Last week I received an email from a prestigious university to ask my opinion regarding a recent applicant.

I knew the applicant. I was good friends with the applicant, five years ago. We worked together extensively for three years at a fast-paced, demanding volunteer agency. After our PCS we kept in touch, sort of. We attended her wedding, two years ago. Since then, we’ve exchanged holiday pleasantries and clicked the like button on each other’s Facebook pages.

I can tell you what Star Wars movie she has seen lately, what grade her child is in and even what her house looks like with Christmas lights.

I can’t tell you where she was working last year, if she was working last year, what kind of employee she was or if she is a good fit for this current position she is applying for.

Yet, she listed me as a reference.

Yikes.

I get it. We worked long hard hours together. She probably figures I saw her in action. I know her abilities and know what she is capable of. And that is correct. However, my knowledge of her abilities and behavior is five years old. That’s a lifetime ago in the job market.

Not to mention this new job has no connection to the volunteer work we did. In fact it is in a field I didn’t know she had any interest in.

So, I found myself in a pickle. Sure, I liked her, I thought she was a fine worker with a lot of potential but that’s about as much detail as I could provide. Not a terribly helpful reference.

The lesson here? Reach out to your references before you list them. If you feel someone has seen you at your best, call or email them and discuss your new goals and plans. Review what you have done to make yourself a viable candidate for the position you hope they will recommend you for.

And, most importantly, ask their permission to list them as your reference. After five years I wasn’t terribly comfortable being listed as her reference. I personally didn’t feel I had the best information to make a good reference for her.

Trust me, the last thing you want is a reference stumbling for words in front of a potential employer. If your reference isn’t confident in how they describe you, the potential employer will notice. It may mean the difference between being hired or being shown the door.

Hurricane Michael slammed into the Gulf Coast last week and destroyed much of Panama City and the surrounding area.

It also ripped through Tyndall Air Force Base. Officials there announced that every structure on base sustained some level of damage, including military family housing.

Families there were evacuated ahead of the storm and many cannot return for now. Many also lost their on-base homes and all their belongings in the storm.

Leaders in military spouse organizations organized a donation system before the storm was even fully over.

To send supplies to the families who are cleaning, rebuilding and re-settling after the devastating storm, volunteers from nearby bases in Alabama and Florida created two wish lists on Amazon and Target.com

Ordered items are being shipped to the Air Force Enlisted Village, a nearby non-profit organization. Staff there is distributing the donations to military families from the Tyndall AFB area.

To order items for hurricane victims, please visit:

https://www.amazon.com/registry/wishlist/16W28YO332KNO

https://www.target.com/gift-registry/giftgiver?registryId=84aa1c6631804dbd900a01b18b500318&lnk=registry_custom_url

By Jenna Moede

Hello! I feel thrilled to be back writing again and look forward to sharing the military life experience and college student experience with everyone again after being gone for so long.

Last year my husband, an active duty airman, received orders to PCS from Wyoming to Oklahoma. The orders excited us, but they also surprised us too. We had been told we would stay in Wyoming for a while so we felt shocked when they came.

When we moved to Tinker, everything changed for me. My job, my husband’s schedule, my comfort level and our plans. I had hoped to iron out the kinks before I jumped back into anything like work or school.  

To say it took me longer than I expected to adjust would be a huge understatement. While we had moved across country before, this was our first real PCS, and I don’t think I was fully prepared.

I let a lot of my goals slip when we first arrived, like getting my master’s degree. I had picked a school, a program, and been accepted, but the timing scared me with the move so I backed out.

Because of the time change, teaching ESL was too difficult so I gave that up along with writing too. Instead of trying to find something to fill that time and keep pursuing the final goal of teaching, I wasted it.

Even long after everyone was settled, I continued putting my goals on the backburner. Somehow it just felt a lot easier to push them aside as a “to do” later.

I didn’t network, I didn’t make friends, I didn’t get involved, and I didn’t give myself a huge chance to have a life separate from the one the military created, and even though we have had fun touring Oklahoma and vacationing, I lost a full year of pursuing what I want as an individual.

Somehow in my mind I let the temporality of the situation define what I would make of it.

Now that I realize that I didn’t have to put everything in life on hold, I am now trying to remember some of my own advice for what I did during our last move so I can take control of this situation and go for it before we run out of time here and PCS again.

I remind myself constantly now that perfect timing usually doesn’t happen for me, but I can create the right time if I’m willing to put in the work and confront the situation head on.

I had to stop putting off the big decisions because our life didn’t really feel real. I had to realize that things will always keep changing, but that doesn’t mean that I can treat everything like a vacation.

