[00:05.120 --> 00:09.840]  Welcome back to the Career Hacking Village. Many in our community are
[00:09.840 --> 00:14.700]  veterans or veterans who will be transitioning into the civilian world.
[00:14.700 --> 00:18.560]  And we wanted to take a few moments to make sure that we recognize those in our
[00:18.560 --> 00:24.400]  community that would need a few extra tips on how to transition from the
[00:24.400 --> 00:29.480]  military world into the civilian career search. So we asked Sailor Doc Bob
[00:29.480 --> 00:34.440]  Wheeler to give us some tips based on his transition and what he recommends
[00:34.440 --> 00:40.060]  to other transitioning veterans. Take it away, Bob. Hey everybody, thanks Kathleen.
[00:40.060 --> 00:44.280]  This is Bob Wheeler and I work with clearedjobs.net and cybersecjobs.com
[00:44.280 --> 00:48.100]  and we're going to talk today about some veteran transition tips focusing on
[00:48.100 --> 00:53.120]  cybersecurity folks. So first thing I want to do is just introduce you know
[00:53.120 --> 00:57.300]  who I am and where I come from. My name is Bob Wheeler. I was in the Navy for 20
[00:57.300 --> 01:01.840]  years and while I was in the Navy I did a lot of my time as a medical person as
[01:01.900 --> 01:05.940]  a hospital corpsman and followed that up with a big stint in recruiting which was
[01:05.940 --> 01:09.160]  how I got into the human resources recruiting business and actually how I
[01:09.160 --> 01:12.960]  met the clearedjobs.net family. I've been with clearedjobs.net and
[01:12.960 --> 01:17.160]  cybersecjobs.com for the last six years. I did do some teaching as well with the
[01:17.160 --> 01:22.460]  Department of Labor TAP classes. So I came to this first through the human
[01:22.460 --> 01:27.140]  resources and recruiting piece and through the jobs now we've really gotten
[01:27.140 --> 01:30.100]  involved in the cybersecurity community. So over the years I've presented at
[01:30.100 --> 01:34.980]  places like B-Sides events in San Antonio, Texas, Augusta, Georgia, Tampa,
[01:34.980 --> 01:38.740]  Florida. You'll notice that those places there those B-Sides events are all in
[01:38.740 --> 01:42.740]  military specific locations so a lot of those events have been focused on
[01:42.740 --> 01:46.380]  military folks but we've also presented at conferences like Hacker Halted and
[01:46.380 --> 01:49.880]  SkyDog over the course of the time and this is my first time talking to the
[01:49.880 --> 01:56.800]  DEF CON community but glad to be here. So let's go ahead and jump right in. We've
[01:56.800 --> 01:59.160]  got to talk about today is we're going to talk about a few things. We're going
[01:59.160 --> 02:02.480]  to talk about understanding the hiring landscape because if you don't really
[02:02.480 --> 02:06.680]  know what's going on you don't know how to proceed. We're going to discuss the
[02:06.680 --> 02:10.100]  differences between entering the military versus entering the private
[02:10.100 --> 02:14.040]  sector and the different roles that recruiters play and then I'm going to
[02:14.040 --> 02:17.920]  kind of really hit the big part here what I call marinating in the industry
[02:17.920 --> 02:20.500]  and we're going to talk about how to marinate in the cybersecurity industry
[02:20.500 --> 02:25.360]  from a veteran standpoint. So let's kick things off here the process of you know
[02:25.360 --> 02:28.500]  how did you join the military the military version you know they identify
[02:28.500 --> 02:32.820]  the right fit they want to know are you are you old enough did you graduate from
[02:32.820 --> 02:36.420]  high school you know did you you don't have a police record you don't have any
[02:36.420 --> 02:40.240]  medical issues then they give you some tests whether it's an ASVAB or whether
[02:40.240 --> 02:44.760]  it's an officer test but the whole idea there is to find out what what can you
[02:44.760 --> 02:49.580]  do not what do you do but what can you do and then you go in and you talk to
[02:49.580 --> 02:52.500]  the folks at MEPS and they tell you why this job is the best job that you can
[02:52.500 --> 02:59.160]  And then from there, you get into that point where they train you and they equip you and they assign you.
[02:59.160 --> 03:04.560]  So basically, what they did was they found out what you could do. They put you in a spot that they needed.
[03:04.560 --> 03:11.380]  And then it might take months, though, you know, before you're actually to a point where you're doing the job that you were hired to do.
[03:11.600 --> 03:17.540]  But the military thing is really based upon quantity and then quality.
[03:17.540 --> 03:22.060]  I mean, the whole aspect of military recruiting is based upon an attrition rate.
[03:22.060 --> 03:26.540]  Certain people are never going to make it out of boot camp. Some people are never going to make it to the fleet.
[03:26.620 --> 03:31.860]  A lot of people are never going to re-enlist. If they get enough folks, they'll eventually find the right folks.
[03:32.460 --> 03:40.100]  Now, the private sector is a little bit different. The private sector organizations, and especially small and medium-sized organizations,
[03:40.600 --> 03:46.560]  they only hire when they have a specific need. And so when they're looking for the person, they're looking for the right person.
[03:46.560 --> 03:53.900]  And they will spend a good bit of money to locate, close with, and hire the person that has the right skills.
[03:53.940 --> 03:59.940]  And when they do this, it's all because they need to make money. They were not making... either they were losing money,
[03:59.940 --> 04:04.300]  or maybe they weren't making as much money as they could when they had a need.
[04:04.300 --> 04:10.360]  So they find the person to do this. Once that need is filled, profits increase. The company expands.
