Veterans Archives: Preserving the Stories of our Nations Heroes
In a world where storytelling has been our link to the past since the days of cave drawings, there exists a timeless tradition. It's the art of passing down knowledge, and for Military Veterans, it's a crucial piece of their legacy. Join us on the Veterans Archives Podcast, where we dive deep into the heartwarming and awe-inspiring stories of those who served, no matter when or where.
Here, Veterans get the chance to be the authors of their own narratives. Through guided interviews in a relaxed and safe environment, they paint their experiences with their own words and unique voices. The result? A memory card in a presentation box, a precious gift they can share however they please.
But that's not all. These stories find a secure home in our archive, a treasure chest of experiences for future generations to explore. The best part? It's all a gift to the Veteran – our way of saying thank you for their service.
Tune in to the Veterans Archives Podcast, where history, heroism, and heartwarming tales come to life.
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Veterans Archives: Preserving the Stories of our Nations Heroes
From College to Navy: Michael Spayde's Journey
In this candid and insightful conversation, Michael Spayde takes us through his remarkable journey from 1970s "country kid" to accomplished Navy veteran. Unlike many who enlist straight out of high school, Michael's path was anything but traditional—attending college, working civilian jobs, and finally joining the Navy Reserves at 28 years old.
With refreshing honesty, Michael recounts entering boot camp at 32 ("I was grandpa"), where his maturity gave him a unique perspective: "I knew the purpose of bootcamp. It was to break you down as an individual, build you back up as the team." Still, by day three, he found himself questioning his decision like everyone else. His story illustrates that military service isn't just for the young—sometimes life experience brings valuable perspective to service.
The heart of Michael's military career was his time as a Navy recruiter, where he developed a philosophy that continues to guide him today: "Forget quota, forget the numbers. Help the people. Why is that kid in your office today?" Through colorful stories of BB gun wars, challenging recruits, and leadership lessons, Michael reveals the human side of military recruiting rarely shown in recruitment ads. His approach—focusing on the person rather than the numbers—led to a successful 23-year career that continues to inform his work today.
Perhaps most valuable are Michael's insights into post-military transition. Despite his HR background and recruiting expertise, he faced 18 consecutive job rejections after retirement—a humbling experience that taught him how different civilian employment truly is. Now working with Operation Job Ready Veteran, he helps fellow veterans translate their military experience for civilian employers, crafting resumes that communicate their true value without military jargon.
Whether you're considering military service, currently serving, or a veteran facing transition challenges, Michael's story offers practical wisdom from someone who's navigated it all. His parting thought captures the essence of successful service: "The military has provided a life that I've always wanted. I used the Navy and got everything out of it that I wanted. Navy got everything out of me that they needed." If you're a veteran struggling with employment transition, reach out to Operation Job Ready Veteran to access the kind of support Michael provides.
Today is Monday, june 9th 2025. We're talking with Michael Spade, who served the United States Navy, so welcome, michael. Thanks. All right, good to see you again. It's been a little bit of time.
Speaker 3:It has been.
Speaker 1:I think it was like the snow was blowing or something the last time we talked. I think so. Yeah, I think so. Anyway, it's been a while, so let's just start out. You know kind of simple when and where were you born?
Speaker 3:Youngstown Ohio. I was born August 5th 1970.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you're a 70s, 80s kid, gen X, alright, so did you grow up in Youngstown?
Speaker 3:No, we actually moved. When I was in second grade, I think. We moved to Terre Haute, indiana. Okay, and what precipitated the move? Dad's job? He was in aluminum uh, in aluminum manufacturing okay, in uh in tarahote okay and uh, from there he was. I'm sorry he was in steel in youngstown and then aluminum in tarahote okay and then from there the aluminum plant shut down as well.
Speaker 1:So yeah, this was kind of a point in time for our country where those industries are really struggling, right, yeah, right. So tell me a little bit about what it was like to grow up in Terre Haute then.
Speaker 3:Redneck kid, yeah, with all my buddies. The school was actually pretty big, terre Haute North. We had about 800 in our grade, 800 graduating class, I think we started with 12. Okay, so it was a pretty big class, but it was. We were country, country kids.
Speaker 1:Yeah, did you so? Did you like go through school with, uh, like all the same people? Pretty much yes. So your friends, like from third grade on, were your friends for the most part? Yes, okay, do you have any brothers?
Speaker 3:and sisters, uh, sister, sister, three years younger. Okay, she, I mean, we don't really keep in contact. Yeah, so we're, I don't know, we just don't keep in contact, okay.
Speaker 1:Well, I won't ask about that then. How about that? That'll work. So what can you tell me about your parents? So your dad worked in the steel industry and then the aluminum industry.
Speaker 3:Yep, both my parents are still around, okay. Still kicking. My dad worked in the aluminum I'm sorry steel industry, then aluminum industry and then he went from there to service physical plant manager for schools. Oh okay, he went from, I think, Saginaw Valley State and then he moved to East Lake Ohio, so Cleveland area, and then from there he retired. So they're snowbirds now, yeah, yeah, so do they still have a he?
Speaker 1:retired, so they're snowbirds now. Yeah, yeah, so do they still like have a place up here in the north somewhere?
Speaker 3:There is that they have a house in Willoughby Well, a condo, three-story condo, and neither of them can go up or downstairs very well anymore. So I'm thinking this might be the last year they're probably going to sell it, probably looking for a ranch style, something or other. I'm trying to talk them into. Hey, why don't you guys come up here and just rent a house somewhere between here and Saginaw, which is where my sister lives? Yeah, halfway in between, why not? Yeah, that'd be perfect. They're only up here for five or six months, yeah.
Speaker 1:I have a lot of neighbors that are like that I don't see them until May. Yep, snowbirds, yep, snowbirds, yep, they're gone until whenever, yeah. So, uh, tell me a little bit about school.
Speaker 3:I want to back up with just a tiny bit school what was that like?
Speaker 1:going through school and it's the 70s and you know I think I joke with everyone like we drink out of the hose. We stayed out till whenever was that was like for you it?
Speaker 3:was exactly like that. So we I mean I can still taste the rubber from the hose every time I I'm watering I'm watering my garden right now and I turn that hose on. I'm like I still remember the taste. Yeah, it's awesome. Um. So, yeah, we drank a lot of uh hose water. Uh-huh, stayed out until dark. When the lights came on, we needed to be home right um road. I mean you know, I don't country kids. I mean I rode my bike everywhere. Um, we had BB gun wars, uh potato bazooka wars.
Speaker 3:I mean, we did all you know all the stupid things that we did. We rode bikes without helmets and you know, I'm sure my parents drank when they were pregnant and you know, yeah, turned out pretty okay, I think, yeah.
Speaker 1:You know it's funny when you talk about the bb gun fights and some people look at you like what you and I so did you guys do this, so um, I remember like I just had a daisy, like red rider bb gun right, had one of those, but then you had that. You always had that kid that had like the, the, the one that you pumped up like 20 times pump only yes okay, so you guys had the rule one pump only.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I remember those days I got curl in my slight pump pump. I want pump, just to make sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly was like dang it.
Speaker 3:That was more than one man.
Speaker 1:That's not fair so when you say you're a country kid, did you like live out in the country? Then is that?
Speaker 3:we actually, um it was. It was a neighborhood, um, just a small, you know neighborhood that was in the middle of the country. I think it was probably a cornfield. At one point we were surrounded by cornfields. I guess I've lived my life that way the whole time. From there I moved out and went to college, did that thing. My first house with my first wife was literally a neighborhood in the middle of a cornfield. That's what Potterville is, right, right, exactly. And then from there, sunfield. That's what Sunfield is. It's a big corn, you know. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Neighborhood in the middle of a cornfield. Oh exactly, and now I'm in Leslie Lots of corn. It's a neighborhood in the middle of a cornfield, so that's me yeah.
Speaker 1:So what, um? What did you go to college to do?
Speaker 3:I went to college initially to be a nurse okay went to purdue. Um, it was a lot of fun, most of which I don't remember, unfortunately. Um, that would explain why you're not a nurse. That would explain why I'm not a nurse and I realized that I don't care for blood that much. Yeah, um, so that wrapped. That was a whole year. Um moved back in with my parents, got my, got my stuff straight, yeah, and uh then went to, uh, went to Kalamazoo, went to Western for a little while. Okay.
Speaker 3:Decided to continue partying. Uh huh, um, got my act together again and finished up at Davenport. That was my first degree. Okay. Um and went to work. I was, uh, you know, in the civilian world um different office type jobs, uh huh, ended up in HR.
Speaker 1:Okay, and so how did the Navy fit into all this?
Speaker 3:Uh, my parents talked me out of joining the Marine Corps out of high school. Okay, I listened to them. Was it a good thing or?
