October 29, 2025 • 42 mins
Welcome to Season 2 Episode 3 of the "Militarily Speaking" podcast with Tom McLean and Jodi Vickery
In this episode of Militarily Speaking, we chat with Joe Reagan from the Mount Carmel Veterans Service Center. The conversation highlights how veteran service organizations help veterans and military spouses transition to civilian life and launch veteran-owned small businesses, offering critical guidance, funding access, and financial education.
“Militarily Speaking” is a podcast produced by Armed Forces Bank that is dedicated to the military lifestyle and all the things that makes the military community who they are.
The Hidden Network Helping Veterans Build Million-Dollar Businesses – with Joe Reagan of Mt. Carmel VBOC
Joe Reagan, Director of the Colorado Veterans Business Outreach Center (VBOC), brings over 20 years of experience across defense, technology, and nonprofit sectors. Mount Carmel Veterans Service Center operates under a “no wrong door” philosophy, ensuring any veteran or military family member seeking assistance receives the appropriate financial resources for veterans, mentorship, and guidance to succeed.
From Military Service to Supporting Veteran Entrepreneurs
Joe’s journey began with a strong sense of duty post-9/11, leading him to serve in the 10th Mountain Division and later transition into civilian life. Today, he leverages his military experience to guide veterans and military spouses in establishing veteran-owned businesses, connecting them to veteran business funding, small business loans for veterans, and other critical resources.
Opportunities, Challenges, and Financial Education for Veterans
Joe touches on the wide array of services provided by Mount Carmel, including business counseling, networking, and financial education for veterans and military spouses running small businesses. He shares examples of diverse entrepreneurial ventures, from a veteran-crafted doll business to a military doctor using 3D printing for prosthetics, highlighting how access to veteran business funding and proper planning drives sustainable growth.
Economic Impact of Veteran Entrepreneurship
The VBOC collaborates with similar centers nationwide, amplifying the impact of veteran entrepreneurship on local economies. Supporting veteran-owned small businesses not only creates personal success but also contributes to broader community development, demonstrating the ripple effect of empowering veterans through business resources and financial education.
OPLAN for Veteran Entrepreneurs
Joe emphasizes translating military leadership strategies into business planning, the use of AI for marketing and operations, and the importance of financial literacy for long-term success. Programs at VBOCs and resources from partners like Armed Forces Bank help veterans and military spouses access small business loans, manage their finances, and confidently grow their businesses.
Whether you’re starting a new venture or expanding an existing business, your local VBOC provides mentorship, veteran business funding, and financial education for military families. Reaching out can be the first step toward achieving your entrepreneurial dreams and contributing to the broader veteran community.
For more information on these resources, visit the Mount Carmel Veterans Service Center website or find your local VBOC through the Small Business Administration.
Military Minute
The Military Minute giveaway offers listeners like you a chance to show off your military and life knowledge. Winners receive $50 for themselves and a charity of their choice!
For giveaway details or to enter, visit the Militarily Speaking Podcast Facebook page and find this episodes’ Military Minute post! After a winning selection, Military Minute participants are eligible for another selection after 12 months.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Militarily speaking,season two, episode three.
Mount Carmel Veterans Service Center.
This episode we talk with Joe Regan withMount Carmel Veterans Service Center.
(00:23):
Welcome to Militarily Speaking.
Brought to you by Armed Forces Spank.
This is Tom McLean and Jody Vickery.
I am the me Meathead.
I'm the Metel.
Yeah.
I'm the military retail executive for
We are.
So not that out.
Let's keep it in there.
And Jody used to be the ChiefDigital Officer, now she's
the Chief Digital Officer.
(00:44):
So the cdo.
Joe, when you think of Chief DigitalOfficer, what do you, you've been,
why don't have ask every guest this.
You've been in the banking world,
right?
I mean, on the periphery, I, I thinkyour, your chief digital officer
is, is probably the one that is.
You know, taking marketing to thenext level of, of really bringing it
back and finding those new mediumsto connect with with your consumers.
(01:07):
You're breaking up Uhoh.
Could you repeat
that?
No kidding.
I have to tell Jess
our chief marketing officer, though.
I know Joe.
I've been trying to get on our team.
I've Jon that I'm very good at creative
graphic.
Joe just boosted you up like.
Thousands of feet.
I know.
Had
you see me, I sat up straighter
walk, walking on cloud nine.
Yeah.
I feel pretty good aboutmyself, so thanks Joe.
I like you already of,
that'll change.
Yeah.
(01:27):
Give, give it time
again.
Welcome to our show.
We're excited to have you listening andlearning about our guest, Joe Regan.
We do wanna take just a second and tellour audience a little bit about you.
Joe is the director of theColorado Veterans Business
Outreach Center, or Vbo C.
He joined the Colorado Vbo C after 20plus years of experience leading change
in teams across the defense, technologyand nonprofit sectors after leaving
(01:49):
active duty in the United States Army.
Thank you for your service, Joe.
Yes, of
course.
Joe earned an MBA from theUniversity of Virginia.
He has his experience spansmultiple industries, ranging from
healthcare to technology, nationalsecurity, and nonprofit work.
Prior to joining the Colorado Vbo, C Joewas the president of New Space Global.
He has also worked for a numberof nonprofit organizations
(02:10):
supporting the military and veterancommunity, including Easterseals and
Wreaths Across America, which is.
Which is a friend of ours as well.
Well, welcome Joe.
It's an honor to have you on our show.
I'm excited to learn aboutyou and your organization.
For those in our audience that that mightnot be aware, just give us kind of that,
that bird's eye view of what Mount CarmelVeterans Business Center is all about.
(02:31):
Of course.
Well, Mount Carmel was founded just alittle bit over 10 years ago with the
goal of being a one-stop shop for Veteranstransitioning service members and their
families in the Pikes Peak region.
And that has expanded over thecourse of the past 10 years to
cover most of Southern Colorado.
And about three years ago, MountCarmel picked up the veteran
business outreach with the Vbo.
Contract with the smallbusiness administration.
(02:53):
So now we provide services to thosesame fee people that are looking
at starting a small business.
And so it's really an amazing organizationwhere our goal is, you know, too often in,
in government, in in nonprofit space, wehave our little lines, lanes in the road.
And when someone shows up to ourdoor and, and maybe we don't do
that service, you know, we justsay, well, sorry, we can't help you.
(03:15):
And then that door closes andMount Carmel was really designed
to be through partnerships.
No wrong door philosophy was anyonethat comes through our door, regardless
of what they need, then we're gonnaprovide them with the, the services
and resources to help them thrive.
I love that.
No wrong door philosophy.
I know there'll be a lotof application for that.
Yeah.
If it said, Jodi Vickery onthe outside of the door, be,
(03:36):
do not enter, do not be beware.
Check how she's doing today and thensee if it's okay to, has she had coffee?
Picture at your own risk.
What cup is she
on?
You and I met.
Joe and I certainly our prep work for the,for the summit that we had in Colorado
Springs, which is in your backyard.
And when you say Pikes Peak, I'm sureour audience gets jealous because it's
(03:57):
such a beautiful landscape out there.
And certainly the, we can't talk aboutthe Colorado Rockies and you can't
talk about the Broncos around KansasCity, so we can't bring that up either.
So
we'll stick away from sports, I guess.
Yes, but I knew you had.
A lot of passion for what you do.
I knew you were veryknowledgeable in what you do.
You have a great background,great experience.
But walk us through a littlebit from a career standpoint.
(04:19):
Jody brought your bio to life,but talk about how you ended
up being at Mount Carmel.
Right.
Well, I think it's, it's a. It's alifelong calling to to serve, and
that started when I was in college.
I went to a private military school andI had the full intention of not going
into the military after the fact that theadvantage of going to a private school
or private military school is that therewas no military service obligation.
(04:42):
After nine 11, I really feltthat calling that going into the
military was the way to, to go.
And I was one of those, I had anopportunity I could have anything
I wanted to do in the military.
And I chose to go infantry, whichis kind of the, you know, frontline
troops and wanted to go with the10th Mountain Division, which at the
time was the, the highest deployedunit in the United States Army.
(05:04):
And so within what was a littlebit over a year from graduation,
I had graduated college.
Done all of my initial trainingand found myself on a plane over to
Afghanistan where I was able to leadsome amazing men and women in combat
over the course of a 16 month deployment.
And then I did, after that one, I cameback, did a second tour as well, was
(05:24):
more of a staff role for that one.
Did a few other kind of interestingstrategic roles within the military and
then got out at about the, the eightyear mark and continued to serve and.
I kind of found myself in a P placeprofessionally where I was learning
a lot and engaging with privatebusiness, but it was not rewarding.
(05:46):
And I was sitting on the board ofdirectors for a local nonprofit.
It's kind of a volunteer.
When our director left and the boardhad asked, well, would you be interested
in taking on this role full time?
And I thought about it and I said,I think that would, yeah, I think
that is something I'd like to do.
And so was able to findthat reward, find that.
That giving back and was ableto, to go from that route.
(06:08):
And it's, and so really for the past10 years, have spent my time in a
number of different nonprofits beingable to serve my fellow veterans in
a variety of different capacities.
And that's where I foundmyself in the, the Vbo.
We're now able to help those fellowservice members, their spouses, veterans,
that wanna start a small business.
And so we're seeing that impact notonly in their own lives, but seeing that
impact in their communities as well.
(06:30):
I love that.
That's such a good thing for Ithink veterans and even particularly
for military spouses, to have sortof that entrepreneurial spirit.
It's portable.
They can take it with them asthey're moving about the country.
For sure.
Kinda along those lines, what are someof the most common things that you see
prospective small business startersor owners coming to Mount Carmel for?
And are they more heavily weightedin certain industries or certain
(06:53):
types of businesses, or doesit really run the full gamut?
Well, I, let me, let me answerthe second question first because
I think that one's kind of funny.
Where really there is no industry focus.
And so oftentimes many of our clients arein the ideation phase of their business.
They're coming to us with a conceptand we're helping them refine that.
And just as an example, about a monthand a half ago, I was teaching a class
(07:16):
on Fort Carson, which is one of the majormilitary installations here in Colorado.
And in the front row, I had aservice member and his spouse who
ran a small business where theywere crocheting dolls that resembled
characters from horror movies.
Oh gosh.
Wait, didn't see that one coming.
Nope.
No.
