Scott Schimmel (00:00)
it's such a joy to talk to you.
Beau Higgins (00:02)
No, love it. really view veteran transition as my vocation and ⁓ been working in this space for a long time. So yeah, I love it. It's great.
Scott Schimmel (00:12)
Tell me, Beau, how you got started in veteran transition. Obviously, you're a Marine. Once Marine, always a Marine, right? But you transition out and did you immediately go into working in transition or is this just kind of, you know, you're pulling someone up behind you?
Beau Higgins (00:25)
Yeah, yeah. So my story,
I said 25 years Marine Corps. I got out 10 years ago. I spent seven years. Well, so I'll start from the beginning because it's important to kind of understand how I got to where I got. But I spent two years working at a company that manufactured and installed fiber optic cable. ⁓ Great first job. Learned a ton. ⁓
felt like I was missing out on the give back factor that you had in the military. it's funny how timing and networking work in the world. We, at Custom Cable, place I worked, had done a couple installs for big Amazon facilities in Florida. And my boss was like, hey, call somebody at Amazon and figure out how we sell them more cable. I'm like, all right, so LinkedIn. Find friends of mine at Amazon.
Scott Schimmel (01:05)
Okay.
Ha
Beau Higgins (01:14)
Like, hey, haven't talked to in while. How's Amazon treating you? How do you all buy FireRaptor Cable? They're like, we have no idea. But yeah, but the one person I talked to ⁓ was a friend of mine and she worked in ⁓ TA ⁓ at Amazon. So she was working in, you know, helping out ⁓ not just veterans, but working in the hiring side of things at Amazon. She said, hey, I don't know how we, you know, how do we, don't know how Amazon buys FireRaptor Cable, but.
Scott Schimmel (01:21)
No idea.
Beau Higgins (01:43)
Amazon, Jeff Bezos just made a pledge to hire 25,000 veterans over the next five years. We don't have a plan or a program in place. ⁓ We're getting ready to start it up. Would you be interested in coming over and joining us?" And I'm like, that sounds pretty cool. I don't have a background in that. She's like, yeah, but your personality, you'd be great. You're well connected. I'm like, all right. And that's kind how it all started. So I went over to Amazon in...
Scott Schimmel (01:58)
Yeah.
Beau Higgins (02:08)
2018, guess it was, started, 2016, and started building out, helping them build out their veteran hiring programs. So, you know, from skill bridge programs to apprenticeship programs to military spouse and student veteran programs and anything in between, working with different VSOs and MSOs and just jumped in, you know, knee deep at Amazon and kind of never looked back from there. Yeah.
Scott Schimmel (02:38)
How much of that, you got at Amazon, how much of your work was figuring things out on the fly compared to you in sitting and thinking, reflecting on your experience as a veteran and kind of advocating, speaking on their behalf?
Beau Higgins (02:51)
Yeah, mean, Amazon is super fast paced. it can be a crazy place to work, but it is well resourced. we had a budget and we had a small team at the time to try to, and we had the ability. think the one nice thing about Amazon is they're very good about letting you try things, right? mean, that's kind of, you fail fast, but try, fail fast. So a lot of these programs we're talking about building,
Scott Schimmel (03:13)
Yeah. Yeah.
Beau Higgins (03:16)
you know, no other companies really had invested at the scale that we had at that time. ⁓ So it was, a lot of it is totally building on the fly. And a lot of it, you you have ideas as the members of the military team at Amazon, which is great. ⁓ A lot of it is really, you have to figure out how to market it internally. Cause you need to get, you need both supply and demand, right? You need, you know, if you look at Amazon in particular,
Amazon's not one big monolithic company. you know, it's dozens of companies inside one brand, right? So it's Amazon Web Services and Amazon Robotics and Amazon Studios and Amazon Labs and Amazon Performance Centers. you know, help kind of marketing internally to generate demand to hire veteran candidates, as well as also marketing externally to the veterans that were out there to make sure they're aware.
Scott Schimmel (03:48)
Yeah, that's a point. Yep.
Beau Higgins (04:09)
of the programs that we had. mean, the nice thing with Amazon is you have a great brand name. So it's pretty easy to get the word out externally. Yeah, hope at this point in time, maybe everybody, my mother knows what Amazon is. But yeah, it is probably more internal work than external work to get that kind of programs up and running and get them to a place where they could be, you know, long standing programs and established inside the company.