Speaker 3:a bad thing it wouldn't have turned out the same. I mean, I wasn't ready, I didn't. I don't think I grew up until I was 25 or 26. I mean really, and I mean when I was 28,. I decided to actually, when I was 28, I was between jobs because SMNP, you know, we talked about that a little bit earlier.
Speaker 3:But uh, they, they'd moved me to Naperville and didn't didn't offer enough to make it worth the move, um, so at that time I was unemployed, um, I had applied to a human resources position that happened to be a blind ad from the Navy reserves. And I got a phone call from my recruiter, matt Wright, nc one, and uh, he said, why don't you come down, talk to me, okie, dokie, and talked to him a little bit and decided that, you know, now I had a chance, it was just a reserve, had a chance to join. And you know, now I had a chance, it was just a reserve. I had a chance to join and maybe do something that I missed doing when I was 18. Um, I did so. I was a reservist for, you know, about two years, okay, and my recruiter called me up and said, hey, we need a recruiter. Like, uh, hey, that's kind of what I do, and so interviewed and took it to your contract, okay, as a canvasser recruiter that's what they called it, canrec, and loved it.
Speaker 1:So a lot of guys I talked to, myself included, we all joined the military pretty early in life, but there was always, like that, one or two dudes at boot camp that were like 31 years old. Super old.
Speaker 1:They're so old, so you know I was, so I was in boot camp in 2002 so yeah, that's 32 years old yeah, in boot camp yeah, I was grandpa, okay, yeah, now I went to ocs when I was 38, so I get it, because you got to keep up with the young guys, sure. But so what, what was your? I mean, you've been on your own. You went to college, got your degree, did some partying, got married, but you pretty much got your life going. You've had a regular job and now you're a bootcamp. Like what was that all? What was that like?
Speaker 3:It was interesting, um, I know how to fold my underwear.
Speaker 1:I know how to.
Speaker 3:I knew how to you know, tuck my socks together and, you know, put them together in my drawers. Um it, it was interesting, it was, it was, I guess, I, I, I approached bootcamp from a different perspective from a you know a 10,000 foot perspective.
Speaker 3:Um, I knew the purpose of bootcamp. It was to break you down as an individual, build you back up as the team. I get it, I got it from day one. I, I, I knew that's what was going to happen. Going into it, right, um, about day three, I still said what the hell did I do? Um, and my locker was perfect every single time and it got tossed every single time. Um, you know it's what. I knew what the purpose was. Right, you had to play the game, had to play the game and that's what it was. It was a game, um, I helped everybody that I could, all the kids, because there were, like everybody else, um, so it was. You know it was an interesting time in my life. Yeah, interesting time.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think too that probably you're questioning your own judgment for those few days is probably a different type of questioning your own judgment. That I did when I went in at 19 or 18, right like I questioned my own judgment because I was, I hadn't had any experience yet, sure, but you had. But still, it's refreshing to know that even the old guys uh, questioned whether they're not.
Speaker 3:I think that's universal I think that's universal, I think everybody. I mean what? I mean, what did I know when I was 18? Yeah, I didn't know anything. I mean, you know, looking at, looking back at that, I mean I was partying girls. Yeah, I mean, that's pretty much my life from 18 to 28 now, were you married at the time you went to?
Speaker 1:I was to boot camp, okay, first one, all right, and you um, so you go to basic training. And then did you go to, like pensacola for, uh, recruiting school? I did, I was a recruiter, so okay yeah, I loved pensacola.
Speaker 3:Pensacola is an awesome place. Um, I enjoyed my time there every single time. Um, I went back for classifier school, so another four weeks down there. Um, a couple of different recruiter awards was presented down there to me. Um, I just I loved being down there. It was, it was an awesome base. I mean, you literally didn't have to go anywhere, right, um, except for the sushi place outside the back gate. Uh, can't remember the name of it, but blue angel rolls were awesome. Uh, I think it was soft shell crab.
Speaker 1:um, and then pensacola beach, of course, right, right. And there was all the bars down there too. I went. I was there in the late eighties, early nineties, okay, and uh, two things to go on my well, actually three things. One it was, hands down, probably one of the best assignments ever, which is great to be there.
Speaker 1:But two things happened when I was there. One is that I um, I ate barbecue from the exchange, okay, the exchange okay, and got sick, I like on a friday, and I thought I was gonna die all weekend, like I wondered what I had done in a previous life to make this happen to me. And I, because I got started getting sick at a bar and I'm not a big drinker, so it wasn't like I was drinking, it was this, yeah, so that happened. And then the other thing that happened, remember, you go to recruiting school and you had to like, do like speeches and things like that. You get up in front of your class and they critiqued you, right. So I got up in front of the class and I do my little speech and all I remember is one guy. One guy wrote on his critique how many times is this guy gonna check his fly to make sure it's? Because I must have been checking my fly every two seconds, I guess. Right, okay, so yeah, that was. That was my recruiting school experience.
Speaker 3:And what I remember, we had a couple of guys, uh, when I was in recruiting school, uh, that were over height and weight standards that way, um, myself included, I never made height or weight. I had to make tape, yeah. Um I made tape.
Speaker 3:I mean that's, I made tape. I mean that's, that's just. You know what I did. And uh, I remember having to PT as a group, all of us, because of these couple of guys, and uh, again, I mean I knew the purpose it was, it was a team effort and military, it's just. It's just what we did. Yeah, and we PT'd twice as long as we had to every single day, seven days a week. I think it was six weeks, yeah, it was awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we didn't. We didn't experience any of that. I was fit back in the day, sure, sure, fortunately, I guess so was everyone else in that class. So now, did you have kids? At this time, I have no biologicals.
Speaker 3:Okay, all right.
Speaker 1:So you, uh, you get done, you come back home and you start recruiting. Talk to me about what was that like for you.
Speaker 3:Oh, it was interesting. Um started recruiting as. Uh, when did I start? I started recruiting, I think my, I want to say February of 2004. Okay, when I started, um, I was at the research center in Lansingansing, saginaw and Marshall Street, I think. Yeah, right there at the corner. Yep, the Quonset Hut. Yep, it's a National Guard recruiting office now. It used to be the Naval Reserve Center for Lansing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and at one time, because I grew up down the street from there. At one time it was like a Marine Corps.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was Navy and Marine Corps. Yeah, okay, because the Marines way better than the Navy staff. I had a lot of fun. Matter of fact, I just met, reconnected, with the supply sergeant that retired back in 2009. Yeah. It was a supply sergeant at the Reserve Center, the guy that I hung out with regularly. How cool is that. And it was, you know, in my work today I just I, you know, blind, blind dad, or blind email contact, Uh-huh, and he calls me and he's like hey yeah, it's like ask me who I was, ask me my name.
Speaker 3:He's like did you by any chance work at, uh, at the reserve center? So, as a matter of fact, I did, you know, from 2000 and you know, four to 2000,. You know well, I actually had had to move to the recruiting office, and on the South side, but, um, but it was, it was the same guy, and so we reconnected. Um, we needed some help with the work that I do now. Um, and we ended up meeting at the gun range. So I figured you know, Marine, I need to shoot.
Speaker 3:Maybe he still shoots and he's like oh yeah, I got two new ones, I got to try them out. Perfect timing. So we met up there. We had actually middle of the afternoon, we were there by ourselves, probably a two-hour conversation Get reacquainted.
Speaker 1:Did you find, though, that like it was just easy. Like I run into guys I haven't seen in 10 years and it's like just pick up.
Speaker 3:There's nothing, we just go yeah, and it seems like that with almost everybody I deal with and my work is veterans. So you know, and that's. It's easy to talk to people. There's no icebreakers. It's like you know, have a hat on or you know know a shirt, or you know it's. It's just, I go have a conversation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean regardless of what branch of service, kind of all speak the same language.
Speaker 3:It doesn't matter. I think at this point, it doesn't matter. Yeah, you know, we, we all went through the same thing it. It doesn't matter what branch you were in, we all got broke down, we all got built up. And again, hindsight, looking back, it's at least for the Navy, and I assume it's the same with all the branches. But as you progress through the ranks, you are required to be a leader. That's you know. You are required to be a leader. Yeah, that's, that's you know. You're required to be a leader. You know, in my work today, what I find is the folks who got out early are the ones who have the most problems. Yeah, in their, in their careers, in their career path.
Speaker 1:Well, if you think about it too. So we're going to talk about what you do today. But you know we'll put a pin in that. But you know the statistics are pretty crazy. That like 50% of the people who get out of the military leave their first job within the first year, I would agree, and then 75% total leave before the second year. Because it's not the. The civilian world is not the same as military.
