Looking for career bliss? You could do worse than consider a military career.
The website CareerBliss.com, where employees can anonymously review their employers, recently mined its database of employee reviews to come up with a list of the "25 Most Blissful Places to Work."
Of the top 10 most satisfying employers, four are branches of the military. The U.S. Air Force tops the list at #5, closely followed by the Army National Guard at #7, the United States Marine Corps at #8, and the United States Navy at #9. The United States Army finished just out of the top ten, placing eleventh.
On CareerBliss' scale of 1 to 5, where 1 indicates a poor workplace and 5 a great one, all of the uniformed services scored highly overall. The Air Force had an overall score of 4.15, the Army National Guard 4.09, the Marine Corps 4.06, the Navy 4.05 and the Army 4.04. For purposes of comparison, the most blissful place to work, Google, had a total index score of 4.36.
Employees consider the military tops in opportunities for career advancement. The Army National Guard ranked first among the top 25 in that category, with a 4.33 score. The Navy came in third, behind Google, with 4.30; the Marines ranked right behind them with a 4.29. The Air Force tied with DTE Energy for sixth, behind PricewaterhouseCoopers, with 4.20, and the Army placed seventh with a 4.18 score.
The uniformed services also scored highly for growth opportunities. The top performer among them was the Marines, leading the pack with a 4.41 score; next came the Air Force and Navy, which tied for fourth with 4.32 scores; the Army placed fifth with a 4.26 score, and the Army National Guard came in sixth with 4.22.
And for job security, the military can't be beat. The armed services took all of the top five slots in this category, with the Navy on top at 4.69. The rest, in order, from two through five: Air Force, 4.61; Marines, 4.60; Army, 4.58; Army National Guard, 4.33.
While military pay lagged that in the private sector, the benefits were among the best, according to reviewers.
Military careers also make sense for those interested in the field of logistics, for that is where the term originated. Getting troops, equipment, material and supplies from bases thousands of miles away to front lines where fighting takes place is an incredibly complex task with many challenges, and working in the military will put one's skills and knowledge to the ultimate test.
The satisfaction of knowing one is helping protect one's fellow Americans is a fringe benefit not rated on the survey.
Whether it's military or civilian, LogisticsJobSite.com has plenty of opportunities for you to advance your career.
By: Sandy Smith
Sandy Smith is an award-winning writer and editor who has spent most of his career in public relations and corporate communications. His work has appeared in The Philadelphia Inquirer, the Philadelphia CityPaper, PGN, and a number of Web sites. Philly-area residents may also recognize him as "MarketStEl" of discussion-board fame. He has been a part of the great reserve army of freelance writers since January 2009 and is actively seeking opportunities wherever they may lie.
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