It was, and it, you know, again, thisvery narrow, very narrow focus right now.
(07:39):
Customers, that's, we'll
call it a niche ni, niche.
Niche.
Niche.
Niche.
It was a niche niche.
In
the back of the room though,there was a military doctor that
was getting ready to retire.
And she wanted to use 3D printingtechnology for what could best be
described as internal prosthetics.
So for example, using a a 3D printer tomaybe print a rib bone or something that
(08:00):
you're going, oh, put inside the body.
And, and that's in one classroom.
To give you an example of the,of the scope and spectrum of, of,
so we'll say diverse.
Diverse, very diverse, yes.
Yes.
But the problems that come to us.
Are very similar and like I said,we are in the ideation phase
of small business development.
So many of these folks havenever run a business before.
(08:20):
Many of them are just leaving themilitary, and so they don't really
understand even the basics ofhow do you build a business plan?
What is accounting, how do I structuremyself and some legal questions.
And so the two biggest questionsthat we generally have is, how
am I going to pay for this?
And then how am I supposedto structure myself?
Should I be an LLCA sole proprietorship?
A lot of people are interested in gettingin the nonprofit space, so we provide them
(08:44):
with that kind of overview as to cue thedifferent resources that are available.
And as a program of the small businessadministration, oftentimes we're
talking a lot about small businessprograms, eight A programs and, and
some of those different loan programs,but we tend to tie in with them.
With different lenders at the same time,because oftentimes you have commercial
lenders that have products that are abetter fit than what the SBA has to offer.
(09:08):
And so what we'll do is we will thencoach those clients to help refine that
business model, build out a financialforecast so that when they go and have a
conversation with the bank, all of thosehard conversations have already been had.
Because like, and Tom, when you andI were talking, and I've talked to a
number of folks in the lending space.
They all say the same thing.
(09:28):
A business owner will showup and oftentimes they don't
have a, a business plan.
They don't really have all those forecaststhat you're gonna need to see in order
to make a decision as to whether or notthis individual qualifies for a loan.
And so by coaching them ahead oftime, we're able to make that first
conversation go that much more smoothly.
And that's, I think, invaluable not onlyfor the client, the veteran, uh, but
(09:49):
also the, the bank that has to make thatdecision and ultimately put that risk up
to, to support that, that new business.
Yeah, I think that's great.
They've got an idea and you're putting,helping 'em put legs underneath of it,
is it, or, I was like to say, whenwhen they walk into our office, they're
gonna come in with a good idea andthey're gonna walk out with a good
idea and about two dozen questionsthey never thought to ask themselves.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
(10:10):
Can we go back to thecrochet dolls for a second?
Because my daughter, I'll tellyou, my daughter does all this
crochet, does fruits, vegetables.
Now she can add, I guess, horror figuresto their, to a repertoire, but did
that ever materialize into something?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
And so when they came to us, they'dactually been selling in a couple
of different venues, and one of thebiggest questions that they had was
(10:33):
they were having a really difficulttime with financial forecasting
because their margins shifted.
Depending on where selling, they wereselling online and that had a certain
set, set cost that came with it, thenthey would sell it like farmer's markets.
They would go to the Comic-Con and sellthere, and that was making financial
forecasting that much difficult.
And so we kind of helped coach them onthe fact that, well, hey, you should
(10:54):
probably think of each of these different.
Venues or events or calendarsduring time of year.
Yeah.
Treat that as a unique sales channel,and that way you can build out that
revenue, figure out where your highestprofitability is, and then you can
make that determination of, well,do I really want to go to Comic-Con?
If it's gonna cost me a thousanddollars to rent a space, am I
gonna be able to recoup that?
(11:14):
You know, same thingwith the farmer's market.
What are my sales gonna looklike there and what's the cost?
And giving them the tools so thatthey were then able to identify
those, those fixed and variable costsassociated with each of the different
platforms where they were selling.
Hmm.
Makes
total sense.
It makes, we wanna still talk about this.
I know you're gonna Google it afteror after we're done, aren't you?
He didn't tell me he wasgonna talk, bring this up.
(11:35):
So now it's got me off my game.
But, and then as Jody mentioned, when,as far as people walking in the door
and seeking guidance assistance whenthey wanna, whether a great idea,
are you seeing a lot of startups cometo the front door or are you seeing.
Veteran owned businesses that have beenthere for 10 years and they're at a, maybe
they're at an inflection point or a at apoint in their business life where they,
(11:58):
they wanna refocus or change direction.
Yeah, I, I would say the majorityof folks that are coming to us
are, are in that early phase.
These are mostly startups,many of which are pre-revenue.
And so we are working with them to getthem to that point of, of doors open.
When you look at the pathwayfor a business owner.
And then the, the differentresources that exist outside
(12:19):
of, of just the veteran space.
So, you know, VBO C is one toolamong many that exist in our
community and in communities acrossthe country that are designed to
help these small businesses thrive.
And so part of the program,in addition to training.
It's also resource navigation.
So if a company comes to us and they're alittle bit more mature and maybe they're
(12:40):
having a specific issue with marketing,then what we might try and do, instead
of necessarily doing all that workin-house, connect them with a resource
in the community that already exists.
So think of score mentors or yoursmall business development centers.
These are are tools that are availableto any business owner, but are able to
specialize more in those things and arefocused more on the developed businesses.
(13:00):
When we deal with folks that aregetting into government contracting,
we have programs like the ApexAccelerator, and these are rules that
are designed to help support thatgrowth into government contracting.
So that's part of that resourcenavigation of saying, Hey, you, you
are a veteran business owner, and thatqualifies you for certain components.
But at the same time, you need tobe tied into the bigger and broader
(13:21):
business community because that'swhere you're going to find a lot of
these different resources to helpyou thrive as a small business owner.
And, and you kind of touchedon it with that, that answer.
Are there other programs and resourcesthat you bring to the table that we,
we haven't hit on just in our otherconversations or, I think just as
importantly, how do people access those?
Is there a website thatwe should direct them to?
How do they connect with you to, tounderstand what the options are for them?
(13:43):
Yeah, so obviously we're talking todayabout my role at the Colorado vbac,
but there are 31 VBACs Nationwide.
So wherever you are, you havethose resources available to you.
So ev every community covers down.
Obviously, some of these VBACs arecovering down on multiple states,
but we do a lot of counseling andtrainings that are available online.
In fact, about two weeks ago,we partnered with the Big Sky.
(14:06):
Vbac, which covers down on Montana,I, Idaho, and I think Nevada or Utah,
and did a, a specific training forfarming and ranching because in the
west of that's a, a big, big deal for.
So we were able to partner withsome of the other vbo to provide
that training virtually tofolks across the Western region.
Other resources that would be available,as I said, you have the small Business
(14:28):
Development Center, you have score.
The small Business administrationhas a number of tools that are
available, like the Women's BusinessCenter, and we also have the
certifications that are available.
So you can get your eight A designation,your small, your veteran owned, small
business, disabled owned, small businessdesignation, and we'll help clients.
Navigate that process as well.
One of the things that I find in myrole, and it's funny, you know, Tom,
(14:49):
we were talking about how I'm from thePikes Peak region, which is in central
Colorado in the front range, but I'mactually talking to you today from
the Western slope of Colorado becauseI was out in Durango for the Western
Slope Small Business or startup Week.
That all just sounds very cool.
It, I'm on the Western slopeit, I'm in, and there's also,
every season is in Colorado.
(15:10):
In one day I, in downtown Kansas City,it's, I, I think just, just today alone,
as I was driving through some of thesepasses, I, I, I hit snow and the, the
beautiful foliage of the aspens andthen got back down into, you know,
70 degrees in some of the valleys.
And here we sit in a concrete jungle.
But that's, and that's the, but that'sthe same thing that communities face.
Right.
So a lot, a lot of these resourcesand tools are gonna vary based
(15:35):
on the community that you livein, the region that you live in.
And so for us understandingwhat is out there for that.
So along the front range of Colorado,we have a number of different
resources on the Western Slope,much different set of resources.
And there're there's not as many of them.
So when we run into rural communities,how do we provide different levels
of support to those business ownersthat might not see what you would see
(15:56):
in a more urban or developed area.
Joe, how do you think being partof a Veteran Service organization
or A VSO, if we're gonna throw outacronyms, how does that help you deliver
better outcomes for your clients?
I think ha, just having theveteran connection is, is
magical in and of itself.
But what does that designation, orwhat does that affiliation mean?
(16:16):
Yeah, so cultural
competency and, and, and you allknow this from your work on, on
installations when it comes to, tobanking specific to our service members.
Having that cultural competencyallows us to speak the language of
our clients and more importantly,help them translate that.
And when I, when I'm teaching someof these classes, I'll get up and
I'll say, I'm not teaching you.
New skills.
(16:37):
I'm teaching you how to translate thoseskills into a different language, right?
You're speaking military right now.
I need you to speak finance, andI'm gonna, I'm gonna, I assure you,
these are the same tools that you'vebeen using for decades in military
planning and military decision making.
But now I just need you, you tospeak a different language so
that everyone else in the roomunderstands what you're talking about.
But being with a Veteran Serviceorganization, lemme tell you a short story
(16:59):
that might highlight this, because I thinkthat's usually the best way to do it.
We had a veteran that came in and was veryinterested in starting a small business.
And like any good conversation, we startwith how are you, tell us about yourself?
And the response we get backwas, oh, I'm doing great.
I just got divorced.
(17:20):
I'm getting evicted next month andI haven't had a job in two years.
And so being able to thenaddress that, be like, okay.
Maybe starting a small business rightnow isn't the best thing for you.
Instead, why don't we walk you downthe hall where we have behavioral
health services, where we have familyservices that can help connect you
(17:41):
with the resources so we get stability.
Let's get you into a permanenthousing situation so we
don't run into homelessness.
Let's connect you with some job trainingresources so we can get you a sustainable
source of, of income and revenue,and that might be getting a job that
might be in getting your disabilities.
Approved.
And once we get you to a pointwhere you're stable and thriving,
(18:02):
let's come back to this idea.
And I think that illustrates thisidea of when we are focused on the
outcome, we're able to address allof those needs, whether it's someone
like me that's more of a business guy.
And I'll share another, I'lltell you another story too.
And this one is, I mean, this is oneof those examples of, we had a client
that called interested in services,and as the conversation progressed,
(18:24):
one of my team members identified thatthis individual was actually suicidal.
