Episode 94 Transcription

Welcome to episode 94 of Behind The Mission, a show that sparks conversations with PsychArmor trusted partners and educational experts.

My name is Duane France, and each week I'll be having conversations with podcasts guests that will equip you with tools and resources to effectively engage with and support military service members, Veterans, and their families. You can find the show on your podcast player of choice or by going to www.psycharmor.org/podcast. 

Thanks again for joining us on Behind The Mission, our work and mission are supported by generous partnerships and sponsors who also believe that education changes lives. This show is brought to you by PsychArmor, the premier education and learning ecosystem, specializing in military culture content. PsychArmor offers an online e-learning laboratory that's free to individual learners as well as custom training options for organizations. 

On today's episode, I'll be talking about RallyPoint, the social network ran by and for service members, Veterans, and those who care for them and those who support them with RallyPoint’s president and CEO, Dave Gowel. Dave began his military career as a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point and is an author and entrepreneur. Dave joined RallyPoint as president and COO in the summer of 2016. You can find out more about Dave by checking out his bio in our show notes. So let's get into my conversation with him and come back afterwards to talk about some of the key points.

DUANE: Dave, I'm grateful that you've been able to take some time to share the success of RallyPoint with the audience. Before we get into that, however, it'd be great for them to hear more about you from your military experience, maybe your work in the corporate world, and what drives you to do the work that you do today.

DAVE: Certainly Duane, thank you so much for having me here today. I'm always happy to talk about what RallyPoint is up to and how we're serving the military community. My story started when I was in the military and I was at West Point when September 11th occurred, and that really energized me to think about what my military career would be like and ultimately what I would try to accomplish.

And so one of my first active duty jobs was being a platoon leader in Iraq. I was on tanks. I was very fortunate to bring my entire unit home with me, and it was a very important experience early in my life that was a typical military start to career, jumping in, leading troops in a combat environment.

I was incredibly fortunate to end my military career in an atypical fashion where some of my leadership who recognized that I had good experiences but didn't yet have company command or the master's degree, were all the things required to teach ROTC at MIT. They got an exception for policy for me to do that, and so I was able to take my experiences from Iraq to help some of these junior leaders in Cambridge, Massachusetts that had no idea what they were about to experience when they were gonna go to Iraq or Afghanistan. And it was a very fulfilling way for me to help bring my experiences to the next generation of leaders, and not even the next generation, the next cycle of leaders going into OIF 2, 3, 4, and five. So that's where my military career became interesting cuz I was given this gift to be in a place with an amazing network. And the military is not a place where you're taught to network. You're not taught to go and find the general down the street and buy em a drink as a private or lieutenant, or even as a major. You follow what your chain of command tells you to do. And unfortunately, I've learned that civilian life, that ability to network is one of the most valuable things that I was given as a gift when I transitioned outta the military out of active duty into the Army Reserve in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

That's where my personal story got me from the military into civilian life, which by the way was in 2008 when I left active duty. And if you recall then the economic conditions weren't optimal, but ended up leaving the military and starting a business with my wife and the social media space, which ultimately led to where we are today.

DUANE: It's very interesting. I think that, yes obviously an ROTC instructor at MIT but of all of the things that you might have been able to get, and I'm sure there was more that you got outta MIT, but I think at that time, all of the knowledge, all of the technology, all of the amazing information there, and what you picked up there was the value of networking and the value of connecting with people outside of your normal sphere of influence.

DAVE: Certainly, and I didn't realize that at the time, but now that RallyPoint does a lot more work in the mental health space, watching our members trust us and share many things about their challenges. I realized from a lot of the some of the most amazing scientific and suicide prevention advisors that we have is that connection is one of the most important protective factors for mental health. So it was during that time that I didn't really know what civilian life would be like, but I thought, hey, I handle the military in Iraq and I can figure it out. I was only able to do so because there were so many people willing to take time out of their day to help me because they had already met success, whether or not they were military or not.