Speaker 1:I agree, and especially if you got out after not serving a whole lot of time Sure Right, because I don't think you had that time to develop as a leader. You're still again.
Speaker 3:Just an observation from a guy that's been there and done that.
Speaker 3:In the Navy. You really don't get into a leadership position until you're an E4, the officer, third class. Then you might have a little workstation, a couple of people, um, but from there it just progresses, progresses. Through your career, you know, and however long you serve, you know by the time you get out you've you've had all of the experience that you need to be successful and if you did it right if you have, you know if you did it right, you're going to come out, you're going to be successful.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and we'll get into that. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So you, you did the recruiting gig for a few years. Um, anything stick out in your mind about recruiting, like I mean, I've got a million stories. I'm not going to share mine, cause this is your story, but yeah, anything like stick out in your mind while you were doing recruiting, do the like. When you think back, that's what you think about.
Speaker 3:Oh, nothing in particular there's. I mean it was. It was a lot of fun. Yeah, you know, looking back at it, um, it was a lot of hours, a lot of days, a lot of people. Yeah, um, yeah, it was. It's just, you know, like different things. You know, I I lost, um, I lost one of my recruits, a female uh, because she was pregnant. She tested positive for a pregnancy test at maps and I worked out of Lansing, so you know I had Lansing MAPS, so it was never. There was never windshield time.
Speaker 3:It was like cool, drop her off you know, hey, but you know, hey, you know, uncle, you know, grab, grab your girl, drop her off, grab your you of it next Sunday. Yeah, um, but I didn't. I couldn't even make it from the office to maps. My boss was on the phone. What's going on?
Speaker 3:Uh well, she tested positive. This is your fault. Yeah, uh, excuse me, this is your fault. How's it my fault, chief? How's it my fault? I didn't have sex with her Right. My fault, chief. I was at my fault. I didn't have sex with her right. It's your fault. You should have had to. You should have had to talk about birds and bees. That's fraternization, chief. I would have gotten trouble for that too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, fix it, it's a catch-22 fix it?
Speaker 3:how am I gonna fix it? It was, that's, that's one of the, that's one of the memories. Um, right, just just things like that. Just, you know different recruits. Um, got a got a pair of brothers, uh-huh, from holt area, still in contact with their mother. Uh, both are doing well. Um, I've had several individual like I are. I guess we're moving into work, so yeah, so you so.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you got out. Are you so? Were you still married at this time then? Or yes, okay, yes. So you stayed married right up through the time you got out of the navy just before.
Speaker 3:So okay with my second wife okay so I had. I had two wives during my my 20 years, 10 years each okay, so I've been married for 20 years. Starter wives yeah, something like that, exactly. Yeah, we won't go there. Okay, so you get out and years 10 years each. Okay, so I've been married for 20 years. Starter wives yeah, something like that, exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we won't go there. Okay, so you get out and what do you do?
Speaker 3:I work with veterans doing career services, so um anything employment related. Uh, that's what I do for veterans. Okay.
Speaker 3:My specialty. What I really enjoy is professional profiles. So give me your resume, let's, let's get it working. So do you help demilitarize package? No, I don't want to do that. That's not, that's, that's not my mission. Okay, my mission is to get you a job. Okay, my mission is to not not let me rephrase my mission is to. But I get them prepared to get there themselves. So every tool that I have available is in their toolbox now. Okay.
Speaker 1:All right, and this is a operation job ready. Veteran. That is correct.
Speaker 3:Yep Based out of Indianapolis. Uh, we're actually 16 people now Um, all veterans, well, all veterans, except one spouse, veteran spouse or army spouse. Okay, so, active duty army spouse, so, um, but yeah, it's all right, it's a great organization.
Speaker 1:How long have you been doing this?
Speaker 3:Uh, I started January 22nd, 23. Okay, oh, 24, 24. I'm sorry 24. Okay, oh, 24, 24. I'm sorry, 24. So my retirement date for the Navy was February 29th. I was on terminal leave. My goal was when I started the retirement process. My goal was to have a job working before I actually got off the roles for the Navy.
Speaker 1:Now let me ask you a question Do you think that your time looking for a job after getting out of the Navy helped you in how you work with people now?
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely it's, it's fresh, it's right there. Um, you know my, my attitude, coming from recruiting. I've been doing this, I've been doing this stuff for 25 years. It's a piece of cake. I get.
Speaker 3:I get me a job right now. Um, that's, that was the attitude I mean that's. You know I started in six months out. So the I think it was September. You know September 1st is when I started. You know, my career search for the, for the. What am I going to do next? Right, um, you know it was uncertain. I, you know I didn't know. You know I, I, I'm six months out and my, my, my background's HR. You know, my background is HR. I can't approach a civilian employer six months out. I can't. It doesn't make sense. So I just started looking for state jobs. I figured state jobs. It's going to take at least three or four months and then, if, transparency, my retirement date is here, everything should be fine.
Speaker 3:18 interviews with the state of Michigan. Wow, 18 interviews, 18 denial letters. Yeah, it's awesome. Um, it was an attitude check. Um, I went back and looked. I talked to some friends, very good friends uh, that are in the HR industry and, uh, one of my some friends very good friends that are in the HR industry and one of my closest friends. Her name's Ellen. She's like that interview you went on. Did you own the room when you walked in? Of course, I did. That's what I do. Can't do that. Oh yeah.
Speaker 3:Just, you know, I forgot about it, it was check, check the attitude. You know you don't run the room, you answer the questions right, you know, and you do. You know, you, you be honest, be transparent. Um, my job search was very, um, very restrictive because of things that I wanted or didn't want. Yeah, Um, I've been driving, you know, for the, for my professional career. I've been driving, you know, for the for my professional career. I've been driving to and from work, hours, hours, hours of driving. I didn't want to drive more than 10 miles. Well, living in Leslie, I mean Lansing, right, Jackson, yeah, you know, no more than that type of a commute.
Speaker 1:You don't want to be in Livonia or Grand Rapids or someplace like that.
Speaker 3:No, been there, done that. Yeah, um, I I actually at one point in my career, um, I, I lived in Potterville and I, I, I drove to St Joe, I worked at Whirlpool for manpower and that was 107 miles, one way, 365 days, Um, and it worked. I got an offer for one of my contractors, uh huh, so that wascom, so that wascom boom and, uh, unfortunately bust, right, um, so what goes up must come down. You got it. We never had a product.
Speaker 3:We never had a product Right. It was always, you know, getting the money, getting the cash and hiring new people to do something and we just didn't have the product Right.
Speaker 1:As close to a Ponzi scheme as you can get without being illegal. Yes, yes, yeah, well, I mean you can sell an idea.
Speaker 3:Yes, you can.
Speaker 1:And as a former recruiter you probably knew I mean when you're recruiting you are selling an idea, right.
Speaker 3:I mean it's not a tangible product. We're going to go into a whole thing at this point, I think, with that question. Um, when I decided to leave smmp because you know, again, we discussed it, but you know, the moving to naperville wasn't wasn't an option for us um, I was looking for a new job. It was frustrating. Um, yeah, I was a recruiter, I was an HR, you know, an HR generalist, basically for SMMP, um, and that's the kind of job I was looking for, um and I. I had an interview I think it was with career builder as a matter of fact, I don't think they're around anymore, but it was a. It was a career, uh, like, like monstercom, yeah.
Speaker 1:Monster or what is it. There's a bunch of them out there.
Speaker 3:There are a bunch of them now, all those places, but the, uh, the. The interview was for a salesman position and I didn't realize that when I went and quickly realized that's what I was interviewing for, during the interview I went home and I was bummed out. It's already been months that I've been unemployed again by my choice and talking to my wife my ex she sat me down and she's like look, dude, you are a salesman, that is what you do. And it was literally an epiphany. It was like holy cow, that is my life, that's what I do. I didn't like it because in my head I was an HR guy. Yeah, um, I embraced it and I mean at this point I try not to sell because that's my entire everything. Right, you know it's, it's part of who I am. You know, in the sense of urgency, you know my, my sense of urgency is stresses me out. It stresses me out Sometimes stresses other people out too, doesn't it?
Speaker 1:It does, yeah, and again.
Speaker 3:That's you know the, the, the recruiters. In the current work that I do, I've spoke with many recruiters. You know very similar backgrounds or just you know that was our last duty station or career recruiters. And it was one of the things I asked him like how you know, were you successful as a recruiter? Because you know recruiting is it's it's it's a tough gig. Yeah, you know it's. It's not the job for most people it's just a three-year tour. I think for, at least for the Navy, it was a three-year tour. Um, I had more trouble with employees than success with employees and it wasn't a leadership issue, it was they're not cut out for this job and you can't hire them, you can't fire them, you just have to deal with them and try to do the best you can with what you have. You can't fire them, you just have to deal with them. Right.
