The best military leavers are strong generalists, and their CVs show you which ones

Introduction

Last spring, I wrote an explanation of my (perhaps unorthodox) career plan. In short, I committed to five years as an officer in the Royal Navy specifically to build leadership and management skills. My plan was to apply those skills to an operations role at a nonprofit aimed at improving how the future turns out. Given the rapid pace of AI capabilities, that plan has narrowed to mitigating risks from AI. m In the year since, I co-founded an AI Security research nonprofit, Intelligence Security Laboratories, serving as the Staff Director (COO-equivalent). Views in this post are my own.

Since going through that transition, I write this article to update my position. While I believe military leavers could be high performing in many roles, I make the specific claim that they should be recognised and sought-out as strong senior generalists, suited to roles such as Chief of Staff (CoS), Chief Operating Officer (COO), Head of Operations or Special Projects Lead.

Several key qualities that make an excellent senior generalist are slow to learn and hard to screen for, and officers and senior non-commissioned officers (SNCOs) leaving the military have a) been screened for them and b) spent years building them. Conversely, they will lack familiarity with small nonprofit workstreams and may not have engaged deeply with AI threat models. These are quicker to learn, especially when supported by today’s LLMs. Nonetheless, open hiring rounds tend to measure exactly these. Hence military leavers are systematically underrated, and founders who look past that can hire people others overlook. To be clear, I’m not claiming the average military leaver is a strong senior generalist. I’m claiming the best are, and that their CVs and references show you which ones.

To the founders of high-impact nonprofits: this talent pool is large and often mission-driven, and I plan to connect you with it.