Summary
Major strides have been made to train and support veteran entrepreneurs over the last two decades, but veteran entrepreneurs still face challenges. Some common challenges include developing and utilizing social capital, identifying successful mentors, accessing appropriate financial capital, and obtaining and utilizing business and management skills. Although challenges vary by location, each local entrepreneurial ecosystem has unique features to support veteran and military connected entrepreneurs.
Within the veteran entrepreneurial ecosystem there are many actors including veterans, veteran and entrepreneurship service organizations, policy makers, government offices, and consumers. However, the veteran entrepreneurship resource landscape can be fragmented and siloed. Many veteran entrepreneurs reported experiencing the most help through SBA resources and college or university academic programs, but over 46 percent of veteran entrepreneurs indicated that navigating the resources in their local community was not easy. Research also indicates that veteran entrepreneurs experience an array of barriers that include (but not limited to) access to capital, difficulty navigating resources, lack of network and mentors, and certification process hurdles. Success or failure does not depend on one, but rather on multiple factors related to barriers and challenges veteran entrepreneurs experience while also navigating the complex and disintegrated veteran entrepreneurship ecosystem. These navigational challenges can lead to a lack of knowledge and access to local resources as well as feeling unsupported by both government and local communities. Some features that have been shown to support veteran entrepreneurs are increased collaboration between organizations, community-based learning, dissemination of information on educational programs and services through various platforms, and policies that encourage entrepreneurship.