Speaker 3:And try to do the best you can with what you have. We figured out how to do it, but it was tough. It was tough and the realization that I'm a salesman. That's my profession. I can put any kind of word on an HR guy. I can. I can, I can put that on there, you know, but I'm still selling a company.
Speaker 3:You know the Navy, you know as a recruiter, you sell. You know as as any, any branch, I mean you, you, you sell. You're trying to sell to a 17, 18 year old kid a concept that most people in today's world have never even heard of from their family. They have no idea or their guidance counselor or whoever. Right, with the guidance counselors, they didn't want military, they wanted everybody to go to college. That's how they got scored. That's how they got scored. It was dealing with. My entire career in the Navy has been millennials and Zs. Yeah, you know, and they just didn't have generally, they just didn't have the wherewithal to figure out. You got to do something. Yeah, what do you? I mean you flip burgers all your life. This is what we offer. This is how we can help. This is what we do. You can pick any job, any job that's in the civilian world. I can tell you the job equivalent in the United States Navy.
Speaker 1:And it's the same job.
Speaker 3:Exactly the same Recruiting is recruiting Cranking a wrench on a diesel engine. It's called an engine Out there, it's called a diesel mechanic. If you play your cards right, you can get your certification paid for by the Navy. You can walk out with a job in two weeks making 60, 70 bucks an hour.
Speaker 1:Or the trades any trade anything, well, and the catch was, though, you couldn't like, you didn't know what they were going to, what was going to be available, what they qualified for Right, that is.
Speaker 3:So you had to you really had to walk that line about don't sell a job. Selling a job, right, don't sell a job. I mean back back. You said you're recruiting in what the, the, the early nineties. Yeah.
Speaker 3:That was, that's still. You know, in the early nineties, what did they call the recruiting manual? I couldn't, I couldn't even tell you. When I joined and started recruiting, at some point on our I don't know third or fourth revision of our recruiting manual, um, my boss told me I don't know if it's true or not, I didn't, you know, I just thought it was funny. Um, the recruiting manual manual used to be called the arts and crafts of recruiting. Probably was, and that is one of the. You know. You asked about memories. That was one of my memories. You know, the arts and crafts of recruiting. Um, all the arts and crafts that we did, yeah, I mean there was a lot.
Speaker 3:I'm not gonna lie like I didn't even look at the recruiting I mean to take the tests yeah, yeah, you know, in recruiting school, but right running, you know, running the station, every now and again I did have to look, look things up. Yeah, you know, just just as a reference, um, but the arts and crafts of recruiting, it's one of the memories that will always stick out for me.
Speaker 1:Got to find that book on eBay.
Speaker 3:So true, we did lots of arts, we did lots of crafts, lots of talking, babysitting, yeah.
Speaker 1:Did you find that like? So I recruited right outside of central Michigan.
Speaker 1:And lots of kids would stop in Sure Right, lots of them. And what I found was I kind of played would stop in Sure Right, lots of them. And what I found was I kind of played the long game, like you got to play the short game, because it's always about what did you do lately? Yes, just like you might have recruited seven people, but you had that one person who showed up pregnant, yep, and now you're down one person and they don't care what you do.
Speaker 3:You're a shit bag. Yeah, yeah, you on one person and they don't care what you do. You're a shit bag. Yeah, yeah, you, you. You put six people in. It's the 15th of the month, you lose one. Yeah, and you're a shit bag.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, so you start over Master Chief's tapping on your desk and, yeah, the whole, the whole nine yards. So, yeah, it's. It's a very weird. If you look at people who are in sales car sales, insurance sales, whatever it's the same thing, you know. Yeah, you sold 20 cars last week, right. How many did you sell this week? We don't care about this, Right, cause that's all money in the bank now. But, yeah, so I, so you would. I would play the long game and then what I was getting at to them because I knew that there was probably 50% of them are going to be back, sure, right, because they've all been sold on college. College is a great place. I got my degree, but it is not for everyone when they're 18.
Speaker 3:I agree.
Speaker 1:And just like the military is not for everyone when they're 18, there should be a balance, but these kids are sold on it. They get to college and like, oh my God, I can't do this, which is what I did and then they come back and then they're that. At that point it's like shooting fish in a barrel. Sure, because they're ready, you don't even have to, you don't have to sell them anymore, because they're ready to go have a seat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, or that or like. Did you ever get that like that one kid who spent all of his dad's money not on college and he had to go somewhere really quick?
Speaker 3:I did quick, quick ships. Yep, get out of here, why my dad's gonna kill me, why, why do you have to get out of here? Um, right, what? What also got me a lot in in recruiting was people just didn't believe you. Yeah, when you said, or ask the question when's the last time you smoked? When's the last time you were arrested? Two questions you realize we're going to do a drug test. You can't beat it. Right, you can't beat it. I don't care what you did, I need 30 days clean. You got it, got it. You sure Got it Next day. You got positive. Clearly, he didn't get it.
Speaker 3:Or you know, the next day, hey, you guys got an FBI hit. You need to get fixed. Yeah, so an FBI hit. Is there? There's a criminal record of some sort somewhere. They've had their fingerprints taken. You know in the way that we introduce this to our candidates. You know again, you, you can't, you can't beat this drug test. If you used it, it will be there. Do you ever have your fingerprints taken? Ever, not as a kid, like for missing persons, but as from a police department. Have you ever had your fingerprints taken? No, all right, cool, you sure Cool. I had an FBI hit yeah. So when that happens you have to fix it. Can it be fixed? Can you get a waiver for it, or is it not waverable that month Right Are?
Speaker 1:waivers. Is this a felony or is this a misdemeanor?
Speaker 3:Right Even sometimes a felony, we could work with Right. Every now and again, sometimes not. Sometimes, yes, so it's really you know those were used. I think those requirements they were used to up the applicants or reduce the applicant levels.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like a throttle.
Speaker 3:Right, yeah, right.
Speaker 1:Exactly correct. Yeah, and did you. So we had this really crazy rule like if you smoke dope like once or twice, that's cool, but if you like smoked it five times in your lifetime, you were an addict and you couldn't join.
Speaker 3:They, they, they, they up the up, the, they, they up the usage, um, they, they called it 10. Um, in my time, um, so it was the magic number, up to 10 times Um, you can get a waiver. Well, just just to our hq, right from 11 to 100, I think it went to our regional and then I think, over 100, like 101, it actually had to go to the admiral of cnrc. So commander navy recruiting, right, um, you know. So you know. Somebody admits it's like okay, how many times I don't know you gotta have a.
Speaker 3:Have a number, brother. Give me a number, give me any number you tell me. I usually preface that with if it's any more than 10, it's going to take a long time, yeah, so how many times did you smoke it? Nine times, roger, that. Make sure you keep that number in mind, right, because you're going to be asked 12, 12 more times today.
Speaker 1:Don't say 15 or 20 later on, or 100. Or I don't remember.
Speaker 3:Right, pick a number and stick with the number.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, and that was something else too is well, two things really. One is that as a recruiter I know a lot of them did but as a recruiter, you cannot rely to an applicant.
Speaker 3:Right, correct.
Speaker 1:Now I would preface that with I'm not going to answer questions. You didn't ask, right? But anything you ask me, I'm going to tell you the truth, yep. And if you decide not to join because I told you the truth, that's fine, because I'd rather do that than have you come back and tell all your friends I'm a liar, because now I'm done.
Speaker 3:Now you're a dirtbag. Yeah, referrals in this, in this business, in sales, I think in in any any kind of a sales, you know career referrals or referrals or money, you know you piss one person off, they're going. It's just, you know, just like the bad. You know that that restaurant, you know, you, you have a bad experience. You're going to tell 10 people If you have a good experience, you might tell one, maybe, right, you know, and those referrals are, are that's, that's money, that's that's how, that's how our life was made easier. You know, somebody told somebody that they had a good experience and that person comes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Especially if they come like right home from bootcamp and bring their friends in.
Speaker 3:that's like gold, it's gold.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Cause. They're like fresh from bootcamp and they're not complaining and they're all Navy, and they're all.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, oh yeah, all patriotic, and yeah it's, it's awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Michael told me everything I. There was no surprises when I got there.
Speaker 3:It's. It's funny that you mentioned that. Uh, same thing. You know, I honestly I don't not gonna. I don't think I lied to anybody. Yeah, um, I tried not to. Um, I never. You know, I've never been on a ship, so you know it's something that I've never admitted to. Nope, never been on a ship. But you know, redirect, yeah, you know, redirect that, redirect that way, um, it is the navy. If you have, you're going to go on a ship, more than likely, right, unless you're my buddy from Eaton Rapids who wanted to be on a ship.
