Working Iowa: career planners at Iowa Workforce Development help veterans find jobs

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – Its Veterans Day and in this weeks Working Iowa we’re hearing from Dakota Andrew, a Veteran Career Planner with Iowa Workforce Development who helps veterans get jobs.

We asked Andrew about the challenges veterans can face when finding work.

“You know when it, when it comes to veterans that were working with here you get a little bit of, kind of the gamut of stuff. You’re gonna have folks with, you know, mental health barriers that’s kind of like the new thing that, I wouldn’t say new but something that were putting a lot more focus into. And there’s some surprising things too you might see things like, you know, veterans are very prideful creatures too, to where coming into Iowa Works or you know even doing things with jobs working with other people can almost seem like help. And you know when I speak with veterans I would encourage them that if you were to come into Iowa Works and seek services that it’s not necessarily help, it’s more just utilizing a resource that’s available to you,” Andrew explained.

When it comes to connecting veterans to jobs he says area resources work together.

“You know one great thing is here in kind of our, I would say our Tri-County area you know Linn, Benton, Jones, Johnson, all of the veteran resources is we’re starting to talk. Now we’re all kind of interconnected. So when you’re working in the veteran community, one of the greatest things is just being connected to other folks in the veteran community. So you’re going to want to know your county veterans service officers, you’re going to want to work with the federal VA, and they’re representatives in the area. You’re going to work want to work with your local non-profits, Freedom Foundation is one, you know you got new ones coming up Patriot Recovery Residences that helps veterans that need low income housing, things like that,” said Andrew.

There are multiple veteran resources available.

“To be honest, I would advocate that almost every veteran community partner is going to help a veteran with employment at some point, because there isn’t a perfect process for it, you know, and it can be a challenge especially for your transitioners. So your nonprofits, your Freedom Foundation, you know, your, your county Veterans Affairs, they’re either going to know what to do or know where to send you. You know, a lot of them are going to send you to Iowa Works hopefully where that’s what we do all day and we’ve got veteran career planners just for them, so hopefully we can help you out. And I, and I would encourage that too, because online is a great resource but also we’re here we can supplement what maybe online didn’t do for you,” Andrew explained.

As a veteran himself Andrew says helping other veterans can be personal.

“The interesting thing is, when I got this job for example, you know, it’s very relevant because if I didn’t have the job, I would be, you know, a client of it. So, and that’s another thing is, you know, our workforce here at Iowa Workforce Development, all these veteran career planners, we’re all veterans. So sometimes it’s personal, you know, we’re a member of the population of which we serve, which helps,” Andrew said.

“When it comes to the employment game, it’s not necessarily easy, but it’s not hard either and that there’s no one way to go about it. There’s no rules, there’s just maybe some etiquette, you know, there’s plenty of resources out there, but I wouldn’t get discouraged if you know you’re getting a lot of what you would say nos. If you keep going into it, people are getting hired. I mean, it’s there,” he added.

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