Career Progression For MILITARY Spouses
One of the most frustrating things that I hear from fellow military spouses has to do with employment. It is hard enough to find a job, let alone one that fits our education, experiences, and salary goals. It is also hard to grow with any job, not just because we move constantly, but because we have the perception of moving constantly.
My friend sent me a venty Snapchat the other day. She has, for all intents and purposes at this time, her dream job. It's in a field she loves, and she has shown to be very successful at all aspects of this work. She is working at a small family-owned franchise. And despite the fact that she is a perfect fit for the upper leadership roles opening up, she is being passed over because, as a military spouse, she has an expiration date.
To demonstrate how successful she is, one of her bosses has talked about opening a second franchise and putting her in charge whenever she moves to her next base (she is a Canadian spouse, so her next assignment would be back home and likely more long-term). This person is willing to invest their time, energy, and money into putting my friend in charge of this business front because of how great she is at it. And yet, she will never advance past her current level because they know she will move.
Here's the kicker: my friend is guaranteed at least another two years at this base, and an extension is not out of the question, given the role her husband is in. I understand the need for consistency in a business, especially in leadership roles. But are they really telling her that two years isn't long enough to be worth their while? Wouldn't we want the perfect person in a role for as long as we could have them rather than searching for someone new?
Tracking how often people change jobs is tricky, but according to Indeed, the average person changes jobs about 13 times in their lifetime. The timeframe for staying at a job (and being considered successful) is anywhere from one to four years. So, as an employer, we should expect someone qualified to be in their role for at least a year. Two years should be more than enough time to expect to have someone in a role.
I understand valuing loyalty. I understand having consistency. I understand falling in love with a company and staying for life. That's not the case with an average employee, though. I think most of us are looking for a place to call home in a sense, but for most of us, a job is a means to an end, and if something serves that end better, then we will move on to that.
Military spouses are not a protected class of people when it comes to job discrimination. That means that employers can pass on hiring someone because of who they married, and they can certainly pass on promoting someone because their time at that location has an expiration date. There is no legal recourse for spouses experiencing something like this.
There are things in the works to try to ease this problem, such as the proposal to expand the USERRA to include military spouses. The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act is primarily designed to protect the civilian jobs of those in the Guard and Reserves. If a service member meets the criteria (pretty much anyone who has been at a company for five years and is called away on military duty), then the company has to hold their position for the time it takes to train, deploy, etc. This change, proposed in the 2024 budget request, sought to extend that right to spouses.
There are a couple of pretty obvious problems with the initial language of the change. Firstly, most spouses leave a job because of a PCS, which means they are unlikely to return to that location. And even if they do return, it will likely be after multiple years, while the servicemembers this act was designed for generally aren't away from their positions for more than a year. It is a long time to ask a company to hold a job. This brings up the second problem: this action could easily backfire and make companies less likely to hire spouses to avoid the paperwork and logistics of implementing this. There is a sense of service to the country when hiring someone in the military, but that same patriotism rarely extends to the spouse.
I think this proposal has the right heart but doesn't actually resolve the matter. Personally, I believe that the right solution is for employers to support and nurture their employees. If you think someone is so great at their job that you would open a franchise in another country to have them run it, then you should be willing to promote them to the leadership positions they deserve. It does suck that a great employee may not be a long-term solution, but as spouses who love our jobs, it is equally difficult to have to walk away. I don't know the best solution, but I do know that telling someone they will never be promoted because of who they married definitely isn't it.