Scott Schimmel (04:16)
Yeah, yeah. Have you heard of Amazon?
I'm sure you're a little rusty on this. I don't want to put you totally on the spot, but what do you remember? What was your pitch internally to hire a veteran?
Beau Higgins (04:47)
No, I mean, that's a great question. know, I think the things that I would always focus on, this is what I started with one and kind of in my pitch morphed over time. Because I mean, it's not like you, anyone doesn't want to hire a veteran, right? know, everybody kind of there, everybody supports veterans, That's generally speaking. But I think the thing that I would initially kind of go lean in with was, hey, the beauty of veterans is that they are not only
Scott Schimmel (05:05)
Yeah. Yeah.
Beau Higgins (05:17)
You know, they're a diverse population in general. So if you hire veterans, you're going to get diversity as part of that, because there were other diversity efforts going on. My point was always, hey, if you hire veterans, you're going to get diversity. So that's a win. The other thing is I would sell it as veterans have what I call diversity of thought. And that meaning they look at problems differently. You know, I can certainly look back at my Marine Corps time.
Scott Schimmel (05:32)
Two for one.
Beau Higgins (05:45)
You know, we're often asked to do things with limited resources and limited time with limited guidance. You know, that's a quality that I don't think veterans kind of talk about enough is your ability to problem solve and the ability to do less with more and that idea of grit. So at Amazon, you really, think you have to adapt your pitch to the culture, right? So at Amazon, the idea of problem solving was a big deal. So I said, Hey, you know, who better than veterans to come in and be problem solved?
So the diversity piece, the problem solving piece, then over time, I was able to also make a business case for hiring veterans, right? Really a true bottom line because if you use the SkillBridge program, that's basically 12 free weeks of an intern, right? So there's a cost. We pay a lot of interns to come in in the summer, you know, for college kids. Well, the veterans that came in through SkillBridge were basically free. So there's a, you can put a monetary value to that.
every veteran you hire or most veterans you hire, they're direct transitioning, they get a work opportunity tax credit, so the WOTC credit, right? So you could put a number to the tax credits you got. ⁓ Same thing for apprenticeship programs, right? They had these paid, you know, you can get stipends, the veterans get stipends if they were in some of our apprenticeship programs. So we were able to actually put a number to say, hey, you know, if you hire veterans,
A dollar you spend on hiring veterans goes farther than a dollar you spend on hiring non-veterans because of the tax credits of basically, let's say free labor, but you know, the skill bridge program, the apprenticeship programs, the government's paying for this. You might as well tap into it because they're great candidates and at pure bottom line level, they are a value to you. that really resonated. Every business, it's about the bottom line, right? But it's hard to do. But yeah. ⁓
Scott Schimmel (07:33)
That's awesome.
Yeah, so even
if you hate America, you still like your bottom line. How long did you last at Amazon? Not last, okay, seven, oh, so that's pretty recent. Okay.
Beau Higgins (07:39)
Right. Exactly. So we want to make money as a company, right? Exactly.
Seven years. Yeah, I was there just under seven years. So
pretty long run. mean, Amazon is obviously a pretty intense place to work. And they say it's like dog years there. So seven years was plenty. It was a great run and built a lot of things from scratch that are still ongoing today. So love seeing what they continue to do there. But yeah, seven years there. Yep.
Scott Schimmel (08:00)
Okay.
Speaking on the other side, as you were recruiting veterans, have you kind of found yourself repeating the same sort of things in terms of like helping them position themselves, advocate for themselves, sell themselves into the company?
Beau Higgins (08:25)
Yeah, I mean, I think that's the other thing too. I talk to transitioning veterans every day in some way, or form, whether email or actual calls still. I I did it at Amazon. I'm still in the veteran hiring space, working for a couple of different companies now. But it's a challenge, right? Because I make the analogy that as veterans, you often get institutionalized, right? And I'd like to think of the Shawshank Redemption as a great example of that, right?