The first step for putting myself back on track was starting my master’s program which I have finally done. I love learning about teaching, and I look forward to each day in the classroom. Plus, it feels so good knowing that I finally quit procrastinating!

In the past I have let my own insecurities stop me from chasing down my dreams, and this last time I let the military life slow me down. This time I am determined not to let anything slow me down, and I will remember that change doesn’t mean that real life stops.

There was a lot of new information to digest when my husband retired in 2013. A lot of paperwork, a lot of decisions to make and a lot of well, a lot.

A point I missed, and maybe you did too, is that military retiree pay fluctuates with cost of living allowances. So far, that amount has been too miniscule to really notice.

In January, military retirees will receive the largest COLA increase in seven years, a full 2.8 percent pay raise. For those military members at the tippy top of the retirement pay charts that increase could be as much as $369  a month.

For those of us closer to the bottom, the amount isn’t shabby either. For example, according to military.com, retirement pay for an E-7 with 20 years of service will increase by $133 a month. An O-5 with 20 years will receive a $252 increase per month.

According to Military.com, retirees who entered military service on or after Aug. 1, 1986 and opted in for the Career Status Bonus (CSB/Redux retirement plan), have any COLA increases reduced by 1 percent, so they will see a 2019 increase of 1.8 percent or $84 monthly for an E-7 with 20 years of service, or $162 each month for an O-5 with 20 years of service.

Service members receiving VA disability pay will also receive increased checks in the new year. The average VA disability check will go up about $4 per month for those with a 10 percent rating, and $83 for those rated at 100 percent.

The oldest of my two kids turned 17 this week. In true mom fashion, I spent most of the day of his birthday reminiscing about when he was born, and where he’s been.

And wondering where he will go.

He was conceived in Hong Kong, grown on Okinawa, and born in Korea.

He’s lived in 11 houses and moved to Florida, Germany, Florida, Kansas, Germany, Canada, Germany and, finally, Florida again. In 10^th grade, he started his eighth school.

He’s been to 20 countries. He’s seen 48 states, most of those while traveling the U.S. in our RV for a year after my husband retired from the Army. 

What a life he has led life so far.

Yet, like any parent, I wonder if we have done right by him. When we were still an active duty family, I felt bad making the kids move all the time and adjust to new places and new cultures.

As a retiree family, I worry that we have limited our experiences. We are very happy with the place we chose to settle down, but let’s just say it’s not quite as exciting and interesting as living overseas.

Honestly, it’s a little boring.

We’re just regular people now. Nothing special. Just like our neighbors.

This week as I reflected back on my son’s 17 years of life so far, I realized all the things he experienced in his military childhood that we don’t see, have or do often in our civilian life now:

• Friends who know what it’s like to be the “new kid.”
• Military “family” next door, or upstairs, or just down the street.
• A whole community of people who had his back.
• Travel, travel and more travel.
• Diversity.
• Culture
• Pride
• Leadership
• Tradition
• Seeing people, everyday, with a strong work ethic, values, and a commitment to something greater than themselves.

On the other hand, here’s what he’s gained:

• Self confidence built while settling into a non-military community.
• A new hometown.
• Friends who have had completely different experiences than he has had.
• Exposure to pop culture.
• Interest in things that weren’t available to him before – robotics, his school dive team, flying.
• A renewed sense of respect for those who serve in the military.
• The realization that kids in America face big challenges from things like broken families, poverty and crime – not everyone has an idyllic childhood running around freely behind the secure fences of a military base.
• The knowledge that not everyone in America believes in the same thing or acts the same way, but that’s OK.
• Pride in his dad, and in our “service” as a military family.

Yeah, I think this kid is going to turn out just fine.

Political jokes, risqué costumes and grotesque props – oh my!

Halloween celebrated in bad taste at the office is the scariest ghoul you may encounter this season.

Halloween can be really fun in the workplace. We’ve all entered an office or store where the employees have banded together to create a whimsical group costume that makes their customers smile or even giggle.

But we’ve all also entered the scariest of haunts, the workplace that leaves its employees to their own devices on this potentially dangerous holiday.

Sure, most employees toe the line of civility and class. But there is always, always someone who leaves their fellow workers in the scary predicament of needing to decide who is going to politely explain that the sexy vampire costume is simply not appropriate. Nor, does it fit well.

Not sure if your costume is workplace appropriate? Follow these rules:

No politics – None. Period. The current political atmosphere is so emotionally charged that there are reports of voting trends ripping families apart. Wearing a costume to make fun of a politician you don’t support might cause feuding in the office or mark Halloween to be your last day on the job.

Skin – Don’t show it. Halloween does not mean all workplace dress codes are tossed to the winds. If your costume would be too short on a normal workday, it’s too short on Halloween. The same goes for the top half of the costume. If it’s too revealing, leave it at home.

