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How
To Determine If A Military Career Is Right For You!
Choosing
the Military (Needs Assessment)
You should have
made a list of your primary motivators before you ever set foot in the
recruiter's office. Whether your list was long---containing such items
as money for college, job security, opportunity to travel, technical
training and good pay---or contained only one item, such as having full-time
employment, the number of items on your list is not what's important.
What is important is that you are able to satisfy those motivators.
What
are YOUR Motivators? Make a List. Check it Twice!
Whatever
your list contains, the first course of action is to collect your list
of primary motivators and put them in order of importance to you. This
process, known as rank-ordering, will help you determine if you should
proceed with the enlistment process.
It should be noted,
however, that at this time you may not have all the information necessary
to determine whether or not you should enlist. For instance, if your
most important primary motivator is receiving technical training, you
will not know if the military can meet this motivator unless you have
taken the Armed Services Vocational Battery (ASVAB) and physical examinations.
If this is the case, you must make the assumption that you will qualify
for technical training and base your decision on the information provided
to you by your recruiter. It will then be necessary for you to return
to this chapter later on and reevaluate your situation if needed.
Rank-Ordering
Your List
Rank-ordering
your list is a simple process of deciding which motivators are most
important to you and then listing them in order of importance. List
your most important motivator as number one, your next most important
as number two and so on.
If we apply the
car-buying scenario here, your primary motivators may be finding a car
that costs under $20,000, has a four-cylinder engine, gets at least
30 miles to the gallon, has leather interior, is available in blue and
has a sunroof. If you put those motivators in rank order, your list
might look something like this:
1. Costs
under $20,000
2. Gets at least 30 mpg
3. Has a sunroof
4. Has leather interior
5. Available in blue
You'll notice that
the number one, or most important, motivator in this case is cost, while
the last, or least important, motivator is color. The more important
the motivator, the less likely you'll be willing to settle for something
different or to live without it altogether.
Meeting
Your Needs (Motivators)
After
you've rank-ordered your motivators, proceed to the simple process of
going down your list and determining whether or not those motivators
can or cannot be met by enlisting in the military. Simply write "yes"
next to those that can be fulfilled by enlisting and "no"
next to those that cannot be fulfilled by enlisting.
If you find that
all your motivators can be met by enlisting, that's great; but even
if only some of your motivators can be met, you may still want to consider
it. Seldom does a product meet all our needs and wants, and you may
be able to make satisfactory compromises and still be happy with the
outcome.
Decide
What is Really Important to YOU!
For
instance, in the car-buying scenario, you may find that a particular
car meets all of your needs but is not available in blue. Although the
color of the car was important, it was the least important of all your
motivators. For this reason you may decide to purchase the car despite
the fact that it isn't available in blue. Or suppose you could get all
your motivators met (even color), but instead of $20,000 you would have
to pay $21, 000? You might decide that you're willing to compromise
on the cost to get the car of your dreams.
If you were buying a car, however, you probably would compare several
makes of cars to see if any could meet all your motivators before buying
one that just met some of them. The same applies when determining whether
or not to enlist. You should compare all the alternatives to enlisting---gather
all the facts---before making a final decision.
Comparing
the Alternatives
Several
alternatives to enlisting may be available to you, such as going to
work at a local company, attending college or attending a local vocational
school. You should perform the "yes/no" test on each of your
motivators as they pertain to each of the available alternatives.
For example, let's assume that one of your alternatives is a job at
the local factory and your primary motivators are (in rank order):
1. Money
for college
2. Technical training
3. Job security
4. Opportunity for travel
Let's further assume
that the local factory offers its employees tuition assistance for college
similar to that offered by the military. It also has an on-the-job technical
training program and a great track record when it comes to keeping employees.
However, since this is a local company, your opportunity for travel
will be nonexistent.
You may need to
modify your approach to your motivator list depending on the alternative.
For instance, job security really does not apply when you are talking
about attending college as an alternative. You might, however, consider
things like the job security of people in occupations related to your
intended major or even the graduation rate of the college you are thinking
about attending.
Although you are well on your way to making a decision, there is still
one very important piece of the puzzle that must be considered---the
negative aspects of each alternative.
Negative
Aspects
Returning
to the car-buying scenario, let's assume you have found a car that matches
all of your motivators. But the closest dealership is 100 miles away,
the particular make of car has a terrible maintenance record, and after
looking at the car you just don't like the style. These are the "negative
aspects" that must be considered.
What
Can YOU Live With? What Can YOU Live Without?
When
you go out to purchase your car armed with your motivator (or needs)
list, you should have (at least in your mind) a list of negative aspects
that you just can't live with when considering a new vehicle.
The same applies
to enlisting in the military: There may be certain things about military
service that would conflict with your desires. For instance, if you
wanted to stay in the local area, you would probably not want to enlist
for Active Duty, although you might want to consider enlisting in the
Reserve or Guard.
Putting
It All Together
Once
you have gotten all of your lists together, it is time to make a decision.
At this point the decision can be whether or not to continue processing
(i.e., take the ASVAB), or it could mean making the decision to enlist.
Whatever your decision,
it should be made based primarily on the facts, with very little emotion
as part of the equation. That said, I must also say that although I
am "preaching" about keeping emotion out of the decision process,
there may be times when emotion may be the one thing that will sway
your decision. In fact, emotion may actually be your primary motivator.
Emotion
As A Primary Motivator
When
I enlisted, I met several people who joined the military for primarily
emotional reasons. For instance, there was one who had immigrated to
the United States with his family. He lived very well here (better than
he could have ever hoped for in his home country), received a very good
education and genuinely loved the United States. In his words, he wanted
to pay something back to the country that had given him so much. His
way of doing that was to enlist in the military. He didn't base his
decision on the facts; he was motivated solely by emotion.
Use
Your Head for More Than a Hat Rack!
In
other cases, individuals because they want to keep a family tradition
alive. They joined because their fathers and grandfathers had joined,
and they wanted to follow in the footsteps of their forefathers.
The emotional reasons
people have for enlisting in the military are many and aren't necessarily
bad. However, as a word of caution, be very careful of making any "buying"
decision based on emotion alone.
"Excerpt
from the book Guide to Joining the Military, by Scott Ostrow (ARCO Press,
2001) used by permission. (Available for sale online and in book stores)"
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