So you want to know how to transition from military duty into the ranks of an entrepreneur? Here are 4 simple steps:
- Take personal stock of your skills or try to develop them while you’re still in the service.
- Take an assessment of the financial risks and plan financially ahead of time.
- Collaborate with others who share your passion.
- Draw on your military experience to deal with pressure and adversity in different situations.
You’ve got to get Skilled to Transition from Military to Business
It has never been easier to learn a skill than it is today. As a matter of fact, a middle-aged man by the name of Josh Kaufman learned 6 new skills in a year. ( Yeah, that’s right – 6 new skills in a year. )
By the way, he did it in his spare time.
Within one year, he learned to play the ukelele, some computer language, windsurfing, yoga, typing, and a complex Chinese board game called “Go”.
In each instance, he recorded kept track of his progress and collated it into data to see how long it took him to acquire the new skill.
On average it took him 20 hours to be able to do each reasonably well.
Now, having been a professional musician myself as well as an educator, if you followed my instruction and practiced, I could teach you how to play an instrument within a year.
You would only be at an intermediate level at that time. To get pretty good would take you 5 years of good practice. (You wouldn’t be a pro, but you’d have a pretty good start.)
However, many skills can be learned within 12 to 24 months. So, if you decided to become a web designer or a javascript coder, you could learn a lot online in just 12 months.
I wouldn’t spread myself too thin. I’d pick just one skill and learn it to the max. If you’re going to create a business around a skill, then you need to focus on just one or two core things.
You’ll also want to make sure that these are valuable skills. I get that Mr. Kaufman learned to play the ukelele, but I wouldn’t try to develop a business around that.
Just say’in.
Once again, these are skills you can learn reasonably fast and to get very good at them will take years, but you can learn enough to apply them to your business when you get out.
The upside of learning skills like this is if you find you don’t like it, you can quit and quickly move on to learning something else.
Save Your Money and Plan Your Finances Ahead of Time
One of the inherent dangers of being in the military is having money coming in every month and having a disposable income.
When you’re living in military quarters or barracks and eating at the mess hall it’s easy to get into the habit of spending money without thinking about it too much.
The best thing you can do no matter how few financial obligations you have is to start a savings plan early and stick with it. The more you can save, the better off you’ll be.
If you need to go back to school to learn a skill or a trade, you can use either the Montgomery G.I. Bill or the Post 9/11 G.I. Bill.
Either way, once you get out, you’ll need some money to start a business.
If you are starting one that needs some capital the Small Business Administration has guaranteed loans to help you with your startup. If you just need a small amount of money to get started you can use a microloan program. These are pretty good options, especially since they are at great interest rates.
The ultimate way to start a small business venture is by self-financing it.
This will mean that you’ll own 100% of your company. This is the riskiest method of getting started because you’re taking on all of the financial burdens upon yourself.
Hang Out With Successful Vets That Have Made the Transition
When you transition from the military to entrepreneurial life, you’ll want to collaborate and network with other veterans that have successfully made the move.
There are a lot of different ways you can do this.
One way is to connect to different online forums and entrepreneurial sites for veterans.
One of the important things about becoming an entrepreneur is making sure you surround yourself with successful people. Here’s one of the world’s most successful veteran/entrepreneurs and his take on surrounding yourself with the right people.
Warning: Contains explicit “Drill Instructor” language. Tell the kiddies to please leave the room.
Here is a list of some of the best resources online for veterans starting a business:
- The U.S. Department f Veteran’s Affairs – This government department has resources and advice for veterans who are entering civilian life. They offer step by step guides on how to start and run a business in a wide array of situations.
- Small Business Administration’s Office of Veterans Business Development – A lot of aspiring entrepreneurs choose to go to this office first. One of the reasons is because it has an office dedicated to helping veterans. This is a place where you can also network with other vets that are starting their own businesses and get valuable advice from them.
- American Corporate Partners – This is a nonprofit which pairs military vets with corporate leaders. It is specifically designed with the idea to help veterans transition back to civilian life. Even though it’s core mission is to help vets pursue a business career, it is also an excellent resource for aspiring entrepreneurs.