[04:10.360 --> 04:18.960]  So this whole deal here is quality and then quantity. It's much more focused when you're going into the private sector.
[04:18.960 --> 04:26.060]  So that's a big thing to think about when you're talking to recruiters, that the job of the private sector recruiter and hiring manager
[04:26.060 --> 04:29.920]  is just different than what you may have experienced when you were coming into the military,
[04:29.920 --> 04:32.440]  whether you came in as an enlisted person or an officer.
[04:33.660 --> 04:38.080]  One of the things... I love this little slide because it reminds me that all the time in the military,
[04:38.080 --> 04:42.420]  my time as a hospital corpsman was heavy with the Marine Corps.
[04:42.540 --> 04:46.240]  But operational risk management was something that's just pounded into your head.
[04:46.240 --> 04:47.920]  Same thing when I was on a ship, too.
[04:48.660 --> 04:53.980]  So when you're coming from a veteran standpoint, you really do understand the idea of risk management.
[04:54.180 --> 04:59.680]  But what a lot of people don't really realize is that the hiring process on the outside,
[04:59.680 --> 05:02.500]  it's a risk management decision for that company.
[05:02.660 --> 05:05.800]  So they're going to identify those risks, they're going to assess the risks,
[05:05.800 --> 05:08.380]  and they're going to make decisions based upon those risks.
[05:08.380 --> 05:16.120]  So your job as a job seeker is to identify the things that in your background might look like a risk to them
[05:16.120 --> 05:18.600]  so that you can then mitigate those things.
[05:18.780 --> 05:22.800]  Just understand that they're making that decision as a risk management thing.
[05:22.980 --> 05:25.940]  They don't want to have to start that whole process over again.
[05:25.940 --> 05:31.700]  The worst thing that could happen is that they hire someone who two or three months later doesn't work out and quits,
[05:31.700 --> 05:34.780]  and now they've got to start that whole process over again.
[05:34.840 --> 05:39.300]  So think about it from that standpoint, that risk management standpoint, as you're getting out of the service.
[05:40.560 --> 05:45.440]  And the idea of understanding that risk management thing really does understand, you know,
[05:45.440 --> 05:48.280]  the different things that people do in this process.
[05:48.280 --> 05:53.900]  Because really, everybody in the process has their own risk management things to think about.
[05:53.900 --> 05:56.000]  They all want to keep their jobs as well.
[05:56.000 --> 06:00.900]  So let's look at, really quickly, who's who in the zoo when it comes to the hiring process.
[06:01.340 --> 06:03.440]  So there's basically some main players.
[06:03.440 --> 06:08.520]  And even if... we'll talk about this in a second, but let's just take a look at the main players here.
[06:08.520 --> 06:10.360]  First of all, you've got sourcers.
[06:10.880 --> 06:13.680]  Sourcers are the people who search really hard to find talent.
[06:13.680 --> 06:18.020]  They use different things like job boards, whether it be clearedjobs.net or any other job boards.
[06:18.020 --> 06:19.640]  They might be on social media.
[06:19.640 --> 06:27.380]  But when a sourcer reaches out to you on a first phone call, really what they're looking for is just to verify the basic qualifications.
[06:27.380 --> 06:33.240]  They call up and say, you know, hey, Joe Job Seeker, do you really have these certifications?
[06:33.240 --> 06:34.920]  Are you interested? Those types of things.
[06:34.920 --> 06:36.660]  Just the very, very basics.
[06:36.920 --> 06:39.540]  So that's a sourcer, just finding people.
[06:39.760 --> 06:40.820]  Then there's recruiters.
[06:40.820 --> 06:55.140]  Now, a recruiter's position moves into this engagement of the qualified candidates because their job, the recruiter's job, their goal of success, is to bring a certain number of qualified candidates into the interview process to that hiring manager.
[06:55.480 --> 07:01.400]  You know, so they're going to go through and they're going to talk to you and they're going to maybe answer some of your questions about the position, about the company.
[07:01.420 --> 07:09.200]  They're going to try to, you know, they're going to try to sell you on the company, but they're also going to try to learn more about you to help sell you to the hiring manager.
[07:10.280 --> 07:12.860]  Because that's their job. They're that middle person.
[07:12.900 --> 07:15.040]  And then you've got the hiring manager.
[07:15.160 --> 07:21.320]  The hiring manager, this is a position that a lot of people coming out of the service really don't understand.
[07:22.080 --> 07:26.460]  I've even talked to some people who think that hiring manager is a job in itself, and it's not.
[07:26.460 --> 07:29.480]  A hiring manager is just a program manager or a project manager.
[07:29.480 --> 07:36.140]  It's somebody at the company who's in charge of a department who's been given the authority to make a hire.
[07:36.140 --> 07:41.260]  The boss says, OK, yes, you can hire one more of these or two more of those or whatever the case may be.
[07:41.500 --> 07:46.100]  The thing to remember about these hiring managers is, too, they have regular work.
[07:46.100 --> 07:48.280]  They have a real job that they're working on.
[07:48.280 --> 08:04.060]  So whenever they have this gap that they need to fill, not only do they have more work than they have people to do the work, they're also having an additional burden of going through this process of hiring people and being involved in interview processes and all that kind of stuff.
[08:04.060 --> 08:07.680]  So that's what the hiring manager is. So those people are very busy.
[08:08.800 --> 08:13.660]  In a very large organization, you may really have specific people that do all three of these.
[08:13.660 --> 08:19.980]  You may have people who just source and people who just recruit and people who are just hiring managers.
[08:20.220 --> 08:23.800]  At some very small companies, this might all be the same person that's doing these things.
