When Matt Disher came out of the military after serving as a combat engineer in the US Marine Corps, he struggled to translate his valuable experience to the civilian workforce. His resume didn’t match what employers sought. He didn’t feel that he interviewed well. He didn’t know what to ask potential employers and didn’t know what they wanted to hear from him, either.
Through trial and error in his job searches, Disher eventually discovered that his leadership skills, ability to work with diverse teams and experience dealing with things like budgets and foreign entities during his time in the military made him a desirable candidate across industries. Fast forward to today: Disher is the Military & Veteran Recruiting Program Leader at Cushman & Wakefield, one of the largest commercial real estate services organizations in the world. He’s also the Chairman of Cushman & Wakefield’s Veteran Employee Resource Group (ERG) and a subject matter expert in his field.
Indeed interviewed Disher about his background and role at Cushman & Wakefield to get his take on the benefits and challenges of military veteran recruitment programs for employers.
Q: How and why did you get into military recruiting?
A: Leaving the military can be a difficult emotional transition. You’re leaving one lifestyle and moving into another. I came out of the Marine Corps as a combat engineer, and my job didn’t translate well to the civilian world. I was challenged to figure out what my next steps were and make meaningful connections with people who could guide me. There weren’t a lot of resources for post-military jobs back then. I wanted to change that.
Q: What is your job now? Tell us about the program you lead.
A: Cushman & Wakefield is a leading commercial real estate firm with 50,000 people globally. Our Military & Veterans Program offers a culture that celebrates veterans’ contributions and leadership, rewarding work related to veteran skills and talents. It offers a community of camaraderie.
The topline function of my role is to attract and hire military and veteran talent, which not only benefits people looking for post-military careers; it also benefits Cushman & Wakefield by creating a pipeline of exceptional talent so we can deliver the best services for our people and clients. A secondary responsibility is teaching teams how to understand and interpret military backgrounds and how to support the culture of hiring. I also help educate clients and other companies on how to build military and veteran programs.
Q: How many veterans does Cushman & Wakefield employ?
A: Cushman & Wakefield employs approximately 1,300 veterans in the US, a number that's based on voluntary identification.
Q: Why are programs like this important?
A: It’s important and advantageous for businesses to recognize that the military is an exceptional resource for talent — it offers a diverse and cultured workforce of people who are elemental in solving difficult problems and who bring an exemplary work ethic. Companies are looking for an educated, experienced and diverse talent pipeline.
Q: Is the military veteran population an overlooked talent pipeline?
A: Military veterans aren't overlooked. They're just underutilized. There are roughly 200,000 people leaving the armed forces every year. And if you’re not looking at them, you’re missing this massive section of our population.
Q: What sort of challenges do you face running a program like this?
A: The challenge is getting business leaders to understand that this is a well-educated, diverse and experienced population that can be relevant to your business operations and your strategic goals as a company. We don’t suffer from this among my team at Cushman & Wakefield, but many businesses do find this to be challenging. Another challenge is looking at a resume and understanding what it’s going to mean inside your business. For example, how do you plug an infantry leader coming out of the army into commercial real estate operations?
Q: What have been the benefits of hiring military talent for Cushman & Wakefield?
A: In my opinion, this population is typically better educated than their civilian counterparts. Often, they have more years of experience — and more experience in hands-on leadership and operations. They’re generally mature, well-traveled and cultured. They’re used to, and adept at, working in and among diverse teams. And if they don't know what the job entails, they’ll learn it quickly.
Q: How does skills-based hiring relate to military veteran hiring?
A: The military keeps meticulous records of the work its members do and the education and training they have so that former service members can more easily take their experience from the armed forces and plug it into a resume or a conversation. For example, the military has cybersecurity and computer help desk technicians. Those men and women have formal training in zero-fail environments. If you have to diagnose a problem on a computer network, you have to do it at that moment; it can’t be sent back to a shop somewhere.
At Cushman & Wakefield, we work with a variety of organizations to provide veterans, transitioning service members and military spouses with training and hands-on experience in the civilian workforce. More information can be found on Cushman & Wakefield’s website.
Q: How does that translate to corporate America?
A: You can think about the military as one giant corporation. It has a lot of the same things that corporate America has. It has people who manage properties and the systems on properties. The military has boats, airplanes, vehicles, veterinarians, doctors and nurses. The only difference is that they wear uniforms and in some cases they fight a war. So if you can find a person in the military with 85% of what you need in your corporate space, then you need to train them on only 15% of what you need.
Q: How do Indeed and Glassdoor help Cushman & Wakefield in its military recruiting?
A: In my opinion, Indeed and Glassdoor are our best resources for military recruiting. Indeed is Cushman & Wakefield’s largest single source of military and veteran talent every year. Indeed makes it easy for military personnel and veterans to find us and for us to find them. As a recruiter, I can check a box that says I want to see only military and veteran talent, and I can search by geographic location or skill set. Additionally, Indeed’s Targeted Ads | Brand allow me to target veterans (military talent) so they see my jobs first when they're transitioning out of the military or looking for a job change years after they’ve left. Now they're seeing Cushman & Wakefield jobs sponsored at the top of their job feed inside of Indeed and Glassdoor.
Editor’s note: Indeed’s Targeted Ads | Brand is now Employer Branding Ads, part of the new Indeed + Glassdoor Employer Branding Hub.
Q: What’s been your experience working with Indeed?
A: It’s been easy working with Indeed. The account managers are well-versed on the products Cushman & Wakefield uses for hiring. Sometimes I ask them, “What's going to work to reach my goals? What can Indeed do for me?” They generally make it really easy to look at how other companies are using Indeed, how it’s worked for them and how it works for the military and veteran population.
Q: How would you characterize Indeed's products compared to their competition?
A: In terms of resume sources and attraction through targeted ads, I’m not using another service. In my opinion, there isn’t competition in that space.
Q: What lessons have you learned in terms of strategy or best practices that you’d share with other companies looking to hire military veteran talent?
A: It starts with executive and company support. It’s hard to run a veteran program like this inside an organization if the leadership either doesn’t support the program or doesn’t understand it. You have to sell the idea that this is a business imperative and that your business will be more successful because of programs like this.
Cushman & Wakefield’s leadership not only supports military and veteran recruiting efforts, but we also have earned several awards for our commitment to recruiting, hiring, retaining, developing and supporting veterans and the military community, including being named a 2022 Military Friendly Employer and a 2022 VETS Indexes 3 Star Employer.
Q: What are the future plans for Cushman & Wakefield’s Military & Veteran Program?
A: Our Military & Veteran Program is growing. We continue to strengthen our recruiting efforts in terms of how many veteran and military hires we make in a year. One of the newer projects we’re working on is the Department of Defense’s SkillBridge program, which allows us to take those who are leaving the armed forces and bring them in to learn our business operations. It’s a game changer in the military transition world. Until recently, people had to leave the military, hang up the uniform and then come home and figure out what they were doing next. Now, they’re afforded the opportunity of up to six months working inside an operation before they officially leave the armed forces. It’s sort of a test drive for both parties.
Q: If you could summarize why other employers should develop a military and veteran hiring program, what would you say?
A: What is every company looking for? They’re looking for a diverse, educated and experienced workforce. There’s no better single place to find them than from the US military. Getting company and executive-level support, standing up a program and intentionally recruiting from the military and veteran populations are critical.
Contact the Indeed for Military team to learn more.
