Exclusive interview with General Mauro Prezioso: the importance of the "Job opportunities" project

(To Maria Grazia Labellarte)
28/11/16

Friday 25 November, as part of the 5th National Conference on "Security, Legality and Development", held in the Aula Magna of the University "Aldo Moro" of Bari, General Mauro Prezioso, military territorial commander of the Army in Puglia, intervened by presenting the project "Occupational opportunities". Accompanied by the project manager for Puglia, Lieutenant Colonel Mauro Adriano Ocone presented the initiative, directed by the 1st Department of the General Secretariat of Defense and managed by the Office for the support of the professional relocation of voluntary personnel discharged without demerit ( whose operative arm are all the Army Military Commands of Italy). 

According to the SILDifesa database, the adherents to the "Employment opportunities" project, between the 2013 and 2014, according to gender, are for the 15% women and for the 85% men. The percentages also indicate that 80% of those discharged come from the Army, 16% from the Navy and 4% from the Air Force. Online Defense, present at the conference, interviewed General Prezioso, exploring the dynamics of the initiative.

Generale Prezioso, what is the orientation and training process of the "Employment opportunities" project?

This project, in line with European methods in terms of active politics, develops with the volunteer discharged without demerit, through a path articulated in various phases. Starting from an information activity addressed to our users, we move on to an individual orientation activity useful in defining the user's aptitudes and potential, in order to orient him towards specific courses; the subsequent training phase takes place through the establishment of courses and following the best practices financed by the Ministry of Defense and organized by my Command, or with public professional training courses; finally in the last phase, the placement. The discharged person is placed in a database in which the curricula of users and registered companies with the possibility of matching (Company-volunteer). Essentially, the discharged are provided with useful tools for an active research aimed at placing in the labor market.

General, "becoming a soldier" today is a mission linked to an "ideal" or rather the search for an employment outlet?

I think it is above all an ideal, also because it is a choice that leads to making sacrifices and having strong peculiarities. I say this from personal experience and the data also attest: we do not in fact have problems with recruitment and in general there has always been an important turnout in our ranks and this shows that it is not a simple "job outlet". It may well be that someone pursues this path, we cannot exclude it, but in principle I believe that we must have strong motivations for this life, because the renunciations and specificities are many.

How would the experience gained within the armed force, nationally and internationally, become expendable in the civil sphere?

This question is linked to what was said before, to more formations there are more opportunities. Many laid off already have a spendable professional profile that is built with the job performed during the service, others instead achieve it later, but in fact, working experiences made in arms have a "flexible" nature and fall into that background professional, enriched by skills transversal that characterize it (ability to work in a team, sense of duty, loyalty, adaptability ...). For example, those who obtain driving licenses already have one more chance than those who do not. This is just an example, to underline that during the service you can have professional experiences that are easy to translate into something concrete in the job market.