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Patrick David
Patrick David

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7 Best Reasons To Hire A Veteran At Your Business

Companies will continue to grow as they look to develop on their success. A major part of this growth are the employees working collaboratively together to reach business goals. This makes the hiring process for any business extremely important.

Most, if not all, employers want to hire people that are skilled, motivated, loyal, and trustworthy. Skills can easily be taught but the qualities of an individual are embedded and this is one of the main reasons why you should consider hiring a veteran. There are many qualities that they can bring to your business and here are some reasons why they would be considered desirable employees:

  1. They’re committed to the task - The experience of a veteran in the military will of one where they’re taught to never give up. They need to be able to look at the overall ‘mission’ and ensure that they go through with it until the end. This attitude will assure you that they won’t give up until you know they’ve tried their very best or they’ll commit to finding an alternative solution until they reach their goal.

  2. Solid teamwork skills - As mentioned earlier, the majority of businesses work well because of how the individuals work so well together in teams to accomplish business goals. Military personnel are familiar with the idea of cooperation and working together. It would have been embedded in them that the smallest of slips from one person can be detrimental to the full team. This makes them extremely useful in team situations.

  3. Leadership skill pre-taught - Having an individual in your team that is able to take initiative or step up when things go wrong is every employer’s dream. It’s likely that a veteran that you hire would have been placed in a leadership role during their service. Alternatively, they may have found themselves in a situation where their partner may have suffered a military brain injury, which means it’s on them to pick up the pieces. These experiences will have provided them with an understanding of important responsibilities and taken up many leadership qualities such as delegation, motivation, behavior management, and direction.

  4. Working well under pressure - A task in a civilian role is likely to have no comparison to the pressure that would have been applied back in the military. Conditions during their time there would have been extremely difficult, training long days and having limited resources. Because of this, they’re unlikely to crack under what others would consider extreme pressure in their job role.

  5. Appreciate authority and structure - Serving in the military, they would have been involved in a highly disciplined environment. Timings and training would have been extremely structured and efficient which means you’ll feel a sense of trust for them to turn up on time and be extremely organized. This makes them likely to strive under a regime that has business policies and procedures.

  6. Employment facilities for veterans - One aspect that veterans are likely to struggle with when leaving the military in the transition to a civilian job. It can be difficult considering the way of life they would have been used to for a long period of time. As an employer, you may feel pressured about the process of helping a veteran to embed into their civilian role but there are employment agencies available for veterans entering civilian roles which help them through the transition phase and help them with their bedding in process.

  7. Skills can be learned quickly - Trainability is an essential quality that veterans need to have during the military if they wish to succeed. Although they may not be used to certain software or equipment that’s unique to specific job roles, veterans are likely to display a developed learning curve that will allow them to adopt new skills quicker than others. This will be crucial for employers who wish to employ characters that can get stuck in straight away.

Veterans that arrive from the military can be considered some of the most resourceful and skillful individuals that would be valuable to a business. They have a range of qualities that can easily fit the skill gap within your business. Next time it’s time to hire a new person for your team, be sure to consider the great qualities that a veteran could bring to it.

About the author:
Patrick Algrim is an experienced executive who has spent a number of years in Silicon Valley hiring and coaching some of the world’s most valuable technology teams. He writes more articles like this one over at Algrim.co. You can read his most popular blog posts here, here, and here.

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