[08:23.800 --> 08:29.120]  You could have the person who's the hiring manager doing all of this work, but they're still going to have these same three processes.
[08:29.120 --> 08:35.880]  Sourcing, which is finding people, recruiting, which is talking to people, and then hiring managers, which is making the decision.
[08:38.240 --> 08:44.880]  So knowing that all of these things happen, the other piece that you want to know is you want to know what's your place in a given market.
[08:45.260 --> 08:50.280]  So there's something called an employer-driven market, and this is a time when you have more talent than you have openings.
[08:50.280 --> 08:59.400]  The hiring process at this point is really just to kind of wade through all of those applications that come in to decide who's the best fit.
[08:59.660 --> 09:03.400]  And you want to make a decision pretty quickly because you've got lots of folks.
[09:03.540 --> 09:10.760]  And looking back at that risk management decision, if you've got 50 people to pick from for only five positions,
[09:11.110 --> 09:18.840]  you may not need to find somebody who's 100% perfect if you can find five people that are 85% or 95% perfect.
[09:18.840 --> 09:20.160]  Why keep going?
[09:21.140 --> 09:26.420]  But in the employer-driven market for these types of jobs, the candidate needs to apply.
[09:26.660 --> 09:28.000]  You need to be reaching out.
[09:28.000 --> 09:35.760]  So this might be in the military and the cyber world, some of your entry-level positions where you need to be engaged in those things.
[09:36.180 --> 09:39.360]  But a lot of times for the cyber world, we're going to be in a different world.
[09:39.360 --> 09:45.880]  We're going to be in a candidate-driven market for a lot of the cybersecurity positions, especially the mid-level to senior-level things.
[09:45.880 --> 09:48.960]  In this case, there's more openings than there is talent.
[09:49.160 --> 09:56.460]  So now the hiring process moves to that sourcer who's going to conferences and looking on job boards and trying to find people
[09:57.000 --> 09:58.840]  because they need to find that talent.
[09:58.840 --> 10:03.240]  It just doesn't exist to the point where they're having to weed through stuff.
[10:03.240 --> 10:04.760]  They need to find people.
[10:04.760 --> 10:10.780]  So if you're one of these types of candidates, now what you need to do is you need to know how to be found.
[10:10.780 --> 10:16.660]  You need to be in the place where they're fishing for that talent and know how to be recognized.
[10:17.400 --> 10:24.300]  When we look at that employer-driven market, when you came out of the military and you went to TAP class, this was really what TAP class was focused on.
[10:24.320 --> 10:35.060]  TAP class was focused on how to look at a job, how to apply for a job, how to do your 15-second elevator speech and how to, you know, those types of things.
[10:35.060 --> 10:38.060]  But the candidate-driven market is a little bit different.
[10:38.060 --> 10:41.720]  And the candidate-driven market is where you need to be more industry-focused.
[10:41.720 --> 10:51.400]  And a place like DEFCON is exactly the place where you need to be, where we can talk about employment things from a cybersecurity perspective as well.
[10:51.400 --> 10:54.840]  And then we're even drilling down even more to talk about being a veteran.
[10:54.840 --> 10:56.620]  But know your place in the market.
[10:57.000 --> 11:02.200]  Because career transition really is more than just, quote, applying for a job.
[11:03.100 --> 11:05.200]  This is a mistake that a lot of people make.
[11:05.200 --> 11:09.280]  They mistake action for progress.
[11:09.280 --> 11:11.440]  And they just say, oh, I'm going to just apply for all these jobs.
[11:11.440 --> 11:12.700]  No one's gotten back to me.
[11:12.940 --> 11:18.540]  A couple weeks ago, I went on our two sites, and I just looked at just jobs for cybersecurity folks just on our sites.
[11:18.640 --> 11:24.700]  You know, the CyberSec jobs, which is a worldwide thing, you know, 21,000 jobs posted on there.
[11:24.700 --> 11:29.940]  You know, on our ClearJob site, which is just for people with security clearances, almost 5,000 jobs listed.
[11:29.940 --> 11:35.240]  You know, so going through there is interesting, and it can be useful in other ways.
[11:35.240 --> 11:40.000]  But to just apply for jobs is not the best way to land your career.
[11:40.080 --> 11:45.100]  The best way to land your career really is to work on your professional network.
[11:45.840 --> 11:51.140]  And what this does is it helps you find opportunities, but it also helps opportunities find you.
[11:51.260 --> 11:58.020]  When it comes to finding opportunities, when you really do talk to a network and when you really have conversations, you can learn about the industry.
[11:58.020 --> 12:04.020]  You can learn about the different job fields, the different job titles and requirements, and you can learn a lot about companies.
[12:04.180 --> 12:08.120]  There's way more companies out there than people give it credit for when you're coming out of the military.
[12:08.120 --> 12:11.780]  You tend to think that there's just, you know, from a government contracting world, for example,
[12:11.780 --> 12:17.760]  you might think that there's just the General Dynamics and the Booz Allen's and things like that, but there's so many companies out there.
[12:18.080 --> 12:23.160]  Even in the private sector for cybersecurity positions, there's so many companies out there.
[12:23.160 --> 12:26.740]  Companies that you never would have thought of that were dealing with cybersecurity are out there.
[12:26.740 --> 12:35.380]  But it also helps when you work your professional network. It also helps you or helps the opportunities find you, because these cyber recruiters, they're hunters.
[12:35.380 --> 12:38.060]  They're not trappers. They're not out there waiting for you to come to them.
[12:38.060 --> 12:46.660]  They're out there specifically looking, not just for do you have a cert, but they want to know who you are because they want to find the right person to engage.
