This essay is based on a conversation with Sven Neu, a German military veteran and now head of e-commerce B2B printing site merchOne. It has been edited for length and clarity.
In 2004, I dropped out of high school and joined the German army. After training, I joined the mechanized infantry and then became a sergeant, leading a platoon of 30 men.
I loved the military, especially encouraging people and helping them realize what they could do.
However, once you take on the role of Sergeant, your possibilities become even more limited. By 2007, I realized I had reached a point where I could neither learn nor progress any more.
After a five day solo trip across the Alps, I decided to plan my departure.
I spent three and a half years studying at night school to complete my A levels, sitting there with my study cards while my peers played games or went out at night. In 2013 I left to do a Bachelor's in Business and Engineering and then a Master's in Technology Management.
Neu decided to leave the army and went on a five-day trip to the Alps.
After an internship, a few jobs, and some freelance work, I got a job at Customization Group, a company creating a whole new ecommerce industry. They hired me to build it from scratch, and now I manage a team of 30 people.
(merchOne is part of the Customization group.)
For a long time, I never told anyone that I had been in the military. People were very surprised when they found out.
But my colleagues say that our team seems to have a completely different mindset than other teams in the company, and I think that's because of the different skills I bring to the table.
Find the right talent
The first few weeks are deliberately put under huge pressure on recruits to determine who is a good fit and who is not, pushing them to their limits mentally and physically, to the point where it is impossible to keep up appearances.
Then you see people for who they really are: some screaming and crying, some helping others, and some only thinking about themselves.
Of course, I don't restrict sleep for all new hires. But I want my team to be stress-resistant, to help each other, to be active team members. And I don't hire jerks.
Having seen how people react in the most tense situations, I have the ability to read people in interviews and understand, “In a stressful situation, is this person yelling at others or is they really focused on helping?”
It helped us build a great team.
Army Tactics
There is a very big difference between the German army and other armies in the world: Auftragstaktik. We give our soldiers a core mission, but we don't tell them how to accomplish it. Soldiers don't just sit and wait for orders, they act autonomously.
That is what I expect from my team.
I always share the big picture and goals with them, but how they achieve it is entirely up to them. The question is, where do you want to go as a team?
Neu is currently president of e-commerce startup merchOne. Sven Neu
German soldiers are also trained to fail from the start.
Giving your team a lot of freedom means you have to accept that mistakes will happen, but failing alone forces team members to really think about how they contribute as individuals.
Another lesson I learned in the military is to always educate those above you so that they can take over if someone is unavailable. In the military, this applies to injuries and deaths, but the principles are the same. This allows my team to be proactive and flexible in their work.
Lastly, I learned firsthand that I am responsible for everything that happens on my team. When my soldiers couldn't make a fire and were freezing, or couldn't pitch a tent and get a good night's sleep, I got into fights with my superiors for not training them. That responsibility is always mine, and I take it seriously.
I recently shared these mind models at a leadership resilience training, and the experts in the workshop fully agreed with my methods.
Career change after military service
If he had to give advice to other veterans looking to embark on a new career, it would be that as a soldier, sometimes you have to have a get-it-done attitude. But the business world is different.
You have no track record, you're starting from scratch, so listen and learn.
In the military, your career path and training are predetermined. But here, it's up to you to continue educating yourself. Don't expect someone else to keep you up to date.
You can't get the camaraderie that you get in the military anywhere else, but you also don't have to sleep in sleeping bags with your coworkers for weeks or months at a time.
I miss that sense of community, but in my new job I get to work for and with people, inspiring them and getting the best out of them, and in doing so I create value for my business.