You know, the military is an institution and you get very used to being comfortable in your place. Your rank helps you figure out where you are. You know how to get things done. You know where you fit in the pecking order. You know how to get promoted. You know, you're very comfortable. mean, military life isn't always easy, but it's you understand how you fit in and how to get things done. And then all of a sudden, all that's gone.
Scott Schimmel (09:13)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Beau Higgins (09:20)
It is super scary for a lot of transitioning veterans, right? You know, I had Marines that would charge a machine gun nest, but they're afraid to go talk to somebody that's outside the walls of the military because they've lost contact with the civilian world in many ways, right? Because of their part of the institution. So I think the thing that I always try to hit home with talking to veterans is, look, know, hundreds of thousands of us have done this before.
Everyone transitions. You're going to be able to see successful at this too, but you have to make a leap, right? It is not going to be easy. have to do, get uncomfortable in doing things that, know, get comfortable doing the uncomfortable, right? And pushing them and nudging them to do that. And the thing I always talk about is, you know, there's this stigma, I think, for veterans that are transitioning about networking, how networking is somehow a dirty word. I'm like,
Well, what do you think you did every day in the military? knew if you're the gunny, the chief, right? You knew a guy in supply, you knew a guy over the armory. just, hey, you need one of these and I'll get you that. I'll get you a slot. You were networking. You had a network. That's what you did every day. But somehow when it comes to a job, it doesn't, it sounds wrong. I'm like, no, it's the same thing. It's a different focus, right? So it's just like, how do you make people understand that
Scott Schimmel (10:37)
Yeah. Yeah.
Beau Higgins (10:43)
that this is how things work out here on the outside world. You need to network, call it whatever you want. Whatever you did in the military, those same qualities are gonna be the ones that your employer wants. But don't be afraid to go out there and talk to people, ask for things, make connections, because that's how you're get a job at end of the day, right? If you're just sitting back applying through an ATS,
Scott Schimmel (10:46)
Yeah.
Terrible.
Beau Higgins (11:06)
You're never going to get hired, right? You're going get frustrated and mad, like nobody wants to. I'm like, that's because you're not doing it right. You know, listen to what we're telling you. We're going to give you the answer to the test. Just go out and do it. You know, so it can be challenging, but I understand that it's easier said than done.
Scott Schimmel (11:12)
Right. Here's the cheat sheet.
It is using 7-Den and I wonder you, as I get to know you, you have an extroverted personality. I don't know if that's how you roll all the time. I'm sure you get quiet space. Yeah, okay. Nailed it. ⁓
Beau Higgins (11:31)
It kind of is.
Scott Schimmel (11:35)
So what's your pep talk for someone that's more reserved and doesn't like, I don't know, the discomfort of meeting someone and not knowing what to do?
Beau Higgins (11:45)
Yeah, I mean, again, there is some piece of you having to get out of your comfort zone to be successful in this, right? And I think it's, but you can do it in a lot of different ways. Certainly, you know, on LinkedIn, you know, again, this is what I would always say too, on LinkedIn, you know, you can find people that are veterans at different companies and engage them, but engage in the right way, right? You know, if you just, if people came to me and said,
Hey, I'm getting out in three months. I'd love to work at Amazon. Can I get a job? I'm like, no, I'm not going to talk to that person. But if you came to me and said, hey, I'm transitioning. I'm interested in the culture of Amazon. How did you get there and have a conversation? I think a veteran is more likely to respond and maybe help you have a phone call and just talk through, hey, this is what I did. Here's some pointers. Here's some tips.
Scott Schimmel (12:15)
Yeah, so lazy.
Yeah.
Beau Higgins (12:40)
So
you can't be afraid to ask and certainly try to find, you know, a similar, a veteran in those companies to make you that you already have a connection, right? You have that veteran connection there and that's not that hard to do. I think the other thing that I, I'm a, I'm a mentor for ACP and I recommend that to anybody. If you don't have a mentor out there, even if you're an introvert, you can establish a one-on-one mentorship through ACP.
Scott Schimmel (13:07)
Yeah, that's right.
Beau Higgins (13:09)
someone that's going to help you and you can build a rapport with and get comfortable with that's going to help you open doors. That's what a mentor is for, is to give you a little rudder on things to do, but also use their network to help you find a job. Again, you don't have to be an extrovert to do those things. You just have to be smart and understand what it takes to to that job. You don't have to go to every job fair under the sun. You should go to some.
