Being an active duty Marine Corps Officer has been core to my success in the business world. There are not many opportunities out there where you are immediately thrust into management in your first job out of college. But at 22 years old, I was in charge of a unit of 60 Marines, all of whom were more experienced than me, and taking them to war. During my 4.5 years on active duty, I had the honor to lead Marines in both combat (Fallujah, Iraq) and domestic humanitarian operations (New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina). Many people think “Marine” and they immediately assume a level of aggressive leadership that probably doesn’t translate into the civilian world, but they are wrong. Marines are humans too (actually superhuman if you ever ask a Marine), so you still need to engage their hearts and minds to earn their trust. 

While serving, I learned how important a strong team culture is to operational (mission) success. No matter how good the plan is or how effective the tool/weapon is, you still need to put those plans and tools in the hands of a human being to effectively apply that tool to accomplish the plan. I also learned that you will often have to quickly make major decisions, with major consequences, based on incomplete or conflicting information. But you have to avoid analysis paralysis and make a decision, because the 80% plan executed on time has a higher likelihood of success than the 100% plan executed too late. I reference the lessons I learned leading Marines in every aspect of my career. 

The MilVets Toast Community was the first group I joined when I started at Toast.  It was great to see all the Toast veterans and military spouses/partners that are involved. I love how the community shares news that would be relevant to vets, shares stories of their time in service, enjoys the “unique” humor that exists in the military, creates opportunities for us to support current troops with care packages and other charity work, and provides resources/advice for veteran and military spouses/partner Toasters just joining Toast. 

There is also a special language that only those in the military understand and it is great to be able to speak to others who understand what I’m saying without needing extra explanation. I guess you could say it’s similar to Toasters having to translate Toast puns for non-Toasters. 

A great example of this occurred last year when we formed a new team called Customer Onboarding Strategy and Operations (COSO). I was working with two fellow veterans, and as we were discussing the vision for this team, we were quickly able to align our vision by tying it back to our military roots. We determined that the COSO team would serve as the “S-3 Ops Cell,” supporting me, “the Battalion Commander,” and my direct reports, who act as the “Company Commanders,” executing the mission. That whole sentence probably means nothing to the average civilian, but is very descriptive to anyone who’s served in the military. As a result, the new team has been extremely successful in quickly ramping and executing on high value initiatives that have made a significant impact on improving Onboarding velocity, experience, and culture. We saved so much time, and were able to act with a lot more clarity in ramping the newly formed team because we had three veterans who were able to use our shared military experience to effectively communicate our vision.

The average service member has had to execute a task or mission with minimal or incomplete information while also being asked to do something with no formal training. Those experiences make veterans extremely valuable contributors, especially at an organization like Toast, where the speed and complexity of our industry require that high level of adaptability and ability to learn on the fly that veterans have developed as a result of their military service.