Military service is the best option for starting a work career: Agree or disagree?

Agree

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by Harry D. Sayles

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This is a very good topic that as I read has brought up some very old memories for me and just reading a couple of paragraphs from both sides has settled some questions in my mind on subjects that have always stirred up debates within myself. However I feel quite compelled to state that I have to agree that military service is the best option for several different reasons which could and have filled volumes of books on the subject.
My career began at the age of thirteen, I was obsessed with wanting to be a chef and everyday in the kitchen culling vegetables made the feeling that much stronger. When I finally decided that I needed to go into the military to get the education I needed to become a chef I found that it was much more than just cooking, it was teamwork to the tenth power and beyond. In the restaurant I had worked in everybody did their own thing even when it was time to go home. If you were on mop duty that day or night, you mopped the floor and others would stand around and watch while you struggled. What made my decision to go into the military was my patriotic side which my father strongly protested, he was a veteran of D-Day and the Battle of the Bulge, he had very strong views about the military and in no uncertain terms told me that I would never make it. He said he was proud that I wanted to do it but, he feared for me because Vietnam was still going on and he said that I wasn't the kind that liked to take orders.
The other mitigating factors were the fact that I had quit school to work, yes I loved it that much, and still do, and my boss told me that if I went back to school and graduated he would pay for me to go to the premier chef school in the nation all I had to do was work for him after I graduated for five years after that I was free to do whatever, I never mad it to the school, I went straight to the army recruiter.
What I found in the infantry was a camaraderie that I hadn't experienced in civilian life, I missed my friends at home but after my first two week leave I realized that I no longer had anything in common with them, nor did I want anything from them. In the unit that I was assigned to I found people from all walks of life that would help me if I was struggling and expected the same from me if they were struggling. When I transfered into the kitchen I found that I was a valuable part of a team also. And nobody that I had worked with in the civilian world kitchen had ever prepared for, cooked and served 850 people two meats, two vegetables, two starches, soup, sauce, several different salads and dressings along with dessert. Once I was assigned to a facility where we had eight cooks to a shift including the supervisor and first cook and we prepared food for 1500 to 1850 people per meal. Plus cleaned our equipment as well as after going in at two a.m. you may have to go to the motor pool or do a physical fitness test, etc.
There were non commissioned officers that taught me how to lead people, they taught me that your people have to respect you because of your ability to lead them, you don't want them to fear you because you're the person in charge. I even had one that taught me how to cook the full menu for 1500 people by myself starting at 4:30 in the morning and being ready with the line set-up at 10:15 a.m.
Since I retired fourteen years ago, I have worked in several different venues with a myriad of individuals from every possible level of experience and knowledge imaginable and I have only found one kitchen that was worthy of the comaradarie, respect, loyalty, honesty, and integrity that I had in the military. It was a kitchen in a french restaurant and the chef-owner was a veteran of the french army. He knew what teamwork was, he was very interested in the complete staff from dishwasher to maitre de, and went out of his way to ensure that you were furnished the knowledge to do the job properly.
The military instills morals and values in you that the civilian job sector does not have time to because of budgetary restraints, and the ever present job security issue. The military teaches you the finer points of working with and individual to train that person to perfection and you don't ever quit on that person, they will quit on you but, you are not allowed to quit on them. In the civilian sector I have watched too many times, young managers terminate an individual for coming to work late three times, even though they've invested thousands of labor dollars in training the individual over the past nine months it's eaier to dump them and find another than spend some time with the individual and find out what the issue is with them and the schedule.
But I think my biggest gripe with the civilian sector is the fact that we have large corporations which I have worked for that put twenty-one and twenty-five year old in the position of manager and expect them to train a staff of individuals to perform. I left food service for five years at one point and worked for a major national retailer. I was very much appalled at what I saw in this company hiring twenty-one year old to lead people from various walks of life. These people had never experienced a diverse group of individuals, I actually on several occasions along with another military retiree intervened to keep a young manager from being taught a lesson so to speak by younger workers. It was because the managers did not have the life experience let alone the diversity experience to deal with a team of individuals that came from Atlanta, Brooklyn, Buffalo, Puerto Rico, and Oklahoma. From the ghetto's and projects, the mansions and farms, each one with a different personality and learning curve, I'm sorry but you cannot convince me that graduating from a major university with a B.A. or M.A. in business will give you the same qualifications as the same age individual that spent four years on active duty in the military.
People who have spent a tour of duty in the military know the fundamentals of leadership and management, yes they may not know how to make a fine sauce the way that's taught in the fine dining restaurants and culinary schools but nine times out of ten a military person has more stamina, loyalty, and leadership ability than the average civilian, and has the drive and desire to learn.
Today I am a very successful chef largely due to the training I recieved in my military career, and I am constantly amazed at the knowledge level of the young cooks in the service industry that cannot handle the pressures of a modern day kitchen because they were not provided with the proper training.

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