WorkingNation celebrates Veterans and Military Families Month

We're addressing veteran workforce issues and highlighting solutions
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November is Veterans and Military Families Month, a chance to celebrate the men and women who have served their country and the families that have been there to support them through their journey. Here at WorkingNation, we are marking the month by taking a look at an important issue to veterans — finding and keeping a good job once they leave the military. MORE: Check out our page devoted to veterans’ content. There are currently more than 18 million American veterans, and each year 200,000 men and women make the transition from military life to civilian life.

The rewards and challenges in the veteran workforce

Veterans have many soft skills that make them valuable employees in businesses big and small. Because military life is tightly structured, veterans generally excel at teamwork and leadership. The dynamic and tactical nature of the military makes them excellent critical thinkers and strategists. They are good communicators because of the need to quickly and efficiently share their plans and outcomes to their colleagues. But veteran employment is not a simple subject. While these skills — and an employer’s desire to now serve those men and women who have served us — make hiring veterans a priority in many businesses, there are challenges. Often, it is hard for veterans to translate the hard skills and specific jobs they held in the military into an equivalent civilian position. Basically, the terms that a company or a hiring manager may use when advertising for a job might not match up with how the military describes a job, so there is a mismatch in that description and what a veteran may put on her or his resume. Another big issue is the difficulty in retaining a veteran in a position long-term, sometimes due to the fact that the veteran was hired in the “wrong” position right out of the service and hasn’t received the training to continue in that job. There are also some stigmas surrounding hiring veterans, including fears by employers and a veteran’s potential workmates that all veterans suffer from PTS. While far from the truth, this stereotype can hurt a veteran’s hiring potential. Families shouldn’t be forgotten when talking about employment issues. There are 687,000 military spouses — husbands and wives who have their own challenges finding a good job because of the nomadic nature of a military family. There can be gaps in their resumes and they may have to get new credentials or licenses in the state of their more recent station assignment. To be sure, all of these are challenges are hurdles to finding a good and meaningful job. But, importantly, there are hundreds of wonderful veteran-serving organizations (VSOs) out there working to end these issues and assure that anyone wanting a good job can get one. We’re going to tells these stories — about challenges and solutions — throughout the month of November through original articles, videos, and podcasts. We’ve interviewed many VSOs and companies committed to helping veterans and military spouses navigate this path to good employment.

Here’s a preview of some of what we’ll be talking about this month:

Navigating the Veterans Services Map with Dr. Lynda C. Davis, Chief Veterans Experience Officer for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Encouraging Employers to Take a Proactive Role in Hiring and Keeping Veterans with Carol Eggert, Senior Vice President of Military and Veteran Affairs at Comcast Creating a Welcoming Job Environment for Veterans with Jason Wright, Vice President of Military and Veterans Affairs for JPMorgan Chase Preparing the Veteran for the Civilian Workforce with Maurice Wilson, President & National Executive Director of National Veterans Transition Services, aka REBOOT Giving More Female Veterans Access to Start-Up Business Capital with Seda Goff, Director of the Veteran Entrepreneur Investment Program at The PenFed Foundation Removing the Stigma Around Hiring Military Spouses with Sue Hoppin, Founder of the National Military Spouse Network

This content was made possible by…

WorkingNation would like to thank The Clint Eastwood Family Foundation for their generous financial gift that made this month possible. We would also like to thank JPMorgan Chase and Apollo Management for their financial support of our veterans-related content.

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Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.