And every time I had a meeting that I prepared for and I would ask a lot of questions and then I would follow up with afterwards, every time I would ask those individuals, very successful professionals, what I could do to repay them for their kindness, they always said pay it forward. They said when they were younger in their career, they had some things they needed to learn and people helped them. And as opposed to buying the next meal or the next drink, they told me to find a way to make sure that whatever I do in the future looks back to help people that are struggling to figure out where they are going next in their career. And for me, that's what RallyPoint's all about.

DUANE: I think that idea of how you said that networking, we're not really taught networking in the military, in networking in the military can be something, it can be very vertical like platoon sergeants know other platoon sergeants. Maybe a little bit higher, maybe a little bit lower. And it's not very broad. You only really know the people like in your brigade or maybe on your post. not really beyond that. but it's not really vertical and it's not very wide. and that's something different that's in the civilian world.

[00:04:48] audioDaveGowel11078198391: It is, and there is, is concept of the strength of weak ties and the networking, I guess a concept in that there's lots of people whom you never know that you can help or can help you. But if you are a good, high integrity, hardworking person and you build relationships, You never know who might pop up in your life that you could hire, or they could hire you or you could help.

And it is technology that accelerates the connectivity of those moments of serendipity. There's chance moments where you happen to find that someone's looking for a job where you know someone's looking to hire. those can happen by design because of technology, and I first got to see this with linked.

I was transitioning outta the military. I realized this tool called LinkedIn in roughly 2006, 2007, was this incredible way to find people to whom I wanted to connect. And then based on who I was connected to, I could pick up the phone and say, Hey Dwayne, I see, you know, BillBill's the head of a company.

I'd love to talk to military veteran. Would you be comfortable introducing us? And it was that type of behavior that. Got me the moniker of the LinkedIn Yeti in the Boston Globe. Cause I got to a tech journalist that wasn't using LinkedIn in that way at that time, and arguably still today, people use LinkedIn as more of a mass harassment tool to try to get their message in front of people, rather as a data source of who knows who.

If you can earn that intro, And by the way, it works really well if you ask for an introduction and then Bill comes back to Dwayne and says, Hey Dwayne, thanks for that introduction to Dave. He is a good guy. now you're incented to make those connections for me whenever you can because it helped build your brand because you trusted me and that works out well.

That is something that I stumbled into and didn't realize going into my civilian career, but it changed my life and I don't think most people in the military are taught. With Rally Point, we're trying to make it easy for those connections to happen to people and programs at the right time in the careers of the people who can benefit.

And those people we focus on are the 2 million service members, veterans, family members, caregivers and survivors and civilian supporters who use Rally Point to make those connections.

[00:07:13] audioDuaneFrance,MA,M21078198391: And that's what I've really seen, is how Rally Point has grown from, maybe in the beginning it might have been described as a message board or maybe an online community to now it, it is a true social network for the military affiliated population. You talk about LinkedIn. but why do you think it's important and necessary For there to be an online social network, specifically for the military and veteran popul.

[00:07:35] audioDaveGowel11078198391: Yes, so LinkedIn is an incredible resource. I use it every day. I advocate that veterans and service members use it as well. It's just that the military has such a different jargon, culture, set of norms, career progression, challenges, opportunities, benefits available from the VA and d o D to the normal civilian world that you're not gonna see The center mass of the military, which is, as we used to call the backbone of the army, the junior enlisted ranks.

They're not gonna thrive on LinkedIn because of all those differences. Not mentioned, we're trained to translate away all of our experience and our background in ways that I look at LinkedIn profiles. For someone who served, I can't tell their army, the navy, or, even the rank they were because of how watered down that valuable military experience is.

So we implore our members to join Rally Point. Be proud of everything you've done. Share only what you want, and then what we're gonna try to do is make it easy for you to find the right people. The right programs and services that are going to help you in your career. And then we're gonna ask you what's working, what's not, How can we be better?

And that's, something that's important to the fabric of how Rally Point works.

[00:08:49] audioDuaneFrance,MA,M21078198391: I think it's, and you hit on something that a lot of us who leave the military have to figure out is, in, in what areas do I highlight the fact that I was in the military and I shared my military service? And what areas do I downplay that? and you're right, sometimes,in, in well meaning people have lots of opinions and things like that.

