The Charlie Brown Communication Problem

If you’re like most military veterans that have sat in that first interview during your transition into the civilian workforce, or you’re like most hiring managers I meet across the US that have read a newly minted resume from a military member or veteran, you feel like Charlie Brown in this post’s picture right! The other party in the hiring conversation is talking, but all you hear or read is an unintelligible droning of “Wha, wha, wha, wha, wha”.

That’s why I call the root problem of the military veteran hiring challenge a communication problem, and that’s why I call this communication problem a “Charlie Brown communication problem”. It’s sooooooo fitting!

Both parties are speaking about how their experience and needs and how they fit so the hiring conversation ends in hired. They’re both speaking about their experience creating plans, to include what to do, when, how, with what, and according to which rules, laws, norms, behaviors, and metrics of performance, gathering and distributing, i.e., organizing, the resources to fuel those plans, hiring, developing, deploying, and leading individuals or teams to execute the plans, and controlling performance and plan using the metrics. These are the four functions of management, and whether called “civilian manager” or “military leader”, they both have the same experience, and they’re both talking about the same thing!

It just doesn’t sound like it. For example, “OPORD” in “military leadership” stands for “operations order”, which is a plan to accomplish a temporary endeavor to produce unique results, which is the definition of a project, which means in “management speak” it’s a project plan. But say or hear “OPORD” in an interview…no help.

Great hires go unhired because the parties are stuck in a Charlie Brown conversation. Don’t be one, either a unhired veteran or a questing hiring manager, Vets2PM can help veterans translate their “military leadership” experience into its intelligible “management experience” form, and we have a deep bench of experienced, translated, certified military veterans ready to go to work for you today hiring manager, either as DoD Skillbridge Interns or Direct Hires.

Extract yourself from the discouraging Charlie Brown hiring conversations in your present AND future. Use the job aid on page 411 of my Amazon #1 Best-selling How To Speak Civilian Fluently! today. Get your free digital copy at www.vets2pm.com/cmthankyou today.

And you can also DM here on LinkedIn to book me to come provide your organization and veteran or hiring manager audience with my keynote, books, and almost a dozen tools you can use tomorrow to solve your Charlie Brown communication problem.