0:13 foreign hello and welcome to this uh Independence Day special edition of business lessons from the military I'm your host Kevin bemel and we're here every Tuesday at 11 A.M Pacific Time 2 p.m eastern time and we talk about military Doctrine history great leaders from the military so that we can learn business lessons that we can apply to our businesses whether it's a for-profit business a non-profit even Academia I
0:50 think these lessons apply really across the board for any of our professional Endeavors so today on on this Independence Day I'm going to take a break from talking about Marine Corps Doctrine and look at the issue of um veterans and Entrepreneurship veterans who have been successful and business going to do kind of a short a short show today I think and it's it's something that's been rattling around in my head that I wanted to do this so I I
1:26 looked up a few things that I thought were interesting and especially for those of you who want to work with veterans you may find this uh interesting now many of my or some of my military colleagues may be a little bit irked by what I've uncovered and so well you know that's that's kind of how it goes so first of all let's see here we go okay and I'm gonna share my screen up so this I want to show you this first of all so these um oh wait by 2021 I know
2:02 this was supposed to be as of uh 2023 wait a minute here we go okay this is it let's see let's see if this is oh boy it's gonna okay well I don't need that um here let's let's try Wikipedia now hopefully that will give us the numbers I want so the first thing I want to look at is how many people are in each branch
2:39 of the Armed Forces and let's see if they're going to give us this here in Wikipedia you think they would there's nothing uh classified about um Force levels in the military oh here we go nope that's that's budget uh okay here we go so um Personnel by service notice that the U.S army which includes the active component the reserve component and the Army National Guard has a total of just
3:14 under a million people okay now by the way they have um the the branches are listed in order of um uh not not preference in order of um um oh shoot I can't think of the name but but um the uh the US Army is listed first because it was the first military branch established the U.S Marine Corps is listed second because it was actually founded uh shortly before the U.S Navy so I I some of my Navy colleagues take
3:50 Umbridge at that um I guess there's some dispute but um in terms of Precedence that's the word I was looking for so the the components of the US military are listed by precedence which means when each one was founded so the Army was founded first the Marine Corps second the Navy third the U.S Air Force as a separate Branch okay originally the U.S Air Force was part of the US Army it was started out as the U.S Army Air corps okay and that was in the I think the I want to say the teens and 20s it was known as
4:25 The Air Corps and on into the Third disease then it became the U.S Army Air Forces during World War II okay it started out as the US Army Air Corps in World War II it became the US Army Air uh force during World War II and then post World War II with the reorganization of the American Military creating a Department of Defense under which the various uh component branches then were put um so the that it became a separate Branch known as the U.S Air Force and then of
5:01 course the U.S space force was founded um during the time that uh president Trump was in office just a few years ago and now the U.S Coast Guard is is is kind of interesting it's been around for a long long time and um originally the U.S Coast Guard was actually during peacetime part of the Treasury Department and then during war time it would be shifted to the Department of the Navy so during World War II for example the U.S
5:38 Coast Guard actually became part of the U.S Navy and in fact many Coast Guardsmen were involved in in all kinds of operations from um Convoy Escorts to piloting uh landing craft at D-Day and and and it um and other other times um now the U.S Coast Guard is part of the Department of Homeland Security okay but during a declared war okay the U.S Coast Guard would still become part of the Department of the Navy so
6:13 um the way the military is currently organized is there's a Department of Defense that's the umbrella department for the military and then within that you have the department of the army which of course oversees the all the the Army including all of its components you have the department of the Navy which covers the Marine Corps and the Navy there is not a separate Department of the Marine Corps there's historic reasons why that's the case um and it does annoy some of some of the some of the people in the Marine Corps and then there's a department of the Air Force okay and and now I guess there's
6:50 there's a separate Department of the U.S space force I'm not sure if that's part of the Department of the Air Force or if it's its own Military Department let's see what does it say here anything oh I don't know anyway the U.S army is the largest of the of the components making up almost half of the U.S military by Personnel okay and then the next largest is actually the U.S Air Force making up about a quarter of the personnel and like the U.S army
7:26 it has three components it has an active and a reserve component as well as an Air National Guard component okay and then the Navy is the third largest with about four hundred thousand uh make made up of an active in a reserve component and then the U.S Marine Corps is the smallest by far by the way notice it's it's only half the size of the Navy and basically 20 of the size of the army it too has an active and a reserve component so um one of the reasons why I find this interesting is I think