[12:47.020 --> 12:50.840]  Now, some of these cyber recruiters, the really good ones, they're not just hunters.
[12:50.840 --> 12:59.920]  They can also be farmers in the sense that they might be able to identify some really great talent in the military even and say, OK, well, I want to engage with you.
[12:59.920 --> 13:04.680]  I want to have a relationship with you so that when you get out of the service, you're ready.
[13:04.740 --> 13:08.980]  I'm going to help you get better so that when you get out, you're ready to talk to us.
[13:09.220 --> 13:17.200]  So you need to be where they're looking. And when you do things like going to DEFCON or any other conferences or joining organizations, don't just attend.
[13:17.200 --> 13:22.180]  You know, maybe the first couple of times you go someplace as a veteran, maybe you're going to just sit back and just see things.
[13:22.180 --> 13:27.440]  But eventually you really need to engage because you need to be more than just your resume.
[13:27.440 --> 13:42.260]  You need to be a person that they know because that's going to get them to think that they might, when they get to know you, they can even offer you positions you never would have thought about applying for because they'll recognize things in you that you didn't even know that you had as far as potential goes.
[13:42.420 --> 13:44.880]  So you need to make sure that you're engaging with folks.
[13:45.820 --> 13:51.320]  Now, when it comes to networking, the phrase I like to use is I like to talk about marinating.
[13:51.320 --> 13:53.660]  You need to marinate in your industry.
[13:54.660 --> 14:06.560]  Too often we got that networking piece that gets a bad rap in the service where people think it's kind of like, you know, oh, it's just, you know, I'm not going to go out there and just have to kiss somebody's rear end or I'm going to have to be super nice to somebody or anything like that.
[14:06.720 --> 14:14.080]  When you marinate in the industry, it's like slowly taking things in so that you can really get it deep down inside of you so you can understand things.
[14:14.660 --> 14:20.960]  So there's a few ways that you can marinate in your industry, even while you're still on active duty and some ways that people don't always think about.
[14:20.960 --> 14:24.800]  One of the great ones is podcasts. There's so many podcasts out there.
[14:24.800 --> 14:29.140]  They're usually short 15 to 30 minute episodes, but they're industry specific.
[14:29.140 --> 14:34.480]  This is going to help you break out of your bubble from being just talking about military specific cybersecurity worlds.
[14:34.480 --> 14:40.100]  One of the great ones that I know about is called Cyber Wire. You know, it's a practically, it's not daily, it's almost daily.
[14:40.960 --> 14:50.380]  Short episodes, but you can download these on your favorite podcast thing and you can keep up with the world of cybersecurity so that when you talk to people on the outside, you know what's going on.
[14:50.380 --> 14:53.720]  You can, you can talk to folks and you can really understand the language.
[14:53.800 --> 15:00.920]  Another one that I found is called Unsupervised Learning, which is another, it's just a daily or practically daily podcast that talks about cybersecurity things.
[15:00.920 --> 15:08.500]  And what was really interesting about this one, Unsupervised Learning, the gentleman who runs it, Daniel, I'm not sure if I'm saying the name right, Meisler or Missler.
[15:08.720 --> 15:13.420]  When I pulled him up on LinkedIn, I started to look back. You go all the way back on his experiences.
[15:13.420 --> 15:19.360]  Look, when you go all the way back there, July 1992 to 1998, Infantryman, U.S. Army.
[15:19.740 --> 15:30.440]  So this is a guy that didn't start off with necessarily, you know, the cybersecurity backgrounds, came out of the military, moved his way to a very high level position of things.
[15:30.440 --> 15:36.480]  You know, but if you were to connect with this person, you can bet he would have a soft spot for a military veteran.
[15:36.480 --> 15:40.220]  I guarantee you he would. I've read some of his stuff. I know he does, but this is why.
[15:40.360 --> 15:44.280]  So, so take a look at some of those things to help marinate in the industry.
[15:44.960 --> 15:52.000]  I had just brought up his LinkedIn page and a lot of people talk about LinkedIn and they have questions about it.
[15:52.000 --> 15:55.200]  It's one of the big questions when I taught the transition class, too, for everybody.
[15:55.200 --> 16:03.460]  Whether you're coming out as a cyber person, whether you're coming out as an engineer, a physician, infantryman, whatever, you know, what should I do on LinkedIn?
[16:03.600 --> 16:07.280]  Well, a few things. Should I list my transition date? Yes, you absolutely should.
[16:07.340 --> 16:11.700]  Go ahead and list it right up there at the top. It's as high up as you can that says your month and your year.
[16:11.700 --> 16:19.680]  Because recruiters, when they're looking at those kind of things, if they can make a good judgment about how much they need to engage with you and at what time.
[16:19.680 --> 16:26.100]  So go ahead and say, you know, transitioning out of the Army, you know, October of 2020 or June of 2021.
[16:26.620 --> 16:34.600]  Should you list your clearance? This is interesting. The technical answer? No, you shouldn't. Do a lot of people do it? Absolutely. Tons of people do it.
[16:34.640 --> 16:40.360]  Does it matter to employers? Sometimes. I know we recently did a survey not long ago.
[16:40.460 --> 16:49.180]  And it was, you know, it was a small survey, but two out of five, roughly, of the employers said that they would look negatively on somebody who listed their clearance on their LinkedIn profile.
[16:49.180 --> 16:57.320]  So, you know, two out of five said maybe, three out of five said it wouldn't bother them. It's one of those things. I'm not going to tell you one way or the other what you have to do.
[16:57.620 --> 17:03.300]  Just know that the technical answer is no. A lot of people do it, yes. You know, should you do it? Whatever.