And while on the call was able to connectthem directly with those resources to
deescalate the situation and bring themback to a point where now this person
sees hope in the future, and now is ableto, to move forward and, and connect them
(18:44):
with mental health resources so that theycan be, move beyond that crisis point.
And, and now they're, they'restill in our community, thriving.
And again, connect them withthose external resources.
Get them to a point where they're stable.
And then when it's time, let's comeback to the business idea afterwards.
So just two examples of how when weare connected as a, a veteran service
organization, you know, regardless ofwhat that veteran is going through or
(19:08):
what that military spouse or militaryfamily member is, is going through
at that time, we're able to bring allthose additional resources from the
periphery to bear and focus on that, thatindividual and what's going to allow them
to thrive in the moment in the future.
You always think about startups andthe, and the success and failure
rates, right, of startups, whetheryou're civilian, military, spouse, or
just have an idea that, I mean, thenumbers are pretty staggering about
(19:30):
failures in the first 12 or 18 months,and sometimes just taking a pause.
And maybe getting 'em on the right track.
Then the success ratesgo up that you like.
To your point, Joe,better outcomes from that.
You don't put them in a, you don'tset 'em up to fail by doing something.
Just 'cause you wanna take theorder from someone that thinks
they know what they're doing.
Exactly, exactly.
(19:51):
Give 'em the guidance, give 'em theresources to give 'em the support.
Get 'em on the right track.
Know that as A VSO, you'll be there forthem when it, when the time's, right.
But you've got access to allthose resources 'cause you've
walked in their footsteps.
Walked in their boots, and understandwhat's available out there.
Especially in the ColoradoSprings area with all the veterans
that lived in that community.
(20:11):
There's so much support out
there.
There is, and one of the things that Ithink has made our community successful
in that sense is the ability to,
as a military spouse, I understand howunpredictable life can be, whether it's
a PCS move or just everyday expenses.
Money can be tight.
(20:32):
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(20:55):
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One of the things that.
(21:38):
I think has made our communitysuccessful in that sense is the ability
to collaborate instead of compete.
And I think this is an issue that we runinto in a lot with a lot of nonprofits
is oftentimes these are all organizationswith very valuable missions that are
competing for financial resources.
And when we partner.
(21:59):
On the programming side, we provideourselves with those opportunities
to get those better outcomes.
And I think in the Pikes Peak region,in the state of Colorado, we have
done a good job of identifyingthose different resources, pulling
them together and creating.
An ecosystem where we can collaborate forclient outcomes while still getting out
(22:21):
there and making sure that we're engagingwith those other community partners,
like lenders that are gonna be able tofinancially support these organizations,
to allow us to provide those services.
Yeah.
I love that.
And it's, it's kind of rightwhere we wanted to, to head
next with this conversation.
So including the collaboration thatyou're talking about there in your
local Pikes Peak area, how do youreach out and collaborate with,
(22:42):
uh, I think you said there were31 total vbox across the country.
How do you share idea?
What ideas have you learnedfrom them, gleaned from them?
What ideas have you shared and kindof proliferated across the country?
How does that Yeah.
Partnership
work?
But Joe, before you answer that.
You're directly tied with the SPA, right?
That's correct.
Is there any, is there anythingwith the state of affairs today with
(23:02):
government shutdown, does that impairor impede your ability to help, or
do you, is it a waiting game for you?
How does that change yourday and then answer Jody's
question?
Yeah, I, I would say that the, thecurrent situation with the government
does not necessarily impede our day-to-dayoperations because of the, we are a
grant funded program, and so that fundinghas already been allocated for us for
(23:23):
the, at least the next six months.
So day to day, we are stillable to provide that function
where we will see delays.
Obviously, if we're having to goto SBA for certain tools, then
obviously our SBA colleagues are,are not in the office currently.
So we've got the knowledge ofthe tools that are out there.
And so in some cases it might be a delayin connecting someone with the, the
(23:46):
different resources to get that approvalfor their small business designation
or getting the hub zone designation.
So those things might be onhold until we get back into the,
everyone gets back into the office.
But for the most part, the counseling,the trainings, all of those have
continued and, and will continue untilthere's a, unless this really continues,
unless this shutdown continues formore than the next three or four
months, hopefully that doesn't happen.
(24:07):
We hope not.
Yeah.
Don't shut that up out.
Yeah.
So to to the, to the questionaround how do we collaborate
with the other, the other V box.
You know, it might sound simple, butyou know, we have a month monthly
meeting where all of the directors gettogether and simply share best practices.
We talk about new toolsthat are available.
The SBA comes down and willtell us anything that's new.
(24:29):
So for example, just a few months ago,the SBA rolled out a new initiative
focused on manufacturing initiatives.
So how do we then take that information,communicate it down to our folks?
All of us right now are very engaged withthe planning for Veteran Small Business
Week, which is coming up in the first,it's the first full week of November.
So those are areas where we've gota formal mechanism where we'll get
(24:50):
together on a regular basis, discussbest practices, interact with each other.
But when you think about it, 31 centersnationwide is not a large number.
So many of us have known eachother or get to know each other.
Over the course of just business andwe were able to pick up the phone and
just say, Hey, what do you think it,and go back to my example about our
work with the Big Sky BU saying, Hey,we know that you guys have this class.
(25:11):
I don't need to replicate that.
Can we just jump on it andpromote it to our clients?
And that way they were ableto benefit from it as well.
And then I talked to other BU andsay, Hey, the state of Colorado.
We have a big outdoor industry,would it be helpful if maybe we
start to try and pull in some folksfrom our tourism industry, from our
outdoor industry, and maybe we candesign a class that's around that
(25:31):
everyone's like, yeah, that'd be great.
And so that's kind of one of thoselonger term initiatives that we've
looked at of what is unique, what skillsets does Colorado have that is unique
to us that might be able to benefitother parts of the, the country as well.
This next question,Joe, was not done by me.
'cause you had to tell mewhat the question would be.
'cause I wasn't smartenough to come up with it.
(25:52):
So here we go.
Ready?
What?
I'm impressed that youactually admitted that.
Oh, did I?
I said that out loud, didn't I?
I, and we're still
recording.
Yeah.
So normally he'd totallytake credit for it.
That's a great question.
That's a Tom, a great question.
Tom, what role does the VboC play in strengthening?
The local economy.
I thought that was great.
And then how do you interact with therest of the entrepreneurial ecosystem?
(26:14):
That's probably why I couldn'tcome up with that question.
That's how I know you didn't come up with
that question.
Yeah.
And then, and then track the impactof small businesses you've helped.
So that's a, a. Jody's favorite part isto do three part questions like that.
Yeah.
And so tackle that one thatyou have advanced warning.
Yeah.
So, okay.
So the, the first part of thatquestion, what are we doing?
How is our work impacting therest of these communities?
(26:37):
So obviously small business.
Is the driver of our economy.
Whether you live in a, a big city ora small town, a small business is,
is the driving force in our economyhere in the state of Colorado.
I can tell you that veteran ownedsmall business contributes over $22
billion to Colorado's economy annually.
If you were to compile that and, andmake veteran owned small business its
(26:58):
own industry, it would be the fifthlargest industry in the state of Colorado.
Wow.
So that, at that, at a big level,that is a large number that can tell
you the impact that this is having.
When veteran owned small business andsmall businesses in general thrive,
we measure the impact of that bylooking at things like, and, and a lot
of these are self-reported metrics.
So when a client comes to us and says,Hey, I just hired my first person.
(27:22):
We'll put that and track that sortof information so that we know how
many jobs have been created basedon these small business openings.
We'll also work with them likeas I mentioned, one of the bigger
questions that we have around lending.
We'll also work both with theclient as well as our lending
partners to get a sense of what hasthis done for your loan pipeline.
So it gives us an idea of how muchmoney is being inserted into the economy
(27:45):
through these new business development.
And I will say in the first sixmonths of the year that Colorado
Vbo for just, I think it was justone lender alone, contributed over
$12 million to their loan pipeline.
So we're able to, to reallybuild out that portfolio.
And if you're a lender.
When you're getting a client fromus, you're also, we're saving you
(28:06):
time because instead of you havingto go back and having the initial
conversation and saying, before we havea further follow on conversation, I
need this, this, this, this, and this.
I've already got it.
And so when a client comes to me,I'm saying, before you go to the
bank here, you need to have thisinformation and show up with it.
That way it's, it's a moreefficient conversation for,
for you and for the client.
It's less frustrating for them.
(28:26):
And so those are some of the areas,some, some of the major areas that we,
we would have the, we would keep themetrics on, on what that looks like.
By the way, I think you put a goodplugin for the 31 Vbo around the country
for banks to come knock on the doors.
Mm-hmm.
To set up shop and try tobe a partner with the vbo.
Well, and you know, this is, I'll go,I'll, I'll take a pause from answering
(28:47):
the, the three part question and goback to a question you already asked.
But you know, this is part of that,you know, when we talk about no wrong
door, our banking partners are oneof those doors that someone walks in.
It's an opportunity for you asa, as a, a community staple.
To ask that question of your, ofyour clients, of of the people
that you're serving, ask them,have you served in the military?
(29:09):
And that's where if you have a partnerlike Mount Carmel in your community,
if you have a Vbo C you can then say,Hey, did you know that this resource
exists for veterans of the community?
If you're a veteran, smallbusiness owner, did you, have you
spoken to your, the local vbo?
And so I encourage anybodythat's interacting with the
public to ask that question.
If you have a, an intake document, ifyou're bringing new clients on, ask them,
(29:31):
have you ever served in the military?
If, if they say yes, you know, then youcan connect them with those resources
that you're a avail that you know of,and make that, make that connection.
And that is something that I advocatenot just for, for bankers, but at all
levels for people to be asking thatquestion so that we can you, 'cause this
is a, when I, and now I'll pivot backto the third part of the question, which
is, how do I interact with the broadereconomic development ecosystem, you know?
(29:55):
And, and one of the questionsthey ask is, is for data.
It actually is kind of difficultto identify how many veteran owned
small businesses are out there,because unless they self-identify,
there's not really a database, right?
If you get the small business designationthrough SBA, that's, you really only need
to do that if you're gonna get involvedwith government contracting at some level.
(30:15):
So many businesses might advertise thefact that they're veteran owned, but
they don't actually put it anywhere.
