invite me to participate in these important hearing. based on my experience as a veteran and my service of the mission continues, i believe that this subcommittee is doing work that is critical to the success of today's generation of veterans. today i am testifying as a west point graduate and former army pilot and as a veteran who sought meaningful employment after service. a national nonprofit organization where we have worked with over 350 veterans to pursue successful transitions to civilian life. based on these experiences with veteran recruitment and retention, i believe that there are several key lessons that federal contractors and corporate leaders can apply to successfully tap into the great skills of today's veteran. applying these lessons will strengthen their organizations while also building successful transitions for veterans. at the mission continues, we

create successful transitions by engaging veterans in six-month community service fellowships. today a cavalry scout mentors hundreds of children at the boys and girls club. a marine corps sergeant help his community prepare for disasters and emergencies through the american red cross. an army communications specialist teaches english as a second language to immigrant children and their parents. we introduce these fellows to a meaningful mission. we welcome them on to a distinct team, and we ask them to don a new uniform of service. as they serve, we provide them with living stipends and mentors. at the end of their fellowship, we will challenge them to mark their life-time commitment to service by executing a service project in their community. after their fellowship, they move on the realize their post fellowship goal of full-time employment, continued education, where an ongoing role of service in their community. our experiences with these

fellows and with more than a thousand veterans who applied for fellowships have shown us this. when you connect veterans to a meaningful mission, ask them to join a distinct team and challenge them with a set of goals that lead to definable impact, they excel. just as they excelled in their military service, they again excel in their citizen service. a primary factor in our selection and placement of fellows is the fashion they have for service. the cavalry scout serves 59 the girls and boys club because he is fulfilled by mentoring youth. the marine serves his community because he is passionate about response. it has been critical to their service. our fellows are further enrich bade renewed connection to a team. as you know, all enlistees and officers take an oath to support and defend the constitution upon entering the military. they then join their military units, each of which possesses a distinct identity and strong

traditions. recently, we gathered more than 100 veterans and awarded them mission continues fellowships. we asked these fellows to take a similar oath and join this distinct new team. in front of thousands of fans at a major league baseball game, wearing sharp royal blue mission continues polo shirt, standing at attention alongside their new comrades in arms, these fellows proudly recited an oath of service. they walked off the field motivated and eager to serve. while they serve, we also require that our fellows set and achieve goals. they each identify at least three goals for the impact they will have in their community. they identify a post fellowship goal that will impact their own lives for years. we hold them accountable to those goals, and we partner in their success. roxley pratt grew up in war-torn

sierra leone. he decided then he wanted to be a marine. years later, after escaping a siege of his city and emigrating to america, he enlisted in the united states marine corps. he honorably served for six years, and his service included deployments to iraq. upon his return, people thanked him for his service, but when it came to landing a job, he struggled to get interviews. unemployed and unable to translate his military skills at job fairs in southern california, roxley found the mission continues. driven by his own experiences with homelessness and his personal responsibility to assist those less fortunate, he earned a fellowship with habitat for humanity. he has reconnected to a mission that is important to him. he is working on distinct teams. his team at the mission continues. his team at habitat for humanity, and the teams of volunteers he now organizes. he is translating military skills to civilian skills, and he is excelling. roxley's story can be the story

of this generation of veterans. it's a story of service in war, and continued service at home. madam chairman, we are grateful for your support and the support of this subcommittee. i would welcome any questions that you or any other members may have. thank you. >> madam chairman, ranking member, distinguished members of the subcommittee, on behalf of more than 200,000 members and supporter of afghanistan veterans of america, i thank you for the opportunity to share our views on this important issue. i've spent 14 years in the marine corps trying to execute the marine corps's two missions, winning battles and making marines. as an iva staff member, i don't make soldiers, sailors, airmen or marines, but i do try to make their lives better. the views expressed in this analysis reflect the views of iva and not the marine corps. unemployment is arguably the most pressing issue facing

veteran today. while recent statistics may indicate the employment outlook might be getting better for veterans, the situation is still worse than it ought to be. for example, the unemployment rate for veterans nearly 18 to 24 years is nearly double the rate for 18 to 24-year-old civilians. helping veterans create their own jobs is touted as part of the solution. many wonder whether federal contracting laws and goals are being met. there are three main areas to consider. data, outreach, and implementable solutions. i will address outreach first. iva believes that the logical place to begin is through the transition program, also known as tap. because tap is now mandatory for all service members, it is a convenient touch point that will allow for the dissemination on federal contracting processes and opportunities and the most basic level of training to the widest possible audience. the small business administration is currently developing an entrepreneurship for tap and we believe this will be a key component in setting

