Blake Hall was destined for military service \u2013 his grandfather fought in World War II; his father was an Army colonel; and after 9\/11, Hall felt called to put on the uniform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But when time came for Hall to transition back to civilian life, Hall blazed an unexpected trail all his own, with a stop at one of the world\u2019s most prestigious universities, help from some finance bigwigs and the transformation of an off-handed idea into a business that has become a pioneering digital verification platform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hall, a recipient of two Bronze Star medals, began his service in the Army in 2004 as a second lieutenant in the infantry and later attended ranger school. He also served as a battalion reconnaissance platoon leader where he led 450 combat patrols through Iraq without any casualties in his platoon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hall decided to leave the military in 2008 after feeling like he wasn\u2019t making the impact he hoped to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI felt frustrated with the lack of strategy and thought that I would make a bigger impact in business where I can have a team and solve practical problems,\u201d Hall said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hall decided to pursue an MBA degree and when it was time to apply to universities, Hall\u2019s battalion commander told him the only way he would get a letter of recommendation was if he applied to Harvard. \u201cHe told me to apply to the best of the best if I\u2019m going to do this.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So that\u2019s what he did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHarvard accepted me, which was great, but I struggled initially,\u201d he said. It was hard for him to find a sense of purpose after leaving the military, but Hall said being at Harvard and following his entrepreneurial passion helped him overcome those struggles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hall didn\u2019t plan on being a tech entrepreneur or working in the digital arena. While attending Harvard, however, he noticed companies that were trying to give benefits to veterans had an elaborate and tedious process to verify the veterans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMicrosoft was doing e-learning vouchers for veterans but they asked veterans to bring in identification paperwork\u201d establishing their veteran status, Hall said. He noted the irony in Microsoft having to resort to old-fashioned stacks of paper to approve vets for high-tech digital training.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThese companies were trying to verify vets on their own and it was a hassle,\u201d he said. \u201cWe decided to do PayPal for digital identity where we can tie identification and verification together in one place.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 2010, Hall started the company ID.me, a digital identification platform where individuals can verify who they are online and receive discounts and benefits if they are part of groups like first responders, the military, students or teachers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Based in McLean, Virginia, ID.me employs nearly 200 employees and is used by more than 6 million individuals and 200 partners, including federal agencies, health care organizations, nonprofits and retailers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Having a good mentor was crucial to Hall\u2019s successful transition. He worked with Kelly Perdew, who took Hall under his wing and helped him learn more about entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Perdew, also a veteran, is the co-founder and managing general partner at Moonshots Capital, a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage tech companies and leans more to those founded by veterans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The two met after David Tisch, an investor in Hall\u2019s company, met Perdew at a seed investing event in New York in 2010. Tisch told Hall he thought Perdew would be a great mentor to him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBlake talked to me and flawlessly executed what he wanted to do with his company,\u201d Perdew said. \u201cWe had six to seven phone calls over the course of two months before I invested, but I gained more and more confidence in him because he was able to successfully execute his vision.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Perdew said one of the qualities he admired most about Hall was his ability to quickly implement changes to his initial business plan. \u201cThere were some flaws in his plan but I as I would suggest fixes, he would immediately talk to his team and make those changes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
ID.me started out as TroopSwap, which was exclusively for service members and veterans to receive benefits. TroopSwap became ID.me in 2013 after creating verification services for teachers, students and first responders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe started with vets but we reached out to nonprofits and learned that verification was not just a problem for the military community but it was affecting groups like students and first responders as well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hall said being in the military taught him the qualities of great leadership, and the experiences are what helped him become successful in his business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think there is any other institution that would have taught me responsibility and leadership. I learned how to work with a team under hard circumstances and this translated to my business.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When it was time to apply to universities for an MBA, Blake Hall\u2019s battalion commander told him the only way he would get a letter of recommendation was if he applied to Harvard. \u201cHe told me to apply to the best of the best if I\u2019m going to do this.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":90763,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3006],"class_list":["post-87127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"AKATBAZU4NGIZD2BQN3JIFPNLY","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/entrepreneurship\/2018\/07\/16\/from-grunt-to-harvard-student-to-tech-entrepreneur-an-army-rangers-journey\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n