Let experience be your mentor. The military teaches us that the most valuable lessons often come from those who have lived through challenges and overcome obstacles. In this episode of Veteran Led, John Berry shares the pieces of wisdom he gained from his military experience in the form of a top-ten list. John will explain how he has used those same valuable lessons to grow his business, and craft his work strategy.
Welcome fellow veterans. From the tip of the spear to in the rear with the gear, I went from active-duty Infantry to reserve-component logistician. I’m your host, CEO, entrepreneur, trial lawyer, and Lieutenant Colonel Retired, John Berry. The military lessons that I learned helped me grow an eight-figure business that has maintained consistent annual double-digit growth, landing on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing companies in America every year for the past seven years, and has allowed me to continue to serve America’s heroes.
Today, I’m going to talk about the top 10 military lessons for scaling an organization. Number one, recruit, recruit, recruit. Think about the military recruiting. It always sends a strong message that targets a specific audience. And when we hear that message, we feel something. I can remember how powerful those Marine Corps recruiting commercials were or even the Army Strong campaign. It was amazing, and it made me feel something. And probably most importantly, when it comes to recruiting, people recruit people. The military has recruiters, and those recruiters reach out to other young people and tell them the future that they can have if they join the military, and they tell them the benefits, and they educate them on where they would fit in that organization. That is an important, important piece of any organization, recruiting.
Number two, have a barrier to entry. Not everybody gets in. And we hear from all of our friends who didn’t join would say, I would have joined the military, but… And having that strong barrier to entry is important in having a great organization and scaling that organization because you’re not just accepting warm bodies. You are accepting capable individuals who can build your organization into an even better organization.
Number three, train. Think about this. We don’t just give someone a rifle when they enlist and raise their hand. Here you go. Here’s your rifle. Go kill the enemy. No, that’s not how it works. We train. And I love the saying that in the military, training isn’t something that we do. It is what we do. At any great organization, trains and trains constantly and trains consistently.
Number four, evaluate your teams. In the military, we have performance standards, we have inspections, and then we do large multi-branch exercises where our leaders and our teams are evaluated. And then we use that information, that feedback, to get even better.
Number five, promote your leaders. If you don’t give your leaders a bigger future, someone else will. And I can think back to the late ’90s when I was a lieutenant, I was looking at going to law school, and I was getting headhunter letters every week from different companies looking for young leaders. And it was amazing to me and my fellow lieutenants that all these companies in California, Texas, and Florida wanted lieutenants who knew nothing about their companies but understood that we as leaders could come in and make a difference. So, promote your leaders, because if you don’t, someone else will.
Number six, create and enforce written policies. The military is great about written policy memos that come out regularly that are enforced. As a growing organization, you must develop policies to keep everyone in line and aligned. And when you have those policies and you enforce them, everybody understands the standard and they achieve the standard.
Number seven, award outstanding performance. In the military, we’re all proud of our racks of ribbons, the awards that we won, our medals. Those are important to us. Those are great achievements. And there’s a proud moment, not only for the soldier who’s receiving the award, but the officer or NCO, who’s pinning that award on. And there’s this feeling of accomplishment, not just for the individual, but from the entire organization that one of our own achieved something great, and we get to celebrate that. So in any organization, awarding outstanding performance is a must.
Number eight, have a mission. Now, there probably is no greater mission than supporting and defending the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. But within that mission, there are many sub-missions that lead to deployments and other exciting, meaningful missions that change the world. Is your organization going to change the world? Do you have a that your team member is excited to tell their family about? If not, you might want to rethink about how you’re going to scale an organization that doesn’t have a compelling mission.
Number nine, set values. In the military, every branch has values. I can remember back when the army would issue a plastic dog tag that you could put on your dog tags that had the army values listed. And the army values were important because we all understood what they were, and we understood that if we didn’t follow them, we would not be in line with what the army expected us to become. And in your organization, you should be hiring, retaining, firing, or promoting based on those values.
Number 10, the final lesson, and probably the most important lesson, win wars. Our military’s objective is peace, but you only get peace one of two ways. You either surrender to the enemy or you defeat the enemy. If you have a reputation for winning, you suffer less attacks. Winners are respected. They command respect, they demand respect, and they get respect because they get results. Win your wars.
Thank you for joining us today on Veteran Led, where we pursue our mission of promoting veteran leadership in business, strengthening the veteran community, and getting veterans all of the benefits that they earned. If you know a leader who should be on the Veteran Led podcast, report to our online community by searching @veteranled on your favorite social channels and posting in the comments. We want to hear how your military challenges prepared you to lead your industry or community, and we will let the world know. And of course, hit subscribe and join me next time on Veteran Led.
Our monthly newsletter features about important and up-to-date veterans' law news, keeping you informed about the changes that matter.
