OK.

Here's another question: Does an Air Force Reserve or Air National Guard job make it harder to get a civilian job? I've been told that there are laws to prevent employers from firing service people who have been deployed, but what about when it comes to getting hired?

I was active duty for 10 years and left for the reserves. I had an interview at Netjets. All questions stopped after I said I was in the Reserves. Now I have a job as a civilian contractor at my reserve base... go figure.

I had heard from quite a few peers who fly with NJA and are also in the Reserves that NJA was a very military friendly organization.

USMCFLYR

When the economy is bad and you need 2 pilots with 10 in front of you equally qualified do you take the one that can get activated for 3 months? Or do you pick the one of the other 9 with no stings attached? I don't blame them. Had it been a year prior I don't think it would have mattered. It worked out for the best. I make more money and I'm home every night in my current job.

Disagree completely. I told them I flew in the Reserves, and the rest of the interview consisted of a few questions, followed by war stories. THEY personally mentioned that the NetJets job would go great with a reserve flying job. I got the job....

Heh, wow. That's quite a disparity of experiences.

How about people pursuing a civilian job outside of airlines? Anybody?

I would think intuitively that you'd be less desirable to the typical employer. All that ANG means to them is that you're going to be away from work a lot. But what if you work in an Aerospace or Engineering field? I can see how in some ways it would be beneficial for an employee to have actual flight experience, but I'm sure the employer would rather not have that flight experience take place during time that the employee might otherwise be getting **** done....

Maybe it's my interpretation, but I'm just saying you could have heard a pin drop when they found out and the interview ended rather abruptly. My guys weren't prior military either so who knows. Best of luck to you!

Coming from a guy who is also working towards earning a Guard slot, reality checks are certainly appreciated from you old heads, but why does reality always have to be so depressing!

Sounds like a peach of a place if you take that kind of abuse from a complete stranger without so much as a whimper.

I thought you could only do that kind of stuff in Russia.

I got two degrees in aerospace engineering. I was given no special consideration just because I was an operator while perusing the engineering jobs. This is mostly due to being entry-level. Lockmart will hire you, but you won't get the job just because you're a flyer. At the upper echelons however, one's affiliations on the operator world will be the very implicit prerequisite to get that level of a contractor job in the first place. At the engineering "levels" world though, you're just another number cruncher with skosh availability, Lockmart will expect you to serve your country outside the hours of 9-5.

As for academia, like I posted before, they said they were "very Reserve friendly" but when I inquired about being given availability to perform weekly duty at the unit while not teaching class or during student counseling hours I was flatly told "h#ll naw, we need you here 5 days a week". Turns out my "part-time" job pays me more than their full time job, so I told them they could keep their "mil friendly" gig. So that was that.

Good luck