There's no database, andthat's where tracking down.
Those numbers can sometimesbecome a little bit more
challenging or, or figuring outhow do we contact these folks?
Because like, as I said, when we'regetting ready for Veteran Small
Business Week, one of the thingsthat I want to do is highlight
(30:37):
those veteran business businesses.
So how do I find them?
Some of them I know, some of them I don't.
And I think that it's,it's always beneficial.
We can find those.
Those businesses that aredoing amazing things that don't
necessarily get their story told.
Because I think sometimes, especiallyin the nonprofit space, we might find
a client, we're like, oh, they've gota great story and we stick to that one.
But there's so many other greatstories that are out there, you just
(30:58):
kind of stumble across sometimes.
And those are the ones that you reallywanna be able to elevate and highlight
fact that this is a great program.
Yeah.
And so through partnership.
Is then where we engage withthose other tools at, at both
the local level, the state level.
So obviously, like I said, ourpartnerships at the federal level are
through the small business administration,but in the state of Colorado we have
a, a state level office for economicdevelopment and international trade.
(31:23):
So we work very closely with them.
And then, you know, I've only beenin this role now for about eight
months and so I've focused a lotof my early time to, into these
different communities to identifywhat other resources are out there.
And at least make that introductionso that when we have a client in
a different area, we can say, Hey,have you talked to this person yet?
Or vice versa.
(31:43):
Someone walks into a localchamber of commerce and says, Hey,
have you talked to the Vbo yet?
They can help you with this.
You know that, right?
So it is a lot of work sometimes toget out there and, and engage with
the community, but that's what,you know, building that network of
strong partners, both inside theveteran space and outside the veteran
space is really what drives success.
I would never have guessed that you'veonly been doing this eight months.
(32:03):
I know.
'cause you're, I can, you're,you've got passion for it.
You're, I thought he
meant years ledge about it.
Yeah, yeah.
No, it's,
it's, he's a pro.
It's awesome.
Yeah.
What kind of things are you seeing, orwould you cause businesses to think about
as emerging trends in small business?
I mean, we, we've talked recentlyabout some different things here
and, and how AI can impact that or,you know, whatever, whatever the hot
(32:23):
topic is, du jour, I suppose, but.
What, what kind of emerging trends areyou encouraging small businesses to think
about when they bring that idea to you?
Well, you know, we started theconversation talking about the diversity
of industries that we deal with atthe, and so it's, it is really hard
to identify one particular trendor even a number of trends that
would be applicable to all of them.
(32:44):
But I do think that when it comesto ai, that is a tool that every
business owner needs to be using.
And so when we talk about ai.
In fact, just just yesterday, uh, I satthrough a an hour long seminar about how
you can utilize AI for doing reputationmanagement, which is something that most
businesses, it takes them years to get toa point of maturity where they're starting
(33:07):
to deal with reputation management.
But AI can be used to monitor, uh, varioussocial media channels, all the review
channels to identify when a negativereview comes in and either cue you to
say, Hey, you need to deal with this.
Or in some cases you can evengenerate a response through ai that
will be kind of that placeholderof, Hey, thanks for the comment.
We'll, we'll get back to you on thatbecause we wanna address this immediately.
(33:30):
So we have a lot of conversations aroundAI and, and what it's going to do.
To the marketplace, but I think everybusiness owner has to be looking
at it as a tool that can increaseefficiency, especially when it
comes to, to marketing, you know?
So for years, right?
SEO was the term.
Term.
The term du jour, right?
Right.
Everyone needs to get SEO, andnow we're getting into a space
(33:51):
where it's, no, we need to getbeyond that and this needs to be.
You need your website to be AI focusedso that when the AI bot is, is scraping
through the internet, it finds yourwebsite and can answer someone's question.
And that's a different wayof, of doing website design.
So it's in fact, just this fallwe've hosted a series of classes of
(34:11):
how a small business owner shouldbe dealing with a web designer.
And how they should be layingout their, their storyboards.
So when they're doing the web interface,that that website is optimized not only
for AI search, but also for the userexperience as well and simplifying that.
So I would say those are probablytwo trends that, you know, how do you
communicate what your business is doing isprobably the biggest one that we, we have.
(34:35):
'cause that's, that'schanging and I think.
How do you do it in away that builds trust?
Because I think there's one of the,the emerging trends we don't talk
about enough is the fact that with allof this information, trusted sources
are few and far between these days.
And so how do you create that authenticresponse that someone is going to feel
(34:55):
confident that the information they'regetting from you is in fact accurate.
Yeah.
Yeah.
One, it sounds like you'regiving them tools too.
So a topic like AI that might beintimidating for somebody that doesn't
know is something that's actionable.
So I've got one final question for you.
Mm-hmm.
It's a zinger.
What's the one piece of advice you wishevery small business owner would know?
(35:17):
Planning, really think through theplanning and, and I'll, I'll say
this from, from the perspectiveof a co of a combat leader, right?
In combat, everyone knows, right?
Every, the, the plan falls apart.
The moment of firstcontact with the enemy.
In small business, it's the same thing.
You know the moment you open those doors.
(35:37):
Your plan is almost certainly going tofall apart, but the act of going through
and plan and doing the plan and reallythinking through all of the assumptions,
and I tell people a lot of times, I said,listen, I got a new joke the other day.
This was a good one.
Oh no.
Oh, oh no.
We haven't done a joke in a long time.
This is right up
my alley.
You could be bringing me back to life.
(35:58):
This is a good one I had, and it'sa clean one too, so this is good.
Right?
We even better.
So three people.
Apply for a mathematician, astatistician, and an economist.
I'll apply for a job, and sothe mathematician goes in first
the ma, and they ask them themathematician, what's two plus two?
And the mathematician says four.
You sure?
Yep.
(36:19):
He goes, okay.
And the statistician goes in andthey say, what's two plus two?
And he says four.
He said, are you sure?
And he says, well, I'm 97%certain with a three of error.
About 1%.
Okay.
Then the economist goes in andhe said, what's two plus two?
And he goes over, locks the door.
Lowers the shades, and says.
(36:39):
What do you want it to be?
Which is funny of course, because whenyou really think through how we're
doing financial forecasting, right?
All of that is based on a numberof different assumptions, and we
can oftentimes make those numberslook really, really good on paper.
And that might be beneficial in somecases, but as a business owner, you
(36:59):
really have to understand what thoseassumptions you're making about how
you're gonna get to profitability.
And so when you're doing that detailedbusiness plan, when you're really
digging into all those assumptionsand your financial forecasting.
Don't just look at the numbers,but understand the assumptions that
you've made to get to that point.
And that's part of yourbusiness planning process.
(37:20):
It's part of your market researchprocess because like I said, you can make
those numbers look really, really rosy.
But until you really understandwhere those assumptions are coming
from and where that, where thatcreates vulnerability and risk,
that is the value of, of doing theplanning, and that's where you need
to create a lot of, uh, effort.
That's a great answer.
I think that joke may illustratehow I did in college and economic.
(37:44):
I didn't, I didn't havethat understanding.
I don't,
somebody famous said a goodplan violently executed now.
Is better than a perfect plan next week.
Is that advice youmight give to a startup?
Because to your point about militaryand every plan that you're gonna put
out there, you might, it might fail and,but it's okay to get something out there
and learn from it, or would you say,like you said earlier in our podcast.
(38:07):
Take a breath and don't,don't do something un until
we get you in the right place.
It's that
mix, right?
So, yes, you'll never have theperfect plan, and you don't want to
get yourself into a position whereyou have, you're, you're indecisive.
At some point, you needto be making decisions.
(38:27):
You have to do it with a, acertain tolerance for risk
where you might not have.
All of the answers that youwant to make that decision.
But to take advantage of opportunitiesthat exist, sometimes you have to
make those balanced risk decisions,you know, in, in the moment.
So I think, like I said, for anybodyit, it, it is a balance that you
(38:49):
certainly have to make, but one thatshould always be made with the, an eye
towards risk mitigation and management.
Yeah.
Good point.
So I don't know that we've, we've askedyet, and if we haven't, our apologies.
We can Anyway, if we, if we did that,it's, it's a good thing to say twice.
Is there a website in that localarea where you would direct people
to, to figure out how to reachyou, how to contact you, and how
(39:11):
to take advantage of some of theseresources we've talked about today?
Absolutely.
So if you are in the state ofColorado, you can go to the
Mount Carmel center.org/vbac.
If you Google Vbo C or Veteran BusinessOutreach Center, you will be brought
to the Small Business Administrationwebpage where you can find the contact
information for all 31 centers nationwide.
Excellent.
(39:31):
Wanted to make sure we got that in.
As an important fact beforewe played the military minute.
Forget it's been there eight months.
I know.
I'll give 'em at least a b plus I think.
Yeah,
I'll take it.
Yeah.
I think we're, it's time.
Let's play the game.
We're gonna play the military minute.
(39:52):
So we have two triviaquestions today for you, Joe.
One, the first and it, it would be superweird if you knew the answer to this.
I'm just going to go outon a limb and say that.
So last week's military minute.
'cause we had aveteran-owned small business.
Owner on talking was aboutthat topic according to the,
(40:13):
and so you can answer this.
A moose, if you know, according tothe SBAs Office of Advocacy, how
many veteran owned businesses arethere in the United States in 2024?
Would that be as in like, no, actually no.
No.
If you're in our audience and you areexcellent at Google and you answered
1.6 million.
Yeah.
So if you're in our audience and youguessed 1.6 million after our last
(40:37):
podcast, watch for your name to beselected as the lucky winner for $50 for
you and $50 to a chariot of your choice.
And so, but I think you might actuallyknow this week's military minute, but
you can't answer because this one'sgonna be teed up for our audience.
So I'm gonna ask you to nod yourhead if you know the answer.
So, but don't, don't tell 'em this week'smilitary minute is a question about Vbo.
(40:59):
In what year did the VeteransBusiness Outreach Center get created?
Thumbs up if you know,but don't say it out loud.
Oh.
Oh.
We won't even rat you out.
That was a audience.
That was a yes.
Yeah.
He's only been there eight months.
Right, right.
So that comes in month nine of training.
He knows,
he knows more about the Pikes Peak
(41:19):
region.
Yes.
Yes.
So if you're in our audience and you knowthe answer to what year did the Veterans
Business Outreach Center get created?
