As most of my readers (I think there are almost ten of you now) know, I was a Marine Corps infantry officer. In this job, I oversaw many young men. The Marine Corps has the lowest retention rate of all the branches of service, so the vast majority of these young men served four years and then returned to civilian life. After the Marine Corps, these Marines have spread to the wind. Many have started families. Some have rejoined the Marines in some capacity, whether reservist or active duty. Some have gone to college, law school, or (unfortunately) jail. Others have become plumbers, teachers, firefighters, or police officers. No matter where these fine men have gone, they need character references or letters of recommendation. Because these guys mostly enlisted out of high school, their only non-Marine Corps work experience was their high school, minimum wage job. That experience does not speak to recruiters, colleges, or juries like a good account of their Marine Corps service. And it is hard for these guys to encapsulate their service in a palatable way for civilians. To my knowledge, the Marine Corps offers no centralized clearinghouse of an enlisted Marine’s reviews that he can tap into after leaving the military. Even if he can access some of his reviews–like officers and higher-ranking enlisted men can–the format is completely foreign to those reading the reviews. So the marines are relegated to reaching out to past non-commissioned officers and junior officers for letters of recommendation.

Don’t forget: when we decided to get a commission as officers, our duties extended far beyond the four year contract. This is a lifelong bond with our Marines. Spend the brainpower and time to give this Marine your best effort. He’s depending on you

As a result, helping these Marines can keep me quite busy. With a demanding job, writing recommendation letters from scratch is a horrible waste of time. So I’ve built a template I use to draft these recommendations. The template helps me save time, accurately “rank” the Marine versus others I have reviewed, and provides the guys with a coherent picture of their service. Below I will provide the template I use. Feel free to copy and use the entire letter or pilfer only certain parts that speak to you. I’ve put each part of the letter you’ll need to fill in in brackets for you to personalize. I have assumed you are a Marine infantry officer for my ease. After reading my proposed letter, see below for an explanation of our goals below the letter. At the end of this post, I provide a slightly-edited version of a letter I recently sent on behalf of a former Marine seeking a law enforcement position.

To Whom it May Concern,

My name is [ your name here]. I am a [insert your city and state]-based [your occupation here] with [your company/firm/school here]. Before completing my graduate degree in [insert highest level of post-service education here] and beginning my career, I worked for four years as a Marine Corps infantry officer. In this capacity, I completed [insert number of deployments] deployments to [location of deployments]. In [describe your first deployment in terms of timeframe], I deployed as an [insert your job here stressing commander in the title if possible–I use “infantry platoon commander”]. In [describe your second deployment in terms of timeframe], I deployed as a [insert your job here stressing commander in the title if possible–I use “Marine company commander”]. [Continue doing this for each of your deployments]

During these deployments—as well as the years before, during, and after—I commanded and observed over [insert number] Marines. Mr. [insert applicant’s name] served as my [insert applicant’s job title] during our [describe deployment in terms of timeframe]. As a [insert applicant’s job title under you] in combat with the Taliban, he [insert applicant’s job title–for example: “led a squad of 12 Marines that we often bolstered with machine gun and mortar teams”]. Of these 375-plus Marines I observed, Mr. [applicant’s name] was in the top [insert percentage]%. Of Marines at his rank and experience level, he was one of the [offer a number here or a percentage if the applicant is not a top-of-the-line performer] Marines I would most trust. In short, Mr. [applicant’s name] is a wonderful, trustworthy leader who can be relied-upon to “get the job done” and treat people with respect and dignity.

[Here I offer a paragraph-long story of a difficulty the applicant overcame (if he did) and tie it back to his overwhelmingly great attributes]

[Next I offer an important paragraph to me. I explain how the Marine treated me, as the leader well while also remaining true to the guys below him or in his charge.]

