When I left active duty back in 1993, I was made aware of and requested a copy of my DD Form 2586. It was 9 pages of erroneous data pertaining to my military experience and training; and contained none of my training. In short, it was crap. And it contained a provision that stated that "The Army cannot add to the document any education or training experience that does not already exist in an automated format." Essentially, what that meant was that the document was only as good as the accuracy and completeness of the data contained therein, and it could not be changed. As a result all of my training was missing because it had not been input through ATTRS and I had completed training up through and including the National Defense University (in addition it only showed training completed after 1984, and I had been in the Army since 1969). On the experience front it purported to go back to 1975, but the dates, assignments, and MOSs in many instances were inaccurate or completely wrong. When I called the contractor who was responsible for handling the program I was blown off and told that the document was only supposed to be used to help me write my resume and not to be shown to employers. The program that was supposed to help Veterans was absolute rubbish. However, I didn't take this lying down. I created a forgery correcting all the erroneous data in my assignments, MOS/AOC/ASIs, expanded out the duty position titles to what they had actually been, and pulled out of AR 611-101 what the actual descriptions of the MOS/AOCs were rather than the numerous entries on the my original that stated in many instances: "No occupation description available." I then sent my "forgery" (32 pages) off to the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Force Management and Personnel along with my original (9 pages) and asked him point blank which document he would prefer receiving (it included all the missing schooling I had along with ACE credit recommendations and/or other accrediting agency recommendations, and experience going back to when I entered the Army in 1969). In his response he stated quite candidly that: "I regret the many inaccuracies contained in your DD Form 2586. I agree that your corrected DD Form 2586 is what you should have received for your VMET." Since I took the time and effort to correct this "uncorrectable" document myself and ran it by the person who was responsible for it, I now use this more accurate document as my DD Form 2586, not the garbage they issued to me. If DoD wants to prosecute for forgery, come and get me, but my forgery is more accurate and complete than the false official document they issued to me. The bottom line here, is you don't have to take the crap they give you. You can do something about it, as I did. However, I was fortunate because I kept all my military records and I annotated throughout my career the job descriptions contained within the various Army regulations that defined what I had done in my career. This is what the military should do, as the DD Form 2586 should be a living document that can be corrected even after you leave active duty. In a nutshell it should lay out your entire military career to include training. I have no hesitation providing my forgery to prospective employers, an yopu should see their reactions because they had never seen as detailed a document as I provided. Now that I work for DoD as a civilian, Resumix has permitted computers to make decisions as to who are best qualified people for positions. I am really tired of hearing people say, don't say too much because people don't want to take the time and effort to wade through a bunch of resumes. To those people I say, the most important job you have as a manager or supervisor is hiring the best people for any position you may have. If you are not willing to spend the time and effort do this, you should not be a manager or supervisor, even if you have to take the resumes home to work on them. To illustrate this point, I recently had to review 90 resumes for a position in my section after Personnel only wanted to send me what they considered were the top 15 candidates. However, no computer or personnel person is going to tell me who the best candidates are for one of my positions. Good luck to anyone who gets their VMET and wants to make it more complete and accurate. I've been through the process of looking for work after leaving the military and it is not easy.
