Blue Coat?Originally Posted by lwt16
Fed Court House detail?
Blue Coat?
Fed Court House detail?
“A gun is a tool, Marian; no better or no worse than any other tool: an axe, a shovel or anything. A gun is as good or as bad as the man using it. Remember that.” - Shane
Maybe.
I'm not LE but did work nearly a decade at a job search technology company. So I've seen the job search / hiring industry from the inside. My question is, are there any particular types of roles or companies/orgs you're considering? These days, any forward-thinking employer sees the degree as less important, save for certain highly-specialized roles that really demand it (engineering, healthcare, etc).
There are unfortunately still a lot of of archaic employers that are adamant about degree requirements for roles where it really doesn't make sense. Honestly, a lot of them will probably be going out of business in the next 5-10yrs for failing to keep up with the industry. I've seen companies who have been slow to adapt, who've interviewed 700-800 people for one role that's not even that specialized. It's not sustainable for companies to keep doing business like that.
I hope you don't mind @Tensaw, I reformatted that quote for emphasis. Some good stuff there!
The things that will probably have the biggest effect is working on the "elevator pitch", custom tailoring the resume to each role you apply for, and figuring out how to best translate your experience to value you can deliver in that role.
For most employers, it's a matter of finding a balance between hard (job-related knowledge) vs soft (work ethic, personality) skills. The employer or hiring manager won't necessarily have in-depth knowledge to understand that, with nearly 3 decades in, your soft skills are probably off the charts and a huge asset. Hard skills are easily learned, and any good employer shouldn't be disqualifying an otherwise good candidate based on that alone, unless again it's non-negotiable (regulatory requirements, etc).
Well, to spin off what Sig Fiend said,...
I spent the last 10 years of my career as a supervisor. The (LE) gig I worked would surprise most people with how technical it became over time. Still, most folks mastered the hard skills without too much drama. But those soft skills, man, that is where a lot of people fell flat. Even when I would talk with folks about paying attention to the soft skills, that mostly never improved. Maybe it's a DNA-level thing. I dunno. But what I do know is that when it came time to hire someone, hard skills were the focus and we only paid attention to soft skill stuff at a superficial level. Kinda crazy. So for me, hard skills are what get you hired; soft skills get you promoted.
Two caveats. Soft skills are super difficult to accurately assess in an interview process, That said, some people with good hard skills got passed over because of a weird vibe, i.e., soft skill fail.
All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
No one is coming. It is up to us.
Again, not LE but...
I've been retired from the FD for a year now. I find there are more parts I don't miss than parts I do. My crew was out on what turned out to be a pedestrian struck, at 4 AM in a torrential rainstorm, and I was completely happy to be on this side of the radio for that one.
I never intended to retire retire, and have always planned on having a second career. I spent 8 months as a police/fire dispatcher for DLA, and in December came back to the agency I retired from as a dispatcher, we do fire/EMS only.
I'm happy I got out when I did.
What field are you trying to get in to?
'Nobody ever called the fire department because they did something intelligent'
Do you need to work to pay the bills if you go or do you need to work to have something to do?
What is the difference between your current pay and your pension pay?
What will health care cost on your own?
Do you stand to lose anything exciting your DROP program now?
Our pension is about 9% off the top of our pay. Full benefits at 22 years and maxes out at 30 years at 82%. From 22 to 30 years of service, you add 2% per year. If you retire at 55 (with at least 22 years), you get a 1.5% COLA from the pension. We have people who choose to stay two years for 4% when they could have retired and gotten 3% in the same time. It's madness. Obviously negotiated wage increases are usually more than 2%, but we're talking very small amounts.
A 59 year old sergeant at an agency in my area dropped dead of a heart attack on duty after responding to a call where a kid got shot. He worked four years longer than he had to. Even if his ticket was pre-punched to go when he did, I'm sure he and his family would have rather had those four years together. I'd bet that four years of not policing would have been better for the ticker.
Moral of the story to me is that anybody staying past 55 better have a damn good reason. Definitely a better reason than 2%.
Thank you gentlemen. These are the types of answers I'm looking for . Thousands have "gone before me" , but finding those to share their experiences is the important part.
To address a few questions...
My hard skills are almost all LE related, but I've been an instructor for over 20 years in several areas that translate to the real world. I've also been a road and admin supervisor for over a decade, and worked in and supervised every aspect of the PD except investigations.
As was mentioned, soft skills are what win the day in most any field.
I've worked in sales off and on my entire adult life, and see LE as sales (convincing someone to voluntarily welcome an outcome they don't necessarily want) and customer service (they walk away knowing they were treated with respect and we listened to them even if it wasn't the outcome they wanted).
I have a stay at home wife who cares for our two disabled kids so insurance is an obvious need until we're old enough for medicare. I'll receive an insurance stipend through the retirement system. And the only money I would lose in DROP is interest if I leave before 5 years in the program.
If you remove the current deductions for retirement, union dues, insurance and so on, There's about $1k difference between my current base pay and my retirement every month. But again, I want to keep moving forward not backwards.
For the next career, I'm looking at non- physical jobs that are still mentally stimulating. Like Gadfly, I need PURPOSE at work. I know of so many LE & FD guys that translated retirement as full stop and died shortly after. There's plenty to do at home, hobbies to enjoy and helping others as a volunteer, but I'm not ready to stop working yet.
There's zero desire to work contract private security like an Allied or Wackenhut- especially in the current world. I did it before I was a cop and I'm not going back. I'm reaching out to contacts in Govt- contract and corporate security. I'm open to anything that doesn't carry the risk of indictment or being fired for making a mistake or the perception of one. I have banking contacts and we're discussing investigations jobs with them.
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