4 Ways It Pays to Hire Veterans for Your Small Business

Nearly 250,000 service members transition out of the military every year. Could one of them be your small business’s next great hire? Providing job opportunities for veterans not only feels like the right thing to do (and earn you some nice tax credits), it's also a smart business move. Consider the qualities these candidates typically bring to the table:

Resourcefulness

Small business employees are often asked to do more with less. Service members are pros at this, as they are used to working with whatever resources they have out in the field to come up with viable solutions.

Grace under pressure

Adjusting to changes, evaluating circumstances, and making quick decisions are par for the course in military life. For these reasons, you can expect to see ex-military members remain calm and goal-focused (and help others at your small business do the same) when unexpected projects arise or when dealing with challenging clients.

Professionalism

Employers often report that veterans are among their most honest, dependable and productive employees. The work ethic these individuals developed in the military can translate easily to other environments.

Teamwork

Colleagues at small businesses depend on each other too much and work in too limited of quarters to not get along. In the military, operating as a cohesive unit means survival. The ability of veterans both to lead and to follow directions can improve dynamics at your small business.    

How to Recruit Veterans

Because they aren't used to searching for civilian jobs, military veterans might not be using the same channels as other job seekers. One way to target your search and get in front of job-seeking military veterans (and their spouses) is to post your jobs where they are most likely to find them.

Sites like RallyPoint, one of the largest military-focused online networks in the world, and Military Times, one of the nation's trusted, independent sources for news and information for military members, have career pages devoted specifically to veterans trying to make the transition to the civilian workforce.

If you have any military veterans on staff, enlist their help, and ask them (and offer incentives) for referrals. Employee referrals are one of the top sources of hire, and often lead to the most successful hires.

See how CareerBuilder and Google Cloud are connecting employers and military veterans.