Speaker 3:His whole reason for being on a ship, joining the Navy, was being on a ship. He was in. He was in our delayed entry program for a long time. He was one of the good ones, yeah, but he chose aviation, which you should still be out. Building a ship, yeah, you should go to a carrier or something, but his platform were the AWACS. They don't land on ships, no, they do not. And he came back, I think, after his A school. He's like man, you guys killed me. It was my buddy's recruit. I'm like, what are you talking about? It's like you never told me I'd never be on a ship. What do you mean? I picked this platform and I can't ever go on a ship. I'm like, dude, you picked the platform yourself. We didn't do any research. It was a joke. He wasn't upset about it, right? Just you know, right, it's like I just didn't realize it. Um, and he ended up getting out, moved to colorado. I think he's a firefighter out there now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's a great example if you don't know what you don't know right like you get in and you start picking these different schools with different things to do, and sometimes it works out great and sometimes it's just a suck fest. Yep, exactly exactly correct.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I've had a. I've had nine people come back through the years that eight of them eight of those nine people, um, had good things to say thank you. You know it was a thank you. You, you know you, you took care of it. One of those nine people brought their son back after college and I ended up putting that person in as an officer candidate, which was awesome. People that I've worked with in the civilian world, that I stayed in contact with, brought me their kids. That's what not lying and being that recruiter can do for you. Yeah, you know, and and after the fact, it was always, you know I introduced myself, you know, as Michael Spada. You know, retired Navy recruiter. Yeah.
Speaker 3:That guy you know, so you know it's fun, you know it's fun, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I would say this too, like if you're listening to this and someone tells you oh, all recruiters are liars, or whatever it is, dig into that story a little bit. Oh sure, because nine times out of 10, there's a lot more to the story than what that person's telling you.
Speaker 3:There is, yeah, there is the one person that came back. I can't remember his name, but I remember he actually came to MEPS. I was working at MEPS at the time, I was a job classifier. Um, and he came, and you know, he came into the, into the office. It was before, you know, all the security protocols are that they have in place now. Um, he came in he had pinpoint pupils and it's like how many, how many Norcos did you take today? Um, you know, or something, right, that's what that's first thought that came to my mind. So, how many Norcos did you take today? Um, you know? Brief conversation. It's like, yeah, the Navy screwed me. I'm like, oh, really, how Well, my doctor got me hooked on on these Norcos. Navy doctor, navy doctor, really, okay, I've had a lot of navy doctors in my life. I got a flexerol and a napperson, right, nothing more than a flexerol and napperson. Here you go, you'll be fine if you're in.
Speaker 3:If you're in the army, you got uh ibuprofen napperson, napperson on my side, but you know, so you know, digging into that story. Yes, you know, there's, there's, there was obviously something going on there. Yeah, um, and, and I would agree, you know bad, bad experiences, you know. I, I, I hear about it still today.
Speaker 1:You know, had experiences in the civilian world too. Absolutely, you have terrible employers and you have terrible bosses, and absolutely that's going to happen, no matter where you go. Right, it's called life, yeah. Yeah, to me, the great thing about being in the military was you had a job like you were guaranteed a job.
Speaker 3:You have a job that you can't get fired from unless fraternization, right Drugs, dui, or you know Right Drugs, dui, or you punched your someone. You had to do something, something seriously messy. Yeah, we weren't at will, which is one of the most important items in my reasoning for joining and staying with the Navy. Every employer in the civilian world is at will for the most part, right. What's that will employment? I?
Speaker 1:I can get fired for any reason or no reason at all if I don't like your shirt or I don't like the way your glasses look, or yeah you're done.
Speaker 3:Have a nice day. Um, that was the contract in the civilian world, the contract with us. Do your job.
Speaker 1:Yeah, don't do anything stupid, do your job you know it's funny, I, when I got out of the military, I actually learned a lesson about the military from a guy who'd never been in the military. But what he told me was I went into a sales job for a little while and what he said was do the things you know you need to do and don't do the things you know you're not supposed to do, and you'll be successful. Agree, I was like that kind of sums up my military experience Right, exactly, correct. And if I go above and beyond, then the rewards are there. You know I'm not going to go to overtime pay or anything like that, just chest candy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, you know ribbons and you know awards and medals and you know that's. You know whatever. You know my, my, I had a secure, you know I had a secure opportunity. You know, in in the field that I was already you know that was my field.
Speaker 3:It was a human resources, you know, and I looked at it, as I basically have a quarter of a century of work available to me today, the only thing I have to do is do that job and don't do anything stupid. You know it sounds. It sounds easy. It was unbelievably difficult for so many people, unbelievably difficult, and the only thing you had to do was don't do drugs, don't drive while you're drinking, keep your wiener in your pants. That's it.
Speaker 1:And don't talk back most of the time, right.
Speaker 3:That's all you got to do, not do, right? Whether it's for two years or 22 years or 32 years, it doesn't matter, right? You know that's.
Speaker 1:That's what the military offers well, and you make it through your enlistment. Those simple lessons will make you successful in the civilian world right because so many people in civilian jobs just can't get it right, you know, especially today. Yeah, you successful in the civilian world Right Because so many people in civilian jobs.
Speaker 3:just can't get it right, you know especially today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you bring in a military person. So this is something I ran into um at consumers energy, as the as the um, as the um veterans program manager, was that I worked with veterans coming in because you have the veteran mindset and there's some things that you need to turn off because you have that veteran mindset and there's some things that you need to turn off, Sure, Right. But then also I worked with hiring managers, because all those things that they hire you for, they get mad at you for too. I agree, Like if someone tells you to go do something, they better be clear, because you're going to go do it Right and, in the absence of orders, you're going to do it the way you think it should be done, Exactly. So don't get mad at me if you didn't tell me what you needed and so that was some of the training that civilian supervisors needed was you bring in a military guy gal. They're going to do. We ask them to do. Make sure you're asking for what you want Exactly.
Speaker 1:Exactly I agree, yeah, so it really kind of ties in with what you're doing, what you're doing. Now back to a question I asked before um, I don't know that I asked it correctly when I said so do you help demilitarize their resumes? And I think what I was asking was you know, um, when I got out I'm like, oh, I was 95, bravo, and I was xyz this and pdq that, and people would look at that and they would just throw it in the trash bin because they didn't understand.
Speaker 3:It didn't understand. So the answer to your question, now that that I understand it, is yes, absolutely, I thought it was. Are you demilitarizing the veteran?
Speaker 1:Oh.
Speaker 3:God, no. The answer is no, no. I like to think of it more as translations. Yeah, I'm not demilitarizing your resume. I want that employer to know you are a veteran. Yeah, absolutely, 100%. You are a veteran. First thing, you know your name.
Speaker 3:Navy veteran. You know, or you know whatever, um, you know secret, you know clearance, your, your clearance options, your, your department of defense clearance, your security clearances those are, you know, items that are huge in the civilian world. Whether you still have it or you used to have it, it's huge, but it's just a translation from what you did in the military into civilian terms. So people like me in my position as an HR person at that company you're applying to understands what you're trying to tell them. Yeah, again, going back to helping civilians become sailors, you know my, my biggest sale this, you know, this is what I counted on. What do you want to do with your life? You know, yes, you want to party. Yeah, you want to get hitched. Yes, all that, yes, all that.
Speaker 3:What do you want to do in your life, like when you're an adult? You know, like, uh, sometimes it's like a career, you know, let's spell it out for him. Sometimes, right, um, you know, most didn't really know. I mean, I, I know I, I couldn't have answered that question when I was 18. You know, I did. I was gonna be a nurse. Didn't quite work out. I was gonna say that turned out like, like a polar opposite yeah um, um, but you know, that's, that's something that you know.
Speaker 3:What are you going to do? Okay, so you know, and what did you do in the? You know in the military, you know, if I don't know, you know acronyms and you know the other branch of the service. You know, I, I, you know, I have to learn what you did so I can translate it for you. So you know, you can work in the civilian world, um, so, yes, that's something that I focus on.
Speaker 1:Well, and you find, do you find too? Like, so you, this was something I think that people struggle with sometimes is that, yeah, I might've done, I might've, I might've been a recruiter in the Navy, as an example, but I was a first class petty officer, I was a chief, right. So I do have the HR background, but here's all the things, the leadership things that a chief did, or all the leadership things that a petty officer, first class did, and sometimes employers don't understand that either.
Speaker 1:Right. I mean, yeah, if I retired as a colonel, right, you're not going to hire me as a vice president because I need to understand your business. But those leadership things that I learned as a colonel or, you know, a full bird captain or whatever it is, applies, yeah, those count, right, it applies.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just like, if you're vice president, we're not going to bring you in the military, you know as the captain of a ship right, but we're going to know that you have the skillset to learn what we do and then eventually do that Sure, and I think that sometimes that gets lost in translation as well. Is that something you work?