veterans up for success. we also believe allowing veterans and their spouses to retake tap after separating is a necessary step. allowing a veteran or a spouse who has completed one track of tap, education, for instance, to retake a different tap based on new circumstances, in this case an entrepreneurship is a small investment on the front end which we believe will pay big dividends on the back end. on the question of data, we must have what do we know hand what do we wish to know. there is a lot of data to be had. vets 100 and 100 a has some meaningful data, but only as a snapshot. it is also not easily accessible. the information is more akin to a head count and misses crucial information. because vets 100 and 100-a allows reporting of veterans deployed at any point during the fighting year, there is no guarantee that employment by a contractor or subcontractor is consistently reliable or accurate. a contractor may have 100 vets

at the beginning of the year and 2 at the end and can report 100 vets employed. in addition, without the inclusion of other relevant information, the value of the 100 and 100 a forms is limited. some good examples would be the north american industry classification codes that allow the tracking -- that allow tracking the number of veteran contractors by industry type and the era from which the veteran hails. these pieces of information would held elucidate which contractors are most heavily and lightly concentrated and whether that force is declining due to edge. much of that information resides with sba. the certification process for a small -- for a service-disabled veteran-owned small business should also be easy and consistent. iava supports efforts to curb abuse by obtaining the veracity of veteran status, but we recognize that the certification process should not discourage small business was limited resources. we're concerned that the

statutorily mandated certification process currently used by the veterans administration is too cumbersome. extending this system to all federal agencies has has been proposed would be unnecessarily burdensome on both government and small businesses. it is also worth noting that the va center for veterans enterprise site was down for approximately two weeks. it was up last thursday, and it with us now back down again for maintenance. and there is no information posted as to when new veterans may expect to be able to reg center their businesses online. the small business administration has relied on self certification and has experienced little fraud. iava believes maintaining this system will help ease the 3wurd on veteran owned small businesses while helping to guarantee that the consideration earned through service to country is not abused. we pursued many different leads

on making the system more efficient and increasing the number of veteran contractors. many of the recommendations we heard often already exist in some form. for example, the idea of a searchable centralized database that could be used by federal contracting officers and federal contractors already exists as the central contractor registration ccr and dynamic small business search dss systems. the use of those resources to find veteran contractors even by federal contracting officers appears to be less than optimal because many people use the path of least resistance. part of the assessment of the problem will require a view of the use of existing systems and processes. but without data that is substantial, accessible, and easy to understand, the implementing solutions is a little bit akin to shooting first and aiming later. some of the reviews of this data are already under way, and

ideally will result in best practices so solutions can be found. we also believe they should be funnels to the small business administration. sb are the experts on small business and should be the prime actor in this area. iva welcomes congress in increasing the number of veteran contractors whether they are fulfilling government or veteran contracts. iva is willing to spread the word about available opportunities or training to our membership in through our extensive media outreach. we're willing to partner with government agencies or private organizations in targeted efforts to help veteran employment through our program such as smart job fairs held with the u.s. chamber of commerce. we believe employment is the number one issue facing veterans of iraq and afghanistan and will only become more important as the war in afghanistan ends. iva appreciates the efforts of this subcommittee and other witnesses and look forward to working with them.

thank you and i look forward to answering any questions. >> madam chairwoman and distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for inviting me to testify here today. i testify as a senior manager in the diversity inclusion team at booz allen hamilton, where i am responsible for all aspects of our organizational efforts to build and maintain a diverse and inclusive culture for all employees at the firm. that includes making booz allen an employer of choice for veterans. booz allen is based in mclane, virginia, and we have over 80 offices throughout the united states. for nearly a century, our work has helped u.s. agencies, defense components, and other business and institutional clients better execute the most challenging government missions around the world. "forbes" magazine recently reported that booz allen ranked as the top employer for veterans, siting the approximately one-third of our employees who have

self-identified as having military backgrounds. we have also been recognized by the national guard and the reserve as well as by the disabled american veterans organization for outstanding practices that support veterans. and we are honored to have been named in the top 10 of the gi jobs list of top 100 military-friendly employers for six years running. booz allen leads in veterans employment because our commitment to veterans and wounded warriors is part of our corporate culture, coordinated by our senior leadership and extending throughout the firm. we approach this commitment by involving multiple aspects and layers of our business, much like we integrate our various capabilities for our clients. we hire veterans because of this commitment, and because veterans bring a unique knowledge and experience base to their work. few can know the challenges that face our u.s. military and other

government clients better than those who have served our country in uniform. for these reasons, booz allen supports the government's efforts to encourage the hiring of former military members, and we believe that the government -- that the current regulatory construct strikes the right balance in allowing contractors like booz allen to explore and develop programs that work best for their particular organization. we approach military hiring, for instance, through a variety of creative recruitment programs. but we also leverage the wide range of expertise we provide to military clients such as knowledge of veterans health services to help us attract and support new hires, we support veteran-owned businesses through our contracting organization. we use members of our own veteran workforce to mentor and support other veteran employees