8:02 a lot of a lot of a lot of people think that the U.S military is much larger than it is so you notice both of of including all three components active reserve and guard there's only about 2.1 million members of the um American Military now if you look at that as a percentage of the U.S population which is around between 330 and 340 million that's less than one percent of the U.S population now if you were to look at
8:39 the adult population people 18 and over I'm guessing it may be around one percent but it's a very small component so contrast that with World War II when somewhere between eight and ten percent of of the U.S population was in uniform and of course that that includes children I mean the percentage include against the U.S population includes children in the U.S population the percentage of adults would be higher I'm guessing somewhere between maybe 12 and 15 percent or something like that okay and that doesn't include people
9:15 civilians who work for the uh various for the Department of the Navy or the department of the of the army it doesn't include people who are working in defense Industries or anything like that that's purely uniformed personnel okay so that being the case then what I looked up um and and I acknowledge this is you know ran fairly random um but you know this is the 25 most famous veteran entrepreneurs um as identified by Samson Helia Helios I guess I guess is his name pronounced
9:51 him and with with do with apologies to um to him if I pronounce his name wrong it was updated um not not not quite a year ago so this is pretty up to date so of the 25 most famous veteran entrepreneurs as detailed by this list two of them the list doesn't identify which branch of the service they served in so setting those aside we've got 23 left of them eight came from the Army or eight were armed are were army veterans and then five each were Marine Corps Navy and Air
10:28 Force veterans so why is that interesting well you you it should be no surprise that the Army has the most uh famous veteran entrepreneurs it is in size equal to the other three branches almost only it's equal almost to the other three branches of the military put together okay but as a percentage um eight against almost a million it's you know it's a it's it's you know less than uh whatever that would be one
11:03 one millionth um a a of a percent the Air Force which has about a half a million people in it and five famous veteran entrepreneurs um has about one uh millionth of a percent uh or yeah the Army has point eight millionth of a percent the Army has one millionth of a percent okay the Navy which has about 400 000 people okay um that has slightly over one like 1.1 or 1.2 millionth of a percent but the
11:41 Marine Corps which has only 200 000 people has five famous veteran entrepreneurs or basically two and a half millionth percent of the fame the most famous veteran entrepreneurs in other words more than double the Navy and almost triple the percentage of the army so you can say well wait a minute these are not related to the four sizes today and that's that's true what I would say is the the the the relative sizes of the
12:19 components of the US military on a percentage basis have been pretty consistent over the years and so I'm using today's Force size as a proxy for their for their relative four sizes so so why is that the case why is it that the Marine Corps stands Head and Shoulders above the other service branches uh when it comes to famous veteran entrepreneurs right so as a Navy guy you might be wondering well wait a minute why are you
12:54 why aren't you trying to make this work out so the Navy is the best well I mean the reality is uh you know the son of a Navy officer father um I was I was raised uh singing um the the Marine Corps hymn and and the Navy fight song um my my father uh when he went through naval Reserve officer training uh was trained by these grizzled World War II Marine Corps veterans he had a great deal of respect for the Marine Corps and so while over the decades there has been
13:30 you know some friction between the Army and the Marine Corps I mean between the Navy and the Marine Corps I look at the Marine Corps as uh the the sort of sister service or brother service to the Navy um we're all what what are broadly called the sea Services which is the Navy Marine Corps and the Coast Guard and so that you know my Marine Corps Brethren beat out the Navy in terms of famous veteran entrepreneurs well you know I guess I'd be happier if the Navy were number one but you know uh that that's the way it goes I'd rather sort of I'd rather report the the genuine
14:06 numbers um than you know fudge for the sake of uh uh you know uh Navy pride in in any event um why do why does the Marine Corps stand Head and Shoulders above the other service branches when it comes to famous veteran entrepreneurs and I think there's several reasons the first reason is that every single Marine enlisted warrant officer commissioned officer goes through the same training okay there's a
14:44 saying in the Marine Corps the Marine Corps is first and every Marine is first and foremost an infantry man okay and I used to joke with my Marines um unless of course they're an infantry woman because there are women in the Marine Corps of course all right but but the the ethos there is that everyone in the Marine Corps has the same shared experience and and the fact that every member of the every Marine is first and foremost an infantryman before he's uh
