a network. You not only need to start with the people you already
know, but you are going to want to begin to build a network whether through social media,
through professional associations or through people that you can connect with in person
at other events. A network of people who can help you to understand what you're facing
and how to make that transition effectively. There is a lot of people out there pulling
for you but it's your job search and your need to understand and plan in advance.