Hishem AzzouzHost Of Recruitment Mentors Podcast

Transitioning away from Military life

Name: Transitioning away from Military life
Uploaded: 2023-11-02T17:00:40+00:00
Duration: 39 s
Channel: Hishem Azzouz
Description: In this monologue, a former Marine heavy‑weapons specialist explains how he used his military resettlement grant to fund a 12‑week network and firewall…

2 Nov 2023 · 1 min

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In this monologue, a former Marine heavy‑weapons specialist explains how he used his military resettlement grant to fund a 12‑week network and firewall engineering course in Lincoln, spending £6,000 to qualify for civilian IT work. He describes his new role as a network and firewall engineer, highlighting the stark contrast between the collaborative, high‑energy environment of the Marines—where he was surrounded by teammates, training, and sports—and the solitary nature of civilian field engineering, which often involves long drives on the M25, working alone in a van for six‑hour shifts, and coping with feelings of isolation and frustration.

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So what did I do in the Marines? I was heavy weapons. When you leave, depending on how long you served and where you served, you'll get a resettlement grant. So basically a certain amount of money to then go and do courses, etc., etc., right? But I went and done like a 12-week course up in Lincoln, spent £6,000. I was a network and firewall engineer. I didn't realize that most of your time as an it engineer is you're on your own. It's cool when you're on site and you're in the server rooms and you're switching out routers and firewalls and stuff, that's cool. But when you're on your own 6 hours a day on the M25 listening to Radio 1, you want to blow your brains out. Because I come from an environment where there's 30 guys all around you all the time, you're on the shooting range, you're playing football, to then just sat in a van by myself. So that was probably the difficulty I had.