You should have an elevator pitch of some variety, practice it, right? You have to know what you want. I mean, think that's part of it is figuring out what you want to do, because that was always the worst thing at a job fair when you're sitting on the employer side at Amazon and someone at a job fair walks up and says, here's my resume. Can you hire me? I'm like, I have 7,000 jobs at Amazon. mean, just because you were an infantryman.
Scott Schimmel (13:38)
Yeah. Yeah.
Beau Higgins (14:01)
I don't know what you want to do at Amazon. probably don't have that job. What job do you want to do? Right. So figure out what you want to do. Figure out what you don't want to do. Alternatively, that's, that's, that's on you. If you do your homework and come to me and say, Hey, yeah, I was a machinist mate in the Navy. think I'd be good as in a maintenance job at Amazon. This is the job in Texas I'm interested in. Can you connect me to somebody? I'm like, yep, I got it. You make that happen. You've done the homework upfront.
Scott Schimmel (14:01)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right.
Yeah, right. Yep.
Beau Higgins (14:31)
to know where you fit and how you want to get there, I can help you get through the ATS system that way then, right? Or I can give you a little nudge. If you haven't done your work, it's hard for me to help you. So, you know, help me help you.
Scott Schimmel (14:36)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, well, you just gave the perfect commercial for Vector Accelerator. It is the homework to figure out what you want, what's next. And I've sat with so many people in the same way, especially for me with college students, which is a big part of my career. And I remember just so many times being like, as soon as you tell me what you want, and by the way, you don't have to be right. It doesn't have to be the end all. Just give me something because if you say anything to me, that kind of means nothing. And I just...
Beau Higgins (15:06)
Yeah. Yeah.
Scott Schimmel (15:12)
I will literally forget about you. But if you say something, then I guarantee even the next couple of days, someone's gonna say something and I'm like, ⁓ I know someone who literally just said that. But if you don't, it's just the way things work.
Beau Higgins (15:14)
That's the worst. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, it's the worst. again, you have to own your own transition, right? I mean, people are dying to help you. There are more resources out there for you than you could possibly utilize, you know, from the military guys that have been out so many different tools like Vector. I mean, there's so many great resources out there, but you you have to the first step and you have to go along with the process. It's what you have to do. you know, again, if the resources are there,
but you have to own your own path. And again, start by figuring out what you, I always say it's important to know what you do want to do as what you don't want to do, right? I you can start with that, right? Okay, do you want to go back into government? Do you want to be a GS? Do you want to be a defense contracting? Even big scope kind of decisions, right? Or do you know where you want to go? Also a big, if you know you want to go somewhere and do something,
Scott Schimmel (16:06)
Absolutely. Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Beau Higgins (16:23)
I can really help you then. I can use my network to help you connect to somebody. But to your point, hey, I'll do anything anywhere. I'm like, the military loved that, right? Oh, sweet. You're going to Okinawa, you're going to Onan Falls. All right, you're great. You're the perfect... If you tell them to monitor that or detail that, great. But in the real world, that's the worst thing you can do is say, well, I just wanted to let them know I can do anything. You really can't probably do everything. the more you can be focused, the more...
Scott Schimmel (16:24)
Yeah.
Yeah, right. Yeah.
Beau Higgins (16:52)
resources that you provide can be of value, 100%.
Scott Schimmel (16:54)
Yeah.
And I know the fear of selecting or declaring what you want feels like you're now saying no, you're restricting yourself, but it's counterintuitive. You're actually opening up opportunities by focusing. It's weird how this works. Speaking of transition, as we're talking about this, ⁓ talk about the transition from Amazon to what you're doing now. How was that?
Beau Higgins (17:01)
like you're now saying no.
100%. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. So, you know, I spent the seven years at Amazon and when I was at Amazon, we utilized this tool called Oplign, O-P-L-I-G-N, ⁓ to help Amazon find and hire veterans. So Oplign is a tool that basically is an MOS translator on steroids, right? You enter in your rank MOS, years of service, it'll ask you then some ⁓ contextually correct questions about your experience. And then based on that, it will say, okay, you said this,
Scott Schimmel (17:36)
Okay.
