Mobilizations, when did you tell your employer?

[Griz882]

Honest question, how do you guys square the risk to your full time career with what amounts to a small payout at the end? It seems that a lot of folks on here have been doing well in their day jobs only to have them go sideways because of a MOB thus resulting in loss of future raises that could have been towards retirement and end up returning more than $1600/mo. I get some of the former ACDU guys who end up in the position of "just 5-8 more years" but it sure seems like a lot of professional risk for a tricare and beer money. It just seems that I know a lot of guys who get caught in between the reserves and a day job and end up trying to do both things well.

Great question. My simple answer is this is why you work for Uncle Sam! You can keep your Tricare and beer money and get a decent retirement and get full protection during MOB. Of course, when it comes to people with grown up jobs in the “real world” I am just as baffled as you.

 

[taxi1]

Honest question, how do you guys square the risk to your full time career with what amounts to a small payout at the end?

You ask a good question.

I remember we had a gent, who was a Raytheon VP, join up in the reserves. Had his own airplane. First assignment was Urinalysis Coordinator. He loved it.

Another gent, high time senior captain with an airline, came back in as an O3 and it was even questionable he would get enough good years to retire.

So often I see on LinkedIn the pictures of guys who are in the reserves is of them in uniform. That sort of stuff is hard to categorize in dollars and cents, but means a lot.

I do volunteer EMS, which pays less than zero in money, but helps give a purposeful life. It’s a similar thing for a lot of people, I imagine.

 

[Hair Warrior]

Honest question, how do you guys square the risk to your full time career with what amounts to a small payout at the end? It seems that a lot of folks on here have been doing well in their day jobs only to have them go sideways because of a MOB thus resulting in loss of future raises that could have been towards retirement and end up returning more than $1600/mo. I get some of the former ACDU guys who end up in the position of "just 5-8 more years" but it sure seems like a lot of professional risk for a tricare and beer money. It just seems that I know a lot of guys who get caught in between the reserves and a day job and end up trying to do both things well.

Honest answer: plenty of private sector jobs suck, and there is plenty of fuckery by employers/ direct supervisors. It’s not all choker whites and dining outs foosball tables and free smoothies. The Reserves can be a welcome, needed respite.

 

[Pags]

You ask a good question.

I remember we had a gent, who was a Raytheon VP, join up in the reserves. Had his own airplane. First assignment was Urinalysis Coordinator. He loved it.

Another gent, high time senior captain with an airline, came back in as an O3 and it was even questionable he would get enough good years to retire.

So often I see on LinkedIn the pictures of guys who are in the reserves is of them in uniform. That sort of stuff is hard to categorize in dollars and cents, but means a lot.

I do volunteer EMS, which pays less than zero in money, but helps give a purposeful life. It’s a similar thing for a lot of people, I imagine.

I certainly get the service aspect but it seems to come with a lot of overhead that doesn't seem like fun. But maybe that's just my former ACDU brain thinking that the last thing id want to do is deal with all the chickenshit USN stuff in my spare time. But I can see how it would be a break or at least something different. I also get the desire to serve and be part of something larger than yourself hence why my gig is as a GS but I've apparently lucked into a decent agency with out a lot of the nonsense that others are discussing here from their GS experience.

 

[Pags]

Honest answer: plenty of private sector jobs suck, and there is plenty of fuckery by employers/ direct supervisors. It’s not all choker whites and dining outs foosball tables and free smoothies. The Reserves can be a welcome, needed respite.

Yeah, I get that. It just seems weird to me as a former ACDU guy to find an escape in a uniformed culture that is rife with its own neverending self imposed fuckery. And my brief exposure to the Reserves seemed to indicate that it amplified the crappy parts of ACDU such as paperwork, reserve instructional minutia, being at work to check a box, PFAs, uniform shennagins, no notice deployments, etc without the parts of ACDU I enjoyed.

I'm glad you guys have found a respite and calling in the reserves for sure I just hope it's not coming with a price.

 

[Pags]

Great question. My simple answer is this is why you work for Uncle Sam! You can keep your Tricare and beer money and get a decent retirement and get full protection during MOB. Of course, when it comes to people with grown up jobs in the “real world” I am just as baffled as you.

