Episode 33: Ben Kohlmann Brings Entrepreneurship To The Navy

Ben Kohlmann, Naval Aviator, Military Entrepreneur

Benjamin Kohlmann is a combat tested F/A-18 naval aviator and entrepreneur. He is a graduate of Northwestern University and is currently a serving as an officer in the United States Navy. He is the Creator of Disruptive Thinkers and Chairman of the Defense Entrepreneurs Forum.

Ben comes from a family of aviators and talks about how that influenced his decision to serve in the Navy. He talks about the challenges and failures he faced in his first deployment and how he was able to grow and make a real impact in a combat deployment to Afghanistan.

In 2012, Ben wrote an article titled The Military Needs More Disruptive Thinkers . He talks about how important writing has been to his career and how you must be willing to put your work in others hands. Ben started Disruptive Thinkers to bring together creative thinkers in the military with entrepreneurs and other creative civilian minds. He then started the Defense Entrepreneurs Forum modeled on TED and TEDx with the intent of instilling a culture of innovation into the Defense Ecosystem.

Ben had a great quote when I asked him about creating something while you still had a “day job”.

If you have passion and belief about something, you find the time to make it happen”

Ben can also be found on LinkedIn.

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