Offensive – Does your costume make fun of a particular group of people? Then absolutely don’t wear it to the office. You might want to re-consider wearing it at all, anywhere. That’s just not nice.

Terrifying – Do you love Halloween because it gives you a reason to stream every scary movie in existence for 31 days straight? Great! But not everyone loves the ghoulish side of the celebration. Keep the spilling guts and ripped skin costumes away from the office.

Want to be the office Halloween hero? Think smart, creative and unusual rather than sexy and ghoulish. Need some ideas? Visit www.pinterest.com and type in the phrase office Halloween costumes for a neverending stream of creative, and simple, costume ideas for the workplace.  

My supervisor just spoke to me for a good 15 minutes and I can’t really tell you what he said or why he was hovering over my desk.

Sure, I nodded, smiled, made eye contact and remember even laughing at his jokes. But internally, I was still re-writing the last line of my report, making a list of all the clients I still had to contact before 5 p.m. and trying desperately to remember what we had in the freezer at home that could make a quick meal before soccer practice.

Employees are often stretched thin, especially working parents who may leave the house to work but never fully leave the long, lingering list of parenting and homeowner to do’s far from their mind.

The experts tell us to meditate and focus. These catch phrases make me laugh. With the ever-growing daily list of things I must do I barely have time to run to the restroom, let alone catch a few quiet moments to myself.

But, you can practice being more mindful both on the job and at home. Mindfulness if the act of being aware of the present, which can be harder than it sounds.

Sure, my boss and I were engaged in conversation and while I was listening to him I wasn’t hearing him. Instead, I was thinking about everything else I had to do. Practicing mindfulness means to make an effort to realize your thoughts are wondering away from the current conversation and concentrate fully on the conversation. It takes intent to refocus your thoughts and attention.

Another way to practice mindfulness? Don’t multi-task. It doesn’t work and in fact studies show it makes us less productive. One task at a time, one focus.

Want to learn more about practicing mindfulness on the job? Visit www.mindful.org for tips and mindful exercises you can practice just about anywhere.

The job hunt continues, one year on.

I’ve been told I’m underqualified. I’ve been told I’m overqualified. I’ve been told I was a top candidate but was missing one key piece of experience.

At one point I was even told, off the record, that at 50 years of age I am too old for a job in marketing or social media.

My main effort, though, has been put toward writing and journalism jobs, my stock and trade for the past 25 years.

And I think I’ve finally discovered the real reason I haven’t gotten a job, despite well over two dozen applications in the past year. What’s the secret? It all goes back to that saying we’ve all heard: It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.

So I decided to take a big step to change that. This week I attended the Military Influencers Conference, or MIC. The annual event was held in Orlando this year, which is just an hour from my house.

I didn’t know a single person there, although there were a few I “knew” from Facebook or mutual friends.

I left with the names and emails of a dozen people to send my resume, and a long list of others to contact.

MIC is touted as “an exciting, dynamic event that brings together hundreds of spouses, community leaders, entrepreneurs, and influencers united by a passion for the military.”

An influencer is a person with credibility and the ability to reach a large number of people in a certain market, field or area. That person is considered to have enough pull to influence the way people think, the products that they buy, and how others view their industry, products or brand, among other things.

The conference included more than 350 attendees, over 30 exhibitors and some 35 speakers, panels and round-table discussions. The focus was on veterans, active duty personnel, military spouses, and those whose business, organization or product serve that sector.

Many were entrepreneurs or freelancers. Others came from well-established brands in the military world, or the nonprofit sector.

Really, though, we were all there to network. While the presentations were compelling, most of us spent our time connecting individually with others in our same fields. The conference had an app where you could look up each attendee’s information, including a profile picture. I’m not ashamed to admit I stalked a few people, and when I found them I just walked up and introduced myself.

That’s a little out of my comfort zone which, for me, was kind of the whole point.

What did I learn at MIC? Here are my key takeaways:

• Keep up with your previous employers and co-workers, as well as college friends or anyone else who might be able to help you find a job either now or in the future. Follow them on social media. Send them a holiday card. Know their current contact information.
• Network, network, network. Yes, we hear that all the time. But one of the key things I heard over and over again at MIC was that you also have to continue to grow your network. Join new groups that might be have people in your career field, volunteer, go to Chamber of Commerce meetings and professional organizations. ‘
• Connections are everywhere. Chat up people in the grocery store, at your kid’s school and on airplanes. Let your parents brag about you to their friends – they just may know someone who knows someone.
• Don’t be afraid to sell yourself. Have a standard 30-second “elevator pitch” prepared that you can spout off anywhere – like in the grocery line, or at that PTA meeting or on the airplane.
• Learn who the influencers are in your career field or area of interest. Follow them. If you can, try to meet them in one way or another.
• Always carry business cards, even if they just have your name and contact information on them. MIC made me realize I should carry some of my husband’s, too. You never know when an opportunity might present itself!