Yeah, the GS and SELRES or Airlines and SELRES seems the best way to make it work. Although it would seem to be agency/org specific as some have had very different experiences than I have. I recently had a guy on my team call and say, "hey, getting activated to go to DC for at least 30 days." I said, "stay safe, let us know if you or your family n need anything and we've got the watch at work." Which didnt seem like a ground breaking response to me but from this thread it sounds like it might be.

 

[Hair Warrior]

Yeah, I get that. It just seems weird to me as a former ACDU guy to find an escape in a uniformed culture that is rife with its own neverending self imposed fuckery. And my brief exposure to the Reserves seemed to indicate that it amplified the crappy parts of ACDU such as paperwork, reserve instructional minutia, being at work to check a box, PFAs, uniform shennagins, no notice deployments, etc without the parts of ACDU I enjoyed.

I'm glad you guys have found a respite and calling in the reserves for sure I just hope it's not coming with a price.

Well, we kind of have the best of both worlds:

• no PCS'ing / train where you live
• Mobs typically come with ~6 mo advance notice, and 4+ years dwell on the back end
• choose your unit in JOAPPLY and APPLY
• don't like your reserve unit? go on ADSW and you can AA all your DWEs, and get your FITREP signed by someone else. Or, you can move to a different geographic area and do a TRUIC change.
• don't like your civilian job? go on ADSW or Mob.
• unemployed? see above.
• health insurance choice: TRICARE Reserve Select, or your employer's plan, whichever you prefer
• cherry pick your ATs, somewhat
• (what else am I missing?)

 

[SlickAg]

I certainly get the service aspect but it seems to come with a lot of overhead that doesn't seem like fun. But maybe that's just my former ACDU brain thinking that the last thing id want to do is deal with all the chickenshit USN stuff in my spare time. But I can see how it would be a break or at least something different. I also get the desire to serve and be part of something larger than yourself hence why my gig is as a GS but I've apparently lucked into a decent agency with out a lot of the nonsense that others are discussing here from their GS experience.

USNR chickenshit is a much more tolerable brand of chickenshit. Any large bureaucratic organization has its issues, whether civilian or military. The difference is that the USNR chickenshit has an expiration date. Be it the end of your orders, end of the drill weekend, whatever. Anything is tolerable in small doses.

And I've said it before and I'll say it again, in my experience, reservists aren't simply paying lip service to leadership principles while scheming their way up the pyramid. I've consistently seen my reserve leadership step up to the plate again and again. Everyone's already quit once. Turns out everything I found missing on active duty I found on the reserve side. My only complaint is that I couldn't jump ship sooner. Again, different folks will have different experiences, but for me the grass really is greener.

 

[SELRES_AMDO]

My previous bosses hated my SELRES gig but there was literally nothing they could do. We both knew that they were in an unwinnable position if I choose to push the issue.

GS14/15 pension plus retired SELRES pension is a nice position to be in when you get older. And like I stated earlier, putting on the uniform and contributing is satisfying after spending all week fighting bureaucracy in my civ job.

Being in a private sector job is a lot different and I've heard some terrible stories and knew people that had to quit the reserves because their real job was at risk.

 

[FlyinSpy]

require

That would be "retire", but can't seem to be able to edit (or spell) today...

 

[FlyinSpy]

Honest question, how do you guys square the risk to your full time career with what amounts to a small payout at the end? It seems that a lot of folks on here have been doing well in their day jobs only to have them go sideways because of a MOB thus resulting in loss of future raises that could have been towards retirement and end up returning more than $1600/mo. I get some of the former ACDU guys who end up in the position of "just 5-8 more years" but it sure seems like a lot of professional risk for a tricare and beer money. It just seems that I know a lot of guys who get caught in between the reserves and a day job and end up trying to do both things well.

I've always had a very transactional relationship with the Navy and SELRES - my objective was to always get more out of them than they got out of me, and I like to think I succeeded in that respect. I've also always worked for my entire career (11 years prior to commissioning, now +22 as a SELRES...) in the DoD and IC, so there was essentially no risk. I've had the same employer for those 22 years, and while they were never happy when I would up and disappear for 3 months or so - that was the nice thing about mob'ing with VAQ-209 over the years; mobs were always on the order of 3 months. Now, I did it 7 times in that time block so it does add up in total, but in the end there always has been decent crossover between my day job and my hobby job, so it was always a net positive. Coming back with operational stink on me over the years (ONW, OIF, 2xOEF, a UDP rotation to Japan, and two WESTPAC pumps) was a good thing.

