Hill Air Force Base sits right next to Ogden. It is one of the biggest employers in northern Utah. And every year, a steady stream of skilled airmen separate from there and stay in the area.

That is a gift for a local employer. You do not have to recruit talent from far away. It already lives here. The hard part is reaching these people before someone else does.

This guide shows you how. We will cover what skills cluster around Hill and where they come from. We will also show how to find these veterans before they separate. If you run a midsize company in the Ogden or Salt Lake area, this is an edge most of your competitors miss.

Why is Hill AFB such a strong talent source?

Hill is not a basic flying base. It is a maintenance and sustainment hub. The Ogden Air Logistics Complex does deep depot work on aircraft and weapons systems. That means the people here are technical, trained, and used to high standards.

The Ogden complex handles maintenance, repair, and overhaul on a wide fleet. That includes the C-130, F-16, F-22, and the entire Air Force F-35 fleet. The base also supports the nation's ICBM force and the new Sentinel missile system. This is precision work with zero room for error.

So the talent leaving Hill is not generic. These are people who fix complex machines and manage parts and supply. They run quality control and lead teams under pressure. Many also hold a security clearance. That mix is hard to find in the open job market.

The scale matters too. Hill is one of the largest single-site employers in Utah. Thousands of military and civilian staff work there. That means a steady flow of skilled people leaving the service each year. And most of them already live within a short drive of your business.

One more thing matters here. Veterans hold jobs at a strong rate. In 2025, the veteran unemployment rate was 3.5 percent. That is lower than the 4.2 percent rate for nonveterans. So you are sourcing from a group that wants to work and tends to stay.

What skills concentrate around Hill AFB?

The base shapes the local talent pool. Because Hill is a depot and sustainment hub, the skills lean toward maintenance, logistics, and technical trades. Here is what shows up most often when these airmen separate.

Each of these maps to a real civilian role. A depot maintainer fits aircraft MRO, manufacturing, or heavy equipment work. A supply airman fits a warehouse, a parts room, or a distribution center. If you want the role-by-role view, our guides on hiring veterans for aviation and aerospace roles and logistics and supply chain roles break it down.

You can also read the source jobs directly. The Air Force codes that feed Hill include Aerospace Maintenance, Materiel Management, and Logistics Plans. These pages show the exact civilian work each one maps to.

How do you read a military resume from Hill?

Here is where most employers trip up. An airman's resume may be full of base terms and job codes. The words look foreign. So the resume gets skipped, even when the person is a great fit.

Do not skip it. Read the work, not the unit. A "phase inspection" is a major scheduled overhaul. A "production superintendent" ran a maintenance line. A "materiel management" airman ran a supply operation. The skill is right there, just in a different language.

Your hiring software can make this worse. An applicant tracking system racks and stacks resumes by keyword. It does not reject people. But a strong airman can sink to the bottom of your list when the words do not match your job post. A "phase inspection" will not match "preventive maintenance" on its own.

The fix is simple. Search both languages. Put the military terms and the civilian terms side by side when you screen. Our guide on how to recognize maintenance and reliability experience in veterans walks through this in detail.

How do you source veterans before they separate?

Timing is the whole game. Most airmen start their job search months before they leave. If you wait for them to apply, you are late. The best candidates often have an offer in hand before their last day.

So reach them early. Build a relationship while they are still in uniform. Here is how to do that around Hill.

The third step is the fastest. Posting a job and waiting is not a sourcing plan. Our guide on how to source veterans before their separation date shows why early outreach wins. You want to be in front of these airmen while they are still deciding.

How does SkillBridge work for a local employer?

SkillBridge is one of the best tools you have near Hill. It lets a service member work at your company during their last few months. They learn your job. You see their work. No risk to your payroll.

You can read the program rules on the official DoD SkillBridge site. The short version is this. The military keeps paying the airman during the program. You get their time and skill for free. Then you decide if you want to make an offer.

For a midsize firm, this is a clean way to test fit. You may find a depot maintainer who slots right into your shop. Or a supply airman who fixes your warehouse flow. You learn that before you commit to a full-time hire.

Start the SkillBridge conversation early. Programs need approval and lead time. The airman also needs their command to sign off. So begin talks well before their final months. The earlier you start, the more options you both have.

What about hiring incentives and clearances?

Two things often come up when employers hire from Hill. The first is tax credits. The second is security clearances. Both can help, but you need the current facts.

The Work Opportunity Tax Credit status

The Work Opportunity Tax Credit, or WOTC, used to give employers a credit for hiring certain veterans. It expired at the end of 2025. It is not available for 2026 hires unless Congress renews it. Congress has brought it back after past lapses, so check the current status. Veterans you hired in 2025 may still qualify. You can confirm the latest on the DOL WOTC page.

Do not base a hire on a tax break. Hire the airman because the skill fits. A credit is a bonus if it comes back, not a reason to choose one person over another.

The clearance advantage

Many airmen from Hill hold a security clearance. That is a real asset, and it is one most civilian hires do not have. A clearance takes time and money to grant. If you do cleared work, a separating airman can save you both.

What mistakes do employers make hiring from Hill?

Plenty of local firms try to hire from Hill and come up short. The talent is there. The approach is off. Here are the slips that cost employers good airmen.

The thread through all four is the same. Slow down and read the person in front of you. An airman from Hill has spent years on hard, precise work. Give the resume a real look, and the value shows up fast.

It also helps to write your job posts in plain terms. Drop the buzzwords. Describe the actual work and the actual tools. A separating airman can then see the match clearly. And your hiring software can rank the right people higher when the words line up.

One more point on retention. Veterans who stay in their home region tend to stay in the job longer. Northern Utah is home for many of these airmen. So a local hire near Hill is often a stable, long-term hire. That lowers your turnover cost down the road.

Where else can you learn this play?

Hill is not the only base where this works. Other Air Force depots run the same way. If you have hiring needs beyond Ogden, the same approach applies to other regions.

Our guides on hiring near Tinker AFB in Oklahoma City and Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton cover other major depots. Both bases push out the same kind of maintenance and logistics talent.

You can also go deeper on the roles themselves. See our guides on hiring veterans for aircraft MRO work and fleet maintenance management. And if pay is the question, our guide on how to map a military pay grade to a civilian comp band helps you set a fair offer.

How can BMR help you hire near Hill AFB?

You can reach Hill talent without building a sourcing team from scratch. Best Military Resume is a platform built around veteran job seekers. That includes airmen separating from bases like Hill.

Our pool grows fast. More than 1,000 new profiles get added every month. And over 60,000 resumes have been built on the platform. So the supply is fresh, and it runs deep in maintenance, logistics, and technical roles. That is the exact talent Hill produces.

The best part for you is the translation. These resumes are already written in civilian terms. You see the skill, not the jargon. So you spend less time decoding and more time interviewing the right people.

Ready to reach veteran talent in the Ogden area? Reach out to access BMR's veteran talent pool and start hiring the airmen separating from Hill. You can also partner with us to build a longer-term hiring pipeline.