But when your job searching, maybe in some industries or at some points in some industries, it might be good to highlight your military service, and other times it might be good to downplay it. But Rally Point is really a place where you can highlight. And refine it if you need to, but to be able to get that understanding of which way to turn that up and which way to turn that down in what situations.

[00:09:28] audioDaveGowel11078198391: I agree, and even before we started this conversation, asked who the audience is, we should always ask that question, who the audience is that we'll be speaking to. Because ultimately, when you're selling yourself in civilian life to get a job or to get a promotion, you have to know what are the compelling elements of your experience that will resonate with that audience.

In the military, we just walk around. You see the tabs or badges on our uniforms. You see their rank. combat patches. You can just look at someone and know their story. And because of the structured way that military career progression occurs, That's enough to know how to talk to someone. And you know your audience just by looking at them.

Civilian world is very different and there's a much broader array of career opportunities that you can pursue. And so being able to do your research, online and again, really point is just one of many tools. They highly recommend all service members, veterans, family members, caregivers, and survivors use.

We are just the military focus tool that lets you talk about things in a way that you're comfortable speaking about them and the language and jargon that we're familiar with without having to translate it. And, in the concept of what a rally point is, that place and a patrol where you go back to and we need to consolidate and reorganize.

We're there for you when you need something, and we want to be there in a much bigger, more pronounced way, in an easier way as we continue to grow and make things easier for our members to get everything from healthcare to, GI Bill benefits to non-profit services in their area that are well regarded by their peers, and to continue that virtuous cycle of engaging with programs that.

Essentially take war fighters and bring them back to civilian life in a comfortable way with their families, with their caregivers, and then of course with their survivors. And to be able to do that as fast and efficiently with our members on the design team as we can.

[00:11:30] audioDuaneFrance,MA,M21078198391: And again, I think that's another really valuable, part of what Rally Point does. and you mentioned it earlier about how it connectedness and I truly believe connectedness saves lives. But it's not just a social network designed to connect people to each other.

It's a network with the purpose, understanding that supporting each other improves the lives, all who served and all who care.

[00:11:49] audioDaveGowel11078198391: Agreed. Our mission is to help all members of the military community lead more successful, fulfilling lives, and that is a hard thing to do. War fighting is a hard thing to do. Many of us are, have experienced Iraq in Afghanistan. Many civilians who haven't are now seeing some of the atrocities occurring in Ukraine.

the, those of us that wear the uniform, which I no longer am and incredibly indebted to everyone who is serving and protecting us right now, it's not something that has been. The challenges that are created when you have to go into a combat zone and deal with or do very difficult things, scientists haven't been able to make it easy to come out of that easily.

[00:12:30] audioDaveGowel11078198391: So I think that's where it's very important that there be public, private. And by private I certainly include corporate, nonprofit, academic partnerships that try to advance the science on how to take war fighting, and ideally minimize. Figure out how to have policy that solves issues where we don't need to get kinetic, but when we do, and we do so with the best military in the world, that we give that military the best programs and treatment and care when they come home.

[00:13:00] audioDuaneFrance,MA,M21078198391: And I think that's one of the things again, that, that does, put rally point, separate from some of the other social networks with the more of a broader audience, is that, by veterans four veterans. Service members and veterans or members of the platform. And so they understand those unique challenges and the unique difficulties, and they're able to support each other, because there is that level of familiar.

[00:13:21] audioDaveGowel11078198391: Yeah, peer support has always been, Most important elements of the really point experience can come on our site and ask a question and get people from different branches, areas of generation, service, ranks, answering your questions. Or if you're not comfortable sharing that you have a problem with your chain of command and issues like domestic abuse, sexual harassment, those types of things unfortunately happen.

in the military and people don't know how to deal with them. those discussions have been captured on Rally point by millions of conversations. So you can come on Rally point, not share anything, but look for answers that people have already been given to problems that might be similar to yours.

Never have to expose those challenges. So not only is there peer to peer support in real time, But there's asynchronous support where someone who might have had a situation a week, a month, a year ago can be fully documented with back and forth, problems and potential solutions. And then you can reach out to those people and get off Rally Point, much like I still get off LinkedIn today.

