Veteran Hiring and Retention

This chapter describes the experience and lessons learned regarding the veteran hiring initiative within Military Programs at Walmart. A proponent of veteran hiring for decades, Walmart formally launched the Veterans Welcome Home Commitment in 2013 and is currently the largest private sector employer of veterans and military spouses. While many companies understand the benefits of hiring veterans, a number of companies find that retaining veteran employees can be challenging. Using a four-step model, common-sense tactics utilized by Walmart are provided that can be used to help veterans successfully transition from their military careers to civilian organizations through understanding military and corporate culture and how veterans coming from the military’s culture fit in with an organization’s corporate culture. This chapter also describes how the lessons learned from Walmart’s veteran hiring efforts can be used by smaller companies that may be considering or are actively deploying veteran and military family member hiring initiatives.

Introduction

The introduction of this book explains how industrial/organizational (I/O) psychologists and human resources leaders can use I/O research and best practices to understand military veterans and military families. This knowledge can help employers find, hire, and retain veterans as civilian employees in their organizations. This chapter first describes the American military as an organization, the demographics of the military, and why service members and veterans are different from other groups of individuals; it offers insight into the types of individuals who self-select into the military and then describes how the military develops the traits, skills, and competencies (including nontechnical “soft” skills) that are in high demand but short supply in the civilian labor market. In concludes with an explanation of how the military culture impacts the service members and how these elements create veteran employees who may differ in their tenure and their performance in civilian organizations.

The Recent History of Veteran Recruitment and Retention

Setting the historical context for this book, this chapter describes the recent history of civilian veteran employment, relaying how the high military veteran unemployment rate in 2010 generated concern and reactions from the government and the public and the private sectors. It then provides examples of how government and companies worked together to improve the employment situation of military veterans through legislation, corporate hiring programs, and corporate partnerships but faced limited success because too few companies were involved. The current situation of veteran employment and retention is outlined, with examples provided of why military veterans may choose to leave civilian employment and suggestions offered to address the issues veteran employees may have in their jobs so that employers can do a better job of retaining them in their workforces.

Retention of Veteran Employees

Instead of viewing veteran employment as simply the state of having a job, this chapter posits thinking about the issue more holistically by examining the employment life cycle, including recruiting, hiring/onboarding, and retention. As military veteran unemployment numbers remain low, this chapter argues that the primary question has now shifted from whether or not veterans have a job to whether they have the right job and how long they remain in that job (i.e., retention or attrition). It next examines why veteran employees in civilian organizations leave their jobs; the reasons for their dissatisfaction; differences between veteran and nonveteran employees; how this impacts attraction; the difference between positive and negative veteran attrition; and how underemployment is defined and addressed. Best practices for retaining veteran employees are offered.

Military Veteran Employment

Companies that can hire and retain military veterans will have a strong competitive advantage over their competitors that lack this capability. This book will help business leaders obtain that advantage. The chapters in this book draw from the research and findings from Industrial/Organizational (I/O) psychology and Human Resources (HR) research to describe how to find, communicate with, recruit, develop, lead, and retain military veterans and their family members as civilian employees. Unlike other books on this topic that lack evidence-based content, this book draws upon science, research, and best practices to provide guidance organizations can implement to drive their success. Topics in this book include sourcing, communications, and recruiting military veterans and their spouses; reviewing résumés to extract cross-corporate competencies; branding your organization to successfully appeal to this population; understanding and challenging your misconceptions of the military and doing the same with veterans’ misperceptions of civilian employment; addressing culture mismatches between civilian and military cultures and improving cultural communication and understanding; improving person-job-organization fit for veterans and military family members to retain them in their jobs; providing culturally sensitive mentoring and leadership; understanding the training veterans receive and their personality traits and culture—and how these can benefit your organization; hiring and retaining wounded warriors and veterans with disabilities; creating and utilizing veteran mentoring programs and affinity groups; providing effective supervision for veteran employees; supporting National Guardsmen and Reservists working as civilian employees, and retaining these employees to gain a further competitive advantage for your organization.

Veteran Affinity Groups and Mentoring Programs

This chapter provides guidance and best practices on corporate veteran affinity groups and mentoring programs and how they can increase the retention, engagement, and satisfaction of veteran employees in civilian organizations. It begins by defining these programs and outlining their benefits in general. It then outlines specifically how such programs can address challenges veterans face in the workplace, thus benefitting both companies and veteran employees. Then specific issues and steps to take in creating such programs are discussed. The chapter concludes with overall recommendations and best practices companies can follow to leverage the power of these programs. Short case examples of different companies’ programs are provided to illustrate key points.

The Health Status of Veteran Employees Compared to Civilian Employees in Veterans Health Administration

IntroductionVeterans Health Administration (VHA) is undergoing changes in the practice of health care focusing on approaches that prioritize veteran well-being. Given transformation efforts, opportunities exist to enhance the health and well-being of patients and employees alike – a significant proportion of whom are veterans. To date, differences in health status between veteran and civilian employees within VHA have not been examined.Materials and MethodsData from an annual organizational census survey with health promotion module conducted in 2015 were analyzed to estimate the prevalence of health risk behaviors, mental health, and chronic health conditions by veteran status within genders (n = 86,257). To further examine associations by gender between veteran status and health measures controlling for covariates, multivariate logistic regression analyses were utilized.ResultsPrevalence estimates generally indicated veterans have worse health status and health risk behaviors than their civilian counterparts. Results from multivariate logistic regression analyses indicated many significant associations between veteran status and health by gender controlling for other important demographic variables and a total comorbidity score. Compared to civilian employees within respective genders, both male and female veteran employees have increased odds of being a current smoker. Both male and female veteran employees have decreased odds of physical inactivity compared to civilian employees. For mental health and chronic health conditions, there are several conditions that veteran employees have increased odds for when compared to civilian employees of like gender; these include low back problems, arthritis, anxiety, depression, and sleep disorders.ConclusionsVeteran employees in VHA have worse health status than their civilian counterparts on a number of measures of health risk behaviors, mental health, and chronic health conditions. Given current organizational priorities aimed at cultural transformation, the present time is an optimal one to work collaboratively to enhance the health and well-being services that are available for patients and employees alike. All employees, particularly our unique population of veteran employees, will benefit from such an approach.

Can Diversity Management Improve Job Satisfaction for Military Veterans in the Federal Government?

On November 9, 2009, Executive Order 13518 established the Veterans Employment Initiative and invigorated veteran hiring within the federal government. By fiscal year 2016, 635,266 veterans accounted for 31% of the federal workforce, an increase of over 5% in 7 years. To account for this growing employee demographic, the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey began tracking veteran status in 2012 and analysis of these data show that veterans are more likely to express turnover intention than nonveterans. This raises a troubling question: Is the policy objective of the Veterans Hiring Initiative achieved if these veterans are more likely to turnover than nonveterans? This article explores whether diversity management mitigates lower job satisfaction levels among military veterans working for the federal government and whether veterans might be considered a stand-alone demographic in diversity scholarship. This study finds that perceptions of fair and effective diversity management are associated with higher job satisfaction among veteran employees, but slightly less so than among nonveterans. The results demonstrate that veterans are a unique employee demographic by showing statistically significant differences in job satisfaction between veterans and nonveterans while controlling for other demographics. Overall, this article contributes to public management research by highlighting military veteran employees and offering insight into an understudied employee population accounting for approximately 31% of the federal workforce.