[17:04.080 --> 17:09.620]  Now, what else helps on your LinkedIn profile, though? What else helps is, you know, certifications, even the ones you're working on.
[17:09.620 --> 17:17.700]  Because when people run searches for things, they might search for things like, you know, CISSP or CEH or other types of certifications.
[17:17.700 --> 17:24.120]  So even if you just listed that you're working on it with an expected completion date, that's going to help you come up with some searches as well.
[17:24.120 --> 17:32.600]  You also want to list tools that you've used, you know, the ones that you can talk about. If you've done something super secret, you can't talk about it, got it, you know.
[17:32.800 --> 17:40.600]  But list those tools and list those languages. And if you're really worried about, well, I work in such a highly classified area, I can't list everything.
[17:40.600 --> 17:49.940]  Just listing, you know, some of your certifications and the languages and things like that. And you say that you worked in San Antonio or Fort Meade or something like that.
[17:49.940 --> 17:54.540]  The right recruiters for government contractors can figure out what's going on if they want to talk to you.
[17:54.540 --> 17:59.720]  So just, you don't need to list, you know, everything, but you should list some things.
[17:59.880 --> 18:03.040]  And you should also go ahead and list your soft skills in context.
[18:03.040 --> 18:11.140]  Don't make the mistake of listing all of your leadership and management skills right up front, because that's not what's going to get them to look at you first.
[18:11.140 --> 18:14.580]  It's going to be those certs and tools and languages and things like that.
[18:14.980 --> 18:27.460]  But include in there that you do have management, because that's one of the things that a lot of cyber security professionals are saying is lacking in the industry, is the ability to work cross-functionally and across teams.
[18:27.460 --> 18:32.760]  And we get that in the military. You know, you do get that kind of leadership training that a lot of other folks don't.
[18:32.760 --> 18:36.620]  So, yes, do list your soft skills, but just don't lead with them.
[18:38.700 --> 18:46.220]  While we're on LinkedIn, there's a few other things you can do on LinkedIn that can really help your transition to help you marinate in the industry.
[18:46.660 --> 19:00.940]  Events and groups are two things. You know, events is something that just recently came back on LinkedIn, but you can find events like, for example, we've got a job fair coming up in a couple weeks focused on the San Antonio area, but there's an event page to it.
[19:00.940 --> 19:06.300]  So, you can join that event page and you can see updates and you can also see other things that people are talking about.
[19:06.520 --> 19:13.700]  You can join groups. Some of those groups can be very specific. There's a cyber security forum initiative group that's got lots of people on it.
[19:13.700 --> 19:17.680]  I would recommend that you join those types of groups with your LinkedIn profile.
[19:17.800 --> 19:26.520]  Again, you don't have to, you know, necessarily have a whole profile on that says that you've got your full scope poly clearance and all that kind of stuff, but you can make a basic profile.
[19:26.520 --> 19:36.780]  You can follow people and you can engage in conversations and that's going to help get you out of that military specific bubble. And that's the problem that a lot of veterans have.
[19:37.840 --> 19:43.560]  Besides the cyber security specific things, there's a great group called the Veteran Mentor Network. It's one of my favorites.
[19:43.560 --> 19:52.480]  I actually joined this group back in 2011 when I was a transitioning person coming out of the military and now I'm still active as a mentor. So, I've seen it on both sides.
[19:52.480 --> 20:03.680]  But it's a group that gives no kidding solid advice. It doesn't just, you know, doesn't just always tell you what you want to hear. There's a good group of folks that tell you what you need to hear when you ask specific questions.
[20:03.900 --> 20:14.520]  And you can jump into an event like this and you can search for things up in the search bar. You can put in the word cyber, for example, and then sort by latest and you'll be able to see things that come up in the cyber realm.
[20:14.520 --> 20:23.760]  So, you can search by conversations to see what's going on. But that Veteran Mentor Network group is another very powerful tool on LinkedIn to help you out.
[20:24.280 --> 20:34.880]  Now, talk about LinkedIn. Let's talk about Twitter. And this is weird because I never would have thought that I would be talking to veterans about Twitter until I got involved in the cyber security world.
[20:34.880 --> 20:44.580]  The military is very famous for telling you to avoid social media at all costs. Don't be on Facebook, don't post this, don't post that, you know, operational risk management and security and all that stuff.
[20:44.660 --> 21:03.040]  But you know what? Twitter is, it's actually very important in the cyber world. And most cyber security professionals know this, but a lot of veterans coming out don't. So they say, oh, I don't want to be on Twitter. I heard it's the, I heard it's the, you know, it's the bane of our existence in America and bad politics and blah, blah, blah.
[21:03.040 --> 21:18.920]  You know, social media is what you make of it. So you can create a very basic Twitter profile and then you can use it for what I call career intelligence. So for example, if you got on the DEF CON Twitter page, you can see that there's 3,424 people following them.
[21:18.920 --> 21:35.200]  So go to the part of, of who's following them. And you can learn so much about other companies and other organizations and other people who are also involved in cyber security. So it's, it's worth creating that, that Twitter profile, just so that you can start to do some of this career intelligence.
[21:36.260 --> 21:52.700]  Now also that kind of relates to Twitter, but also is a big piece here for transitioning military veterans. You saw that I mentioned I had spoken at B-Sides conferences in the past. B-Sides conferences, if you're not familiar with those, are locally produced cyber security conferences.
[21:52.700 --> 22:09.340]  So the value here is number one, well, they're cheap to go to if you want to attend those things. But also because they're very active on Twitter, this is a way for a military veteran who's not in the area that they want to be to start to get some ideas of what's going on in the cyber community in that location.