Rally Point is not an end all, be all solution to solve all your problems. It is one piece of, if you know how to use it well, a process that can help you identify. What you might be going through that you know likely other people have as well. Then find the right people or programs that can help you.

That's our job is to make it as easy as.

and you mentioned earlier about the broad membership base of Rally Point. but just to, to maybe, That point again, is that you don't have to have served in the military to be a member of Rally Point. it's just someone that, that has a desire or a connection or some form of connection to the military.

[00:15:07] audioDaveGowel11078198391: Yes, so we have many civilian supporters on our site, roughly 10% of the 2 million. Have no military service whatsoever. If you serve and then you can verify that service, either as currently serving or a veteran or a retiree, you can verify that service on our site using various means. And by doing that, it's clear to everyone on your profile that you are verified, but we don't require.

And civilian supporters are especially welcome because it is often those civilian supporters who know the military culture enough to join Rally Point that want to participate. Who often can be some of the best connectors to jobs or programs or services that veterans and service members might not be familiar.

So that's why, we often hear people say, Oh, I'm a civilian. I can't join Rally Point. Cause we kind of want it to feel that way. if you're not part of our community, you shouldn't be here. And we do have member administrators and our own team looking for nefarious actors that are trying to take advantage of our members or abuse the trust that they've placed in us in some way.

And so we do suspend accounts based on, anything that we see that looks predatory on our members. But at the end of the day, anyone can join if you support the military and conduct yourself in that.

[00:16:27] audioDuaneFrance,MA,M21078198391: I think that's amazing. And I think really the work that is being done, I think will continue to be done by rally point,is really significant and beneficial to the military and veteran population. so people wanted to find out more about Rally Point, Obviously join the platform understand some of the stuff that's going on.

How can they do.

[00:16:45] audioDaveGowel11078198391: So simply go to point.com. You can create a profile. If you don't have one already, you can see the conversations that are occurring on our site. but especially given the audience that,listens to your podcast, like I do think there is a very important element of what we do is helping experts tell their stories to our members.

And oftentimes those stories will be, pressed out by other partners who believe in them and find value in the discussions and particularly success stories. So any of your audience who has had success stories with certain programs be with psych armor, or others, those authentic stories perform better online.

Authenticity is one of the most valuable things that people appreciate in social media. So if anyone listening has a success story about using a program that they believe would be valuable for a large group of our members, and please email marketing and@rallypoint.com and we'll follow up with you right away and see if we can publish that for you.

[00:17:46] audioDuaneFrance,MA,M21078198391: That's great and we'll make sure that the link to Rally Point is in the show notes as well as that link to the, the email. thank you so much for coming on the show today, Dave.

[00:17:55] audioDaveGowel11078198391: Thank you for what you do, Dwayne. It's,this is a great community. Have a lot of great people and organizations taking care of those who are serving us today. And even if they take off the uniform tomorrow, we wanna still keep them connected to all the great things that are out there and available for 'em.

So thank you for what you do.

[00:18:11] audioDuaneFrance,MA,M21078198391: Absolutely.

Once again, we would like to thank this week's sponsor, PsychArmor. PsychArmor is the premier education and learning ecosystem specializing in military culture content. PsychArmor offers an online e-learning laboratory that is free individual learners, as well as custom training options for organizations.

I appreciate it. Dave, coming on the show to talk about rally point. If you haven't heard of it, I highly recommend checking it out. As Dave mentioned, it's a great place to share expertise and seek information and answers while being able to interact with others with the military background. for those of us who have spent some time in the squad base and motor pools in the military. 

Maybe hanging around, talking about stuff in a military way may not have a whole lot of appeal. But as Dave mentioned, they have a pretty robust moderating system that keeps conversations, productive and effective. Dave mentioned something that he learned from his time at MIT networking. 

It's definitely not a skill that's explicitly taught in bootcamp or in any standardized leadership schools in the military as a graduate of the military academy at west Dave, like other graduates of the service academies, like the Naval academy, the air force academy, the coast guard academy. 

I became a member of a very robust alumni network. and there are associations throughout the military, whether the connected to a particular occupational specialty, military unit or location. And of course the greatest alumni association in the military is the United States Marine Corps. Once a Marine, always 

But those are networks that are available for service members to plug into. There's not a lot of support around or training on how to do that or how to leverage those networks in a beneficial way. 

