Americans prize patriotism highly, so one of the most honorable decisions a person can make is to serve in the military. And most people who have served look back on that time as providing them far more growth, education, and experience than they could possibly have expected when they were first herded off that bus in front of their basic training depot.
All of the training that individuals receive in the military is unparalleled. And the technical and vocational education military personnel receive is just part of the package. People in the military pick up valuable traits like self-discipline and bearing. They expand their capacity for innovative thought. They learn to value diversity and teamwork. These are skills and behaviors that stay with them forever.
Employers who hire Veterans are pretty damn patriotic too. The best way you can show how much you appreciate your own freedoms is to hire our heroes, the people who secured those freedoms for you in the first place. Not only do you lift and support the Veterans who made your way of life possible, you fill your teams with the best trained and most disciplined Americans in the entire nation.
What Veterans bring to your organization
The notion that Veterans are just people who used to run around with rifles for a living is long past. Everyone knows that the US military is an extremely high tech operation at every level. Even the infantry—the people who run around with the rifles—use equipment that’s remarkably sophisticated. This means the basic infantryperson has received a lot of specific training in using high tech devices that their civilian counterparts have not.
In fact, automation and computerized operations are a huge part of any job in the military now. And many skills military personnel learn have direct equivalents that employers need, or the skills can be modified to suit the needs of any organization when Veterans receive appropriate training after completing their military service.
The highly tuned technical skills Veterans bring to your organization are just part of the whole. Most people in the military work in positions that require high levels of trust, so almost everyone who’s served has had at least a special background investigation at some point during their career. And the many military personnel who work in highly sensitive positions require security clearances, of course.
What many civilian employers may not realize, however, is that a person’s clearance does not immediately expire once they leave the military. Another important consideration is that even a Veteran with an expired security clearance needs to be reactivated is cheaper to hire than a candidate who has never held a clearance.
Another benefit of hiring our heroes is Veterans appreciate diversity in the workplace. The military itself is extremely diverse, so military personnel learn to work with anyone from the very beginning. And during a person’s time in service, they travel across the nation and around the world to do their jobs. Because of how often they move from place to place, they have many opportunities to meet and work with people of any gender, from all sorts of cultures, and from every socio-economic background. Veterans know how important it is to get along with everyone in the organization to accomplish the mission, and they work to make sure their teams, no matter how diverse, are functioning at the highest levels.
Of course, no discussion of what Veterans bring to an organization is complete without taking into account the discipline and maturity that come with military service. No matter what job a person held in the military or no matter what branch of the military the person served in, they have a baseline level of discipline that’s much higher than anyone who has never been in the military. And Veterans bring that discipline to the jobs they choose in the civilian world.
Essentially, any employer who isn’t actively hiring our heroes is, by that single fact, making their companies less competitive.
Incentive programs for hiring Veterans
Hiring Veterans isn’t just the patriotic choice—you reap real benefits from hiring our heroes in the form of tax breaks, subsidies, and workplace improvement programs. And that’s just some of it!
Work Opportunity Tax Credit
The IRS added this credit in 2021, and it has since been extended until December 31, 2025. This Federal incentive provides a maximum credit of $2400 for employers who hire members of targeted groups, including Veterans.
Veteran Readiness and Employment and Special Employer Incentive programs
The VA has the Veteran Readiness and Employment program that offers salary subsidies and provides specialized tools and modifications to your workplace to meet the accessibility needs of any Veterans you hire. With the Special Employer Incentive program, if you hire a Veteran facing extraordinary obstacles, you can be reimbursed up to 50% of the Veteran’s salary for as many as six months.
Non-Paid Work Experience Training program
This is another program offered by the VA although it’s focused toward government employers. In this program, local, state, and Federal offices can temporarily employ a Veteran without it counting against the agency’s full-time equivalent allocation. During this period, the Veteran receives a subsistence allowance from the VA.
Where to find Veterans with the skills you need
People in the military receive the best training in the world, but the skills they learn don’t always translate directly to the needs of civilian employers. And as employers, you want to know that the people you hire have the skills you need. That’s where CCS Learning Academy comes in. We have various programs designed to help Veterans update their skills and make them relatable to your needs.
Not only do we train and support Veterans, but we also have programs and partners that allow us to place trained Veterans in the positions you need filled, no matter whether they’re junior or senior level positions, or anything in between. And because of how our Veterans are sourced, you can hire them to match your staffing needs, whether for a single project or for permanent positions.
Conclusion
The hiring process is laborious and costly. Tapping into our Veteran talent accelerates the process, brings solid workers to your company, and makes you eligible for a host of federally funded benefits. Most importantly, you support our heroes in a productive, meaningful way. It’s win-win!
Want to know more about our Veteran hire program? Contact us! We’re happy to help you hire our heroes.