Military Cultural Competence: A Gateway to Effective Service Provision
Tammy (to Rita): How has your search for a therapist been going? I know you’ve been dealing with a lot of anxiety since Max deployed.
Rita: Not great. I’ve met with a few different providers in town, and while they seem knowledgeable about strategies to manage anxiety, they don’t understand what it’s like to be a military spouse. I just wish I could talk to a professional who gets it, who gets me. I don’t want to spend time educating my therapist about military life when I’m the one asking them for help.
The above story is a reality faced by many family members who seek support from helping professionals during times of stress or need. Military culture is centered on common values (e.g., camaraderie, respect, sacrifice, duty; Atuel & Castro, 2018) and shared experiences (e.g., relocation, deployment). These cultural aspects are pervasive across military family life, both in day-to-day interactions and in military policy (Meyer et al., 2016). This unique cultural context shapes the experiences of military families and how families respond to stressful situations. Thus, to prevent scenarios like the one above and to help military families successfully overcome the challenges they face, helping professionals can ensure they understand military culture and the impact it has on military family experiences. This article provides an overview of military cultural competence, and strategies helping professionals can use to enhance their own military cultural competence and support families seeking culturally sensitive services.
What is military cultural competence, and why does it matter?
Military cultural competence refers to a helping professionals’ awareness of their attitudes toward the military and its members, knowledge of the social structure and norms of the military, and skill to assess and treat military families (Atuel & Castro, 2018).
| Military culturally competent helping professionals are those who: |
|---|
| Are aware of and combat their biases and assumptions about the military and military families |
| Are knowledgeable of military culture and the identities of military family members |
| Employ the most effective strategies (e.g., assessment, therapeutic approaches) to serve military families in a culturally sensitive manner |
Helping professionals who are military culturally competent are more likely to have shared understanding with their military-affiliated clients (Johnson et al., 2018), which can lead to greater provider-client rapport (Atuel & Castro, 2018) and therefore more effective service provision. Thus, it is critical for helping professionals who work with military families to stay up to date on military family affairs, understand the unique nature of military family experiences, and expand their procedures to include military-specific approaches.
Strategies for Helping Professionals to Enhance Their Military Cultural Competence
Did you know that estimates indicate that among helping professionals, less than 1/5 meet criteria for military cultural competence (Tanielian et al., 2014)? Hope is not lost, however. Military cultural competence is a teachable trait which can be enhanced through training. There are a number of opportunities for helping professionals to build upon their own understanding of military culture, including:
- Free, online webinars about military family issues through the OneOp platform
- Online training programs through Uniformed Services University or PsychArmor
- Online educations resources through Star Behavioral Health Providers
- In-person workshops or training programs
- University courses or certificate programs
- Reading Military REACH’s TRIP Reports on military family-related research
How to Support Military Families Seeking Military Culturally Competent Services
Developing and maintaining one’s own military cultural competence is one aspect of supporting military families, but another way helping professionals can support military families is by facilitating families’ search for military culturally competent providers. Here are a number of steps helping professionals can take to increase access for families:
- Refer families to the Star Behavioral Health Providers search
platform, which allows families to search for helping professionals
who have completed military cultural competence training.
- Helping professionals can also register with the platform to be located by families seeking services.
- Include any experience working with military families or military cultural competence trainings completed in practitioner biographies or descriptions of services provided to communicate understanding of military experiences to prospective clients.
- Encourage military families to refer friends and family in need to trusted helping professionals who have demonstrated military cultural competence during service provision.
- Be familiar with community resources available to military families and refer to these as appropriate.
Being a military culturally competent helping professional does not require expertise in every aspect of military culture; rather, it means being open to continuously learning about military families and being able to provide relevant, sensitive services to military families seeking support. By investing in their military cultural competence and directing families to culturally sensitive services, helping professionals can play a key role in supporting military families through the challenges they face.
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