through employee resource groups, mentoring circles, education, and leadership programs and other means. we focus on programs to support military families and spouses, and importantly, veterans and wounded warriors are a major focus and beneficiary of the firm's philanthropic efforts. in our prepared statement, we detailed several hiring and retention programs that have made us so successful. in hiring we foster strategic recruitment partnerships with nonprofit organizations in the military community. we also run a junior military officers program to put recently separated junior officers directly in contact with our military recruiting team. and we participate in the u.s. army partnership for youth success program by pledging to provide future full-time employment positions for qualified army-trained veterans. we retain veterans through

initiatives at our firm, and in the surrounding community we offer a employer resource group known as the armed services forum to give former members of the military a forum to interact with each other and navigate their transition into the civilian workplace. we have a proactive disability accommodations program, generous military leave and return policies for reservists, and we conduct targeted training and development programs to help veterans convert skills they learned in the military into skills they can use and market at booz allen. we have also hosted several collaborative community summits across the country to better understand and improve service delivery to veterans across local government, advocacy, health care, and other community organizations. while we believe our firm is already effective in employing veterans, we recognize that there is more work we all need to do.

collaboration among industry, veterans organizations, and the government is of paramount importance, and we particularly support the subcommittee's efforts to enhance this type of collaboration. madam chairwoman, thank you again for permitting me the opportunity to discuss this important issue with you today. i welcome any questions you may have. >> thank you very much. ms. sullivan? >> madam chairman, and distinguished members of the committee, i'm honored on behalf of mantech international corporation to appear before you this morning to share our experiences in hiring and retaining our nation's veterans. mantech is a global employer to almost 10,000 people. that roughly 40% of our employees today proudly identify themselves as having served or are currently serving in the u.s. military is evident of the success we enjoy as a company and the culture that successfully attracts those exiting the military and assimilates them into the civilian workforce on a

sustained basis. mantech provides those leaving the military with the opportunity to join the civilian workforce, the opportunity to jane additional job skills and training, health care coverage, and the opportunity to continue to serve their country and support an important mission as a contractor. as the majority of our work today supports the u.s. military and intelligence community, a large number of the career opportunities available at mantech are for positions that directly support mission requirements and typically require skills gained through military service and the possession of active security clearances. many of our recruiting activities are focused on engaging those who are in the process of exiting the military, or those who have recently exited. mantech is an active member of more than a dozen military employment partnerships such as the 100,000 jobs mission, the military spouse employment partnership, wounded warrior project, hiring our heroes, and va for vets. we also build and maintain relationships directly with

colleges and universities that support the gi bill and offer programs developed especially for veterans. over the past year, we have participated in more than 125 hiring events spanning 72 cities nationwide. as a result, we connected with more than 5,000 veterans and hired more than 2,000 of them. as part of our outreach to recruits, we work closely with the transition assistance program, tap, sponsored by the u.s. military. through tap we offer site assistance to active duty soldiers who will be leaving the military, including practical device on how to develop and write a resume, how to interview for a job, and how the civilian job environment works. of the many things we do to retain our employees to include veterans, mantech offers educational skills and career development training as well as mentorship opportunities. our education programs are offered through mantech university, or mtu, a first class award winning corporate

university established to support the emerging training in educational needs of our employees. additionally, mtu has alliances with 13 different accreditedmtu with 13 accredited universities offering certificates, bachelor's and masters degrees and many mbas in online and traditional classroom settings. in 2011 a large percentage of our veteran employees took advantage of training opportunities through mantech university. more than 40,000 courses were successfully completed by our veterans. roughly ten courses per veteran employee. many of mantech's contracts require foreign deployments. so mantech offers two specific programs to assist family members of deployed individuals. one program called lifeworks provides employees and family members free confidential access to resources and counseling 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. this program offers expert guidance on health-related issues. addiction, grief and loss,

financial ideas, how to parent a difficult child or teenager, and how to cope with stress. constant tacare, a second progr offered by mantech is an internally staffed program available to employees 24 hours a day 365 days a year by human resource professionals who have the knowledge and experience to assist deployed employees and their families. constant care is similar to the military ombudsman program and therefore is familiar and well received by veterans and their families. as a result of retention efforts such as these many of our new recruits come as referrals from existing employees, which accounts in part for mantech being named number 6 top military-friendly employers by g.i. jobs magazine, most valuable employer for the military by sinjobs.com, one of the country's most veteran-friendly employers by usaa magazine, and the top ten best employer for veterans by military times edge magazine. now, let me comment on mantech's experience with assembling and