Beau Higgins (17:48)
You're a fit for these jobs at Boeing and J &J and Verizon and whatever it may be, right? So it is super cool too, because it's not just for transitioning veterans. If you've been out five years, I was an 03, I was an infantryman, but I've been since I went back and got my degree in business. Well, we're going to defer the questions asked to your experience in college, right? We're not going to say, oh, you're a grunt, you should do this, right? You would say, no, now you're no longer that, you are this. Or I've been out.
Scott Schimmel (17:50)
Gotcha. Yep.
All
Beau Higgins (18:18)
I've been doing program management for five years. We're going to defer the questions that you get asked relate to what your most recent experience is. So we use that tool at Amazon a ton. Cause again, for those people that didn't know where to start, this is a great tool. go on the Amazon page. says, I'm a Navy corpsman. I spent seven years in. These are the schools I went to. are the I do. It would say, these are the jobs at Amazon you're a fit for. So that...
Scott Schimmel (18:33)
Yeah, absolutely.
Awesome.
Beau Higgins (18:47)
It's a targeting tool at its finest to help veterans start their search process. So the way it works is we give it free to veterans, we give it free to military spouses, we give it free to any nonprofits that are helping veterans try to find jobs, give it free to colleges and universities. We charge companies to use the tool to access the talent. So Amazon uses it, J &J, Verizon, Wells Fargo, USAA, a bunch of folks use it. And it's a super cool tool. So my job is to help...
Scott Schimmel (18:48)
Yeah.
nice.
Beau Higgins (19:16)
get the word out that the tool exists for those transitioning veterans that are out there, or veterans in general, or military spouses, and to also talk to companies and get them to sign up and utilize the tool. ⁓ it's something that it's been great. I got to see it from the corporate side. I got to see it and saw how much it made ⁓ my recruiter's time.
⁓ more ⁓ focused basically, because every day they'd have a list of candidates that are fit for their jobs. It made it easy for them. Most recruiters are not veterans. They wouldn't understand it. This turns your veteran information into a skills-based resume that they can understand. So I saw it from that side, and now we're going to see from the other side, from the veterans and them using it and how much it makes their life easier to begin the process of looking for a job. So super cool tool.
Scott Schimmel (19:43)
Yeah. Right. How do you filter? Yeah.
Beau Higgins (20:09)
So been doing that for two years now. And then about six months ago, I started working for another company called the Military Veteran, also involved in veteran recruiting, but very different. ⁓ The MilVet focuses on placing kind of executive roles or hiring veterans into executive roles in private equity and venture capital backed portfolio companies. So typical profile, and I don't want to limit it, but typical profile is something I did five or eight years, went back, maybe got their MBA.
Scott Schimmel (20:31)
yeah, awesome.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Beau Higgins (20:39)
working on Wall Street for McKinsey, working in
industry and wants to move into the PE world. So it's a little more niche, but it's a kind of a subset of the veteran hiring, know, bucket. Good stuff though, yeah.
Scott Schimmel (20:48)
Yeah. That
is awesome. But there's this pattern from fiber optic cable to Amazon, Amazon to Hopline. Like it seems like whoever your clients are, you tend to end up there getting poached or otherwise. I can predict your future. Who are your current clients? Well, I you're already sharing, obviously your your deep care and love for veterans. I'm just curious what what keeps you in the veteran game?
Beau Higgins (21:02)
Yeah, tell me. You never know. You never know what's going to go. That's right. That's right.
Scott Schimmel (21:17)
What is it about veterans for you?
Beau Higgins (21:19)
Yeah, mean, you know, again, I think part of it is ⁓ it's it has become for me and I'm a pretty Catholic guy and a faith based guy. And I think you do find your vocation in time. And for me, there's just such a there's such a reward on the investment of helping veterans transition. I remember, you know, I remember what it was like for my own personal transition. And I and I talked to so many people that I can tell her how scared they are, petrified of transition.
And when you can help them work through that and you know, the notes I would get, you know, months later from someone you helped that you probably, sometimes you forgot their name because you had so many people come through the door at Amazon like, you know, thanks so much. mean, you're the only person that actually replied to my email and you helped me get, like, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's just, you know, fills your bucket every day, you know? So I get, I think I get more out of giving back, the more you give the more you get, right? So that's kind of for me.