Or you can Google it by the timethis podcast drops, put your
best answer in the comments.
And if you're right, you two couldbe the lucky recipient of $50 for you
and $50 to a charity of your choice.
Joe Regan, I applaud you.
If you enjoyed today's episodeas much as Jodi did, go out to af
(41:42):
bank.com, subscribe to the show.
Also, make sure to rate us, leave us acomment on your favorite podcast platform.
Apple, Spotify, YouTube.
Well done, Joe.
Thank
you.
No, that was lovely.
Thank
you.
Bye-bye.
Copyright Armed Forces Bank Member,FDIC, equal Housing Lender, all
(42:02):
non Armed forces, bank owned apps,websites, company names, and product
names or trademarks or registeredtrademarks of their respective owners.
They're mentioned does not implyany affiliation with or endorsement
by Armed Forces Bank of themor their products and services.
They're merely used as examples of themany available apps, companies, and
websites that offer similar services.
Before using any app or website, youshould carefully review the terms
of use data collection and privacypolicy apps may have an initial cost
or in application purchase features.
This information is general innature and is not intended to be
(42:23):
legal, tax or financial advice.
Although Armed Forces Bank believesthis information to be accurate, it
cannot ensure that it could change.
Statements or opinions of individualsreferenced herein are their own
not Armed Forces Bank consultant.
Appropriate professional concerningyour specific situation and respective
governing bodies for applicablelaws such as irs.gov for current tax
law, armed Forces Bank, the ArmedForces Bank logo and the Militarily
Speaking logo are registered.
Trademarks of Armed Forces Bank.
Militarily speaking,season two, episode three.
Mount Carmel Veterans Service Center.
This episode we talk with Joe Regan withMount Carmel Veterans Service Center.
(00:23):
Welcome to Militarily Speaking.
Brought to you by Armed Forces Spank.
This is Tom McLean and Jody Vickery.
I am the me Meathead.
I'm the Metel.
Yeah.
I'm the military retail executive for
We are.
So not that out.
Let's keep it in there.
And Jody used to be the ChiefDigital Officer, now she's
the Chief Digital Officer.
(00:44):
So the cdo.
Joe, when you think of Chief DigitalOfficer, what do you, you've been,
why don't have ask every guest this.
You've been in the banking world,
right?
I mean, on the periphery, I, I thinkyour, your chief digital officer
is, is probably the one that is.
You know, taking marketing to thenext level of, of really bringing it
back and finding those new mediumsto connect with with your consumers.
(01:07):
You're breaking up Uhoh.
Could you repeat
that?
No kidding.
I have to tell Jess
our chief marketing officer, though.
I know Joe.
I've been trying to get on our team.
I've Jon that I'm very good at creative
graphic.
Joe just boosted you up like.
Thousands of feet.
I know.
Had
you see me, I sat up straighter
walk, walking on cloud nine.
Yeah.
I feel pretty good aboutmyself, so thanks Joe.
I like you already of,
that'll change.
Yeah.
(01:27):
Give, give it time
again.
Welcome to our show.
We're excited to have you listening andlearning about our guest, Joe Regan.
We do wanna take just a second and tellour audience a little bit about you.
Joe is the director of theColorado Veterans Business
Outreach Center, or Vbo C.
He joined the Colorado Vbo C after 20plus years of experience leading change
in teams across the defense, technologyand nonprofit sectors after leaving
(01:49):
active duty in the United States Army.
Thank you for your service, Joe.
Yes, of
course.
Joe earned an MBA from theUniversity of Virginia.
He has his experience spansmultiple industries, ranging from
healthcare to technology, nationalsecurity, and nonprofit work.
Prior to joining the Colorado Vbo, C Joewas the president of New Space Global.
He has also worked for a numberof nonprofit organizations
(02:10):
supporting the military and veterancommunity, including Easterseals and
Wreaths Across America, which is.
Which is a friend of ours as well.
Well, welcome Joe.
It's an honor to have you on our show.
I'm excited to learn aboutyou and your organization.
For those in our audience that that mightnot be aware, just give us kind of that,
that bird's eye view of what Mount CarmelVeterans Business Center is all about.
(02:31):
Of course.
Well, Mount Carmel was founded just alittle bit over 10 years ago with the
goal of being a one-stop shop for Veteranstransitioning service members and their
families in the Pikes Peak region.
And that has expanded over thecourse of the past 10 years to
cover most of Southern Colorado.
And about three years ago, MountCarmel picked up the veteran
business outreach with the Vbo.
Contract with the smallbusiness administration.
(02:53):
So now we provide services to thosesame fee people that are looking
at starting a small business.
And so it's really an amazing organizationwhere our goal is, you know, too often in,
in government, in in nonprofit space, wehave our little lines, lanes in the road.
And when someone shows up to ourdoor and, and maybe we don't do
that service, you know, we justsay, well, sorry, we can't help you.
(03:15):
And then that door closes andMount Carmel was really designed
to be through partnerships.
No wrong door philosophy was anyonethat comes through our door, regardless
of what they need, then we're gonnaprovide them with the, the services
and resources to help them thrive.
I love that.
No wrong door philosophy.
I know there'll be a lotof application for that.
Yeah.
If it said, Jodi Vickery onthe outside of the door, be,
(03:36):
do not enter, do not be beware.
Check how she's doing today and thensee if it's okay to, has she had coffee?
Picture at your own risk.
What cup is she
on?
You and I met.
Joe and I certainly our prep work for the,for the summit that we had in Colorado
Springs, which is in your backyard.
And when you say Pikes Peak, I'm sureour audience gets jealous because it's
(03:57):
such a beautiful landscape out there.
And certainly the, we can't talk aboutthe Colorado Rockies and you can't
talk about the Broncos around KansasCity, so we can't bring that up either.
So
we'll stick away from sports, I guess.
Yes, but I knew you had.
A lot of passion for what you do.
I knew you were veryknowledgeable in what you do.
You have a great background,great experience.
But walk us through a littlebit from a career standpoint.
(04:19):
Jody brought your bio to life,but talk about how you ended
up being at Mount Carmel.
Right.
Well, I think it's, it's a. It's alifelong calling to to serve, and
that started when I was in college.
I went to a private military school andI had the full intention of not going
into the military after the fact that theadvantage of going to a private school
or private military school is that therewas no military service obligation.
(04:42):
After nine 11, I really feltthat calling that going into the
military was the way to, to go.
And I was one of those, I had anopportunity I could have anything
I wanted to do in the military.
And I chose to go infantry, whichis kind of the, you know, frontline
troops and wanted to go with the10th Mountain Division, which at the
time was the, the highest deployedunit in the United States Army.
(05:04):
And so within what was a littlebit over a year from graduation,
I had graduated college.
Done all of my initial trainingand found myself on a plane over to
Afghanistan where I was able to leadsome amazing men and women in combat
over the course of a 16 month deployment.
And then I did, after that one, I cameback, did a second tour as well, was
(05:24):
more of a staff role for that one.
Did a few other kind of interestingstrategic roles within the military and
then got out at about the, the eightyear mark and continued to serve and.
I kind of found myself in a P placeprofessionally where I was learning
a lot and engaging with privatebusiness, but it was not rewarding.
(05:46):
And I was sitting on the board ofdirectors for a local nonprofit.
It's kind of a volunteer.
When our director left and the boardhad asked, well, would you be interested
in taking on this role full time?
And I thought about it and I said,I think that would, yeah, I think
that is something I'd like to do.
And so was able to findthat reward, find that.
That giving back and was ableto, to go from that route.
(06:08):
And it's, and so really for the past10 years, have spent my time in a
number of different nonprofits beingable to serve my fellow veterans in
a variety of different capacities.
And that's where I foundmyself in the, the Vbo.
We're now able to help those fellowservice members, their spouses, veterans,
that wanna start a small business.
And so we're seeing that impact notonly in their own lives, but seeing that
impact in their communities as well.
(06:30):
I love that.
That's such a good thing for Ithink veterans and even particularly
for military spouses, to have sortof that entrepreneurial spirit.
It's portable.
They can take it with them asthey're moving about the country.
For sure.
Kinda along those lines, what are someof the most common things that you see
prospective small business startersor owners coming to Mount Carmel for?
And are they more heavily weightedin certain industries or certain
(06:53):
types of businesses, or doesit really run the full gamut?
Well, I, let me, let me answerthe second question first because
I think that one's kind of funny.
Where really there is no industry focus.
And so oftentimes many of our clients arein the ideation phase of their business.
They're coming to us with a conceptand we're helping them refine that.
And just as an example, about a monthand a half ago, I was teaching a class
(07:16):
on Fort Carson, which is one of the majormilitary installations here in Colorado.
And in the front row, I had aservice member and his spouse who
ran a small business where theywere crocheting dolls that resembled
characters from horror movies.
Oh gosh.
Wait, didn't see that one coming.
Nope.
No.
It was, and it, you know, again, thisvery narrow, very narrow focus right now.
(07:39):
Customers, that's, we'll
call it a niche ni, niche.
Niche.
Niche.
Niche.
It was a niche niche.
In
the back of the room though,there was a military doctor that
was getting ready to retire.
And she wanted to use 3D printingtechnology for what could best be
described as internal prosthetics.
So for example, using a a 3D printer tomaybe print a rib bone or something that
(08:00):
you're going, oh, put inside the body.
And, and that's in one classroom.
To give you an example of the,of the scope and spectrum of, of,
so we'll say diverse.
Diverse, very diverse, yes.
Yes.
But the problems that come to us.
Are very similar and like I said,we are in the ideation phase
of small business development.
So many of these folks havenever run a business before.
(08:20):
Many of them are just leaving themilitary, and so they don't really
understand even the basics ofhow do you build a business plan?
What is accounting, how do I structuremyself and some legal questions.
And so the two biggest questionsthat we generally have is, how
am I going to pay for this?
And then how am I supposedto structure myself?
Should I be an LLCA sole proprietorship?
A lot of people are interested in gettingin the nonprofit space, so we provide them
(08:44):
with that kind of overview as to cue thedifferent resources that are available.
And as a program of the small businessadministration, oftentimes we're
talking a lot about small businessprograms, eight A programs and, and
some of those different loan programs,but we tend to tie in with them.
With different lenders at the same time,because oftentimes you have commercial
lenders that have products that are abetter fit than what the SBA has to offer.
