Linkedin and Coffee - two essential tools for ex-military entrepreneurs

Linkedin and Coffee

This is one of a series of posts on useful tools for entrepreneurs leaving the Armed Forces. Here is the full list and links.

For people leaving the Armed Forces, one of the most important - and time consuming - activities is developing personal networks.

If you have spent most or all of your career in the military, it is likely that most of your friends and professional contacts are also military themselves. But in creating a career beyond the Armed Forces, it pays to reach out further afield.

Networking

The most powerful personal networking tool I have found is Linkedin - a website used by over 100m people to manage their professional profile and engage with others. One of its key features is that it enables you to see who connects you to people who you may want to engage with - and so who can help you with introductions. It is also a great source of information about personal and organisational interests and priorities.

Many service leavers have extensive networks within the services, but if you are moving on to civilian life it is best to focus on developing a network that gives access to the key shapers of the environment you are entering. This helps with recruiting potential mentors, introducers, customers, advisors, competitors and even regulators. And if you explicitly set out to increase your network you will quickly identify key contacts who are themselves great networkers and can open many doors for you.

6 Steps to Kevin Bacon

To illustrate how far networking can reach, I decided to check on how many removes I am from the Holywood actor Kevin Bacon. In 1994 he famously claimed to have worked with everyone in Holywood, but since then the world has become much more connected. In summer 2012 I went to Linkedin to find that I was 3 removes from Kevin Bacon - 7 people I knew knew someone who knew one of the 142 people he listed as connections. 6 months later I now know 11 people who know one or more of his 204 connections.

In other words, it is possible to build very broad networks as soon as you recognise the value your contacts can have by introducing their own contacts - so always end a meeting by asking for introductions. This is the alchemy of networking.

Caffeine Rush

Investing time in meeting people face to face is a great approach, and to adapt a military phrase, "time spent in coffee shops is rarely wasted". Getting to know people whose activities shape your environment is essential, and learning from their experience is usually less costly than trying to work everything out alone.

Coffee has played a part in networking for hundreds of years - in fact many of the great trading and banking institutions of the City of London grew out of coffee shops in the 17th and 18th Centuries, as did the RSA, which still does a fine job of promoting networking more than 250 years after it was founded. For more on the value of coffee in the generation of good ideas, see is video of Steven Johnson.

This is one of a series of posts on useful tools for entrepreneurs leaving the Armed Forces. Here is the full list and links.

Nine Tools for Entrepreneurs

On Tuesday I was asked to join speak on "Inspiring Entrepreneurs: From Battlefield to Business" at the British Library.

Following a keynote speech from Clare Perry, the MP for Devizes Matthew Rock from Real Business, who chaired the event, introduced me, Peter Fitchett of Absolute Rubbish, Sarah-Jane Hill of Bish Bosh Becca and Mark Palmer of Green & Black's.

You can see the full webcast of the event here. My presentation starts at 17:17.

I shared nine tools that I believe can help service leavers in their journey from the Forces to Entrepreneurship. The nine tools are:

1. Determination
2. Adaptability
3. Financial Analysis
4. Marketing
5. Timing
6. Capital
7. LinkedIn
8. Coffee
9. Crowds

I'll explore each of these tools in more detail in following posts.

After the presentation we faced questions from the audience and also via twitter from the online viewers. I asked what tools other people would recommend and "Mentor" was a frequent suggestion - what additional tools would you suggest?

Slow is smooth, smooth is fast - lessons from Commando training

This is one of a series of articles on lessons from Commando training.  Here is the full list.

On Friday 16th I visited the Commando Training Centre Royal Marines (CTCRM) just south of Exeter to Meet the Marines.  I was one of 30 guests of the C Group, an organisation that is building bridges between the business commmunity and the Royal Marines.  During the course of the day I was introduced to the latest developments and techniques used in Commando training.  It was 12 years since my last visit to CTCRM and in that time the trainers have developed many new capabilities that are valuable to both Royal Marine and civilian alike.

The day started with an introductory run around the assault course and a competitive shoot on the live firing range, followed by an unarmed combat demonstration.  Since I left the Royal Marines in 2000 attitudes to unarmed combat have evolved to cover the range of arrest and restraint techniques that are required in Afghanistan, and to reflect the fact that the traditional punch and kick moves are hard to carry out when carrying as much as 120lbs of equipment.  Several of the ladies in our group in particular were very pleased to discover some of the techniques they could use to restrain or discourage an assailant.  The key theme highlighted by our instructor was "simplicity".

Next we moved to the Coaching Advisory Team, who introduced us to the visualisation and memory techniques they use for training elite and special forces.  Alexei, a very impressive coach explained the effectiveness of linking and visualising (as soon as I have further reading on this subject to recommend I'll reference it here), and confirmed that this new element of the Commando training system has helped turn around 85% of borderline students by unlocking their mental capabilities.  That delivers savings of millions of pounds per annum.  After the presentation many of us queued to ask further questions!

After briefings on the unfolding situation in Afghanistan (where 75% of all Royal Marines will be deployed over the next year), and demonstrations of mine clearance and building entry, we were introduced to Modified Urban Combat - the process that the Commando units now use for attacking and clearing buildings.

Urban combat has always been considered among the most challenging phases of war - communications, resupply and command are all exceptionally difficult, and the close-quarters nature of the fighting requires aggression and control in equal measure.  We watched a demonstration of building clearance in which a team of Marines cleared a weapon factory using the dictum "Slow is smooth, smooth is fast".  The team worked steadily through a complex checking each room systematically, marking cleared areas, casualties and arrested suspects while minimising the dangers of friendly fire with methodical and simple procedures like waggling the muzzle of their weapons around the corners of walls.

True to the guiding principle, each Marine moved slowly, but the overall effect was a smooth progression as the whole compound was cleared as if a liquid was flowing through it (I was watching from a gantry above).  To ensure that the process was robust, the communications between the individual Marines was very simple and based on practiced routines, so problems and setbacks (one Marine's weapon jammed as he cleared a room) were easily overcome.  In this simple yet effective assault there were many lessons - simple procedures, interoperability, measured investment, delegated leadership and of course, the quality and courage of the team members.

Since I completed my Commando training in 1996, the intellectual and technical framework for training has expanded dramatically to include the lessons learned in Iraq and Afghanistan, and I was truly impressed by the rigour and adaptability of the Royal Marines.  Enthusiastic knowledge sharing was very evident - during the course of the day I met Americans, Australians and Saudis comparing experience and testing assumptions.  By combining the expertise of educational psychologists, elite sports trainers and anthropologists among many other disciplines, the Royal Marines are staying at the forefront of their profession.  I was one of several guests who determined to borrow from their hard-won lessons.

As we left CTCRM we passed the memorial wall where the 100 Royal Marines who have been killed since 2000 are remembered.  Many more have been greviously injured.  Our host, Colonel Jim Hutton, invited us all to join the Corps family and get involved with the support of those who are unable to continue to serve - giving mentoring, career advice and introductions where appropriate.  Count me in!

If you would like to find out more about the Royal Marines and experience some of the challenges of Royal Marines training, check out the Commando Spirit challenges. The Commando Spirit Appeal is part of the Royal Marines Charitable Trust Fund.

This is one of a series of articles on lessons from Commando training.  Here is the full list.