You were qualified for that job, but they had to give it to a veteran:
"Some civil servants grumble over push to hire veterans" by Lisa Rein | Washington Post September 21, 2014
WASHINGTON — President Obama’s push to hire military veterans for jobs throughout the government is fueling resentment in federal offices, as longtime civil servants and former troops increasingly question one another’s competence and qualifications.
With veterans moving to the head of the hiring queue in the biggest numbers in a generation, there’s growing bitterness on both sides, according to dozens of interviews with federal employees.
Those who did not serve in the military bristle at times at the preferential hiring of veterans and accuse them of a blind deference to authority. The veterans chafe at what they say is a condescending view of their skills and experience, and accuse many nonveterans of lacking a work ethic and sense of mission.
At the Government Printing Office, six of eight electricians who have joined the electrical shop in recent years are former military members. But Robert Chaney, the shop’s senior mechanic and a nonveteran, said some arrived without electrician’s licenses. One was hired over the phone from Michigan, he said, then quit soon after starting.
‘‘It’s hard to tell until they get here,’’ he said. ‘‘Then you realize this guy doesn’t know common electric components that a one- or two-year electrician should know.’’
But Laura Barmby was pleasantly surprised when she ran a training session this summer for the Commerce Department that included veterans. In a role-playing exercise, the eight veterans banded together in reaction to a natural disaster, devising a novel response to offer emergency services to the public.
‘‘When a group gets a certain preference, there’s an inclination to say somehow they’re less than’’ others, Barmby said. ‘‘But they have the real-world experience of having challenges put in their way they need to overcome. If they’re able to do the job, what’s wrong with helping someone who risked their life for their country?’’
Obama began accelerating the hiring of veterans five years ago in response to the bleak employment prospects many service members faced after coming home from Afghanistan and Iraq. It is the government’s most visible effort to reward military service since the draft ended in the 1970s.
Veterans benefit from preferential hiring for civil service jobs under a law dating to World War II, but the administration has boosted the extra credit veterans get, giving them an even greater edge in getting those jobs.
The government has also set hiring goals for veterans at each agency, and managers are graded on how many they bring on board, officials said.
Last year, veterans made up 46 percent of full-time hires, the Office of Personnel Management said. They now represent a third of the federal workforce, holding positions well beyond the Defense and Veterans Affairs departments.
But some colleagues in the civil service say that while veterans work hard, they rarely display independent thinking.
‘‘You’re getting a very conservative worker that’s very narrow-minded,’’ said Bob O’Brien, a technology specialist for the Office of Personnel Management. About 90 of the 100 computer experts in his office in suburban Maryland are veterans, he said.
‘‘In meetings, you can’t question anything,’’ he said. The veterans’ attitude to their supervisors, he said, is: ‘‘You’re my boss. You could be a complete lunatic, but I won’t question you.’’
During the longest stretch of war in American history, many veterans have served multiple combat tours. They say they have earned a right to preferential treatment and they resent the perception that they are grunts unqualified for civil service.
‘‘I’ve heard people say, ‘I’ve applied for a job, but some veteran’s just going to get it,’ ‘‘ said Mark Butler, 56, a Navy veteran who investigates fair housing violations for the Department of Housing and Urban Development in Boston.
‘‘I think veterans bring so much to the table,’’ he added. ‘‘The military is not all screaming, yelling [at] people to charge up the hill and kill, kill, kill.’’
By law, veterans who meet certain criteria related to where, when, and how long they served and whether they were injured go to the head of the line when they are considered for civil service jobs.
Troops with combat injuries or those disabled during their service get higher preference.
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