The prospect of $1600/month was never what kept me in though, not would it have had I perceived a significant degree of the same "career risk" that others seem to face. I came very close to bailing on the 9-8 Sep 2001 drill weekend, when as a fresh JG my bullshit tolerance for Reserve buffoonery was exceeded - I had actually drafted up my "AMF, send me to the IRR" letter, but two days later there was a tectonic shift. And 2 months after that I found myself in an intel instructor billet at NSAWC/Fallon, which next to being in VAQ-209 is the best intel billet in the entire IWC.

I never wanted to deal with the ass pain of being a SELRES CO, and to make O-6 in the IWC you need to be a CO. So when the O-6 board results came out in May, I set a new land speed record in NSIPS for time elapsed between Board results being released, and my retirement request in NSIPS being submitted. (~5 mins) So I've got that going for me...

 

[nittany03]

I'm glad you guys have found a respite and calling in the reserves for sure I just hope it's not coming with a price.

But what's a "price?" Is there an opportunity cost? Sure. But not everything has to be reduced to money. At some point, once you've got the life basics covered, the "best" choice is what works for an individual and gives their lives a sense of meaning. Otherwise you're going to have a shitty depressed life with a big fat bank account.

Personally, CDR nittany03 makes more than Mr. nittany03 anyway, although I recognize for more junior folks that may not always be true.

 

[Pags]

But what's a "price?" Is there an opportunity cost? Sure. But not everything has to be reduced to money. At some point, once you've got the life basics covered, the "best" choice is what works for an individual and gives their lives a sense of meaning. Otherwise you're going to have a shitty depressed life with a big fat bank account.

Personally, CDR nittany03 makes more than Mr. nittany03 anyway, although I recognize for more junior folks that may not always be true.

I agree and that's what I'm trying to say and by price I don't necessarily mean "money." It sounds like the existential goodness of the reserves outweighs the badness for y'all and that's good. Just asking the question big that is the case because it sure didn't seem to look that way to me when I did my personal calculus. But you and I aren't the same and thats ok.

 

[Pags]

Well, we kind of have the best of both worlds:

• no PCS'ing / train where you live
• Mobs typically come with ~6 mo advance notice, and 4+ years dwell on the back end
• choose your unit in JOAPPLY and APPLY
• don't like your reserve unit? go on ADSW and you can AA all your DWEs, and get your FITREP signed by someone else. Or, you can move to a different geographic area and do a TRUIC change.
• don't like your civilian job? go on ADSW or Mob.
• unemployed? see above.
• health insurance choice: TRICARE Reserve Select, or your employer's plan, whichever you prefer
• cherry pick your ATs, somewhat
• (what else am I missing?)

Yeah, I had plenty of SELRES try and recruit me and all that seemed like a lot of extra work on top of real work. Of course I was going into the reserves as an O4 so I would've had to jump right into a real job and not a fun one and the opportunities for O4s where less and less good. I was also coming off of 8yrs of long hard tours and a 2xFOS so my personal tolerance and goodwill for more of USN's "promises" and shennagins was nil.

 

[nodropinufaka]

Honestly I hate the reserves. I did 10 years active duty already.

I got almost 17 years total and am just trying to bide my time until I can drop my papers.

I don’t even really need to make O4 cause I have so much enlisted time I make sanctuary. I have about 3800 points so the return to scrape up 300ish more points in the next 3 years just isn’t there for me. I gotta make it to 20 but I’m also ready to go.

That being said I’m not a dirt bag and I put my best foot forward and do my best and got all good paperwork. But it’s time for me to move on.

Im also rated 90 percent from the VA with a pretty severe back injury from a deployment to Iraq back in 2008. I have to submit a MRR every year just to stick around.

I may be in the minority. It’s doenst offer me any respite. Active duty for so long left a really bad taste in my mouth.