Scott Goodman ⋅ Waxhaw, NC Siemens ⋅ 30 years experience

All of these comments are very valid. All MOS positions are transferable to the civilian sector. It is of course up to the individual how to approach employment, meaning to continue to pursue a civilian career using MOS related skills or to start a new career using leadership skills aquired in the military as a baseline and to growth into a new professional career.

Kerry West ⋅ Herndon, VA Accenture ⋅ 13 years experience

The simple answer to your question is yes. Your skills are translatable to civilian skills. Sometimes it is difficult to know how to string the words to make sense to the civilian recruiter. There are sites like the Ladders and Linked-in that provide free resume writing which should assist you in that regard.

Mark Tegtmeyer ⋅ Denton, TX PepsiCo - Frito Lay ⋅ 11 years experience

Right now you're thinking in very classical military terms. You're defining yourself by the job titles and ranks you've held. Instead, first focus your resume on what you did.

The stereotypical advice for any resume is to 'tailor it for the job you're applying for.' Well it applies really well here. Instead of describing your experience by everything you did, take out the skills that directly correlate to the job you're applying to and only talk about those. Focus on those skills that the future employer needs. Your resume should highlight those skills with a laser focus. Use the interview to explain the position. It's much easier and a better use of time to describe things like that in an interview rather than the limited space of a resume.

Second, understand the fundamentals of what you did. Superficially, you may have just inputted data into a software program that no one else in the world uses. You may feel like it's completely irrelavent because the new company doesn't use a program anything like that, but fundamentally you did data processing. It doesn't matter if you were inputting baseball statistics or nuclear arming codes. What matters is that you demonstrated that you can interact with computer software, you can do it accurately, quickly and use the system to its fullest potential. You didn't tell Privates what to do and take orders from Majors, you communicated clearly with all levels of the organization in order to accomplish the single goal. You mentored junior personnel on technical skills and discussed strategic operations with executive management.

Fundamentally break down the tasks you did instead of the job titles you held and clearly state how you've demonstrated them in your resume. Use the interview to fill in the detail.

Cedric Anderson ⋅ Torrance, CA U.S. Navy, Petty Officer Third Class ⋅ 12 years served

I have found that the key to finding a job is to highlight your skillsets. After all civilian employers are hiring you for what you can do first.

If you go in INDEED.COM and simular sites you can search by key words. I've found that my best results have been to search by skills.

With that being said, I would focus on an employer with a need for my skillset by typeing into the search civilian keywords to describe my skillset.

Frank Aburto ⋅ Jersey City, NJ U.S. Army, Captain ⋅ 6 years served

You can also use your non MOS skills to show how quickly you can learn, adapt and implement new skills in a stressful and results oriented situation. It's an easy way to quickly answer the question of "Can you learn and be successful in this job?"

-Frank

Charles McGrue ⋅ U.S. Army Reserve, Captain ⋅ 21 years served

What you should put on your resume is what you have experience in. Just because you were trained as one thing, doesn't mean that is what you have to put down there. Someone else may disagree, but your focus is on the job you want to get. I don't know of any civilian companies that ask for your NCOER, and if they do, that's a new one to me. However, you can state the jobs you have had, but elaborate on what your strengths on and why you would be a good (or great) fit for the position that you are seeking.

With regard to the NCOER directly, it has (if I recall corectly) five different areas of evaluation. You can use those areas, which should translate well enough to civilian to tell of your professionalism. For example, Accountability. Regardless of the position held, how did you manage accountability of yourself, your soldiers and your equipment? Leadership. How well did you lead your team for success?

One thing the civilian world is familar with is a SGT. Think about it. The most popular ranks you here are: Private, SGT, CPT, COL and Gen. You typically don't hear all the other ranks in the civilian world as much. As a SGT you are a leader, so use that to your advantage.

Charles