Scott Schimmel (22:13)
Thank
Beau Higgins (22:16)
I love that. that's certainly just my job itself is one that I love doing. I certainly have some other... So I'm a big member or work with the Travis Manion Foundation. So Travis Manion was actually one of my Marines at Recon Battalion when he was killed. And I've been involved with TMF since its inception. And that's another place where I plug in...
Scott Schimmel (22:27)
⁓ awesome,
⁓ Wow.
Beau Higgins (22:38)
a lot to try to give back to the community more at large. remembering 9-11 and doing some of the things that Travis Mahan Foundation does and supporting Gold Star families. I'm the chairman of the Race Direct, a 9-11 run in New Orleans actually, and started the one in Tampa. you know, between what I do as a day job and then kind of where I volunteer, you can see similar entities, I guess, in some ways, but just get a lot back from, again, the more you give, the more you get back.
Scott Schimmel (22:53)
Awesome.
Beau Higgins (23:07)
And it really does keep me fired up. Yeah.
Scott Schimmel (23:09)
Yeah, no, I mean, I feel the same way. I'm so thankful you shared that. And when or if someone is very appreciative of my work, I'm very quick to remind them like, no, dude, I'm like, I'm getting a lot. You know, trust me, I'm getting the I'm getting all the juice from this already. And I've heard I probably wrong, but that that kind of root concept of vocation, vocare to hear, to listen. I'm, know, hearing that as a a thread or a theme in your life, too, as you listen to it.
Beau Higgins (23:37)
100%. I went to a Jesuit high school.
you know, it's in the idea of being a man for others was like in your, it's just part of your, part of your DNA at some point, right? So how do you be a man for others? And then the Charles Mannion Foundation, you if not me, then who, right? So it's about how do you, you know, where do you step up when you see the opportunity and then to do something where there is that give back factor and you can see that you're making an impact and just, you know, it's being selfless.
Scott Schimmel (23:44)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Beau Higgins (24:07)
hopefully trying to be selfless to help others. But again, the reward for that is 10X. mean, again, when you get those notes from people, it's there's nothing better. mean, there's nothing, truly nothing better than that. And I'll run into, know, Marines of mine at some of these shows later on that are now hired and they help, it blows me away. mean, it's nothing better than that.
Scott Schimmel (24:25)
That's awesome. That's awesome.
Well, Beau, you're breath of fresh air. How can we get more of you? sure like, I'm like, I wanna hear Beau every day. How do we get connected with you?
Beau Higgins (24:37)
Well,
I mean, so I do have my own podcast for, for offline, I the opcast. I talk to people there every day. And again, just trying to listen. I love the stories. I love transition stories. Everyone is different. And I work, I have the MilVet has their podcast and a little different focus, but I'm always out there talking to people because again, similar to you, you know, Scott, I love the storytelling and I love.
Scott Schimmel (24:41)
good.
Beau Higgins (24:59)
hearing people's story of how they got from where they were in the military to where they are today, because every path is different, right? And I think the more stories we can tell, the more someone will relate to, yeah, that he was like me. You know, I was that guy and he did it and he's a knucklehead. Well, I can do it, too. You know, so it's it's and I'm certainly always happy to help, too. If you have anyone out there that is interested in what I can do or Oplign or the MilVet, always I'm on LinkedIn.
Scott Schimmel (25:17)
Yeah, yeah.
Beau Higgins (25:29)
all the time, doing the podcast, just getting out there and trying to make it happen. Yeah.
Scott Schimmel (25:34)
You're
like the, you're like the Wilt Chamberlain of LinkedIn. got so many.
Beau Higgins (25:37)
I did
learn about a year ago at 30,000 connections you're matched out, right? So you have to like go in and like delete connections of like. Seriously, come on, give me a little something here. Exactly, Crap.
Scott Schimmel (25:45)
Are you serious? What? Come on LinkedIn. That's not cool. ⁓
Well, thanks so much for being on the show and enjoy your time up in Wisconsin and we'll stay connected.
Beau Higgins (25:59)
I appreciate it Scott. Anytime, anything I do for you, let me know. Happy to help and great to be here today. Thanks again.
