Counselors Campus to Careers Toolkit

For career counselors who guide student veterans
7
A career counselor meets with local business leaders

Connecting with Employers

Building bridges for student veterans

What Do You Know?

Question 1:

When forging a partnership with an employer, you should build upon their charitable intentions.
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Answer: False

Effective sustainable partnerships with employers are built not on charity or pity, but on the employers’ need for skilled, talented workers.

Question 2:

To build bridges and partnerships with employers, be where they are so you can converse, connect, and build trust.
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Answer: True

When building partnerships, nothing replaces spontaneous, authentic conversation. Find out where this happens and be there.

Question 3:

Generally, veterans with disabilities will do fine in veteran-friendly workplaces.
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Answer: True (but not always)

Veteran-friendly does not always mean disability-friendly. Reach out to get a sense of how and if people with disabilities are fully included in a workplace.

Question 4:

The key part of establishing partnerships with employers is to make them aware of the tax and financial incentives available if they hire veterans and veterans with disabilities.
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Answer: False

These financial incentives might be of interest to employers. However, most employers will be more motivated by getting a sustainable source of talent. Lead by talking about talent, but be prepared to describe financial and tax incentives available to employers who hire veterans and veterans with disabilities.

Question 5:

If a business partnership isn’t working for you or for the student veterans you work with, keep trying to repair the relationship until it does work.
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Answer: False

Business partnerships are valuable and worth trying to maintain, even when you hit a rough patch. But if your repeated attempts to address a problem don’t work, it might be time to walk away for now. You can always try to rebuild the partnership if things change.

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