@rakimball,

Plan on things being slightly easier, while expecting more to do. As a Reserve compo officer, you could have what amounts to 2 full time jobs; your civilian career and Guard/USAR position.  In the AC you only have one. Yes, you might have a couple of additional duties, but from the experience of several deployments, life is MUCH easier when you only have one thing to worry about and concentrate on.

However plan on being held to knowing more than you currently do. Not spending every waking minute in uniform means it’s expected that you don’t know everything, however that “excuse” gets tossed out the window when it is literally your full time job to KNOW as much as you can. So I would recommend hitting the books and hard.

Also, I would strongly recommend that you keep the fact you were USAR close to the vest. Not that it’s something to be ashamed of, but it will sway how some people base their first impressions of you (be they subordinate, peer, or superior). You have 8 years of experience; you deployed to X and Y locations # of times… Use that.  Just my thoughts (having just had a “the importance of a first impression” conversation with my son this morning).

Brock