Apr 12, 2021
On this week's episode of the FourBlock Podcast, we welcome FourBlock alumnus Brian Arrington, USAF (ret), M.S., CEO and Founder of VETS2INDUSTRY LLC and VETS2INDUSTRY Foundation Inc. and a Business Initiatives Consultant with Wells Fargo.
Brian joins host Mike Abrams to discuss his 20-year service in the Air Force, his military retirement and transition, and his subsequent work creating VETS2INDUSTRY to help more veterans and their families get connected with the resources and benefits available to them and to ensure the success of every veteran and their families after military service. VETS2INDUSTRY provides a free online library that of all the free veteran and dependent resources and Veteran Service Organizations nationwide.
Since founding VETS2INDUSTRY in 2019, nearly 1,000 vetted resources have been added on vets2industry.com, and the community has grown to more than 35,000 followers on LinkedIn alone.
Brian retired in July of 2019 after serving 20 years in the United States Air Force with Robins AFB, GA as his final duty station. His distinguished career led him to deploy to Iraq, Afghanistan, and Qatar and provide humanitarian relief throughout Southeast Asia during the tsunami, Haiti during the earthquake, and in Turkey supporting refugee evacuations during the Israel-Lebanon Mideast Crisis. Brian’s career has taken him to 90 countries and five of the seven continents.
In his last year of 20-years devoted service to the U.S. Air Force, Brian learned there were over 45,000 Veteran Service Organizations nationwide that provided free services and support to U.S. military families and realized a huge gap existed between available free Veteran, Military Spouse, and dependent children resources and benefits and the knowledge of their existence among our nation's heroes and their families.
With this newly discovered knowledge, Brian vowed to eliminate the knowledge gap and ensure the success of every veteran and their families by creating an online library, a free single-site repository of every free Veteran Service Organization to include providing mentorship and information services to each knowledge-seeker.
Since the library’s creation, March 2019, Brian has led VETS2INDUSTRY’s growth by reaching 7,000 veterans and military spouses with over 20,000 page-views and he continues to supply employment opportunity success with the ever-growing grassroots volunteer force of veterans and military spouses he leads.
Brian is married with six children and resides in Atlanta. He is an active alumnus of Centurion Military Alliance, Hiring our Heroes Corporate Fellowship Program, FourBlock, and American Corporate Partners. He volunteers with VETLANTA and the National Black MBA Association Atlanta Chapter, and he is a student veteran leader and student ambassador at Syracuse University where he is currently pursuing his MBA.
He holds two A.A.S. from the Community College of the Air Force, a B.A. in History, a Graduate Certificate in Homeland Security, and a M.S. in Management from Thomas Edison State University and is a certified Georgia State Hostage Negotiator.
ABOUT US
Welcome to the FourBlock Podcast, a show that examines veteran career transition and the military-civilian divide in the workplace.
General Charles Krulak coined the term "Three Block War" to describe the nature of 21st-century military service defined by peace-keeping, humanitarian aid, and full combat.
But what happens next? Veterans are often unprepared to return home and begin new careers. We call this the Fourth Block.
FourBlock is a national non-profit that has supported thousands of transitioning service members across the nation in beginning new and meaningful careers.
Mike Abrams (@fourblock) is an Afghanistan veteran, founder of FourBlock, and author of two military transition books. He’ll be representing the military transition perspective.
Lindsey Pollak (@lindsaypollak) is a career and workplace expert and New York Times bestselling author of three career advice books. Lindsey will be representing the civilian perspective of this issue.
Veterans, explore new industries and make the right connections. Find a career that fits your calling. Join us at fourblock.org/
Sponsor our program or host a class to equip more of our veterans at fourblock.org/donate.
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Podcast episodes are produced and edited by the Columbia University Center for Veteran Transition and Integration.