Speaker 3:on it does I've. I've got several officers that are, you know, retired officers. Or you know I was an officer in the military officers, um, their mindset's different. You know I was, I was enlisted. Um, you know I never had an. You know I had, yes, I had a degree when I came in. Wasn't wasn't my mission.
Speaker 3:Um, I didn't want to go through all that, you know waivers, going through this and that and the other thing, and it was a lot of fun. I wanted to work. My mindset is not 10,000 foot looking down, it's meat and potatoes. That's my background. When I was a kid, that was meat and potatoes. That's what I wanted to do. That's what I wanted to do and continue doing.
Speaker 3:But officers are different. There's a different outlook, a different look on um, but officers are different. There there's a. There's a difference um, different outlook, a different. I think look on the world, you know, and it's, it's a, it's a 10 000 over. Oh, you know it's 10 000 foot overview. You know they're again, generally, you know, in general, um, you know good, bad, different there's, it's know, it's just different.
Speaker 3:Yeah, um, obviously dealt with a lot of officers and you know, in my years in the Navy, um, most are pretty decent. I mean, I've had worse luck with chiefs than I had with with most of the officers that I worked with. Um, they're a different breed. That's a different breed too, um, you know, but the the translation for officers is a little more in-depth than most enlisted folks. Enlisted folks here's a list. Boom, here you go. I think a lot of what officers do. It's a lot of putting together a lot of theoretical information that would go on that, on that, on those profiles, on that resume, um, I don't think I explained that properly, but that's well, I think so I served 14 years enlisted in the.
Speaker 1:in my last seven years I was an officer and, um, I think the difference, if I boiled it down to my experience, was that at the, when you're an officer, you're at the strategic level yes, and when you're enlisted, you're at the execution level tactical, yeah, yep, so. So if you were enlisted and then an officer, a lot of those strategic decisions you make are tempered by the fact that you had to execute those at some point, exactly correct, whereas if you were just an officer, your whole career, you don't have have that knowledge of how this is going to impact. I won't say you don't. A lot of them don't have the understanding of how this impacts the boots on the ground.
Speaker 3:The officers who were previous enlisted, those were the good ones. Yeah, in my experience working for officers, those were the ones they knew. You know, in my experience working for um, you know, working for officers, those, those were the ones you know. They they knew you know, especially in recruiting. I mean, recruiting is it's just a tough business, you know, it's all there is.
Speaker 1:It's the toughest job you'll ever like.
Speaker 3:Is what I, what I tell people If you liked it or if there there's nothing in between, right, you either love it or you hate it, that's true. There's nothing, there's all right. No, there's no. Uh, there are no fence sitters. Yeah, it's, it's, it's it's, they're, they're, they're polar opposite. Yeah, you know, you love it or you hate it. Um, you know, but those officers, even if they never served in a recruiting role, they, they understood, you know, they understood that. You know that that lansing station, you know south, south lansing, it's not, it's over by wal now, but that station, the only Saturday we had off was the first Saturday of the month, that's it.
Speaker 3:We worked every other Saturday. It was just that's what we did 60 to 75, 80 hours a week. That's what we did. A lot of the guys that came from the fleet didn't realize that, yeah, culture shock. Didn't realize. You know they're, they're, they're detailer and you can get home and see people with your family. I can, I can get you, you know, I can you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, your folks live in Traverse City. I can get you to. I can get you to Lansing. I can get you to Lansing right now as a recruiter. Okay, cool, that's, you know there's, there's.
Speaker 1:You're never going to go to Traverse City, though.
Speaker 3:You're, you're, you're not going to be in Traverse City, it's, you know it's full. Yeah, Um, you know. And then they sit down and they realize I'm working twice is what I used to do in my old job and I don't understand anything. I have to learn an entirely new job, you know. I have to learn an entire new way to live my life, you know, and that didn't bode well for most people that came into recruiting.
Speaker 1:And I you know, I think that's where the where there's a I'm going to call it a mistake is that. You know, I came from the fleet. I was a fire controlman, had no idea what I was getting into when I became a recruiter, but I loved it and I was good at it. I'm not bragging on myself, but I was good at it. I excelled at recruiting, I think because I loved it. But a lot of guys, like you said, would come in and be like holy crap one, I'm not good at this, I suck, and there's no amount of training you're going to give that guy to make him good, because he's just not good at it Not a people person Right.
Speaker 1:We should give them the option to go back to the fleet or go do something else. But we force them to stay in recruiting and they don't belong there. And that's the only thing I'll say about the military is like once you're there, you're kind of stuck and hopefully it's a fit. Now I didn't see a lot of people where whatever they did wasn't a fit, because I think they do a pretty good job of fitting people with jobs that match who they are. But recruiting is a whole different.
Speaker 3:It's beast when it comes to the opposite of that. Yes, it is a station commander. I ran the station in Lansing from four to nine 2004, 2009. Um, I think I had five or six recruiters. Um, I would say three of those recruiters were worth anything. Yeah, one of those recruiters was a negative in the office. Um tried to get him reassigned several times. Um it, it wasn't. It wasn't an option. It wasn't an option.
Speaker 1:It wasn't a possibility.
Speaker 3:It was an incumbent on you to make sure he was successful, and how do I make him if I've got myself two recruiters that are successful and one that is literally an anchor in making our job more difficult? What do I do with this person? You are the driver. All you got to do do brother, don't worry about it take them there and pick them up and then just give them one every month and don't talk to them. Don't talk to them. All I need you to do is drive these guys, drive them to the motel, take them from MEPS and take them home. That's all you got to do. For that. You'll get one contract a month every month. That's all you got to do. For that. You'll get one contract a month every month. That's all you got to do.
Speaker 3:My guys were successful. He got his one contract, which kept HQ off of his ass. All my guys made gold. Most months. My guys made gold and I was able to deal with that one issue, you know. And then you know you have mediocres. You know people who were eh, they're okay, you know they can at least you know get one most months. You get one contract. So get one person in the Navy, get that one. So it was a difficult it was difficult.
Speaker 1:Just see, that's where real leadership comes in. Right, if I'm not a leader, I'm just going to try and force that round peg into that square hole every month and it's just never going to fit. But as a leader, you were like okay, this guy has a skillset, he can drive a car. Sure, right, let's let him drive a car.
Speaker 3:This is a diesel mechanic actually, but yeah, you know what I mean, like drive a car.
Speaker 1:you can drive a car. He can't talk to people and we don't want him to do that, right, but also we don't. You know he's not going anywhere, you know. So as a leader, you saw, you were able to kind of mix things up and and get things done. And the thing is he probably wasn't an anchor because he wanted to be, or was he?
Speaker 3:He, he, I don't think that was his, his, his initial Right, um, I think at the end he was. He was very frustrated. Yeah, um, it was. It was difficult from you know, from from a you know, from a leadership standpoint. My office wasn't successful if I had a recruiter that didn't put somebody in the Navy, if everybody put somebody in the Navy, even if we don't make a goal, if everybody put somebody in the Navy, we're not getting in trouble. We still have Saturday off. Yeah, somebody in the Navy, we're not getting in trouble. We still have Saturday off. You know, and our, our bosses, you know, our chief is is, is on somebody else's ass today. Um, you know, because tomorrow is tomorrow and you haven't done anything for me tomorrow yet.
Speaker 3:Right Um so yeah, it was. You know it's difficult. It was difficult Um learning experience. Absolutely, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 1:I get that. So, um, so now you're working um with operation job ready veteran. Can't say that enough, because I really appreciate the work that you guys do. Um, if someone is either fresh out of the military and looking for some help, or someone who maybe has been out for a while and is just kind ofering, um, how would they get in touch with you?
Speaker 3:Website. Okay, um, I, I, I've plastered the you know the mid Michigan area with you know everybody I know, right, Um, my business cards are out in town. Okay, but I hang out at places where I have, you know.
Speaker 3:I hang out at places where I have clients. I'm proud of what I do. I tell everybody this and I don't want people to take it the wrong way. I don't have a job, I just am doing what I do. I've been doing that for the last know, I think over 18 months. At this point, um, I'm getting a paycheck for it. Yeah, okay, you want to pay me? Cool, um, so I mean it's, it's, it's not work, it's just I get up. You know, I know I've got, you know I these certain things I got to do. You know for this, you know for this person, or this person, or my ex-wife, I did two cover letters for last week.