15:20 you know a motor Tech guy or an intelligence guy or a lawyer or whatever it is that ethos means that they have a shared experience in training and in Outlook and the reality is if the Marines are in combat and they need more Marines the the cooks are going to pick up their rifles and go into combat okay and they're going to be able to shoot effectively every single Marine has to pass not only the physical Readiness test but the combat Readiness test they need to qualify on their weapons all the time it's it's it's not it's not good
15:56 enough that they qualify during their initial training and then don't have to worry about it the rest of their career so there is a sense of camaraderie that's very very deep in the Marine Corps because everybody shares the same experience so that's that's number one number two um and and again I say this with due respect to my military colleagues who are not Marines um I you know they they will sometimes you know dispute these things um however when you look at the various
16:33 service branches let's look at the Army the Army has its tanks it has its howitzers in fact the Army has more boats than the Navy now they're landing craft and and riverine craft and that sort of thing but they actually have in in point of fact more boats than the Navy does the Air Force has its aircraft it has its fighter aircraft it's other tactical aircraft has its tankers it has its um cargo aircraft okay and the Navy we have our ships right the Navy is known
17:08 for ships even though a huge percentage of of sailors never actually do a shipboard deployment these days okay we not only do we have our ships we have our airplanes we have our helicopters by the way the Army has a huge helicopter Force as well helicopter gunships Etc transport helicopters Etc okay the Marine Corps has its people okay it and that's what they're known for while they do have equipment okay they have their Humvees and they do have helicopters and they've got aircraft
17:44 um they're they're uh Marine Corps um fighter squadrons do have aircraft typically they have the oldest um the oldest uh um uh aircraft and the oldest uh um uh material of all of the service branches okay when I was deployed um I was I was fortunate to have a Marine Corps um Fighter Squadron in my air Wing the the um famous um rattlesnakes um the EFM 323 I believe
18:21 it is their Squadron um and by the way vfv is a fixed Wing F fighter M Marine Corps that's how you can tell um you can tell by the designation what the Squadron does what type it is okay so they had what were known as Legacy fa-18s they had C's these aircraft had so many flight hours on them trying to keep them flying was a nearly impossible job and yet between the Marine Corps
18:56 maintainers in my Squadron and their pilots and their leadership they had the highest uptime percentage of all of the squadrons in in the Air Wing I mean the the CEO really did an amazing job as did the command uh uh not the command master chief that's for the Navy the um command sergeant major um who was an amazing guy uh himself um and and it was this ability to
19:32 motivate their people and to train their people that made them so effective okay their people would not quit I used to joke with them that they were the my MacGyver the macgyvers of the airwaves they would get a plane and they'd put it together with you know chewing gum and duct tape and and yet it would fly and and it would fly safely there there was just nothing like them for their ability to meet the mission and and so I think that is another reason why we see a much
20:07 higher percentage of uh famous veteran entrepreneurs coming from the Marine Corps and the third thing that I believe makes the Marine Corps so effective in civilian life is they have a huge emphasis on developing leadership in their people there's a phrase you'll hear around Marine Corps circles called the Strategic Corporal now just to give you a little bit of background in the Marine Corps in in the um in the enlisted ranks okay you start
20:44 out as a private a private first class I believe um and then you become a lance corporal okay and then you become a Corporal okay so you're actually you start as a private it's private private first class um lance corporal Corporal you are already what's known as a non-commissioned officer and the Marine Corps pushes down decision making as low as it possibly can so that Corporal in
21:19 the field in combat could very well be leading a small unit action okay and the Marine Corps has a highly developed excellent Leadership Academy that starts with the corporals course okay so you could have been in the Marine Corps for only about I think two years and become a Corporal and you're already into the leadership training track okay there's the corporals course the sergeants course the um I think this I think staff sergeant is next the staff sergeants course and
21:55 so on and so on okay and so this emphasis on leadership and on developing leaders as early in their Marine Corps careers as possible really creates a a group of people who can act on their own initiative if necessary to meet the the commander's intent to meet the objectives of what it is that's been set before them and so because of that when these marines get out into civilian life they
22:31 are honestly light years ahead of most people due to this experience of having to lead Okay so if you when I remember when I was in Okinawa um I I sometimes I'd get up early in the morning to go exercise because it was so bloody hot you couldn't exercise after about you know seven a.m so I'm I'm at the gym it I'm heading to the gym it's still dark right and corporals are out there with their squads and they're already training them doing their you know physical training for the morning
