As a flight lieutenant in the RAF’s administrative branch, Michelle Hitt helped to deal with the aftermath of the 2005 Hercules crash in Iraq that killed 10 servicemen. “It was a question of looking after the families, dealing with pensions and all the other admin required,” she says. In the same year, she went to Turkey and Azerbaijan to assist crews taking humanitarian relief to victims of the Pakistan earthquake.

Then at the age of 38, after 16 years in the forces, it was time for her to join civvy street. “I wanted more stability in my life. I had reached a point where I could take my pension but I also felt I was young enough to start a second career,” she says.

Hitt signed up to the Career Transition Partnership, which the Ministry of Defence runs with Right Management, a specialist career development company that is part of the Manpower group. It offers support and preparation for the transfer to civilian life as well as assistance in finding a job. In her final year in the RAF, Hitt started a part-time university course to gain accreditation in human resources from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

“The bursar’s course I attended as part of my resettlement programme was very influential in my change of career and helped me to gain my current position,” she says. Since February, Hitt has been bursar at Witham Hall School, near Stamford, Lincolnshire. “I look after finance and budgets, health and safety, and the human resources for the nonteaching staff. I was lucky in that I had transferable skills.”

The transition to civilian life is not always easy for forces personnel.

Adrian Cheesman, head of demobjob.co. uk, which specialises in finding jobs for service leavers, spent 24 years in the Royal Corps of Signals. “In the military you’re in a very self-contained environment,” he says. “When they leave, some people find it hard to relate their military skills to the civilian equivalent.”

HMForces.co.uk, which was set up by the online recuitment specialist Monster with MoD cooperation, provides information about training courses and advice on job applications as well as carrying job advertisements.

Julian Acquari, managing director of Monster UK and Ireland, says: “Veterans deserve recognition and support and this web community will hopefully give all members of the UK armed forces a tool that will help them.”

“This site is really helpful. I left the army 20 years ago but feel very much a member of the forces community,” says Dannie Mileham, of Halifax, who was injured while serving in Belize and is now disabled. “Most people don’t realise how hard it is to leave the services.”

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