Paradox and Transition: Exploring Women Veteran

December 3, 2025

Paradox and Transition: Exploring Women Veteran’s Leadership Identity Construction From Military Leader to Civilian Leader

Amelia Frances Underwood | 2023

Abstract

The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological research study was to explore the lived experiences of women veteran leaders and how they constructed and negotiated their leadership identity as they transitioned from leaders in active-duty military service to leaders in the civilian workplace. This study’s intersectional approach investigated the lived experiences of five noncommissioned officer women veterans and five officer female veteran leaders who currently or have served in a civilian leadership position. I applied Schlossberg’s (1981) 4S’s of transition (situations, self-directed actions, supports, and strategies) to better understand women veterans’ perceptions of their transitional experiences from military leader to civilian leader. Eight themes emerged in this study that addressed how the military-to-civilian (MTC) transition process positively and negatively impacted the participants’ perceptions of their leadership identity. As women combat veterans, all of the participants in this study expressed great pride in their military service and readily claimed their veteran status within their civilian work environments. The participants identified positive impacts of MTC to include valuable relationship-building with other military women and women veterans and an increased desire to help other women in the workplace. The participants experienced a multitude of struggles following MTC to include homelessness, posttraumatic stress disorder, alcohol addiction, legal trouble, serious health issues, grieving the loss of a spouse and fellow servicemembers, financial difficulties, and feeling a sense of loss that deteriorated their perceptions of themselves as leaders. The participants shared how their MTC transition offered them new insights into their leadership identity to include increased levels of empathy and understanding of others while also recognizing the need to establish personal and professional boundaries, speak up more, delegate more, and regulate their emotions. The findings indicated that women veterans require additional time, networking skills training, and opportunities to network such as virtual and in-person conferences before, during, and after MTC. Recommendations included civilian organizations efforts to recognize women veteran’s military contributions while also building communities of support for transitioning women veterans in their workplaces.

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