[22:09.340 --> 22:23.900]  If you go to the website securitybsides.com, it's basically like a wiki page, but you can see all that list of the different things that are coming up and they're all over the world. Just FYI, the one in Islamabad, Pakistan is going to be virtual this year.
[22:24.300 --> 22:38.580]  But still, if you want to check these things out, you can go to their Twitter pages. And then just like I looked, I showed you at the DEF CON, you can look at who's following them and you can find out what's going on, whether it's Columbus or Boston or Kansas City or Charlotte or whatever.
[22:38.580 --> 22:52.960]  So this is a great tool for people who are in the military who are stuck. I say stuck, you know, maybe you're in Fort Huachuca, Arizona, or maybe you're, you know, in Maine or something like that. And you don't want to end up there. You want to transition to someplace else.
[22:53.040 --> 22:59.340]  This is a conduit into a local area that a lot of people don't really know about. So take a look at the B-Sides events.
[23:00.900 --> 23:14.160]  In the end, what you want to remember, though, is that you're coming out of the service. And for a lot of us who come out of the service, we did very well in the service. We got promoted. You know, we made, we had a good living, you know, but what got you here won't get you there.
[23:14.200 --> 23:23.860]  You know, so what is it that you do know? Coming out of the service, you do. You know your job. You know about cutting edge technology. You know how to handle a budget. You've got good leadership skills.
[23:23.860 --> 23:37.180]  But let's think about some things that maybe you don't know. Maybe you don't know what your job is called on the outside. You know, it's certainly not called, you know, department head or it might not be called, you know, work center supervisor.
[23:37.760 --> 23:49.660]  You also, you might think you know cutting edge technology because you do know a lot of cutting edge technology, but there might be a whole lot of cutting edge technology that you don't know because we don't use it in the military.
[23:49.660 --> 24:00.880]  It's only used in the private sector. So if you haven't been exposed to it, you know, there's a lot of stuff out there. You might be great at handling a budget, but you know what we don't do in the military? We don't handle profit and loss.
[24:00.880 --> 24:10.540]  I mean, when you think about it, we operate in a, as in the military, we operate in a place that's, it's okay to lose money. You know, we run a deficit all the time in the DoD.
[24:10.540 --> 24:24.680]  We're not very efficient with things all the time in the DoD, but in the private sector, profit and loss means does your company stay alive or not? Same thing with leadership skills. You know, yeah, you can lead a team of folks, but we never dealt with wage and hour laws.
[24:24.680 --> 24:35.980]  We never had to pay overtime for people. We never had to worry about if you gave somebody a day off that that might affect their paycheck. And it's always nice in the military that if they don't show up to work, you can like throw them in jail.
[24:35.980 --> 24:46.460]  You know, can't do that in the private sector. So understanding those differences are some things that we need to do as we move out of the military.
[24:47.580 --> 24:56.280]  This is not focused. This is a piece here that's not just for cyber talent, but is more for the business case. There's a lot of great organizations out there.
[24:56.280 --> 25:14.480]  American Corporate Partners, you know, there's the one that says it's the VCTP. They're the Veterans Career Transition Program. I know that they do a lot of work with certifications, and you can get them to pay for certification tests to include IT and cybersecurity certification tests.
[25:15.380 --> 25:25.220]  Hiring Our Heroes Fellowship Program. I've talked to people who've done that, and that was a great thing because it was a great eye opener to help them understand what life was like on the outside.
[25:25.220 --> 25:32.200]  To get them out of their uniform and stop being, you know, stop being Major Johnson and being Shirley Johnson and just being a person.
[25:33.360 --> 25:39.480]  You know, one of the things I did earlier to prepare for this talk is I reached out via that Veteran Mentor Network.
[25:40.240 --> 25:49.660]  And I just said, hey, I'm going to give this talk and, you know, tell me about some things that you learned coming out if you're a veteran. And this guy Chase Watson reached out to me. I ended up having a nice conversation with him.
[25:49.660 --> 26:04.820]  You know, but I think some of the things I just pulled what he said here, you know, the second paragraph, there's many aspects in the cyber realm, you know, SOC, vulnerability management, data loss prevention, training and development, threat analysis, intrusion detection, you know, the list goes on and on.
[26:05.160 --> 26:16.940]  You know, there's a whole world of IT and then cyber aspects of organization like fraud and corporate security. He was saying that a lot of military transitioners are just unaware of these opportunities until they've worked in the industry.
[26:16.940 --> 26:25.480]  You know, like he said, you know, saying that you work in cybersecurity is like saying you work in business. Yeah, that's the field, but what part? Finance, marketing, something else.
[26:25.740 --> 26:38.040]  So we have to get out of our bubble to understand all those places that cybersecurity plays in at the business level so that you can figure out where you feel comfortable. You can figure out where you fit in.
[26:38.040 --> 26:49.580]  You can also figure out where maybe you thought you fit in, but maybe you didn't. So it's the combination of learning the cyber world and learning the business world for that transitioning veteran coming out.
[26:50.440 --> 27:02.920]  This is just an example here of all the different cybersecurity domains, all the different things that lead into stuff. And again, like Chase was saying, you know, so many folks coming out of the service, they just don't know what they don't know.
[27:02.920 --> 27:14.020]  So when you, when you're learning cybersecurity, also learn the business world so you can figure out where cybersecurity plays and how it affects those different aspects of the business.
[27:16.020 --> 27:28.420]  There's a website that I encourage you to check out too. It's CyberSeek. They have a really good job of career pathways where you can, it kind of lays out of saying like if you, if you're doing, if you want to do this, here's your feeder roles.