(09:08):
And so what we'll do is we will thencoach those clients to help refine that
business model, build out a financialforecast so that when they go and have a
conversation with the bank, all of thosehard conversations have already been had.
Because like, and Tom, when you andI were talking, and I've talked to a
number of folks in the lending space.
They all say the same thing.
(09:28):
A business owner will showup and oftentimes they don't
have a, a business plan.
They don't really have all those forecaststhat you're gonna need to see in order
to make a decision as to whether or notthis individual qualifies for a loan.
And so by coaching them ahead oftime, we're able to make that first
conversation go that much more smoothly.
And that's, I think, invaluable not onlyfor the client, the veteran, uh, but
(09:49):
also the, the bank that has to make thatdecision and ultimately put that risk up
to, to support that, that new business.
Yeah, I think that's great.
They've got an idea and you're putting,helping 'em put legs underneath of it,
is it, or, I was like to say, whenwhen they walk into our office, they're
gonna come in with a good idea andthey're gonna walk out with a good
idea and about two dozen questionsthey never thought to ask themselves.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
(10:10):
Can we go back to thecrochet dolls for a second?
Because my daughter, I'll tellyou, my daughter does all this
crochet, does fruits, vegetables.
Now she can add, I guess, horror figuresto their, to a repertoire, but did
that ever materialize into something?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
And so when they came to us, they'dactually been selling in a couple
of different venues, and one of thebiggest questions that they had was
(10:33):
they were having a really difficulttime with financial forecasting
because their margins shifted.
Depending on where selling, they wereselling online and that had a certain
set, set cost that came with it, thenthey would sell it like farmer's markets.
They would go to the Comic-Con and sellthere, and that was making financial
forecasting that much difficult.
And so we kind of helped coach them onthe fact that, well, hey, you should
(10:54):
probably think of each of these different.
Venues or events or calendarsduring time of year.
Yeah.
Treat that as a unique sales channel,and that way you can build out that
revenue, figure out where your highestprofitability is, and then you can
make that determination of, well,do I really want to go to Comic-Con?
If it's gonna cost me a thousanddollars to rent a space, am I
gonna be able to recoup that?
(11:14):
You know, same thingwith the farmer's market.
What are my sales gonna looklike there and what's the cost?
And giving them the tools so thatthey were then able to identify
those, those fixed and variable costsassociated with each of the different
platforms where they were selling.
Hmm.
Makes
total sense.
It makes, we wanna still talk about this.
I know you're gonna Google it afteror after we're done, aren't you?
He didn't tell me he wasgonna talk, bring this up.
(11:35):
So now it's got me off my game.
But, and then as Jody mentioned, when,as far as people walking in the door
and seeking guidance assistance whenthey wanna, whether a great idea,
are you seeing a lot of startups cometo the front door or are you seeing.
Veteran owned businesses that have beenthere for 10 years and they're at a, maybe
they're at an inflection point or a at apoint in their business life where they,
(11:58):
they wanna refocus or change direction.
Yeah, I, I would say the majorityof folks that are coming to us
are, are in that early phase.
These are mostly startups,many of which are pre-revenue.
And so we are working with them to getthem to that point of, of doors open.
When you look at the pathwayfor a business owner.
And then the, the differentresources that exist outside
(12:19):
of, of just the veteran space.
So, you know, VBO C is one toolamong many that exist in our
community and in communities acrossthe country that are designed to
help these small businesses thrive.
And so part of the program,in addition to training.
It's also resource navigation.
So if a company comes to us and they're alittle bit more mature and maybe they're
(12:40):
having a specific issue with marketing,then what we might try and do, instead
of necessarily doing all that workin-house, connect them with a resource
in the community that already exists.
So think of score mentors or yoursmall business development centers.
These are are tools that are availableto any business owner, but are able to
specialize more in those things and arefocused more on the developed businesses.
(13:00):
When we deal with folks that aregetting into government contracting,
we have programs like the ApexAccelerator, and these are rules that
are designed to help support thatgrowth into government contracting.
So that's part of that resourcenavigation of saying, Hey, you, you
are a veteran business owner, and thatqualifies you for certain components.
But at the same time, you need tobe tied into the bigger and broader
(13:21):
business community because that'swhere you're going to find a lot of
these different resources to helpyou thrive as a small business owner.
And, and you kind of touchedon it with that, that answer.
Are there other programs and resourcesthat you bring to the table that we,
we haven't hit on just in our otherconversations or, I think just as
importantly, how do people access those?
Is there a website thatwe should direct them to?
How do they connect with you to, tounderstand what the options are for them?
(13:43):
Yeah, so obviously we're talking todayabout my role at the Colorado vbac,
but there are 31 VBACs Nationwide.
So wherever you are, you havethose resources available to you.
So ev every community covers down.
Obviously, some of these VBACs arecovering down on multiple states,
but we do a lot of counseling andtrainings that are available online.
In fact, about two weeks ago,we partnered with the Big Sky.
(14:06):
Vbac, which covers down on Montana,I, Idaho, and I think Nevada or Utah,
and did a, a specific training forfarming and ranching because in the
west of that's a, a big, big deal for.
So we were able to partner withsome of the other vbo to provide
that training virtually tofolks across the Western region.
Other resources that would be available,as I said, you have the small Business
(14:28):
Development Center, you have score.
The small Business administrationhas a number of tools that are
available, like the Women's BusinessCenter, and we also have the
certifications that are available.
So you can get your eight A designation,your small, your veteran owned, small
business, disabled owned, small businessdesignation, and we'll help clients.
Navigate that process as well.
One of the things that I find in myrole, and it's funny, you know, Tom,
(14:49):
we were talking about how I'm from thePikes Peak region, which is in central
Colorado in the front range, but I'mactually talking to you today from
the Western slope of Colorado becauseI was out in Durango for the Western
Slope Small Business or startup Week.
That all just sounds very cool.
It, I'm on the Western slopeit, I'm in, and there's also,
every season is in Colorado.
(15:10):
In one day I, in downtown Kansas City,it's, I, I think just, just today alone,
as I was driving through some of thesepasses, I, I, I hit snow and the, the
beautiful foliage of the aspens andthen got back down into, you know,
70 degrees in some of the valleys.
And here we sit in a concrete jungle.
But that's, and that's the, but that'sthe same thing that communities face.
Right.
So a lot, a lot of these resourcesand tools are gonna vary based
(15:35):
on the community that you livein, the region that you live in.
And so for us understandingwhat is out there for that.
So along the front range of Colorado,we have a number of different
resources on the Western Slope,much different set of resources.
And there're there's not as many of them.
So when we run into rural communities,how do we provide different levels
of support to those business ownersthat might not see what you would see
(15:56):
in a more urban or developed area.
Joe, how do you think being partof a Veteran Service organization
or A VSO, if we're gonna throw outacronyms, how does that help you deliver
better outcomes for your clients?
I think ha, just having theveteran connection is, is
magical in and of itself.
But what does that designation, orwhat does that affiliation mean?
(16:16):
Yeah, so cultural
competency and, and, and you allknow this from your work on, on
installations when it comes to, tobanking specific to our service members.
Having that cultural competencyallows us to speak the language of
our clients and more importantly,help them translate that.
And when I, when I'm teaching someof these classes, I'll get up and
I'll say, I'm not teaching you.
New skills.
(16:37):
I'm teaching you how to translate thoseskills into a different language, right?
You're speaking military right now.
I need you to speak finance, andI'm gonna, I'm gonna, I assure you,
these are the same tools that you'vebeen using for decades in military
planning and military decision making.
But now I just need you, you tospeak a different language so
that everyone else in the roomunderstands what you're talking about.
But being with a Veteran Serviceorganization, lemme tell you a short story
(16:59):
that might highlight this, because I thinkthat's usually the best way to do it.
We had a veteran that came in and was veryinterested in starting a small business.
And like any good conversation, we startwith how are you, tell us about yourself?
And the response we get backwas, oh, I'm doing great.
I just got divorced.
(17:20):
I'm getting evicted next month andI haven't had a job in two years.
And so being able to thenaddress that, be like, okay.
Maybe starting a small business rightnow isn't the best thing for you.
Instead, why don't we walk you downthe hall where we have behavioral
health services, where we have familyservices that can help connect you
(17:41):
with the resources so we get stability.
Let's get you into a permanenthousing situation so we
don't run into homelessness.
Let's connect you with some job trainingresources so we can get you a sustainable
source of, of income and revenue,and that might be getting a job that
might be in getting your disabilities.
Approved.
And once we get you to a pointwhere you're stable and thriving,
(18:02):
let's come back to this idea.
And I think that illustrates thisidea of when we are focused on the
outcome, we're able to address allof those needs, whether it's someone
like me that's more of a business guy.
And I'll share another, I'lltell you another story too.
And this one is, I mean, this is oneof those examples of, we had a client
that called interested in services,and as the conversation progressed,
(18:24):
one of my team members identified thatthis individual was actually suicidal.
And while on the call was able to connectthem directly with those resources to
deescalate the situation and bring themback to a point where now this person
sees hope in the future, and now is ableto, to move forward and, and connect them
(18:44):
with mental health resources so that theycan be, move beyond that crisis point.
And, and now they're, they'restill in our community, thriving.
And again, connect them withthose external resources.
Get them to a point where they're stable.
And then when it's time, let's comeback to the business idea afterwards.
So just two examples of how when weare connected as a, a veteran service
organization, you know, regardless ofwhat that veteran is going through or
(19:08):
what that military spouse or militaryfamily member is, is going through
at that time, we're able to bring allthose additional resources from the
periphery to bear and focus on that, thatindividual and what's going to allow them
to thrive in the moment in the future.
You always think about startups andthe, and the success and failure
rates, right, of startups, whetheryou're civilian, military, spouse, or
just have an idea that, I mean, thenumbers are pretty staggering about
(19:30):
failures in the first 12 or 18 months,and sometimes just taking a pause.
And maybe getting 'em on the right track.
Then the success ratesgo up that you like.
To your point, Joe,better outcomes from that.
You don't put them in a, you don'tset 'em up to fail by doing something.
Just 'cause you wanna take theorder from someone that thinks
they know what they're doing.
Exactly, exactly.
(19:51):
Give 'em the guidance, give 'em theresources to give 'em the support.
Get 'em on the right track.
Know that as A VSO, you'll be there forthem when it, when the time's, right.