Mr. [insert applicant’s name here] would fit in great for [position title] at [company/school]. From what I can tell, this position requires [X,Y, and Z]. Mr. [insert applicant’s name] possesses these qualities in spades. [Here I try to put in a personal anecdote]

Please do not hesitate to reach out to me if I failed to address some important aspect of your consideration. Were that to occur, I would like the opportunity to address that aspect as I have the utmost confidence in Mr. [applicant’s name]’s abilities. I can be reached at the above contact information or at my personal e-mail [(my personal e-mail address)] and phone number [(my personal phone number)].

Sincerely,

[your name here]

Objectives:

• Our first objective is to establish our bona fides. We need to first show that we are a post-Marine Corps “success” so the reader loses their picture of a dumb knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing Marine. You may be writing this letter to a liberal college admissions person on the East Coast, so this is where you convey that you are a dynamic, intelligent person.
• Next, we need to establish our service-related credentials. I try to stretch this portion out a bit to show that I have a huge swath of similar people to compare with our applicant. This explains that you were a commander responsible for reviewing and overseeing a lot of people. In fact, I provide a total number of Marines I oversaw in my different platoons and company. In doing this, you establish that your recommendation and “ranking” later in the letter for this applicant is not meaningless–you have a big frame of reference.
• Then describe quickly the applicant’s job description when working for you. Don’t use military task organization job titles with wording like “close with and destroy the enemy.” Instead, try to use civilian-friendly phraseology like “led and managed 12 Marines for seven months while in near daily contact with Taliban fighters,” “provided overnight security our 50-man outpost relied-on daily,” or “planned and led 40-plus patrols of 12 or more Marines in hostile contact with Taliban fighters.” See what I did there? I quantified the applicant’s accomplishments in non-military speak. Do not assume a civilian understands any military jargon.
• Now you must place the applicant in the proper context among all the men you led and managed. Then–since comparing an 18 year-old PFC to a stud sergeant is not fair, I provide a ranking of the Marine among his peers. If the Marine was not a stud, I generally only offer his ranking among his peers. And don’t worry here, low performers rarely reach out looking for a recommendation. Most requests come from top 50% Marines, so they are easy to write.
• Next comes the meat and potatoes. I spend one paragraphs explaining a difficulty the Marine overcame. I especially make sure to do this for the top performers. This often takes a long time and requires me to review my deployment journals and spend some time in reflection. You may need to reach out to other Marines or intermediary leaders for some help–and that’s okay! When we decided to get a commission as officers, our duties extended far beyond the four year contract. This is a lifelong bond with our Marines. Spend the brainpower and time to give this Marine your best effort. He’s depending on you.
• For the second half of the meat and potatoes, I then spend another paragraph that I think is important; I write an explanation of why this Marine was not only a good leader but also a good follower. Many “great” leaders are awful followers. Our American individualistic, entrepreneurial folklore venerates great leaders as awful followers as though that were a virtue. Sure, for Steve Jobs and Bill Bellicheck, that may be true because they are at the top of their chosen field and can get away with it. Our applicant is not there yet. He is at the bottom of the rung or close to it. And while we want to extol his virtues as a leader to show his potential, many employers need reassurance that, in the here-and-now, he can be a good follower and not too much of a renegade. Arm the employer with the information it needs to hire your Marine.
• Next I provide a few values that a perfect candidate for the applicant’s desired position would possess and explain that the applicant has these virtues in spades. I also add in that, if I have failed to address some important aspect of the position, the company or school should reach out to me to let me redress the error because I believe in the applicant so much I would feel awful shortchanging him.
• Finally, save all your letters of recommendations in one folder. This way, you can have templates for i) different deployments, ii) members of different companies, platoons, and squads that will stress those units’ specific accomplishments, iii) different levels of performers so you can “place” the current applicant in his or her proper group, and iv) the same Marine should he later ask for another recommendation.

Here’s an example of a recent letter of recommendation I prepared for a young leader I had on one of my deployments. Note that I’ve changed a few details and used a fake name so this guy is not identifiable.

