Military Appreciation Month Profile: Mark Zinno, U.S. Army

May is Military Appreciation Month and Connecting Vets is running a series of veteran profiles telling the stories of those who have made the military to civilian transition. In the series, the veterans discuss their military career, how they transitioned back to civilian life and what advice they offer to vets who are currently going through what they did.

What propelled you towards military service? When did you join, which branch, which duty position(s)?

The only thing that really propelled me towards military service honestly, was just to pay for college. I grew up in a pre-9/11 world and the idea of joining the military wasn't something that a lot of people did. I remember my college classmates asking me during my senior year if I was going to the career fair and I told them that I wasn't going because I had to go in the Army after college and then they asked me, “Why don't you just get a real job?” So that was sort of the mindset of people joining the military in a pre-9/11 world. I thought I would do my four years and get out. In my wildest dreams, I never thought I would still be here 1/4 of a century later.

Tell us a bit about your military service, positions served, moving up through the ranks, deployments, memorable moments.

I was commissioned as a second lieutenant in 1999 and my first duty station was at Fort Hood, Texas. Within the next 2.5 years, I was transferred to the Army National Guard as part of a force reduction move by the government prior to 9/11. I was promoted to captain and took the first of three company-level commands. One of those commands was my first deployment to Iraq in 2005.

Within a year of returning from my first deployment, I was promoted to major and then took a detachment-level command as well. It was here that I had my second deployment to Iraq. It took about another two years before I was promoted to lieutenant colonel and took battalion command shortly after that. I now hold the rank of colonel and I'm currently still serving in the Army Reserves.

My first deployment to Iraq was the highlight of my entire military career. I was fortunate enough to serve alongside of Green Berets and Special Forces. I got opportunities to do things that I never thought I could do and was asked to do things that I had no formal training to do. I was challenged and pushed to my very limits, and as a whole, we enjoyed tons of success during that deployment. I always look back fondly at those 15 months as the most formative time of my entire life.

When did you transition out of the military and why?

I haven't made a full transition out of the military yet, as I'm still serving in the Army Reserves. I have just under five years left until mandatory retirement if I don't get promoted one more time.

I will say I know there's a time when I'll have to take the uniform off in my near future and it is a little unnerving to say the least. I've spent more of my life wearing this uniform than not.

What did you transition to in the private sector and what were the biggest challenges you faced in doing so?

In the private sector, I work in sports media as a host and analyst on TV radio and digital. This was a tough transition just because there really isn't any field that the military offers that correlate to being in the media. So, my status as a veteran didn't really help me find a job in any way. It was something people saw as an added benefit to their staff, but never really factored into the hiring process. And that's the true challenge of a veteran trying to transition, is
to be able to explain what you've done in the military and how it closely relates to any civilian job. But mostly the leadership aspect is what is really challenging for the civilian world to understand. They can't fully grasp what leadership positions are truly in charge of and how much they are responsible for. And sadly, most in the civilian world will never understand leadership the way the military understands leadership. Especially in a combat zone.

What is the biggest piece of advice you would give to a veteran currently transitioning from military service?

The best piece of advice I can give to any veteran currently transitioning is to know what you want to do first. Take some time and do some soul searching take some more time and get on the Internet and look for things and after you've done all that take some more time to talk to people and find out what they think you're good at and what your best attributes are and that should help you figure out what you want to do. If you don't know what you want to do your search can be fruitless. But if you know what you want to do you at least know where to start.

And the next piece of advice I would give would be to continue to be persistent in your search. You're going to hear a lot of “no” before you get that one “yes!” Finally, I would say network a ton! Talk to everyone. Ask
people if they know an individual in your field that you could speak with. Meet for coffee. Hop on Zoom calls. Shake as many trees as you possibly can and see what falls out. Don’t get discouraged.