INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
From the earliest moments of boot camp, budding soldiers learn about entrepreneurship
They learn how to operate in unknown terrain, how to listen to signals and, perhaps most importantly, how to make things happen with
extremely limited time and resources.Yet, when soldiers return home following a deployment, the transition to civilian life can be jarring
Perhaps even more challenging, according to Josh Carter, is their lack of connections
through Patriot Boot Camp, a series of programs under the Techstars banner that gives veterans the tools and connections they need in order
Since its founding in 2012, the program has held nine boot camps in cities like San Antonio, DC and Austin, with its next program in Denver
He joined the service when he was 17 in the mid-90s, and over the following three years, traveled to 30 countries
The experience matured him, he explained, and on his return, he joined the telecom industry, starting his career climbing poles and
eventually joining Twilio as an escalation manager and early employee
developer microservices API founded in 2015
The company went through Techstars Chicago, and Carter was hoping to build the kind of company he had seen at Twilio
But growth challenges early on proved insurmountable
Following the dissolution of Brightwork, he eventually joined the program as an executive, first as chief operating officer last November,
and then as interim CEO earlier this year when his predecessor, Charlotte Creech, stepped down to join USAA.Carter has big ambitions for the
While today the boot camp has been focused on one-two multi-day events per year, he wants to build the program into a full-fledged growth
accelerator that would target startups in addition to budding entrepreneurs
He also hopes to increase the number of boot camps per year to three
base as the veteran themselves, and startups could prove to be an important avenue to make that transition.As its numbers and successes
crazy risk that they first appear
Indeed, after what many of these men and women have just been through, it may not be all that daunting of a next mission after all.
