Aiming High
Texas McCombs MBA Grad and Navy SEAL Launches Career Transition Program for Veterans
By Samantha Harris
Michael Sarraille, MBA ’17, remained an active duty lieutenant commander in the Navy throughout the course of his full- time graduate program at McCombs. But he’s low-key about it. He doesn’t mention that he is a highly decorated member of the elite Navy SEALs special operations force or that he has risked his life for his country, though it’s all true. But what he will tell you — heartily — is that one of his life’s goals is to help shape the course of veterans’ paths once they leave the military. While he was still an MBA student, Sarraille launched the VETTED Foundation, which offers a condensed advanced business education to high-performing veterans.
Despite years of experience leading high-risk missions and managing classified data, many top-ranked military service members are overlooked for jobs when they try to shift into corporate America. Seventy percent of career military veterans struggle to find work in the private sector, according to research by Army veteran Chris Gerber, MBA ’16, and colleagues. More than 70 percent of hiring managers admit having a hard time making business sense of military experience, according to market research agency Harris Interactive.
Enter VETTED. The foundation’s Veteran Accelerated Management Program combines five months of distance learning and two months of on-site business instruction taught at UT Austin, Texas A&M, or Rice University.
“We’ve developed a program that is both cost- and time-efficient for veterans,” Sarraille explains. “A lot of these service members just retired and are in their mid-40s with a family. They don’t have the option of a full-time MBA and are eager to transition into the private sector.”
Forty elite veterans have already been selected for the first cohort, which began its distance learning in August. This segment of the program includes more than 100 hours of core business education through Wharton. Then, after mastering the basics through online learning, they come to campus and tackle an intense 300 hours of MBA-level coursework in two months. UT Austin’s classes have an entrepreneurship focus, Texas A&M’s specialize in executive management, and Rice’s focus is on executive management in the energy industry.
Participants also have access to career services, including resume development, mock interviews, and networking techniques. The program does not end until participants have been successfully placed with an employer.
VETTED received a big boost in June when Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush, State Rep. Pat Fallon, and UT and Texas A&M System Chancellors William McRaven and John Sharp announced their support. The two university systems and AT&T offered the foundation a collective $75,000 gift.
McRaven commended Sarraille for his leadership, energy, and ingenuity. “That Michael is currently a serving military officer and a University of Texas Longhorn makes me even prouder,” McRaven said. “He embodies UT Austin’s belief that ‘What starts here changes the world,’ and this program will undoubtedly change lives for the better.”
Sarraille’s long-term goal is to privatize and expand the VETTED model. He is currently in talks with other top MBA programs across the country to do just that.
“They aren’t done after military service. Veterans are a resource this nation needs to reintegrate and put back to work,” he says.
Sarraille will retire from the military this February after serving 20 years. But his duty roster will still be full as he continues working to increase VETTED’s reach.
“We need the support of corporations, UT Austin’s alumni network, and good citizens as a whole to drive the foundation and program forward,” he says. “I am confident that those who invest in us will see an ROI for what we do for our nation.”
Volunteers, donors, potential corporate partners, and universities can contact the foundation through its website: www.vetted.org.
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From the Fall 2017 issue of McCombs, the magazine for alumni and friends of the McCombs School of Business. Full PDF
