A few days ago I blogged about the long overdue “White House Report On Women”. To recap: The last report was done in the Kennedy Area with Eleonore Roosevelt in charge. Times have changed indeed since then. Being a military wife things can get very tough, when you are trying to fit military life style, family, education and employment under one hat. Kate Ovelman Nelson is a military spouse and has “taken on” Executive Order 13473: Military Spouse Hiring Authority is on Facebook. (“The purpose is to facilitate the entry of Military Spouses into federal service as part of an effort to recruit and retain skilled and experienced spouses.”) Read more EO13473 in the following post, then head over and join her group.

She says: “We are Army and stationed at Fort Stewart, GA. I have worked in the DoD for several years as a School Liaison Officer and recently transitioned back to the classroom side of education. Since we married in 2004, we were here at Stewart then we moved to Fort Irwin, Fort Sam, Fort Sill and now back to Stewart. Lots of PCSing and job changing since 2004!!”

There is a saying that Military Spouses have the toughest jobs. I would have to agree with that. Many people will try to say that we knew what we were getting ourselves into when we married our Active Duty spouses and th

at we made this choice to live a life such as ours. Yes, and yes. But you know what? I wouldn’t change a moment of it, nor do I have any regrets.

As Military Spouses, we make so many sacrifices. We give up our loved ones for months at a time when they are deployed or training. We are required to be both the mother and father when we are temporarily singled. We move and leave friends behind. We shed tears the same way civilians do and many times those tears are shed in the secrecy of our rooms late at night when our babies are tucked in, the dishes are finished, house cleaned, dog walked, coffee made and in many cases our own school work is completed. But there is one area that we as Military Spouses should not have to make sacrifices in and that area is: employment

So many of us have higher education degrees, and some even have multiple degrees. We are teachers, nurses, lawyers, retail specialists, accountants and business men and women who made a choice to follow our spouses in their pursuit of maintaining our country’s freedom. Our resumes look atrocious jumping from one job to another due to our mobile lifestyle, but that does not mean that we are less qualified than anyone else.

Finding employment, as we move frequently can pose to be a big problem and each time we are not hired, our hearts and ambition drop a little. I have been married to my Active Duty spouse for seven years. Yes, seven years does seem to be a short time, but when you have PCS’ed four times in seven years, and have changed jobs each time, it really isn’t. Holding two Masters Degrees in education, fully qualified teaching certificates in seven states, awards, letters of recommendations from Colonels and Two-star Generals, you would think that my resume and qualifications would outshine and come to the front when applying for jobs. Not so. I remained unemployed for almost a year after our last PCS which took my enthusiasm for being a working Military Spouse down the drain. I applied for numerous Government Service positions and Non-Appropriated Funds positions including the same position that I had held for four years prior, but to no avail. I started to wonder what I was doing wrong? Was I not putting myself out there? No. Was I not making my resume look appealing? No. Then I learned about an Executive Order that was created by former President Bush and signed into action by President Obama that is supposed to ease employment transitions of Military Spouses.

Executive Order 13473: Military Spouse Hiring Authority

On September 11, 2009, President Obama made the Executive Order 13473: Military Spouse Hiring Authority effective. Under this Executive Order, spouses of Active Duty Military are able to receive non-competitive appointment into federal civil service if they are highly qualified. This allows them to be hired for a position for which they are qualified without having to apply with the public in an open job announcement. The purpose is to facilitate the entry of Military Spouses into federal service as part of an effort to recruit and retain skilled and experienced spouses. It is also in place to help minimize disruptions in military families due to permanent relocations, disability and deaths resulting from active duty service. To achieve this, these provisions authorize the non-competitive appointment of certain military spouses to positions in the competitive service.

Executive Order 13473: This is One Order All Military Spouses Should Follow!

For quite some time, the intent of this Executive Order was not being met. The majority of hiring agencies in the Federal Service were not opting in for this hiring authority. The only positions that this EO applied for are part time and temporary. Upon further discussion with various hiring agencies within the governments it was discovered the majority of positions did not qualify or (more times than not) that the hiring authority was not even aware that such an executive order exists. There are still some positions for which this EO does not apply such as DoDDs teacher positions and some NAF positions.

Of course this authority is at the discretion of the hiring agency and it does not entitle military spouses to a federal job. This appointing authority does allow for eligible individuals to be considered and selected for Federal jobs; however it does not convey selection priority to eligible spouses. This authority is an additional non-competitive hiring tool which agencies may use to select qualified, eligible individuals.

It should be noted that Executive Order 13473 is different from the Military Spouse Preference (MSP) program which was developed by the Department of Defense (DoD) to help ease the interruption of a spouse’s career when the family must move due to permanent change of station (PCS) orders. MSP gives the military spouse applicant an additional five or 10 points on his or her civil service examination score for certain competitive positions.

When applying for positions under the website: www.armycivilianservice.com you will complete a resume builder where you will list all of your information, previous work experience, references and special skills. You will then be asked to complete a supplemental data form where you will fill out sections based on special skills and qualifications. There is a section that allows you to check several boxes based on your eligibility. There is a box designated for EO 13473. Check that box!!! Again, this does not automatically guarantee you the position, but it puts a flag up to the hiring agency that you are a highly qualified spouse applying for this position and that your resume should be considered at the top of the list.