Talk to a Veteran

What an amazing day at Fermilab National Laboratory yesterday.

Not only did the organization help our on-campus veterans group provide a space for the recognition of the day we also had an honor guard performance by our very own Fire Department, great food, great conversations, and special visits from Illinois State Representative Stephanie Kifowit and VFW State Commander Brett Nila.

Illinois State Representative Stephanie Kifowit

State Rep Kifowit presenting at our Veterans Day Luncheon about the value of having Vets on government. Her bio is even more impressive - “Stephanie Kifowit proudly served her country in the United States Marine Corps, and served the residents of the City of Aurora as Alderman for over nine years. Now, as full-time State Representative of the 84th District, she serves the residents of Aurora, Montgomery, Naperville, and Oswego.” 
 
”Representative Kifowit has a record of fighting for Veterans, seniors and the most vulnerable in our community. She has made it a priority to introduce and support legislation that would assist Veterans and help restore integrity to state government. During her tenure, she has passed legislation to lower Veteran suicide, reduce property taxes, and provide services for the elderly, disabled, and children.” 

Special thanks to our own Brian Niesman for leading our veterans' group on Fermilab.  He truly embraces the responsibility needed to honor vets and pull us together in a lonely corporate world.  Vets normally miss the camaraderie once separated from our units and it’s nice to see a camaraderie centered group here at Fermi.  Although we may not be defending a way of life with advanced weaponry, the camaraderie here reflects a different mission, a mission of supporting the Fermi standard of being the best neutrino lab in the world, plus some other foundational science that is impacting the world in amazing ways.  

Within our room yesterday we had representatives from the Army, Air Force, Marines, and Navy (we are hoping to get some Coast Guard members someday).  Both men and women vets, no one is left out, and it seems like there is a fun rivalry as the number of Army vets may be outnumbering the incumbent Navy representatives.  The cool part, and more personal part, was that at my table I (Army myself) sat with a couple Marines, Army, and Air Force vets.  The pride just at that table was encouraging and jovial.

State Commander Brett Nila

Discussing the values of all-volunteer militaries and the act of serving.

His LinkedIn message is priceless - “It was through my experiences as a military commander, a business manager, an entrepreneur, a volunteer organization executive, a public speaker and a father, that I found that one of the most important things a leader must be able to communicate is perspective; it helps the audience to orient their world in light of a call to action. Bringing a message to life verbally may involve an approach that is demanding, commanding, cajoling, consoling, educating, advising, and/ or a tone that could be authoritative, humorous, warm, confident or empathetic --but always delivered with the sincerity and conviction that inspire trust.”

During the presentations, one specifically caught my attention, it was State Commander Brett Nila’s presentation.  The core concept was about “all-volunteer force” and how that emulates the desire of our nation to want to defend our way with intent, and not draft force.  An all-volunteer force, a force composed solely of volunteers, without resorting to a military draft, has been the American Way since 1973. 

This was no mistake action; this path forward has been a success resulting in better morale and skills development for soldiers. An interesting intersection of this presentation was looking back at the model in the inception of the United States where militias were the choice of soldier.  For example, if a pending war was coming the leaders at the time had time to gather volunteers, hopefully they had some knowledge of war and weapons.  If not, they were roughly trained, and the war began.  However, at this current time an all-volunteer military can be ready and waiting as most conflicts seem to escalate faster than anyone could be trained, especially because of the technical understanding needed for the advanced weaponry we need now.

But deeper than that, an all-volunteer military removes the barrier of initial confidence to serve.  We all have the desire to serve, whether it’s locally at a school or special interest non-profit, or whether embarking on a career to push yourself and continually learn and serve a greater cause, our way of life.  To accomplish this task of drawing out our servitude characteristic the military had to become a career instead of an interruption of family and work by using the draft.

This directional shift in 1973 required the military to learn how to become an organization to retain its members.  This took human resource professionals and military leaders to shift from basic models of short form drafting (send a ticket with a number, if it was yours then your life will change drastically forever) to a career model of family togetherness beyond that bond from battle buddies to extend to the bond of family evolution.

When the State Commander mentioned the family, that hit home for me, as I have had many members serve in the military in my family, but I never really discuss it at home.  As a matter of example, a few years ago when my son came home from school and said they were discussing Veteran’s Day I shared that I was in the military and his eyes opened wide and he asked a ton of questions.  I was happy and sad at the same time.  I had unintentionally kept that part of my life hidden away from my family.  That camaraderie should have started at home, and I was remiss in sharing.

Commander Nila’s motto this year is “Making A Difference” and this I also want to discuss more about military service. Starting with my family.

This may stem from the generation before, Vietnam era war soldiers that saw unbelievable atrocities and were treated so badly when they arrived home that it was a survival instinct to not discuss the military as returning soldiers were afraid of, of well everything from losing a job to violence.  This may be why my generation never discusses our military time, the family model didn’t allow us to ask those forbidden questions for fear of PTSD resurfacing.

This tender footing around talking to vets must stop, most returning and serving military members would value the conversation.  Besides the healing aspects of letting things out, the conversations share an experience of a fellow American. Something we should encourage. Within these conversations you find a person that understands the need for processes and proper training to accomplish goals.  You will find someone that is confident to take charge in untraveled areas of business.  You will find a person that can put aside the emotion of the moment and push forward. 

Corporate HR professionals, its okay to dive past the yes/no answering model and dig a little deeper.  Most soldiers are trained to answer the question without a lot of fluff, by making the answer the shortest possible.  This can be problematic in interviews where the goal is to sell yourself.  I bet if the interview turns into a conversation the passion for serving will come forward and you will not be disappointed.  As a personal story, when I separated from the military my first job out, I bombed the interview but still got hired.  The manager said point blank “I’m hiring you because I know I can train you!” and away we went.

To wrap this up, an all-volunteer military allows our natural ability to serve come out and flourish as the training is not just all tech stuff, its about confidence building, problem solving, skills evolution, pressure training, communication training, respecting experience, and so many other great human attributes. 

Let’s hire more vets!