But you've got access to allthose resources 'cause you've
walked in their footsteps.
Walked in their boots, and understandwhat's available out there.
Especially in the ColoradoSprings area with all the veterans
that lived in that community.
(20:11):
There's so much support out
there.
There is, and one of the things that Ithink has made our community successful
in that sense is the ability to,
as a military spouse, I understand howunpredictable life can be, whether it's
a PCS move or just everyday expenses.
Money can be tight.
(20:32):
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(20:55):
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One of the things that.
(21:38):
I think has made our communitysuccessful in that sense is the ability
to collaborate instead of compete.
And I think this is an issue that we runinto in a lot with a lot of nonprofits
is oftentimes these are all organizationswith very valuable missions that are
competing for financial resources.
And when we partner.
(21:59):
On the programming side, we provideourselves with those opportunities
to get those better outcomes.
And I think in the Pikes Peak region,in the state of Colorado, we have
done a good job of identifyingthose different resources, pulling
them together and creating.
An ecosystem where we can collaborate forclient outcomes while still getting out
(22:21):
there and making sure that we're engagingwith those other community partners,
like lenders that are gonna be able tofinancially support these organizations,
to allow us to provide those services.
Yeah.
I love that.
And it's, it's kind of rightwhere we wanted to, to head
next with this conversation.
So including the collaboration thatyou're talking about there in your
local Pikes Peak area, how do youreach out and collaborate with,
(22:42):
uh, I think you said there were31 total vbox across the country.
How do you share idea?
What ideas have you learnedfrom them, gleaned from them?
What ideas have you shared and kindof proliferated across the country?
How does that Yeah.
Partnership
work?
But Joe, before you answer that.
You're directly tied with the SPA, right?
That's correct.
Is there any, is there anythingwith the state of affairs today with
(23:02):
government shutdown, does that impairor impede your ability to help, or
do you, is it a waiting game for you?
How does that change yourday and then answer Jody's
question?
Yeah, I, I would say that the, thecurrent situation with the government
does not necessarily impede our day-to-dayoperations because of the, we are a
grant funded program, and so that fundinghas already been allocated for us for
(23:23):
the, at least the next six months.
So day to day, we are stillable to provide that function
where we will see delays.
Obviously, if we're having to goto SBA for certain tools, then
obviously our SBA colleagues are,are not in the office currently.
So we've got the knowledge ofthe tools that are out there.
And so in some cases it might be a delayin connecting someone with the, the
(23:46):
different resources to get that approvalfor their small business designation
or getting the hub zone designation.
So those things might be onhold until we get back into the,
everyone gets back into the office.
But for the most part, the counseling,the trainings, all of those have
continued and, and will continue untilthere's a, unless this really continues,
unless this shutdown continues formore than the next three or four
months, hopefully that doesn't happen.
(24:07):
We hope not.
Yeah.
Don't shut that up out.
Yeah.
So to to the, to the questionaround how do we collaborate
with the other, the other V box.
You know, it might sound simple, butyou know, we have a month monthly
meeting where all of the directors gettogether and simply share best practices.
We talk about new toolsthat are available.
The SBA comes down and willtell us anything that's new.
(24:29):
So for example, just a few months ago,the SBA rolled out a new initiative
focused on manufacturing initiatives.
So how do we then take that information,communicate it down to our folks?
All of us right now are very engaged withthe planning for Veteran Small Business
Week, which is coming up in the first,it's the first full week of November.
So those are areas where we've gota formal mechanism where we'll get
(24:50):
together on a regular basis, discussbest practices, interact with each other.
But when you think about it, 31 centersnationwide is not a large number.
So many of us have known eachother or get to know each other.
Over the course of just business andwe were able to pick up the phone and
just say, Hey, what do you think it,and go back to my example about our
work with the Big Sky BU saying, Hey,we know that you guys have this class.
(25:11):
I don't need to replicate that.
Can we just jump on it andpromote it to our clients?
And that way they were ableto benefit from it as well.
And then I talked to other BU andsay, Hey, the state of Colorado.
We have a big outdoor industry,would it be helpful if maybe we
start to try and pull in some folksfrom our tourism industry, from our
outdoor industry, and maybe we candesign a class that's around that
(25:31):
everyone's like, yeah, that'd be great.
And so that's kind of one of thoselonger term initiatives that we've
looked at of what is unique, what skillsets does Colorado have that is unique
to us that might be able to benefitother parts of the, the country as well.
This next question,Joe, was not done by me.
'cause you had to tell mewhat the question would be.
'cause I wasn't smartenough to come up with it.
(25:52):
So here we go.
Ready?
What?
I'm impressed that youactually admitted that.
Oh, did I?
I said that out loud, didn't I?
I, and we're still
recording.
Yeah.
So normally he'd totallytake credit for it.
That's a great question.
That's a Tom, a great question.
Tom, what role does the VboC play in strengthening?
The local economy.
I thought that was great.
And then how do you interact with therest of the entrepreneurial ecosystem?
(26:14):
That's probably why I couldn'tcome up with that question.
That's how I know you didn't come up with
that question.
Yeah.
And then, and then track the impactof small businesses you've helped.
So that's a, a. Jody's favorite part isto do three part questions like that.
Yeah.
And so tackle that one thatyou have advanced warning.
Yeah.
So, okay.
So the, the first part of thatquestion, what are we doing?
How is our work impacting therest of these communities?
(26:37):
So obviously small business.
Is the driver of our economy.
Whether you live in a, a big city ora small town, a small business is,
is the driving force in our economyhere in the state of Colorado.
I can tell you that veteran ownedsmall business contributes over $22
billion to Colorado's economy annually.
If you were to compile that and, andmake veteran owned small business its
(26:58):
own industry, it would be the fifthlargest industry in the state of Colorado.
Wow.
So that, at that, at a big level,that is a large number that can tell
you the impact that this is having.
When veteran owned small business andsmall businesses in general thrive,
we measure the impact of that bylooking at things like, and, and a lot
of these are self-reported metrics.
So when a client comes to us and says,Hey, I just hired my first person.
(27:22):
We'll put that and track that sortof information so that we know how
many jobs have been created basedon these small business openings.
We'll also work with them likeas I mentioned, one of the bigger
questions that we have around lending.
We'll also work both with theclient as well as our lending
partners to get a sense of what hasthis done for your loan pipeline.
So it gives us an idea of how muchmoney is being inserted into the economy
(27:45):
through these new business development.
And I will say in the first sixmonths of the year that Colorado
Vbo for just, I think it was justone lender alone, contributed over
$12 million to their loan pipeline.
So we're able to, to reallybuild out that portfolio.
And if you're a lender.
When you're getting a client fromus, you're also, we're saving you
(28:06):
time because instead of you havingto go back and having the initial
conversation and saying, before we havea further follow on conversation, I
need this, this, this, this, and this.
I've already got it.
And so when a client comes to me,I'm saying, before you go to the
bank here, you need to have thisinformation and show up with it.
That way it's, it's a moreefficient conversation for,
for you and for the client.
It's less frustrating for them.
(28:26):
And so those are some of the areas,some, some of the major areas that we,
we would have the, we would keep themetrics on, on what that looks like.
By the way, I think you put a goodplugin for the 31 Vbo around the country
for banks to come knock on the doors.
Mm-hmm.
To set up shop and try tobe a partner with the vbo.
Well, and you know, this is, I'll go,I'll, I'll take a pause from answering
(28:47):
the, the three part question and goback to a question you already asked.
But you know, this is part of that,you know, when we talk about no wrong
door, our banking partners are oneof those doors that someone walks in.
It's an opportunity for you asa, as a, a community staple.
To ask that question of your, ofyour clients, of of the people
that you're serving, ask them,have you served in the military?
(29:09):
And that's where if you have a partnerlike Mount Carmel in your community,
if you have a Vbo C you can then say,Hey, did you know that this resource
exists for veterans of the community?
If you're a veteran, smallbusiness owner, did you, have you
spoken to your, the local vbo?
And so I encourage anybodythat's interacting with the
public to ask that question.
If you have a, an intake document, ifyou're bringing new clients on, ask them,
(29:31):
have you ever served in the military?
If, if they say yes, you know, then youcan connect them with those resources
that you're a avail that you know of,and make that, make that connection.
And that is something that I advocatenot just for, for bankers, but at all
levels for people to be asking thatquestion so that we can you, 'cause this
is a, when I, and now I'll pivot backto the third part of the question, which
is, how do I interact with the broadereconomic development ecosystem, you know?
(29:55):
And, and one of the questionsthey ask is, is for data.
It actually is kind of difficultto identify how many veteran owned
small businesses are out there,because unless they self-identify,
there's not really a database, right?
If you get the small business designationthrough SBA, that's, you really only need
to do that if you're gonna get involvedwith government contracting at some level.
(30:15):
So many businesses might advertise thefact that they're veteran owned, but
they don't actually put it anywhere.
There's no database, andthat's where tracking down.
Those numbers can sometimesbecome a little bit more
challenging or, or figuring outhow do we contact these folks?
Because like, as I said, when we'regetting ready for Veteran Small
Business Week, one of the thingsthat I want to do is highlight
(30:37):
those veteran business businesses.
So how do I find them?
Some of them I know, some of them I don't.
And I think that it's,it's always beneficial.
We can find those.
Those businesses that aredoing amazing things that don't
necessarily get their story told.
Because I think sometimes, especiallyin the nonprofit space, we might find
a client, we're like, oh, they've gota great story and we stick to that one.
But there's so many other greatstories that are out there, you just
(30:58):
kind of stumble across sometimes.
And those are the ones that you reallywanna be able to elevate and highlight
fact that this is a great program.
Yeah.
And so through partnership.
Is then where we engage withthose other tools at, at both
the local level, the state level.
So obviously, like I said, ourpartnerships at the federal level are
through the small business administration,but in the state of Colorado we have
a, a state level office for economicdevelopment and international trade.
(31:23):
So we work very closely with them.
And then, you know, I've only beenin this role now for about eight
months and so I've focused a lotof my early time to, into these
different communities to identifywhat other resources are out there.
And at least make that introductionso that when we have a client in
a different area, we can say, Hey,have you talked to this person yet?
Or vice versa.
(31:43):
Someone walks into a localchamber of commerce and says, Hey,
have you talked to the Vbo yet?
They can help you with this.
You know that, right?