Unfortunately hurricane damage and repairs have cancelled several military spouse hiring events in North Carolina in early October. However, the rest of the month is full of military spouse professional opportunities.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation continues to support spouses not just with spouse-only job fairs but also with events to help spouses build their resumes, practice professional interviewing skills and find ways to become leaders in building their communities.

For more information on each event, visit www.uschamberfoundation.org/events/hiringfairs

Be certain to register asap! These events fill up quickly. Good luck!

Oct. 10

Norfolk, Va.

Hampton Roads Military Spouse Economic Empowerment Zone Launch Event

Oct. 11

Atlanta, Ga.

A Call to Lead: Creating Lasting Impact for Atlanta’s Military Community

Oct. 12

Hampton, Ga.

VET 2.0 Experience Hiring Expo at the Atlanta Air Show

Oct. 15

Honolulu, Hawaii

Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam Military Spouse Symposium

Philadelphia, Penn.

A Call to Lead: Creating Lasting Impact for Philadelphia’s Military Community

Oct. 16

Schofield Barracks, Hawaii

Schofield Barracks Transition Summit

Philadelphia, Penn.

Philadelphia Hiring Expo with Philadelphia Flyers

Oct. 17

Washington D.C.

Washington Hiring Expo with the Washington Capitals

Oct. 18

Hickam, Hawaii

Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam Transition Summit

Hanover, MD

Maryland Live! Casino at Arundel Mills Military Spouse Hiring Reception

Oct. 19

Kaneohe Marine Corps Base, Hawaii

Marine Corps Base Hawaii Transition Summit

Oct. 24

Fort Bragg, N.C.

Amplify Military Spouse Career Intensive

Newark, NJ

A Call to lead: Creating lasting impact for Newark’s military community

Oct. 25

Newark, NJ

Newark Hiring Expo with the New Jersey Devils

Fort Hood, Texas

Military Spouse Hiring Fair

If your summer PCS has left you jobless and you’ve had no luck hitting the pavement, you may be eligible for unemployment benefits, depending on the state you live in.

Unemployment compensation programs are mandated and run by individual state governments and each have their own set of rules. Eligible unemployed workers receive weekly checks to hold them over until they do find a job and may qualify for other benefits. Generally this compensation is not given to workers who voluntarily quit their jobs.

However, some states offer what is known as “good cause” exceptions to the rule, including quitting  job to PCS with a military member or even to follow a civilian spouse to a new job in a new area.

Here is the 2014 list of state benefit rules:

• Alabama (military transfer only)
• Alaska (any job transfer, including military)
• Arizona (miitary transfer only)
• Arkansas (any job transfer, including military)
• California (any job transfer, including military)
• Colorado (military transfer only)
• Connecticut (any job transfer, including military)
• Delaware (any job transfer, including military)
• D.C. (any job transfer, including military)
• Florida (military transfer only)
• Georgia (military transfer only)
• Hawaii (any job transfer, including military)
• Illinois (any job transfer, including military)
• Indiana (any job transfer, including military)
• Iowa (military transfer only)
• Kansas (military transfer only)
• Kentucky (military transfer only)
• Maine (any job transfer, including military)
• Maryland (military transfer only)
• Massachusetts (any job transfer, including military)
• Michigan (military transfer only)
• Minnesota (any job transfer, including military)
• Mississippi (military transfer only)
• Missouri (military transfer only)
• Montana (military transfer only)
• Nebraska (any job transfer, including military)
• Nevada (any job transfer, including military)
• New Hampshire (any job transfer, including military)
• New Jersey (military transfer only)
• New Mexico (military transfer only)
• New York (any job transfer, including military)
• North Carolina (military transfer only)
• Ohio (any job transfer, including military)
• Oklahoma (military transfer only)
• Oregon (any job transfer, including military)
• Pennsylvania (any job transfer, including military)
• Rhode Island (any job transfer, including military)
• South Carolina (any job transfer, including military)
• South Dakota (military transfer only)
• Tennessee (military transfer only)
• Texas (military transfer only)
• Utah (military transfer only)
• Virginia (military transfer only)
• Virgin Islands (any job transfer, including military)
• Washington (any job transfer, including military)
• West Virginia (military transfer only)
• Wisconsin (any job transfer, including military)
• Wyoming (military transfer only)

These laws are subject to change at any time, check with the individual state for the most current information. To file for unemployment benefits visit your state office as soon as possible after your PCS. To find your state office visit: https://www.dol.gov/general/location