Most employers have a pretty good idea about how to find recent college graduates to hire: running an internship program or visiting university job fairs are two great ways. But when businesses want to hire veterans — to gain good employees and to do their part to lower the veteran unemployment rate — some of them don’t know where to begin. But that’s about to change.
Recently, the website Employer Roadmap launched to help answer employers’ questions about hiring vets and their spouses and to connect veterans with businesses looking for specific skills.
The website, a joint project of Hiring Our Heroes and USAA, went live during a Veterans Jobs Summit at North Carolina’s Fort Bragg. Kathryn Dill of Forbes spoke to Eric Eversole, the executive director of Hiring Our Heroes and the vice president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce about what Employer Roadmap aims to accomplish: “There’s really no one-size-fits-all approach to helping companies recruit, hire, and retain veteran talent,” Eversole said. “This allows businesses to self-asses, and then we can deliver more customizable solutions.”
Part of the website’s mission is to educate employers on such matters like why hiring veterans’ spouses can still be a good idea — despite the fact that they often have gaps in their resumes brought on by frequent moves. Employer Roadmap also includes resources about how to recruit and train veterans and encourages employers to get to know the veterans already working for them and ask for their assistance in recruiting more service members.
While some larger companies are able to launch their own initiatives to train and hire veterans (think: Microsoft, Tesla, and General Motors), smaller companies might not have the resources to set up such a program. And that’s where Employer Roadmap comes in.
Army veteran Geoff Grant, USAA program director, told Dill, “Small to medium sized businesses say, ‘I don’t have this huge HR budget, what do I do to hire one or two vets? Where do I find them?’ That’s where the best practices tool is really key.”
Of the estimated 1.5 million veterans that are expected to join the civilian workforce in the next five years, we’re sure that many of them will find employment, thanks to Employer Roadmap.
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Tag: USAA
This Supercomputer Is Helping Vets Transition Back to Civilian Life
When many of us last heard about Watson, the artificially-intelligent computer that scientists at IBM programmed to understand and respond to questions asked in normal language, it was destroying Jeopardy! mega winners Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter on the famous quiz show, winning $1 million in prize money.
But Watson’s creators wondered if their machine could serve a higher purpose than embarrassing big-brained game show geeks, and now it will. Two weeks ago, IBM and USAA, the insurance company serving over 10 million military members, veterans and their families, announced that Watson’s brain power will be available online to all its members who are looking to transition out of the military and establish civilian careers. All they need to do is enter a query through Ask Watson on USAA’s homepage or mobile app.
Neff Hudson, USAA’s vice president of emerging channels, told Doug Henschen of Information Week, “More and more of the interactions that we’re getting from our members are coming through our digital channels, including our web and mobile sites, so we’re trying to make these channels as adept at delivering advice as a human being in our call center.”
Watson has been programmed to learn from each of its interactions, becoming more helpful at answering questions as it receives more input. Because transitioning from the military can elicit so many complicated questions — from what to do about health insurance, to how to craft a resume that will appeal to a civilian employer, to how to manage saving for retirement or the best way to fund an education — a wise guy like Watson is sure to be of assistance.
MORE: This Innovative Car Company Makes Employing Veterans Part of Its Mission