23:06 right um you know it it and it's it's a Corporal out there leading that and these corporals would be you know 19 20 years old okay now I know people are fond of of knocking young people today and and I I I don't I don't I candidly don't think it's it's Justified really there's a lot of very very fine young people there's a lot of young people doing really outstanding work whether it's um scholarly work or or work in business or whatever uh having said that
23:42 um it's very rare error that I need a civilian with no military uh background who can really reach to the level of the Young Marines that I worked with when I was stationed in Okinawa and and uh this is again not to put down the other branches of the service I I've known many fine people in the Navy and the Army and the Air Force and the Coast Guard I've never met anybody in space force I was basically out of the military by then um but uh time and again I find that the
24:18 uh highest quality leaders come came from the Marine Corps one sign of the quality of Marine Corps leadership is when they study leadership that they do not confine themselves just to Great Marine Corps leaders they will study great leaders across the board not just the other service branches but other uh other uh militaries besides the United States military Etc it is a a truly amazing uh quality
24:53 that I find in uh in Marine Corps people so you know for Fourth of July I wanted to change things up a little bit and and just talk about uh why I think it's it's worthwhile to examine um um military Doctrine military history four lessons that we can use in civilian life and I think the the the the primary one is the military has an Esprit de corps about it and and it's it's
25:29 different than anything I've experienced in civilian life and it's most Keen in the Marine Corps but you see it in the Navy you see it in the Army You See It in the Air Force when somebody from a service Branch meets somebody else a stranger and finds out there from that service Branch there is an immediate bonding that takes place there's a shared experience and it's I think it's unfortunate uh you know I don't want to get to uh you know up on my soapbox but I do think it's unfortunate that there doesn't seem to be a lot of places like
26:05 that outside of the military where will meet a stranger and find out something about them that that is the same for us and we feel an instant connection I will say it happens with Jewish people typically if I'm in a store someplace and I find out somebody's Jewish we feel an immediate kinship um but uh aside from maybe a religious affiliation or maybe a school affiliation there aren't too many places and I'm not sure that even a religious or School affiliation is quite as deep as the military Affinity is because of
26:40 the kind of um things the kinds of uh experiences that military people share because it's not uh as you can imagine a necessarily Pleasant being in the military all the time there's there's the training can be difficult I know when I was doing my officer training one of the things we had to do was crawl on our arms and and our stomachs through sand and I later I later uh well not later but during the exercise I realized there was broken glass in the sand and
27:15 by the time I was done I had cuts on both of my arms um and you know frankly some of my fellow trainees were pretty ticked off about that and uh my attitude was well I guess this is what they wanted us to do and uh you know after we were done we were rushing ourselves off and I just said to our training Chiefs hey chief uh can we go wash our our you know our our cuts off and uh you know just uh if necessary uh you know bandage the the bad bleeders off he's like yeah yes Mr Bammel you know proceed or whatever he said you know I was like I
27:50 think it was kind of like hmm he's so calm about this you know it's like well whatever it's like you know he later learned why I was so calm about it my dad had you know prepared me for for much of what I went through and and and basically my my deal was to just be as calm about all this stuff as possible there was there wasn't noon to do any good to get all mad about it but but to share those experiences with um my uh uh um you know with my colleagues was um really uh special and
28:25 um and so uh you know that that bond is there so to the extent that you can create those we can create those Bonds in the civilian World especially in the business World um that would be a really uh I think a really a a strong way to build greater Esprit de corps in our businesses and our non-profits in our in Academia in a way that will be very very positive and that will bind people together rather than drive them apart so that's what I have for you today on business lessons from the military I thank you for tuning in on this uh Fourth of July
29:02 and uh let's see tomorrow please do tune in for people making money um have a special classic episode on how to use LinkedIn to create create business relationships if you don't know how to do that I cannot encourage you enough to check that out LinkedIn is a fantastic tool for creating relationships and building your Professional Network in a way that will mutually serve you and the people that you work with the people that you're connected with and then next week we will start it again on Monday with trust
29:39 and Estates weekly at 10 A.M Pacific Time by the way tomorrow uh people making money starts at 12 30 PM Pacific time so thank you again for tuning in and just signing off as I always do oh you know I'm going to go ahead and stop sharing here we go there we are I'm gonna um just gonna sign off as I always do by uh making a tribute to my dear friend Marie you are my bell thank you all very much for joining me and have a wonderful and meaningful Independence Day