Speaker 3:You know we still hang out, but anyway, um, that's all right, you know, but she's army veteran, you know, works at uh, works at the uh prison on Ionia, um, you know she's. Yes, we still hang out, yes, we're still friends, we still share custody of our dogs, um, but the bottom line is, you know, it boils down to the fact that she's a veteran and she is, she's building her career with the state of Michigan and I respect it and I respect everybody that has went through what we went through. You know, whether it be you know, whatever you know, whatever you know, whatever that veteran sitting across the table for me has went through, we've, we've, we've been through something similar. Right, we all served, you know, and we don't have to break the ice. We just, you know, have a seat and you know even different branches of service right.
Speaker 3:You know, we just sit down and start talking. You know I'm, I'm not, I'm not a threat. I'm not asking you for money, I'm not asking employers for money, it's, it's there, there's, there's no cost, there's no cost, right which we're, we're, we're funded, we're funded by you know, we're funded by grants. You know, and and and you know, all of all this, this, this opportunity, has clicked every single box that I made when I was retiring, Even even a couple of boxes that I didn't know I was that I, that I had.
Speaker 3:Yeah, um, you know it's I, I. I don't have to drive anywhere if I don't want to. You know I don't have to drive anywhere if I don't want to. My office is on the bottom floor of my house as well. I've got everything I need to do my job, which is a phone and a computer, and me, my mouth. I get up in the morning and say how many people I got today.
Speaker 3:I go through and you know, look at my notes, or you know, if I've got to call people, if I got, you know, make that initial conversation, that initial phone call. You know, try and figure out what their goals are. You know I'm going to help you get there. I'm going to give you everything. I'm going to give you everything that I have to help you are, you know, a 21 year old kid just out of you know, just out of your first you know four year tour, or two year tour, or how many years you did, or retired, been out of the Navy, been out of the military. For you know, I've, I've got a couple of clients who are over 70. Yeah, you know they're, they don't need to work. You know one guy's working at, I think, ryder youder, doing just warehousing stuff. Why are you working? I sit around the house. Yeah. Okay, okay, I'll help you, I'll help.
Speaker 3:You know, that's what I do.
Speaker 1:So you, you know I love your story because it's a little bit different from most stories. Like most stories, it's school military. You know it's this progression and you kind of did it a little bit differently, but you've done a lot really. I mean, you served your country, you brought people into the Navy, not only serving the military, but also serving those folks because they're going to get something from all of that. And you're continuing to do that in what you do today, even after retirement from the Navy. Is there anything that we haven't talked about that you wanted to cover?
Speaker 3:Oh, the military is a fantastic option. It is a fantastic option, um, you can pick a branch and do pretty much exactly what you want to do, whatever that may be. You know you want to be a. You know you want to be a marine cool, be a marine. You want to be in the navy cool, what do you want to do? You want to be in there for cool, what do you want to do? You'll be in depo long time, um, um, you know, coast Guard. Good luck finding a recruiter, bro. Uh, you know, so it you know it.
Speaker 3:It it's an option, just like the trades, just like college. You, you've got options. You make the choice to go military. I mean, we've already talked about it You're not going to get fired unless you do something stupid and do your job, if done properly. We can, we can translate everything that you did in the military to civilian to make it look just like a job. Yeah, you know, because that's what it is. It's it that it was just a job, right, you know, look at it. You know as as your first job, do you? You know, 18 year old kid, let me see your resume. My, what? That's what the Navy is going to give to you. Or you know whatever branch you know, you, you go into the Navy as a, you know, a, cbht, haltech or not, not? Not, haltech? Um, you say Haltech? Yeah, sheet metal guy, right? Well, who does sheet metal in the civilian world? Plumbers, right. Hvac guys.
Speaker 1:Auto industry Auto industry People who build boilers, people who build water heaters, people yeah, it's on and on and on.
Speaker 3:You know again, my career is career. You know it's employment. That's what I do. That's what I've done my entire professional career. I live it. That's just me.
Speaker 3:Every time I have somebody come into the house, a worker the last one was a plumbing guy, a kid, maybe 23, 24, 25. Hey, how'd you get into this? Usually it's are you an apprentice or are you still an apprenticeship? This kid, yeah, I've got three years done. I've got one more year to go. He was 23. I always again preface it. You know, in the civilian world we don't talk about. You know wages, but I'm curious, 23 years old, you didn't go to college, nope, how much you making? How much you making? It's usually upwards of. You know apprenticeship 25, 30, 25, 35 bucks an hour. You know, usually somewhere in there, 23 years old, no college, you're one year away from making 60, 70, 80 bucks an hour, right In a union job. In a union job, you're, you're, you have, you have a funded pension. Yeah, let me tell you that's a wonderful thing. Yes, it is. You know, listen to me, it is a wonderful thing. You know it too. Yeah absolutely.
Speaker 3:I open my eyes in the morning and I get a paycheck. Just because I open my eyes in the morning, it's because you breathe them, it's liberating.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to piggyback on the apprenticeship thing too. So here's something that a lot of people don't know. Let's say you go into the Navy on a two year hitch, right, you get out, you get into an apprenticeship. Guess what? You get GI bill money for being an apprenticeship.
Speaker 3:Yes, you do.
Speaker 1:So, on top of the 30 bucks an hour you're making, you're going to get BAH for like 1500 bucks a month, right, right.
Speaker 3:So, and if you do it the right way and you don't, you're not. You know, I'm not. You know, if you're one of those people who I'm not going to college, yeah, not my thing, cool, I, I love it. You're, you're, you're, you, are you? You do you give that gi bill to your kids?
Speaker 3:yeah, that's available to you, you if, if you do it right. Each branch has different rules and regulations. When I married my second wife, she had a stepdaughter who she had a daughter, my stepdaughter. That's one of the first things I did. Hey, I already have a degree. I already went and got another degree, maybe paid 400% Bachelor's degree in psychology, 3.94 GPA. Never paid a cent, not one cent. Paid for tuition assistance, all the books were covered and I walk out with a degree. And I did it all at MAPS. We had to be there. We didn't have eight hours worth of work every day but we couldn't leave. It was cool. That's a good idea. We went Go to school. That's a good idea.
Speaker 3:Why not go to school. You know they'd be paid for that A hundred percent Right, and they will do it for the most part, for anybody. Your duty station, your deployment schedule, it all affects it, right, but it's there. It's available to you Forty, forty, five hundred bucks a year to go to school.
Speaker 1:Any school, yeah, and depending on what program you fall under and all that thing, you can use your GI Bill if you want to while you're on active duty.
Speaker 3:I don't ever suggest doing that because it's a waste of a lot of money that's available, but it's there, right. I don't the entitlement. I hate that word. I hate it, especially in today's world. Right, everybody's in thinks that they're entitled. Entitled to what A good job. A house, you know, the American dream. I'm entitled to the American dream. Shut up. You're not entitled to anything except death and paying taxes. Bro, sit down. Shut up. Now we have a conversation to have.
Speaker 1:Join the military and you do have entitlements just for doing your job. Well, here's what I would argue is those VA programs and the GI bill, those are not entitlements, those are things that you earned for having served your country right yes. This isn't something you're just giving me to give me.
Speaker 1:That's true, I earned it. That is true. I served my. However long, I get X number of dollars for my GI bill. I got injured, I can't function properly. I get my VA benefits.
Speaker 1:Those aren't entitlements. Those are things that I earned as a, as a veteran, and you earned them too. I agree, I agree, and I think that's where that's where the differentiation has to happen. Right, those things are not entitlements. You take that off the table because those are earned benefits, right, and that's that's one of the things too, like when we oh, you're going to get me going, but when we, when we go to war, um, congress always, like, calculates the cost of going to that war, sure, and sending people over there.
Speaker 1:What they don't ever calculate is the cost of bringing them home, yes, and once they get back right, them home, yes, and once they get back right. So all of a sudden, now that's an entitlement. Well, no, those people got hurt or or earned those benefits or whatever. It was doing what you asked them to do, right. So you know, I really struggle with when people, when people talk about those as entitlements and want to do something with them because, look, we wrote a blank check when we signed up I agree right, and that's whether you are a combat veteran or whether you're a non-combat veteran, whether you're a recruiter, every single job in the military helps the military be successful.
Speaker 1:I agree, and that's why I always ask people if they served, because many times, if you ask them if they're a veteran, they're hesitant to say yes, I'm a veteran If they didn't serve in combat, or they only serve for two years or whatever, it is Sure. So I always ask did you serve? Because to me that's that's the important thing. Did you, if you serve? Did you serve for one year? Did you serve for 40 years? Whatever it is, everyone served and it made our country successful, no matter what your job. I agree.
Speaker 3:I say that's a good idea because I usually ask are you a veteran Right? And I like did you serve better? It's different, yeah. Because, I've talked to a lot of people. You know that. Because our requirements to be a veteran for Operation Job Ready Veterans less than what the state of Michigan requires, I don't need to talk about them, but I can work with a lot of folks that the job folks at the state of Michigan can't work.
