As the sun sets on a suburban office park, sixteen entrepreneurs gather nervously near a conference room stage. For the last twelve weeks, they have been preparing for this evening. Now they’ll finally get their chance to stand up in front of top business leaders and investors to pitch their new companies. A young woman named Kim has founded a non-profit designed to support recent female graduates of the foster care system. Andrew is pitching a service that connects event planners to non-traditional event spaces. Marquell is launching a new clothing brand.
Scenes like this play out every day in the tech world, but these entrepreneurs are unlike the characters depicted on HBO’s Silicon Valley in one key respect: They’re all veterans. Marquell and Andrew are Marines, while Kim served in the Army. The organization sponsoring the evening’s event, a national non-profit named Bunker Labs, helps discharged soldiers like these found and grow businesses of their own. But while Bunker Labs is making remarkable progress, many more veterans hunger for opportunities to hang their own shingle.
It may seem surprising—veterans as the great untapped market for entrepreneurs. Many Americans associate entrepreneurship with young dorm-room disruptors, not former soldiers. But the latter are, in fact, well-equipped to found and lead great businesses. In fact, veterans start an incredible variety of businesses, from low-tech to high-tech, like Signafire Technologies, a data fusion company founded by Marc Alacqua, an Army veteran. Think about it: both basic and advanced military training equips soldiers know how to think on their feet, handle adversity, and operate cutting edge-technology in the most trying of circumstances. Many veterans are also confident and seasoned. They’ve tested their skills in life and death situations—and lived to tell about it.
I know that veterans can thrive in the world of free enterprise, because I’ve seen it in my own family. My grandfather, Henry Libby, sacrificed his hearing operating a mortar on the Italian front in the Second World War. Upon his return, he went to school, worked, and then founded Libby Laboratories, a custom manufacturer of cosmetics that has thrived for decades, innovating new techniques and creating dozens of jobs.
We need more people like my grandfather. Outside of a few prominent innovation hives, entrepreneurship is on the wane in America, with 30 percent fewer businesses founded over the past decade compared with previous decades. Start-ups are particularly rare in the cities and towns that provide a disproportionate share of the nation’s military recruits. Veteran-founded businesses could help reverse that trend—benefitting not merely these communities, but veterans themselves. As the country singer Charlie Daniels reminds the Twitterverse every morning, an average of twenty-two veterans take their own lives each day. Former soldiers are particularly apt to experience homelessness; many struggle to find gainful employment. But many don’t want to claim spots on someone else’s payroll. They want to build something of their own. We should make it our mission to ensure that they have that opportunity.
Today, a number of hurdles prevent many vets from making the most of their skills and savvy. These would-be entrepreneurs often lack ties to the financial and small business communities that provide the start-up capital required to launch new companies. Military men and women are often dismissed by funders because they talk with a unique cadence, use distinct jargon, and prepare PowerPoint presentations quite different from your typical young techie.
These obstacles aren’t insurmountable. As someone who makes his living growing companies across a variety of sectors, I’ve seen many businesses succeed because of (rather than despite) their founder’s military background. The key is to focus additional resources on efforts to give veterans the best chance of striking out successfully on their own. Imploring and incentivizing big businesses to hire veterans is a worthy cause indeed (and, in fact, a business called HirePurpose – founded by Marine veteran Zach Iscol – is helping veterans connect with such jobs!). But so is helping veterans embark on an entrepreneurial adventure of their own.
My grandfather helped defend American freedom, losing his hearing in the process. But his patriotic contributions didn’t end there. Together with many other veteran-owned businesses, Libby Laboratories fueled the post-War economic boom, putting millions of Americans to work. Today’s veterans are hungry to reprise that role. We often talk about how best to take care of those who have served, but we too rarely follow through. Our former soldiers are as capable of founding companies as they are of leading platoons. Let’s get them started.