Episode #11

Greg Austin

Greg served as an Electrical and Environmental Specialist Functional Manager for 2 MAJCOM career fields by the end of his 22-year Air Force journey. He particularly excelled in risk mitigation strategies, leveraging the right education, certifications and assets at the right time. This skill helped him transition to his current role as a Lean Process Manager for a large financial institution. Greg practices what he teaches: he developed his own successful risk mitigation strategy from the beginning of his tenure with the Air Force, determined how to pursue a path in engineering and discovered how well engineering management dovetailed with his military career experience along the way. His key takeaway--it’s never too soon to plan your exit strategy and start working toward it.

Lessons Learned:

• Well before retirement, write down the issues you can imagine and figure out who can help with those (such as people at various stages of retirement or separation).
• In the civilian workforce, non-military peers do not always have 15-20 years’ experience within their career fields, so veterans bring a “value-add” of strategic perspective.
• As military veterans, we work well in teams; collaboration and inclusiveness are highly desirable traits in job candidates.
• Your military job title is not always synonymous with a civilian job title.
• The first job offer may not be the best fit for you, so don’t feel like you’ll cut off other, better-fit options by waiting. You are qualified.
• Network within your military organization and outside of the military, within industries that interest you. You’ll learn a lot, and will be able to target your transition much better.