The idea of networking by shaking hands and handing out business cards, . Is often shocking and intimidating for those who served. 

But often when I talked to those who served, I explained that it's really an extension of things that they did in the military. I know that as a platoon Sergeant and the first Sergeant. I had connections down the street and other units and other brigades that could help me out with something that I needed. 

and I was there for them, if they needed help. Whether it was getting supplies for emission coordinating support, or even getting advice around the next assignment. Service members had a network within the military that they leveraged to get the job It was often necessary to do that. 

Because we operated in constrained environments with short deadlines and limited resources to accomplish important things. many veterans don't make the connection from networking within the military to outside the military, though. You learn pretty quickly that networking in the military is a give and take. If you always went somewhere with your handout, but never answered the phone when someone needed your help. You develop a certain reputation for being a taker and people stopped answering the door. When you knocked similarly outside the military, if I'm always an ask mode, what can you do for me rather than reciprocate mode? how can we help each other, then you're not going to effectively leverage your network. 

Relationships are important. Everything we do, life business hobbies, our community. And effectively connecting with people on a relational level is important to success in all of those things. And rally point is definitely a place for those who served to Plug into a network of like-minded people. The other thing I like about rally point is that Dave pointed out that they certainly want people who are interested in supporting those who served and those who care for them. So rally point is definitely focused on the military and veteran population. 

But it's not just for those who served. It might seem intimidating for those who haven't served to engage in a military focused social network. I know that there've been times in meetings when my army has come out, not in an aggressive way or an inappropriate way, but sometimes I say, or do things that made people remember, oh, right. That guy's a veteran. But that's military culture that comes out as the old saying goes, you can take the person out of the military, but you can't take the military out of the person. 

Yeah, but military culture can be learned. That's the goal of PsychArmor of course, is to help you learn about military And joining rally point is another way to learn about the military. Heck the army taught me military culture in nine weeks day. Learn military culture at west point over four years. Common saying about the service academies. 

Is that they're an Ivy league education shoved down your throat, a nickel at a time. All joking aside, though. It is possible to learn about the military, a military culture. It takes time and effort, but anything worth doing takes time and If the work that you're doing brings you in contact with those who served and you care about that work. And to be honest, you wouldn't be listening right now. If you didn't think continuing to learn about military culture is both possible and recommended. 

Take a few courses on PsychArmor, but also head over to rally point and join their network and take your new found military culture skills for a spin. So, hopefully you appreciated my conversation with Dave. If you did drop a review in your podcast player of choice. 

Or send us an email at info@psycharmor.org. We always appreciate hearing from listeners, both feedback on the show and suggestions for future guests. For this week, psychomotor resource of the week, I'd like to share the PsychArmor course, making connections and networking presented by medal of honor recipient Captain Florick Regardless of military background and experience, this course helps service members, veterans, and their families learn how to network in their new communities. You can find the link to the resource in our show notes. 

So thank you for taking the time to listen to this episode. Make sure to take a look at the show notes, which you can find in the podcast player as well as on psycharmor.org/podcast. While you're there, you can find hundreds of online training videos delivered by nationally recognized subject matter experts who are committed to educating the civilian community about military culture. 

All of these courses are free to individual learners. You wouldn't be listening. If you didn't care. And it's that curiosity and passion for supporting service members, Veterans, and their families that we want to encourage and increase. Come back each week for another conversation and make sure to engage with PsychArmor on social media to let us know what you thought about the show. 

I'd like to express special. Thanks to Operation Encore. ad Navy Seahawk, pilot, Gerry for our theme song. Don't kill the messenger. This show was produced by Headspace and timing and all rights to the show remain reserved by PsychArmor much appreciation to the team at PsychArmor that makes the show happen. Carole Turner, Vice President of Strategic Communications who keeps me on track and is an outstanding guest coordinator and support and transcripts by Emma Atherall. Feel free to share the show. In fact, we request that you do, but make sure that you let folks know where you heard it. Join us next time for another great episode. And until then stay aware, get educated and be well.