You with your transition. It's not just about getting a
place in a job. When you leave the military,
it's about helping you adapt to life.
After the military helping, you understand yourself, your
strengths, your interests and then helping guide you to,
hopefully, the right kind of role in the right kind of
company when you leave the military.
Welcome to the when see a podcast today, we have a special
guest Colonel, John Hutchison on behalf of Hiring.
Our Heroes are in are heroes is an organization that helps
military members and spouses with training networking and job
placement. What are the biggest challenges
for people who are leaving the military is transitioning their
skills to the civilian world and learning to work.
In a new culture are in our heroes, is one of the leading
organizations for helping people bridge that gap between military
and civilian careers. They do this by organizing
training iron events running Fellowship, programs organizing
education, and networking opportunities to discuss Hiring
Our Heroes. As I said, our guest today is to
Colonel, John Hutchison, who is transitioning from active duty
to a civilian career? He and Hiring Our Heroes have
agreed to have him on, to discuss his experiences and
hopefully help others in their transition.
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So here's a little background on Colonel, Hutchison.
John Hutchison started in 1995 and work to leadership roles in
contingency operations, including Bosnia-Herzegovina
Iraq, Philippines and Afghanistan.
He also held command positions throughout his career, that
included the commandant of his C Co e and directorship.
Within US forces. Japan, additionally, Colonel
Hutchison has a Masters of Science in National Security
strategy from the national War college and a Actually science,
it administration of justice from Penn State home of the
Lions. Now, I'm personally leaving out
details about his career. In order to help everyone focus
on the transition to the civilian world, something all
service members need. We'll have to send.
Of course you are. Welcome to talk about your past
career and what you did you were a god of many great projects.
But I also wanted to give a neutral background so people can
focus on Hiring Our Heroes. Now, additionally for everyone,
I will have his LinkedIn address and Hiring Our Heroes webpage,
link on the show notes. So, if you have any questions or
want information, it'll be there for you.
With that said, Colonel Hutchison.
Good morning, and thank you for coming on one CA Hey Jack.
Good morning to you and good morning to all your listeners
and thanks for having me on. Oh, it's fantastic to have you
on. I've been a longtime fan of
Hiring Our Heroes and this is my first opportunity to get their
work out into a public setting, to attract more people to what
they do, and why it's important. And the reason I asked you here
today is because you're in the middle of that transition.
So not only do, you know, Hiring Our Heroes but you also are
living it. So I wanted to see how you feel,
what you're seeing with the program.
Well, thanks for the question Jack.
Yeah, it's been as you stated I'm in the middle of my
transition process right now. So I've been working with Hiring
Our Heroes over the last several months, as part of their
corporate fellowship program, where they work with
transitioning military members, from all branches of the
service, the place them in civilian companies for about a,
11-week 12-week, corporate Fellowship.
So that we Fissioning veterans can get an idea of what
corporate life is. Like what corporate culture is
like the see if it's a good fit to make our transition to a post
military career a little bit easier.
So I've been working with them and participating in my
fellowship that at Lockheed Martin Corporation which has
been just fantastic so far and we're about a little over
halfway through the the fellowship right now, right?
That's what I was going to say is they don't usually have these
smudgy corporations, you know, a date.
Senior actually out running signs.
You know it's spinning them on the street.
They're usually real corporations with real Hoops
that industry. So yeah.
Hiring Our Heroes partners with some fantastic companies across
all Industries and all sectors and they really give
transitioning military members a lot of different options and
choices to look at for this fellowship program.
And so you know, Lockheed Martin's been been one of those
partners for a while but there's so many other Are other
companies out there who see the value in hiring veterans, and
giving them opportunities to succeed after they leave the
military. That's terrific.
If you also looked into their hiring events or education
programs, Yes, so if you are in a one of these Fellowship
cohorts, you get to take advantage of all of these other
developmental opportunities. So, I haven't personally
participated in one of their specific hiring fairs, but I
know they do those frequently not only for military members
with Burr, military, spouses as well.
But our we've had so many wonderful professional
development sessions as part of our Hiring.