So it is a lot of work sometimes toget out there and, and engage with
the community, but that's what,you know, building that network of
strong partners, both inside theveteran space and outside the veteran
space is really what drives success.
I would never have guessed that you'veonly been doing this eight months.
(32:03):
I know.
'cause you're, I can, you're,you've got passion for it.
You're, I thought he
meant years ledge about it.
Yeah, yeah.
No, it's,
it's, he's a pro.
It's awesome.
Yeah.
What kind of things are you seeing, orwould you cause businesses to think about
as emerging trends in small business?
I mean, we, we've talked recentlyabout some different things here
and, and how AI can impact that or,you know, whatever, whatever the hot
(32:23):
topic is, du jour, I suppose, but.
What, what kind of emerging trends areyou encouraging small businesses to think
about when they bring that idea to you?
Well, you know, we started theconversation talking about the diversity
of industries that we deal with atthe, and so it's, it is really hard
to identify one particular trendor even a number of trends that
would be applicable to all of them.
(32:44):
But I do think that when it comesto ai, that is a tool that every
business owner needs to be using.
And so when we talk about ai.
In fact, just just yesterday, uh, I satthrough a an hour long seminar about how
you can utilize AI for doing reputationmanagement, which is something that most
businesses, it takes them years to get toa point of maturity where they're starting
(33:07):
to deal with reputation management.
But AI can be used to monitor, uh, varioussocial media channels, all the review
channels to identify when a negativereview comes in and either cue you to
say, Hey, you need to deal with this.
Or in some cases you can evengenerate a response through ai that
will be kind of that placeholderof, Hey, thanks for the comment.
We'll, we'll get back to you on thatbecause we wanna address this immediately.
(33:30):
So we have a lot of conversations aroundAI and, and what it's going to do.
To the marketplace, but I think everybusiness owner has to be looking
at it as a tool that can increaseefficiency, especially when it
comes to, to marketing, you know?
So for years, right?
SEO was the term.
Term.
The term du jour, right?
Right.
Everyone needs to get SEO, andnow we're getting into a space
(33:51):
where it's, no, we need to getbeyond that and this needs to be.
You need your website to be AI focusedso that when the AI bot is, is scraping
through the internet, it finds yourwebsite and can answer someone's question.
And that's a different wayof, of doing website design.
So it's in fact, just this fallwe've hosted a series of classes of
(34:11):
how a small business owner shouldbe dealing with a web designer.
And how they should be layingout their, their storyboards.
So when they're doing the web interface,that that website is optimized not only
for AI search, but also for the userexperience as well and simplifying that.
So I would say those are probablytwo trends that, you know, how do you
communicate what your business is doing isprobably the biggest one that we, we have.
(34:35):
'cause that's, that'schanging and I think.
How do you do it in away that builds trust?
Because I think there's one of the,the emerging trends we don't talk
about enough is the fact that with allof this information, trusted sources
are few and far between these days.
And so how do you create that authenticresponse that someone is going to feel
(34:55):
confident that the information they'regetting from you is in fact accurate.
Yeah.
Yeah.
One, it sounds like you'regiving them tools too.
So a topic like AI that might beintimidating for somebody that doesn't
know is something that's actionable.
So I've got one final question for you.
Mm-hmm.
It's a zinger.
What's the one piece of advice you wishevery small business owner would know?
(35:17):
Planning, really think through theplanning and, and I'll, I'll say
this from, from the perspectiveof a co of a combat leader, right?
In combat, everyone knows, right?
Every, the, the plan falls apart.
The moment of firstcontact with the enemy.
In small business, it's the same thing.
You know the moment you open those doors.
(35:37):
Your plan is almost certainly going tofall apart, but the act of going through
and plan and doing the plan and reallythinking through all of the assumptions,
and I tell people a lot of times, I said,listen, I got a new joke the other day.
This was a good one.
Oh no.
Oh, oh no.
We haven't done a joke in a long time.
This is right up
my alley.
You could be bringing me back to life.
(35:58):
This is a good one I had, and it'sa clean one too, so this is good.
Right?
We even better.
So three people.
Apply for a mathematician, astatistician, and an economist.
I'll apply for a job, and sothe mathematician goes in first
the ma, and they ask them themathematician, what's two plus two?
And the mathematician says four.
You sure?
Yep.
(36:19):
He goes, okay.
And the statistician goes in andthey say, what's two plus two?
And he says four.
He said, are you sure?
And he says, well, I'm 97%certain with a three of error.
About 1%.
Okay.
Then the economist goes in andhe said, what's two plus two?
And he goes over, locks the door.
Lowers the shades, and says.
(36:39):
What do you want it to be?
Which is funny of course, because whenyou really think through how we're
doing financial forecasting, right?
All of that is based on a numberof different assumptions, and we
can oftentimes make those numberslook really, really good on paper.
And that might be beneficial in somecases, but as a business owner, you
(36:59):
really have to understand what thoseassumptions you're making about how
you're gonna get to profitability.
And so when you're doing that detailedbusiness plan, when you're really
digging into all those assumptionsand your financial forecasting.
Don't just look at the numbers,but understand the assumptions that
you've made to get to that point.
And that's part of yourbusiness planning process.
(37:20):
It's part of your market researchprocess because like I said, you can make
those numbers look really, really rosy.
But until you really understandwhere those assumptions are coming
from and where that, where thatcreates vulnerability and risk,
that is the value of, of doing theplanning, and that's where you need
to create a lot of, uh, effort.
That's a great answer.
I think that joke may illustratehow I did in college and economic.
(37:44):
I didn't, I didn't havethat understanding.
I don't,
somebody famous said a goodplan violently executed now.
Is better than a perfect plan next week.
Is that advice youmight give to a startup?
Because to your point about militaryand every plan that you're gonna put
out there, you might, it might fail and,but it's okay to get something out there
and learn from it, or would you say,like you said earlier in our podcast.
(38:07):
Take a breath and don't,don't do something un until
we get you in the right place.
It's that
mix, right?
So, yes, you'll never have theperfect plan, and you don't want to
get yourself into a position whereyou have, you're, you're indecisive.
At some point, you needto be making decisions.
(38:27):
You have to do it with a, acertain tolerance for risk
where you might not have.
All of the answers that youwant to make that decision.
But to take advantage of opportunitiesthat exist, sometimes you have to
make those balanced risk decisions,you know, in, in the moment.
So I think, like I said, for anybodyit, it, it is a balance that you
(38:49):
certainly have to make, but one thatshould always be made with the, an eye
towards risk mitigation and management.
Yeah.
Good point.
So I don't know that we've, we've askedyet, and if we haven't, our apologies.
We can Anyway, if we, if we did that,it's, it's a good thing to say twice.
Is there a website in that localarea where you would direct people
to, to figure out how to reachyou, how to contact you, and how
(39:11):
to take advantage of some of theseresources we've talked about today?
Absolutely.
So if you are in the state ofColorado, you can go to the
Mount Carmel center.org/vbac.
If you Google Vbo C or Veteran BusinessOutreach Center, you will be brought
to the Small Business Administrationwebpage where you can find the contact
information for all 31 centers nationwide.
Excellent.
(39:31):
Wanted to make sure we got that in.
As an important fact beforewe played the military minute.
Forget it's been there eight months.
I know.
I'll give 'em at least a b plus I think.
Yeah,
I'll take it.
Yeah.
I think we're, it's time.
Let's play the game.
We're gonna play the military minute.
(39:52):
So we have two triviaquestions today for you, Joe.
One, the first and it, it would be superweird if you knew the answer to this.
I'm just going to go outon a limb and say that.
So last week's military minute.
'cause we had aveteran-owned small business.
Owner on talking was aboutthat topic according to the,
(40:13):
and so you can answer this.
A moose, if you know, according tothe SBAs Office of Advocacy, how
many veteran owned businesses arethere in the United States in 2024?
Would that be as in like, no, actually no.
No.
If you're in our audience and you areexcellent at Google and you answered
1.6 million.
Yeah.
So if you're in our audience and youguessed 1.6 million after our last
(40:37):
podcast, watch for your name to beselected as the lucky winner for $50 for
you and $50 to a chariot of your choice.
And so, but I think you might actuallyknow this week's military minute, but
you can't answer because this one'sgonna be teed up for our audience.
So I'm gonna ask you to nod yourhead if you know the answer.
So, but don't, don't tell 'em this week'smilitary minute is a question about Vbo.
(40:59):
In what year did the VeteransBusiness Outreach Center get created?
Thumbs up if you know,but don't say it out loud.
Oh.
Oh.
We won't even rat you out.
That was a audience.
That was a yes.
Yeah.
He's only been there eight months.
Right, right.
So that comes in month nine of training.
He knows,
he knows more about the Pikes Peak
(41:19):
region.
Yes.
Yes.
So if you're in our audience and you knowthe answer to what year did the Veterans
Business Outreach Center get created?
Or you can Google it by the timethis podcast drops, put your
best answer in the comments.
And if you're right, you two couldbe the lucky recipient of $50 for you
and $50 to a charity of your choice.
Joe Regan, I applaud you.
If you enjoyed today's episodeas much as Jodi did, go out to af
(41:42):
bank.com, subscribe to the show.
Also, make sure to rate us, leave us acomment on your favorite podcast platform.
Apple, Spotify, YouTube.
Well done, Joe.
Thank
you.
No, that was lovely.
Thank
you.
Bye-bye.
Copyright Armed Forces Bank Member,FDIC, equal Housing Lender, all
(42:02):
non Armed forces, bank owned apps,websites, company names, and product
names or trademarks or registeredtrademarks of their respective owners.
They're mentioned does not implyany affiliation with or endorsement
by Armed Forces Bank of themor their products and services.
They're merely used as examples of themany available apps, companies, and
websites that offer similar services.
Before using any app or website, youshould carefully review the terms
of use data collection and privacypolicy apps may have an initial cost
or in application purchase features.
This information is general innature and is not intended to be
(42:23):
legal, tax or financial advice.
Although Armed Forces Bank believesthis information to be accurate, it
cannot ensure that it could change.
Statements or opinions of individualsreferenced herein are their own
not Armed Forces Bank consultant.
Appropriate professional concerningyour specific situation and respective
governing bodies for applicablelaws such as irs.gov for current tax
law, armed Forces Bank, the ArmedForces Bank logo and the Militarily
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Trademarks of Armed Forces Bank.
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