When should post army career planning for an officer begin?

I assume that an officer at this stage in the career (17 years of experience) makes up his mind to seek voluntary retirement only when further promotions are not forthcoming or in the rare case even if they are coming feels that grass is greener on the other side.

BTW
The question can be answered correctly if we ask the following addon questions

• What is the officer's core competency?
• What domain does the officer seek to target?
• What are the requisites for that domain?
• Where does the officer stand as compared to the requisites?
• What and how does the officer want to bridge the gap?

Unless the above questions are considered, the officer should not even bother to look outside as there is no turning back.

Some officers may have an advantage due to their unique work experience

• GE, CE, CWEs could easily step into construction industry
• Signals officers have a easy transition into telecom industry
• ASC and AOC officers could get into logistics and supply chain management
• And so on

The officers who could be at disadvantage would be the ones in infantry, armoured, artillery - the fighting arms which do not have a civilian counterpart industry.

Irrespective of the advantage preparation is a must to negotiate the best deal. Typically army officers count the pension and other benefits and are okay with a lesser pay package.

Wrong thinking - the pension is what you have done in past and in no way should be counted in your pay package. I have seen officers ending up with salaries less than Rs 5 lacs because they did not negotiate well whereas they could have doubled the salary with some career preparation and negotiation. The starting point in corporate matters as every jump after that is related to the last pay and role.

And it could take up to 2 years for an officer to prepare for the life outside.