Our Heroes cohort, focused on things like resume, writing,
building an effective We've been profile, you know, corporate
culture of corporate benefits and compensation.
Interviewing techniques, you know everything that is a little
bit foreign to folks in the military until they need to know
it when they're getting out and getting ready to transition into
the civilian sector. So they really focus on a very
holistic approach to prepare you for life after the military and
that's the hardest part, isn't it is When you get into that
language change, because that's one of the things that people
have coached me throughout my time is how you write your
resume. How you speak in the corporate
office is very different than what is said and done in the
military and it takes time. It takes time to get out of
that. Knee-jerk response of, you know,
Jumping into a sir, ma'am. And and going crazy on a project
trying to predict what the boss wants.
Whereas in the corporate culture, you can walk in and
say, hi, Tom, how you doing today in the guy's worth four
billion dollars and and it's crazy and it's and I'll be
honest, it's a hard transition for civilians going into the
military as well because they're used to walk in into Tom's
office, who's a billionaire and say, hey I heard you're going to
bring the grand piano into the office, this weekend, so people
can play and, and they just can't do that two or three or
four star, or even a to It's a big cultural change and so, how
much work is it taken to get through that cultural
adjustment? For yourself.
How did you know I have found for me?
At least it's it hasn't been that difficult, you know, so but
I know it can be an adjustment then you know, I come as a
public affairs officer for most of my career in the Air Force,
you know, I the skills that I developed as a communicator and
a leader weren't too difficult to translate into civilian,
speaking into the civilian sector.
But you know, if you spent your career infantry or Special
Operations or, you know, some more of a combat arms type of
roles Making that that transition and translating those
skills that you've developed over time can be a lot more
difficult. So I feel fortunate that many of
my skills and experiences translate well into the civilian
sector but also know that others have more difficult time to make
that connection and to really be able to highlight what they
bring to the table when they're looking for civilian rules.
Right? And that's you know, that is
good. A good point especially for
recruiting, is that public affairs, civil affairs?
These roles that deal with people that deal with
communities, local governments Regional National governments.
They do have a better chance of transitioning successfully into
the career field, because those skills that they've stacked
over, the overtime are appliable.
It's just then a little bit of language and culture adjustment.
Absolutely. Yeah.
And you've traveled all over the world with your job.
So you have seen this Yeah, I've seen I've seen some wonderful
places and some not so wonderful ones as I'm sure you have as
well Jack. Yeah.
And you know, all of those experiences, especially, you
know, interacting and working with folks from other countries
and immersing myself in other cultures and some of those
assignments. They've all helped me.
I think to be adaptable to different situations and
certainly transitioning to a civilian career and corporate
culture with would qualify as a different situation than what
I've been used to the last 20-plus years.
So I think all of those experiences that I've had have
helped me along the way. In addition to the great
development and training and mentoring that I'm getting
through Hiring Our Heroes, right?
Right. You know, one thing I wanted to
bring up and I'm not sure if you can talk it to this or not.
But Hiring Our Heroes also provides the same support for
spouses which is wonderful when We lived overseas, my wife
struggled with getting a job because of all the sofa
agreements she's a financial analyst.
You worked Wall Street and to go to Germany and people to say,
well you can work at the gas station was was yeah, that was
deflating and I paid the price. I could have absolutely and so
it's nice to see that programs, like how Hiring Our Heroes
consider the spouse, as well? Because they are so much a part
of our lives and our military. Military career.
Yeah, I can't agree with you more.
I to, you know, I'm married and when we were stationed in Japan,
my wife, you know, went through the same struggle, she had a
promising career here in the United States up until the point
that we moved to Okinawa and she made the most of the assignment.
But the the resources back, you know, when we were there back in
2007, to 2010 the resources to help military spouses, this
weren't the Same as they are today.
So I'm, it's wonderful to that Hiring Our Heroes and other
organizations are paying attention to the needs of
military spouses and creating more opportunities account for
the difficulties of a military lifestyle here.
Absolutely true. And it helps also that they have
a remote work now. I mean you and I started 80s
90s, you know, the only remote work was, you know, catalog
sales or bill collectors. So right, right.