[27:28.420 --> 27:41.980]  And then you got an entry level versus a mid-level, like how do I get from point A to point B in the private sector? You know, there's a lot of steps along the way. And if you understand those things, this is going to help you marinate in your, in your industry.
[27:42.140 --> 27:52.400]  It's also going to help you know how to have conversations, you know? So if you're doing one thing and you want to get to a mid-level, you want to be asking, well, what kind of entry level position do I need to get to there?
[27:52.400 --> 28:03.840]  You know, or if you want to jump into the, out to the industry, into a mid-level or senior level position, well, you better make sure that you've got some of these boxes from the feeder roles and entry levels checked off.
[28:03.920 --> 28:11.160]  And as a veteran coming out of the service, you may have a lot of these skills checked off, but you just didn't call it the same thing.
[28:11.540 --> 28:22.380]  And so this is why understanding those things can help you proactively tell your story in the right way that says, this is why I'm, you know, I'm suitable for a mid-level position or a senior level position coming out.
[28:22.840 --> 28:31.580]  It's also a great way for you to kind of understand, well, I understand I might not fit into the senior level position because I still have a little bit to learn, but let me start at the mid-level.
[28:31.720 --> 28:40.460]  If you don't understand that career transition piece, you know, from the cyber world, you're not going to know how to tell your story.
[28:42.400 --> 28:52.240]  So we've got some final thoughts here. You know, I don't want to go on too terribly long, but look, getting into the military was easy, really.
[28:52.260 --> 29:04.200]  If you haven't been to jail and you're not doing drugs and, you know, you're in shape, the military will do their best to find a job for you, whether that's cyber or not.
[29:04.200 --> 29:13.260]  You know, so getting in is easy. Getting out is, you know, relatively easy. Your contract's up, you have to get out type thing, but landing where you want is harder.
[29:13.260 --> 29:21.140]  And there's things that you can and can't control of those deals. Some of it's location, you know, but just know that landing where you want is the hard part.
[29:21.160 --> 29:32.600]  So the way to make sure that you marinate in the industry, you know, to make sure that you land where you want is to marinate, you know, because you want to know the things that you don't know.
[29:32.600 --> 29:41.760]  You want to ask the questions that you don't even know to ask yet. You want to make your mistakes when you're still two years away from getting out, not two months after you've gotten out.
[29:42.400 --> 29:50.660]  And then be cautious, but not afraid of social media platforms, especially if you're in a geographically diverse area where you're trying to go someplace else.
[29:50.880 --> 29:58.720]  Social media platforms can be the beginning of how you understand the rest of the private sector. So be cautious, but not afraid.
[29:59.460 --> 30:07.460]  Speaking of social media platforms, feel free to hit me up. I am happy to connect with any veterans. I'm happy to answer any questions.
[30:07.460 --> 30:15.620]  If you've got specific things, you can find me on LinkedIn. I'm Bob Wheeler. As Kathleen said, my Twitter handle is SailorDoc.
[30:16.400 --> 30:25.680]  Shoot me an email, bwheeler at thirdjobs.net. You know, like I said, happy to help, happy to connect, and happy to do anything that you need.
[30:25.680 --> 30:36.640]  So we went about a half an hour. I hope that was enough time. We kind of went a little quick on some of these slides, but good luck with everything, and I look forward to helping anybody out.
[30:36.880 --> 30:50.020]  So, Bob, I'm going to jump in here with a question on when, you know, typically in the military, when you go in to get a new job, you're basically just assigned the job.
[30:50.020 --> 31:03.320]  You don't necessarily interview for the job. So can you sort of talk about two or three things that someone transitioning from the military should think about the first time they do a civilian interview?
[31:03.740 --> 31:15.000]  Yeah, great question, Kathleen. So when it comes to interviews, one of the things, well, the first thing to know is, is that it's a two-way street. So they're interviewing you and you're interviewing them.
[31:17.100 --> 31:31.000]  So be ready to ask questions about the organization, but also when you're trying to put your best foot forward, always remember that everything that we say or do should be designed to bring us closer to that company, to make us more...
[31:31.000 --> 31:46.560]  the word's not appealing, but to make us more feel like a good fit. And sometimes we may have this thing where we say things that sound like it's really cool, but it just makes us sound like it's more different, that we're different than the company.
[31:46.640 --> 31:52.920]  I always tell people, sometimes the coolest thing you did in the military has no place in your resume or in your interview.
[31:52.920 --> 32:03.840]  If they ask you a question and say, what's the most... if you're interviewing for a cybersecurity-related position and they say, what's the most difficult decision you ever had to make in the military?
[32:04.040 --> 32:12.840]  Now is not the time to tell them about how you had to decide whether to shoot somebody or not shoot somebody, or whether you had to kick somebody out or not kick somebody out.
[32:12.840 --> 32:26.440]  What they really want to know is, tell me a story that relates to the job that was also difficult. So the idea that, well, if I can do it in Afghanistan, I can certainly do it here in Louisiana. Not always the case.
[32:26.660 --> 32:38.640]  But if you bring those things up, all it makes them... because all they're thinking now is like, wow, did he shoot somebody? They stopped listening to your discussion about network security or audits or something like that.
[32:38.640 --> 32:49.080]  So those are some tips when it comes to interviewing is to really focus all of your answers and telling all your stories based upon the job description that you're interviewing for.
[32:49.880 --> 32:59.840]  And then I think the other question that normally comes up or that I know people don't really touch on is understanding the culture of a company that you're going to.
