Whether you have served two years or 20 years in the military, your experiences have instilled skills and habits that can benefit you well when you end your enlistment and take on other roles. However, the transition to find and take on your next challenge can sometimes be a difficult one.

Many formerly military personnel struggle to re-enter civilian life or chart a course into other activities or careers once they leave the service. Not to worry — there are a wide variety of role types and endeavors that can be highly benefited by former military experience and that can prove extremely viable and fulfilling career paths. Entrepreneurship is one of those options.

Entering the World of Entrepreneurship After the Military

A large number of military veterans take on some form of entrepreneurship after leaving the service. It’s estimated that veteran-owned businesses employ almost four million people in the States alone or roughly the number of residents of Oklahoma.

Veteran-owned businesses can be found in just about every industry. They also account for some of the most successful companies in the world including Nike, RE/MAX, Walmart, and more. Military-turned-entrepreneurs account for a huge number of celebrated success stories.

Military Skills That Can Translate Well to Entrepreneurship

Many of the traits and skills that are cultivated by military experience can become huge advantages in an entrepreneurial undertaking. Here are just a few examples:

Dedication and Perseverance

Entrepreneurship can be a painstaking, difficult, drawn-out process that may last months or years before seeing the fruit of your labor. Thankfully, your experience in the military learning how to push through difficulties and stay on task will benefit you immensely as you experience the up’s and down’s of entrepreneurial startups.

Problem-solving

Entrepreneurship requires not only an initial innovative idea, but continual iterations and problem-solving as you encounter challenges or roadblocks. This takes creativity, logistical acuity, tactical awareness, and thinking outside the box.

Teamwork

Some people mistakenly think entrepreneurship is something you do on your own. Though entrepreneurship is certainly different from taking a “regular job,” it is not something that can be accomplished without others. Whether it might be vendors, partners, co-founders, employees, or simply customers, an entrepreneur will always work alongside other people in some capacity. Strong teamwork skills are vital.

Work Ethic and Discipline

Entrepreneurship is a grind. Many entrepreneurs spend the first years of their endeavor working long hours, traveling to events or for meetings, developing their business on their personal time while holding down a full-time job, fulfilling all the needs of their business on their own, or doing things manually before they have the option of automating or delegating. Thankfully, work ethic and discipline are huge parts of the military’s ethos.

Management

It takes courage, self-confidence, vision, and managerial skills to become an entrepreneur. You need to be comfortable making important decisions; able to enter pressured situations and keep your cool; repeatedly cast vision to customers, investors, and prospective employees; and be willing to do what it takes yourself before asking anyone else to do it. These skills (or their foundational components) are highly emphasized in military service.

As you can see, military experience naturally fosters many of the skills entrepreneurs eventually need to draw on.

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Realities About Entrepreneurship that Retired Military Personnel Should Know About

Though entrepreneurial pathways can be incredibly fulfilling and rewarding, they can be difficult. And it’s important for veterans to be aware of the aspects of entrepreneurial endeavors that can be particularly taxing or triggering for retired military. Entrepreneurship can often cause or exacerbate certain psychological stressors that, when combined with specific histories or experiences, including former military service, can be extremely harmful if not adequately treated or understood. Here are a few important examples to keep in mind.

Entrepreneurship Often Creates Ongoing, High-Pressure Situations.

It’s important for anyone to recognize when they are under habitual or prolonged stress, and particularly important for persons who have experienced acute or life-threatening stress in the past. Knowing your triggers, stress points, and how you react to stress (particularly when you’re tired) is imperative to keep yourself healthy, performing well, and in a good headspace.

Entrepreneurship Can Create Unhealthy Competition.

For some people, even a hint of competition in an atmosphere or task can instigate a surge of competitive spirit to the point that it can dull decision-making, change behavior, and potentially even hurt people or the project. Retired military personnel can sometimes carry with them from their service a strong competitive spirit. But it’s important to be aware of this propensity and make sure it’s well-balanced so as not to get extreme or out of hand.

Entrepreneurial Endeavors Often Cause One to Sideline Important Elements of Healthy Living.

Unless you are diligent about making sure you prioritize healthy habits, they can get pushed out by an entrepreneurial project. Don’t let this happen. Make sure you keep eating healthily, going to the gym, and spending time with loved ones.

Leadership: How Leading Fits into Entrepreneurship

Military service instills a number of strong, important aptitudes in those who enlist. We’ve touched on a few of them above. Arguably, one of the most core traits that veterans learn while serving in the military is that of leadership. This trait alone makes retired military personnel some of the best candidates for engaging in entrepreneurship.

Entrepreneurship often takes acting with strong leadership in more ways than one. It requires effective leadership for employees, partners, co-founders, and vendors. It requires strong leadership in relational spaces adjacent to the entrepreneurial endeavor — for family, friends, and other contacts. And it requires strong leadership within and for yourself.

If you are an active or retired member of the military and you are contemplating options for your post-service life chapters, creating an entrepreneurial project or business can be a hugely rewarding and fitting next career step.

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This content is made possible by Andrew Deen.

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