About
About HandsOnward
Why this exists
I built HandsOnward after getting out of the Navy with no real idea which direction to go next. I went the four-year-college route looking for an answer and came out the other side with a load of debt and still no clear plan. That gap - between having real, hands-on experience and having any straightforward way to see what it's actually worth - is what this is trying to close. Whether you're leaving the service, just out of high school, or years into a trade already, the goal is the same: a real answer about where you stand and what to do next, without spending thousands of dollars and years to get it.
Who operates this
HandsOnward is built and operated by Garrett Ledbetter, independently - not a corporation or a funded startup, just one person building a tool meant to actually be useful. That's worth knowing because it shapes what you should expect: fast iteration on real feedback, and full accountability for whatever's on this site - there's no team to point to.
How occupation data is selected and reviewed
Occupation, skill, and wage data comes from O*NET OnLine and the Bureau of Labor Statistics - see the full breakdown on the data sources page. Nothing here is hand-curated opinion about which careers are "good" - it's the same government labor data used for public workforce planning, applied consistently across every occupation in the catalog.
How AI is used - and isn't
AI (OpenAI's models) is used in exactly two places: reading an uploaded resume to pull out plain facts (job titles, dates, skills), and the optional AI career coach chat for Pro users. It is never used to calculate your match score or decide what counts as a skill gap - see how scoring works for the deterministic calculation that actually drives those numbers.
What this platform doesn't do
HandsOnward isn't a guarantee of employment, income, or admission to any training program. It doesn't replace professional legal, educational, or financial advice. Match scores and skill gaps are a starting point built from population-level labor data - not a personal prediction, and not a substitute for talking to a real employer, school, or advisor before making a decision.
Contact
garrettledbetterdesigns@gmail.com for anything - questions, corrections, partnership interest, or feedback.