[32:59.840 --> 33:25.840]  Because more times than not, we hear that a person doesn't get a job because they didn't match the culture of the new company. So how can... can you sort of explain the types of cultures that are out there in the civilian world and how a veteran can sort of ask those questions or do their OSINT on figuring out if the new company is someplace that they want to work?
[33:25.840 --> 33:39.600]  Yeah, well, that's another great question, Kathleen. And, you know, company culture, first of all, if you're not a good fit for the company culture, that's not a bad thing. You don't want to work at a place where you don't mesh with the company culture.
[33:40.840 --> 34:02.460]  So I would never tell somebody to fake the funk by changing the way they are. You know, but you can certainly learn things and you can learn to find out is this a... you know, some smaller companies, for example, might have a very loose culture where people can say and do things and you can report to the president of the company very easily. He's always around or she's always around and you can joke and you have happy hours and things like that.
[34:02.460 --> 34:22.960]  And there may be other companies that are like, no, we are very businesslike, you know, stay in your lane, focus on the project. You know, sometimes that has to do with the size of the company, but not always. You know, there can be some very large companies with a very, you know, loose and have fun culture. And there can be some small companies that are still very, you know, kind of rigid and things like that.
[34:22.960 --> 34:51.280]  Now, coming out of the service, we understand the culture of the military. You know, you've been to a sailor of the quarter board or a soldier of the quarter board and you know how to, yes, ma'am, yes, sir, you know, aye, aye, all that kind of stuff. I've seen some people show up for an interview and they say, you know, you start answering questions and saying, yes, sir, and no, ma'am, because that's the way you were taught. And they say things like, no, please call me Debra. You know, well, if she says, please call me Debra, call her Debra.
[34:51.280 --> 35:11.440]  You know, so if you can't, one of the things is you have to be able to let them know that you're more than just the military. But how can you find out that culture? Asking people if you know who's worked there, that's one way. Social media, again, you know, the companies who are very loose and have, you know, like to have fun, they like to tell people they have fun.
[35:11.440 --> 35:32.520]  You know, they like to have their job descriptions and say things like, I'm looking for a, you know, a cyber magician wizard, you know, as opposed to just going with the straight, you know, vernacular of exactly what the position is called. So you can do things to figure out what it's like, dress the way everybody else dresses, you know, so that you can fit into that culture.
[35:32.520 --> 35:57.300]  And if it's, if you are a rigid person, and then you don't need to work at a company that's, that's, you know, happy hours and flowers and roses and rainbows. If you're the flowers and roses and rainbows person, you would be, you would be miserable in a rigid thing. So don't worry about it if you're not a good fit. Be more worried if you end up in a place that's a bad fit. So learn the culture, and then do what you can to be yourself.
[35:58.420 --> 36:18.480]  My final question is, obviously, in the military, there are so many things that are encompassed with your compensation. So you, you know, you have a wardrobe allowance, and you, your housing is taken care of, and, you know, all kinds of things are there, and you don't have to worry about it.
[36:18.480 --> 36:32.660]  So a lot of transitioning veterans have this difficulty understanding what they need to do to calculate the salary that they're looking for, and also how to negotiate that. So can you touch on that a little bit?
[36:32.660 --> 36:56.200]  Yeah, salary is, is a, is always a tough thing for people coming out of the service. You know, because, like you said, first of all, military pay is so, is so weird. You know, you can get, you have some of it that's taxable, and you have a housing allowance that's not taxable. But if you live on base, they don't, they take away the housing allowance. And if you have a special job, or if you're deployed somewhere, you get extra bonus pay, which is also not taxable.
[36:57.460 --> 37:17.900]  But compensation is more than just money, first of all. So some of the things that you are not thinking about, necessarily, when you get out is, you know, you're, it's unlikely you're going to start with 30 days of paid vacation, and every, and all federal holidays off, you know, at a, at a private sector company. You'll get some vacation days, but, but not 30 days, just about anywhere.
[37:18.580 --> 37:32.600]  You know, other things with compensation comes things like, like your health care. You know, a lot of people, you know, if you get out after four years of service, you're not going to have health care. If you get out after 20 years and you retire, you're going to keep your TRICARE and those types of things.
[37:32.600 --> 37:52.960]  You know, so think about the whole compensation package. But what you really want to do is you want to look around and say, what does it take for me to live where I want to live? And understand, so when they, when they ask the questions, they really shouldn't be asking questions, what did you make at your last job? Some places still do that, but that's really, it's really frowned upon.
[37:52.960 --> 38:17.360]  What they really want to know is what, how much, how much money do you want to make from a salary perspective, but you also want to think to yourself, what's the total compensation and what can I, what can I barter for? You know, so think about those things. Think about what does it take to live, you know, and asking the questions about things like, you know, do I, you know, what does it cost if I get health care through this organization? Do you offer health care?
[38:18.100 --> 38:41.340]  Think about those questions so that you can answer the question of what does it take so you don't undersell or oversell yourself. And then when it comes to government contracting, the other piece to just know is a lot of government contracting rates are kind of set. There's, there's maybe a little bit of wiggle room that one company to another company, but, but not a lot. You know, so if, if you ask for more than they can give and they come back and say, well, we can't give that. Well, then, you know, that just is what it is.
[38:44.810 --> 39:10.490]  Great, Bob, thank you. As always, you have a great perspective, being a veteran, being a recruiter, and now helping employers and job seekers connect. So we're going to have everyone ask some questions in the Discord channel, and we can sort of moderate that discussion throughout the day. Thank you again for your time. And we look forward to seeing you around on Twitter. Take care, Bob.
[39:10.490 --> 39:11.490]  Bye bye. Thanks, everybody.