Right. So that's opened up a whole new
world, for sure? Yeah, yeah, it's made it and
actually for us looking into our second and or third careers or
fourth careers, you know, it gives us more opportunity, you
can work remotely or through consulates or you know, how to
branches and agency stations around the world and do your
job. It's really made it much more
convenient. Yeah, for sure.
So, can you talk about informational interviews?
I think that's something that People have heard of, they don't
understand. Yeah, absolutely things that you
hear over and over through the, the tap program and in Hiring
Our Heroes and other experts on Military transition is Reach
Out, Network, conduct informational interviews, with
people who are in your industry or in companies that you're
interested in, to find out more about that industry, more about
that role more about the kind of job that you're interested in.
And you're, you know, it's a simple as sending.
Somebody a connection request with a note on LinkedIn saying,
hey I see, you're you're involved in this particular role
that I'm interested in and I would love to chat with you for
20 minutes or so just to find out more about what you do and
what it takes to succeed in this industry.
And that's really really helpful, especially if you're
looking to completely change the kind of work that you're doing
or if you're going to be doing, you know, the same I work but in
a different sector and so what you will find is that many many
people are happy and willing to talk to you about their roles to
give you a little bit of mentoring and look and let's be
clear. You're not reaching out to them
to ask for a job that's not part of the conversation.
You're reaching out to find out more about them, more about why
they've been successful and to build up your knowledge of a
particular role or industry and also to build.
Network. So I have done many of these
since I, you know, left, my last Air Force job and they've been
really, really valuable in again, building the network and
finding out more about what it takes to succeed on the outside.
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like, your job. Right.
I think the biggest fear people have because of that training
and chain of command is actually sending that email to a CEO or a
cc 0. And saying, hey I'd really like
to know more about your company. Can you or somebody?
You know you know direct me to meet and have lunch and just
talk about it because it's it has four boat in the in the
military world to get you in a lot of trouble but the outside
world that kind of yeah, that kind of Drive is actually
respected and appreciated. So I'm glad you brought it right
up. So is there anything else about
the experience that you want to talk about with Hiring Our
Heroes? I just I can't recommend the
program enough for transitioning military members.
Whether you are you know completing one or two
enlistments. Maybe you're giving out at the
six or eight year mark or you're retiring from the military, they
really take a holistic approach to helping you with your
transition. It's not just about getting
placed in a job when you leave the military, it's about helping
you adapt. To life after the military
helping, you understand yourself, your strengths, your
interests and then helping guide you to, hopefully, the right
kind of role in the right kind of company when you leave the
military. So I just, I really like their
approach and I you know, if you're a if you are a
transitioning veteran and you're getting, you're looking at what
comes next. I highly recommend you look into
their programs that you take advantage of Of the resources
that they have, and there are many, whether it be
participating in a corporate fellowship program or simply,
you know, leveraging some of their workshops and hiring fairs
and things like that, they're a great organization and they're
helping a lot of veterans, achieve success after the
military. Fantastic.
You know, it actually I was just scrolling through some of their
resources and they have employer panels where they bring in
people and they talked to folks and you get to listen to them.
They also have recorded sessions so you can kind of get a feel of
what's going on. They have Financial costs of
unemployment and transitioning work.
And also as a cultural piece that I think is very important
belong. It at work, is it?
I, you still feel like a soldier when you get out, you're walking
these, these carpeted halls. And you're I don't know if I
belong, you know, and so it's that kind of emotional coaching
that gets you into that transition so that you're more
comfortable in that workspace. So well, fantastic Colonel John
es hecha said, you've been great, I appreciate all the time
you've put into this meeting and I look forward to seeing your,
your career go, you know, fantastically.
So that's the look on the transitions were pretty much
back. Thanks for having me and again,
to all your listeners. If You're getting ready to
transition from the military. Check out Hiring Our Heroes.
They're fantastic. A lot of great programs to help
you and Jack. Thanks again for having me on my
pleasure today, Angela, David will read us out If you enjoyed
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