My Transition to the Energy Transition

For the better part of the last decade I’ve been working with various veteran non-profits because being successful in business wasn’t enough. I was called to serve in the military when the towers fell and I felt called to serve the veteran community because I believed that a pragmatic business based perspective on the mission was needed. I saw a lack of connectivity among veterans, especially as they sought to leverage their military service to accelerate their impact within their careers and their communities.

Most recently as the COO of Combined Arms and getting Bunker Labs launched in Houston. It’s been a real privilege to have been able to give back to the veteran community and help those in career and personal transitions realize their full potential whether that was by accelerating their access to human services or connecting them with a similar group of high achieving military veterans. We’ve launched some really fun and innovative groups like our LGBTQ veterans group, our Christian veterans group, professional groups for Energy, as well as one for attorneys. We’ve brought together thousands of veterans to connect and accelerate their careers and families.  

While I’ve loved my time in the veteran non-profit space and have been privileged to do great work with amazing people for a hard working community, I also feel called to serve again. This time in the Energy Transition. Because I love and respect this community, I wanted to share with you why I believe now is the time for me to focus on this new calling.

I believe that the energy transition is the most important thing to happen to our civilization in our lives.

Before I started working in the veteran services sector I’ve been intrigued by the growing Energy Transition. This is happening not only in Houston, but globally as the way that we generate and consume energy is changing more in the last 10 years than it has in the past 100 years. I believe that the energy transition is the most important thing to happen to our civilization in our lives. This event over the coming decades will connect over a billion people currently without power to the means for economic prosperity. Energy independence has profound implications for the national security of all nations. The economics of renewable energy is already disrupting the conventional models of energy capital investment. 

I’ve loved my time in the veteran non-profit space and have been privileged to do great work with amazing people for a hard working community, it’s time that I pass the reins. As we search an incredible pool of talent for the ideal candidate to replace me, I’m still burning the midnight oil like I always have. to the next leadership and follow my passion into the Energy Transition. I plan on staying involved with Combined Arms for many years to come. I am still a recurring monthly donor with the organization and I encourage you to support them as they accelerate the impact of veterans.

I feel that Combined Arms is a movement and larger than any one person. I am honored that I’ve been able to add a brick in building this monument that will impact veterans’ lives and their families for decades to come. 

• Through the creation of the Community Leader and Affinity Group program models developed we’ve created leadership opportunities for a wide range of veterans and their families to connect with one another in meaningful and highly impactful community groups based on their personal and professional lives. 
• We merged the largest veteran non-profit in Houston with the fastest growing to create a true one stop shop for veteran transition services and a community of support.
• It was a pleasure, and sometimes a challenge to lead the implementation of the co-working business model that you experience when you visit Combined Arms now, increasing the utilization efficiency of the space and increasing the connectivity among our members. 

I don’t know exactly what is next for me yet. I’m evaluating several leadership opportunities in Renewables and Cleantech. I couldn’t be more excited to leverage the network and friends that serving as a non-profit executive in this space has provided me the opportunity to meet.

take a few years outside of your business or professional career ladder to serve again in the veteran community

I’ve taken the experiences of building the veteran community and am now volunteering my time to do the same for the Renewables industry by chairing a new professional group focused on making Houston the Energy Capital of tomorrow, Renewable Energy Alliance Houston (REAL-Houston) led by the amazing Kay McCall. We are working with many of the companies listed above to bring meaningful connectivity to the Renewables industry and elevate the awareness for workforce development as more and more people want to join me in this move into the Energy Transition.

I'm also extremely excited to join Revterra as an adviser. Ben Jawdat founded this company to fix one achillies heel in the renewable energy industry, intermittancy. He has a long duration energy storage solution that isn't a dangerous or hard to scale chemical battery.

One final personal privilege I will take is this: I encourage anyone that is reading this to consider taking a few years outside of your business or professional career ladder to serve again in the veteran community, or in any community initiatives that you’re passionate about. The veteran services industry, as I think of it, is filled with passionate people, but we also need talented executives and professionals who are willing to serve their community and generate out sized impact operationally. We have a highly talented veteran professional community in Houston, and if more of those leaders take a turn building this industry, just think what a lasting impact we could make, like we did with our military service. A great example of this is Steph Drake who left a lucrative career at Shell to lead NextOp, a Combined Arms member that is the best in class veteran placement agency for energy companies.

If you’re interested in discussing where your talent would be best deployed in either the Energy Transition or Veteran Services then please reach out to me. These are my two passions and I’d love to buy you coffee to convince you that one or both will impact you more than you impact either.