December 24, 2017

Re:    Jeffrey Gomez letter of recommendation

 

To Whom it May Concern,

My name is Robert R. [last name]. I am a Minneapolis, Minnesota-based attorney with the national law firm [firm name]. Before going to law school and beginning my legal career at this firm, I worked as a Marine Corps infantry officer. In this capacity, I completed two deployments to Afghanistan. In 2009 – 2010, I deployed as an infantry platoon commander. In 2011, I deployed as a company commander. In these deployments—as well as the years before, during, and after—I commanded and observed over 375 Marines. Mr. Gomez served as one of my squad leaders in my 2009 – 2010 deployment. As a squad leader in combat with the Taliban, he planned patrols and led a squad of 12 Marines that we often bolstered with machine gun and mortar teams on over 100 patrols. Of these 375-plus Marines I observed, Mr. Gomez’s exceptional performance places him in the top 3-4 %. Compared to Marines at his rank and experience level, he was one of the four or five Marines I would most trust. In short, Mr. Gomez is a wonderful, trustworthy leader who can be relied-upon to “get the job done” and treat people with respect and dignity.

Then-Corporal Gomez came to my platoon late in the “workup” (the time before the deployment), having volunteered to go on the 2009 deployment. He had a tough assignment of leading 12 Marines he had neither met nor worked with before the deployment. However, Mr. Gomez quickly won these Marines over. His infectious personality, coupled with his effectiveness as a combat leader, engendered trust in his subordinates and leaders alike. Within weeks I trusted him to run complex patrols and operations with up to 20 or 25 Marines in my command. And he never once let me down.

As a leader, it is sometimes difficult to know where you stand with the men in your command. Mr. Gomez eased that burden on me. With no agenda other than accomplishing the mission and taking care of the Marines, he went out of his way to make me look good to the junior Marines, while also voicing any concerns in a respectful, effective manner. And this mutual respect and honor did not only flow up our chain-of-command; the Marines in Mr. Gomez’s squad loved him, respected him, and (when necessary) feared him. He is still close with those Marines—many of whom count him among their closest confidantes. Mr. Gomez personifies the virtues of a Marine leader. Aside from his wonderful work as a Marine, Mr. Gomez also is a good person and loyal friend.

In a law enforcement position such as the one Mr. Gomez is applying for with your organization, I suspect that a holding one’s self to a high standard while connecting with people of all backgrounds proves valuable. Mr. Gomez’s personal standards–whether physical appearance, intellectual vigor, or moral clarity–are second to none. I trusted him with the moral, physical, and emotional well-being of 12 Marines from all sorts of backgrounds in far remote areas of the Afghan mountains where I–as the next higher-up commander–was often more than ten miles away for days at a time. Mr. Gomez connected with his men on many levels and despite their many differences. Jewish upper class Marine from New York? Friends with Mr. Gomez. White middle class Southerners? Friends with Mr. Gomez. Black Alabaman Marine? Friends with Mr. Gomez. Marginalized Pashtun Afghan tribesmen? Mr. Gomez’s trusted partners. Disinterested Afghan National Army soldier from Kabul? Mr. Gomez’s personality produced “buy in.” Mr. Gomez can be trusted to treat all with dignity while on difficult calls to difficult situations as a police officer with your police force.

Please do not hesitate to reach out to me if I failed to address some important aspect of your consideration. Were that to occur, I would like the opportunity to address that aspect as I have the utmost confidence in Mr. Gomez’s abilities. I can be reached at the above contact information or at my personal e-mail [(redacted)] and phone number [(redacted)].

Sincerely,

[my name]

One thing I could have done to make this letter better is include a description of Mr. Gomez’s (fake name) important, relevant awards. I am near certain that this Marine earned a medal with a combat distinguishing “v” device and I wrote the award recommendation. I should have asked “Mr. Gomez” for the citation. I could have then mentioned the award and quoted my own previous work in this letter. That was an oversight, so you should try not to make the same error.

First, I hope this post helps former military officers and non-commissioned officers continue to serve their old subordinates by providing a comprehensive, meaningful review of the servicemember’s time in the military. Secondly, I hope this post helps save former military leaders’ time and energy by offering suggested format and content for letters of recommendation. Finally, readers: Do you think I missed anything? Any suggestions or ideas to incorporate into writing these letters of recommendation? If so, comment below.