Speaker 1:It's not in their wheelhouse, they've got their left and right limits and they have to stay with them.
Speaker 3:Correct. It's their rules. I can pick up some folks that they can't help yeah, and I can send folks their way that they can help more than what I can help them. It's case management. I look at it as case management.
Speaker 1:Well, I think you probably learned some of that recruiting too right. Like I can't bring you in, but I know that that branch is looking for what you got right Recruiting my, my, this, I, I want to leave this for, you know, possible recruiters in the future, right?
Speaker 3:Um, a couple of things.
Speaker 3:Number one don't let your boss ruin your career. Right, number one, because, worst case scenario, you guys are together three years, probably less. You know overlapping, overlapping. You know duty stations. Don't ever let your boss ruin your career. Number two this is probably the most important thing and it it applies to me today as well Forget, forget quota, forget that word, forget the numbers, forget quota, forget that word, forget the numbers. Just forget them, because they're there. They're never going away. You can't make that change. You can't change it. Help the people. Why is that kid in your office? Why is that kid in your office today? Yeah, well, because mom and dad are going to kick him out when he turns 18 and he graduates. Awesome, mom and dad. Sweet, you know good job, he needs a job. You might not know he needs a job. He needs to understand he needs a job. Help the person. Right Numbers will come. Yeah, you know come.
Speaker 3:Every recruiter that ever worked for me, every person in recruiting that I've ever worked with in officer recruiting, officer recruiting. I get officers, brand new officers, coming into the office. I was not a station commander for officer recruiting, I was just there. I have chiefs come in. I have officers come in to do that job. I'm a career recruiter. I know how to do this job. It was my job to teach folks how to do this job. You got to. Let me. Don't be an officer today. Don't be a chief today, be a student. Let me show you how to do this. Is it the right way? It works for me, though? It's worked for me for you know, these years.
Speaker 3:You know so you got to forget about the numbers. You know, officer recruiting a lot different, but you know, enlisted recruiting it's always numbers. Right, you know, forget about that stuff. Just help somebody you know. And on the flip side, you know, I'm sorry, go back as a recruiter.
Speaker 3:I took that to heart really early in my career because the numbers were killing me. The numbers were killing me. I always woke up, I got to make. Well, I got to. If you stop worrying about that and worry about the person that you're talking to, why is that person there? Obviously, you know, like you don't go to a car lot without needing or wanting to buy a new car, right, that's, it's just a given For the most part, everybody that comes into the office needed something, you know. And if I couldn't help them for for whatever reason, you know you still need something. You know what? I think the army can help you here. Yeah, I know a guy. You know, I know a guy, come on, let's go, I'll introduce you. Or you know, hey, the Marine Corps. Marine Corps is, it's different.
Speaker 1:You know the Marines, you want to be a Marine right, it's, it's not, it's not the same, and you and I Right it's, it's what they want.
Speaker 3:It's different.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um, yeah, you know you know, I think I think recruiting is a lot back in my younger days. This is how I look at recruiting. It's a lot like when you go to the bar right, you go to the bar, and if you're desperate to go home with someone that night, you'll look like an idiot. You see, they can just smell the desperation on you, right? Sure. So if you're in recruiting and you haven't made your numbers and that's what you're concentrating on that kid sitting in that chair knows that you don't have his best interest at heart.
Speaker 3:right, you're just trying to make a number right and they know it, and that's where a lot of recruiters got in trouble too yeah they cut, they cut corners. You know I've, you know I've had asthma. You know I don't have asthma, but you know that's, that's one of the big ones.
Speaker 1:I had Use an inhaler. I have asthma yeah.
Speaker 3:Oh, you stop using your inhaler? What when you're like less than 12, right, you stopped using your. You know you stopped when you were 12. Moving on, yeah, Next question. Yeah, you know that's where recruiters get in trouble. You know they're, they're, they're hiding stuff.
Speaker 1:You got to know when to move on, you know you you.
Speaker 3:They have to be ready, willing and able. Yeah, all three at the same time. Or you have to be able to talk them into something one of those three, because they're never going to boot camp if they're not ready willing and able.
Speaker 1:There are some people who you just have to say I'm sorry, you're not qualified, and I think that people have trouble. You've gone all this way, you, you got this guy in the office like you're one person away and and they're just not qualified.
Speaker 3:And the thing is again my, my, my first, my first recruiter, um, or my recruiter, it's like who was my first boss? Um, it's like it's you miss goal. You're going to get your weenie slapped Right. You might have to do some extra military training. You might have to come in on Saturday. You tell this guy not to talk about something in his medical record. You get caught, you're out. Yeah, that's it. You're either out of the Navy or you're out of recruiting. You're going to be in a bad position regardless.
Speaker 3:I've seen it happen multiple times. It's not worth it. You know it's a career, even if you're not going to make it a career, it's what you're doing. You know you get kicked out after five years. You have this resume and you got a bad conduct, discharge or dishonorable or something. What happened in those five years? You have this resume and you got a bad conduct, discharge or dishonorable or something. What happened in those five years? You only got two choices hide it, talk about it or lie about it. Right, you know can, can the? You know if, looking at a DD two, 14, if that's a requirement for the job, you know, does that person, that's person, does that civilian know how to read that DD 214? You know, do they know it was a bad conduct discharge, right, you can give them the different copy. Give them copy one. It's not on there, it just says you served. I don't want that copy man. I need copy four. You know, I need to look at that RE code.
Speaker 1:Right, I need copy four. You know I need to look at that RE code, right, you know, cause I know those RE codes. Or I need to see your last eval, dd two, 14, because I have like four DD two 14s.
Speaker 3:Right, yeah, I've got a two 14 and a 15. So they had a bunch of my awards messy, yeah, so but yeah it's cause I got out and went.
Speaker 1:grab the one that doesn't say it Exactly and maybe I'll get away with it. But yeah, so educating employers as to what to look for. You know, but if someone's doing the right thing, you don't have to ever do that.
Speaker 3:Exactly, Correct 23 years, you're still sitting here today. I still get a pension. I still have excellent evals, most excellent. If you miss goal and you just get that missed goal eval, it's hard to explain it. It's fun. It's fun to see that eval come back and like I didn't write any of that, but that is really mediocre.
Speaker 3:It's a mediocre. You know it was meant to be that way, right, we know what this means, we. We know that you were a shitbag that month or that that that particular. That's right, um, but yeah, it's just, I don't know yeah it is what it is so.
Speaker 1:We've talked about a lot of stuff um drinking from a hose yes um, drinking from, drinking from the fire hydrant, um, all those things and um, you know you've already lived quite an interesting life, done a lot of stuff, um, but I think, as we kind of wrap up our conversation today, um, you've said a couple of things already, but I really want to put a finer point on it, and that is you know, if someone is listening to a hundred years from now and neither one of us are here and they're listening to your story, listening about your life, the things that you've done, what message would you leave for that person? Like, what do you want them to take away from all of this?
Speaker 3:the military has provided a life that I've always wanted today, always. You know, I don't have to work. I wake up in the morning and I get paid. Just because I opened my eyes today, I've got a dream house. My home is exactly. I mean, you know, with a VA loan, it's. I walked in. I'm like, yep, this is it right here. You know, just make the offer, I'm done, we're not going anywhere else. Yeah, we're done. Um, you know my resume. You know I mean, again, in career services, my resume is you know, I, I am. You know the resume. You know, and that's it's, it's solid. You know, I don't hope I never have to use it again, but if I need to, it's solid, right, um, I've, I've, I.
Speaker 3:I used the Navy and I got everything out of it that I wanted. Navy got everything out of me that they needed and they're moving on to the next. You know my time in the Navy was 23 years, the best 23 years of my life. My stepdaughter got a free education with my GI bill, no student loans. She's a nurse and she makes more hourly rate than her mother and myself combined. Without overtime. She makes more. She's 23 years old. She's a nurse at U of M emergency room.
Speaker 3:You know what? Yeah, you know I. I don't have a student loan for her. She doesn't have student loans. What's in the news? Everybody's got student loans, thousands and thousands of dollars. They're never going to pay them off, right? You know how many articles do I read? You know student loan 75 years old and still paying the student loan from when they were 18. She has nothing except a good job and she loves it. I had a good job, I loved it. I have a good job now, not really a job, it's just what I do. Yeah, you know, but all of the years of my entire professional career, all of the years I've heard do something you love, you'll never work a day in your life. Do something you love, you'll never work a day in your life. I was 54 years old before I realized what that really meant, and I'm living it every day, every day that's awesome.
Speaker 3:I'm not working, I'm just doing what I do yeah, alright.
Speaker 1:Well, thanks for doing what you do this afternoon, talking with me and sharing your story. I really appreciate it cool, cool.