filing information regarding veterans in the department of labor. logistically the assembling and reporting information required by the department of labor for the vets 100-a is an automated process by data base systems that capture employee information at the initial stage of hiring process. when information required for payroll, health benefits, taxes, et cetera, is input into our systems, when new hires join mantech. each employee, each new employee is asked to self-identify if they are a veteran, and this information issin ing sing areg and reviewed by senior research management as well as management throughout the year. lastly you've asked for suggestions to facilitate the hiring of veterans by contractors. to answer this question thoughtfully i engaged with several cognizant employees working in a variety of levels and roles. whether human resource specialist, recruiter, or line manager their answers were very consistent. all felt strongly that the federal government already takes many bold and aggressive actions to ensure maximum outreach to

this important segment of our population. further, we know that companies like mantech have embraced veterans outreach. after all, if we have not served ourselves, we each have family members and loved ones who have selflessly served our nation or are serving today. our recommendation is to stay the course with those efforts. we have in place today. madam chairman, that concludes my oral statement, and i am pleased to answer any further questions. >> thank you all very much. it was interesting. i try to visit small businesses in my state from time to time, and i actually had a visit with a plumbing supply house in st. louis. and this is not a large employer. less than 50 employees. the people that work there, most of them have worked there many, many years. so they want to be careful when they hire someone because they assume when they hire someone they're going to be with them for years. i didn't go there to talk about hiring veterans. but they brought it up with me.

and the man that owns the company said it was incredibly difficult for them to find veterans. and he mentioned a couple of things. and i'd love your take on this, mr. daywalt. first he said that the websites, that in their experience as they looked at the various listings on the websites they were taken aback at how many people had put information on the website that were not veterans. that people had been able to access various websites and put their employment, you know, that they were anxious to get employed, and then when they actually did the due diligence they found out that people were signing up on these websites that weren't veterans at all. so they found that overwhelming because this is a small operation. they didn't really have -- they ended up working at this for a while. i mean, they spent a lot of time and energy. they finally found two applicants that they're in the final process of interviewing.

the other thing he mentioned to me, and i'd like your take on both of these issues, is matching. he says at the veterans jobs fairs and the places they were going to access, there wrb employers there like banks and enterprise rental car, anheuser busch, and they needed people for their warehouse. they couldn't -- they were not able to hire someone who was disabled because they needed someone who was going to help them load plumbing supplies into the warehouse and out of the warehouse and deliver these plumbing supplies. and he said it was clear to him how inefficient this was because you had all these employers that wanted a much different employee than he was looking for. and he said that once again took hours and hours of their time and effort to try to match up the right veteran with the right job opportunity. so if you could, if you could address those two issues that

this particular employer in st. louis was struggling with. >> yes, madam chairman. excuse me, i'm suffering from allergies. your comments about not being vets doesn't surprise me. there's a number of sites out there that don't validate who the person is that's putting up the resume. you've got over 300,000 internet job boards out there. you've got about 30 left in the military space. the leaders are -- the three of us do validate each person that's putting up the resume. some of the other let anybody put up a resume. and in reality most veterans do not put their resumes up on the internet. we're getting over 200,000 visitors a month, but we only have 140,000 active resumes. and it's been hammered into us that our friends over the sandbox are using sites like

vets assess or other free sites. i wish the press would cover that more. i hear that from a lot of employers because until they need to make a hire they aren't always aware of who the players in a given space are. sort of like i don't know any heart doctors but if all of a sudden i need a heart operation i'm going to do a lot of research to find out who's going to be a good one. so it's not a common thing that everybody uses on a daily basis. regarding the matching, the more advanced sites, ours being one of them, military hire's another good example, have matching mechanisms and career assessment test that's we have people -- cri tests out of fort worth where we can identify a veteran that matches best with the employer. at vet jobs we have customer service reps.

when a customer puts up a job and we've got about 52,000 jobs up today, when they're key jobs we will go in to the data base, identify people, and refer them into customers. we've had a pretty good success rate. but a lot of the complaints that he or she was voicing really comes from just not understanding how the system works. and it's because it's not a system that's used day in and day out. >> what would you suggest if anything maybe that we just -- part of the problem in this area is all of us want to help. >> right. >> and sometimes, you know, all best intentions have ugly endings in government. and frankly, i'm beginning to believe that this reporting requirement to the department of labor is a good example of that, where all best intentions where we were going to try to keep track of contractors hiring veterans and -- but no one is doing the due diligence to make that effort really meani iningmn

any way. what could we do that would help an employer like crescent plumbing supply in st. louis find veterans in a way that is more efficient for them? you know, now, these are great folks, and they just kept working at it until they found two. because they wanted to do this because they love their country and they want to hire veterans. but i'm not sure very many businesses as small as this business is would have spent the time sxefrt they spent at it. what should we be doing to make this easier? i'm surprised that your website wouldn't pop up as one of the first if you went on to search hiring veterans -- >> we generally pop up in the top three or four. >> and is it clear on your website that all the veterans on there have been certified as veterans? >> yes. we've caught some people who put their resumes up that weren't veterans. we take them out. but some suggestions to help improve the