- Vamboa (Veterans and Military Business Owners Association) – Vamboa’s mission is to help ensure the development, prosperity, and growth of Veteran Businesses. This is done by connecting members with private corporations and government agencies. Vamboa provides collaboration by networking, mentoring, education, and certification to its members. This is a great resource for anyone wanting to transition from the military to a business owner.
- V-WISE – An acronym that stands for Veteran Women Igniting the Spirit of Entrepreneurship. Partly funded by Syracuse University, V-WISE has a 3 phase program that runs for 15 days online. It also has a 3-day training session where enrolled female veterans meet for training and scheduled seminars as well as continued mentorship for its members.
In addition to these organizations, you can check with your local Chamber of Commerce and other business organizations to find other entrepreneurial collaboration groups.
Kick Bad Emotions and Pressures to the Curb Using Your Combat Training
Veterans who start their own businesses have one distinct advantage. They know how to handle pressures and adversity in tough situations.
Let’s face it, you’ve been trained to react to all kinds of situations and pressures in the military, so you’re not a snowflake.
Right?
Having said that, you should realize that one of the ways to reduce stressful situations is to take the right kind of action at the onset. How many times have you heard in your military training sessions that being proactive is important?
One of the critical ways you can do that is to plan your business out from the start. Many wantrepreneurs will try to start out without a business or marketing plan and that’s such a huge freakin’ mistake.
And to be quite honest, it takes a considerable amount of time trying to put a solid plan together. If you think that putting these plans together is daunting, then perhaps you should think about going to work for someone.
The reason why I’m reinforcing this is that it’s so critical.
Here are some excellent resources that will take you by the hand and help you with your planning.
If you want to get started fast, Planbuildr is a site that can help you get a basic plan completed in 10 minutes. However, I just want to point out again that creating a GOOD marketing or business plan can take weeks and you should update it all the time.
Having said that, Planbuildr is an excellent way to get started.
One of my favorite resources for creating a marketing plan is Guerilla Marketing in 30 Days by Jay Conrad Levinson.
I have gone through this entire book to plan out my marketing strategy, and it took me longer than 30 days to complete all of the lessons and worksheets.
My advice to you is to do use these resources and activities while you’re building your business. In other words, don’t just sit around for months working on planning. Do sections of them and start implementing them immediately.
One of the biggest benefits of Levinson’s books (Yeah, he wrote loads of them on the subject) is that they show you the cheapest yet most effective ways to market your business.
Yeah, you need to have a marketing budget, but you can keep that relatively small if you use these books and your brains.
Conclusion – Now Get Your Butt Moving
Action.
Yeah, that’s the word I want to use because it is the most important ingredient in the whole process of transition from the military to entrepreneurship.
If you ever get a chance to see a successful business person in action, you’ll notice right away they aren’t sitting on their ass. They are constantly working, meeting, innovating, experimenting, testing, etc.
And since time is the most valuable resource you have, you must use it wisely.
I want to point this out because you can waste a lot of time with actions that are worthless. (Remember above when I told you that you need to plan? Yep, that’s why.)
So the best thing you can do is to start taking action. If you’re sitting idle trying to figure out what went wrong…well you see what I mean.
One other thing.
You’re going to have to keep your family accountable, too.
If you’re at your office working and they call you up ask you what color you think the living room curtains should be, ask them if the situation is life and death. If it isn’t, tell them you’ll talk later.
Because starting a business is war and any good entrepreneur will tell you that. You must guard your time and make sure you’re making the most of it every chance you get.
One last tip.
You need to get fed. Go on Youtube and look up videos created by millionaires and billionaires. I’m not talking about sales pitches but interviews by solid businessmen who have paid the price to get where they are at.
You’ll learn real quick whether you have the stomach to have your own business or not. Not only that but you’ll learn valuable lessons that you can start using immediately.
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About the Author:
Mark “Elmo” Ellis is a freelance copywriter and army veteran with a mission to help provide military veterans and law enforcement high-quality content to help them transition from the military, or public safety, and into entrepreneurship.
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