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Operation Workforce Development

Operation Workforce Development

Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services weekly ‘Bugler’ has recently been the forum to share and discuss our business goals. This week we begin a new series. We will be sharing our 15 programs, as a Center of Excellence, used to help achieve those goals.

Operation Workforce Development
Operation Workforce Development is a program where Dixon Center partners with organizations including trade unions, civic organizations, business and industry, service providers, and training institutions by leveraging existing training and career placement opportunities. Our goal is not to create new programs. Rather, the goal is to enable the integration of military and veteran services into existing programs to increase impact.

Working nationally and locally we have been collaborating to create a pathway to family-wage careers with full benefits for veterans and their families.

As a Center of Excellence, we provide and coordinate technical assistance/training, resource sharing, and strong leadership to our partners, who, with our ongoing support, operate pre-apprenticeship and apprenticeship programs resulting in career opportunities in skilled labor across myriad of industries.

Over the past four years, Operation Workforce Development has resulted in our partners training and employing over 4,800 transitioning service members and veterans who have been out of service for years.

For example, with an investment from corporate donors, Dixon Center has a unique collaboration with the Teamsters Military Assistance Program (TMAP) and ABF Freight. For the past several years TMAP has been expanding programming to multiple military installations across the nation, impacting thousands of veterans and their families participating in employment training and credentialing, as well as information regarding community resources.

Similarly, with funding from Prudential and private foundations, Dixon Center has been expanding our partnerships with other organizations as well as employers and training facilities. Case in point is Dixon Center’s unique partnership with the Utility Workers Military Assistance Program(UWUA). The UMAP program provides hundreds of veterans access to employment training and credentialing in the gas and electric industry, as well as information regarding community resources. Specifically, UWUA and Power for America have created a training program, guaranteeing employment after successful completion of six months of classroom study and paid hands-on internship experience.

The Way Ahead
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Dixon Center, along with our partners from the Trade Unions, have been considering the role of workforce development for veterans and their families during these times and when the pandemic begins to diminish. Despite our success leveraging organizations to include veterans and their families into their existing programs, we’ve found that workforce development operators will have to recreate opportunities. These are a few actions Dixon Center is taking to keep Operation Workforce Development impactful. 

  1. Looking beyond training and creating emergency support the veterans need: Our workforce development partners typically focus on assisting with employment and removing barriers to that goal. During the pandemic, our partners have used Dixon Center as their go to resource in coordinating basic needs and emergency assistance for veterans in training programs delayed by current social conditions.
  2. Building opportunities for re-employment whenever possible: Though our veterans are losing jobs, there are jobs going unfilled, and it is possible to start training and creating access to paid apprenticeships now. Of course, effective re-employment may require remote credentialing and licensing, it also requires flexibility, as veterans’ lives are complicated by health and safety, childcare, and other challenges. We are looking to expand opportunities by building partnerships with more local building trade councils.
  3. Virtual learning is a consideration for the future: What we have learned over the past several years of war and related deployments is that high-quality certifications and training programs can be delivered remotely, and that service members and veterans can participate. Even before veterans and their families are able to fully return to in-person training, we are collaborating with partners to create training models that incorporate virtual learning and individual coaching to enhance in-person classes. We are also seeking solutions for remote service delivery identified by our partner SingleStop to achieve our goal to remove the barriers of travel time, inaccessible public transportation, affordable housing and the financial challenges of paying for childcare and transportation to attend classes.


One of the most critical times for military service members is the reintegration from active service to veteran status. The transition from the military to a civilian career can be particularly challenging. The same can be said for transitioning from any employment for veterans. That is why Dixon Center puts an emphasis on Workforce Development. Dixon Center’s unique partnership with the building trades, training institutions, and employers is one example in a series of connections forged to eliminate major barriers for our veterans and their families.

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Grow Contributed Income

Grow Contributed Income

Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services is a member of The Fedcap Group, a global network of top-tier nonprofit agencies. The Fedcap Group serves as the fiscal agent for Dixon Center and as a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization and provides our back-office support. This includes human resources, finance and accounting, legal services, information technology and many other functions.

The Fedcap Group is committed to promoting transparency and integrity in its fiscal practice and we are proud of its GuideStar recognition with the 2019 Silver Seal of Transparency. Dixon Center’s operating highlights are part of The Fedcap Group’s comprehensive financial statement package. Based on audited financial statements ending September 30, 2019, 86% of Fedcap’s total expenditures went directly toward programming. This demonstrates that The Fedcap Group is an effective steward of its resources.

In 2012, when Dixon Center was founded, we tried to do everything ourselves: generate funds, build programs, monitor results, capture lessons learned, etc. Our Center was doing, doing, doing.

Today, because of the many lessons learned, we no longer create our own programs but partner with business and industry, service providers, and training institutions to assist them in developing and operating direct service programs for veterans and their families.

We have extensive knowledge of the veteran and military family landscape, across all sectors of society. These include nonprofits, private, public and civic sectors. Therefore, we leverage existing community-based organizations to implement our plans. This understanding allows for the creation and rapid use of a networked service distribution model to stand up to external scrutiny and immediately remove barriers for potential program sponsors and underwriters to fund this important initiative.

In other word we ‘delegate to innovate’.

In our current reality the needs of our veterans and their families are evolving, not disappearing. Dixon Center, as a centralized source of advocacy and fund raising for veterans and their families, directs funds to the right organizations, ensuring optimal impact. We provide and coordinate technical assistance/training, resource sharing, and strong leadership to our partners, who, with our ongoing support, operate direct service programs.

To be successful we need to grow our contributed income. Contributed income are gifts made freely without receiving anything in exchange. Every year, since our founding, we have seen steady growth in contributed income. This allows us to:

  • Increase our reach and successful planning for long term impact.
  • Increase our agility and responsiveness to change.
  • Attract new donors who seek efficient use of dollars for shorter periods of giving, rather than the never ending, ongoing giving cycle.

A strong base of contributed income strengthens our response and builds for the future with resource solutions that can fundamentally change the outcome for veterans and their families.

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Diversify Operations and Revenue Streams

Diversify Operations and Revenue Streams

Since 2012, Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services has had the goal to diversify operations and revenue streams as part of our business strategy.

As a Center of Excellence, diversification allows the Center to remain relevant and current on the needs of veterans and their families. It also causes us to look for new business opportunities. This strategy allows the Center to seek new market segments to expand our reach and impact. We have found that diversifying can prove to be a challenging decision as it can lead to extraordinary rewards but still has possible risks.

Specifically, operations are inextricably linked to diversified fundraising revenue. In other words, getting money from more than once source. We have found over the past eight years, and learning from our parent organization, The Fedcap Group, that having diversified fundraising revenue creates stability and keeps Dixon Center from being overly dependent on one source of funding, which can endanger our work.

The three reasons that Dixon Center opts for diversification is for:

  • Growing business operations,
  • Ensuring maximum utilization of community and partner resources and capabilities, and,
  • Getting away from solutions that are no longer relevant due to changing social conditions where veterans needs no longer exist.

Dixon Center subscribes to the 1-10-1000 Rule of fundraising activities. We do 1 event a year with a return on our investment, we seek 10 grants, and we have built a donor base of more than 1,000.

In Fiscal Year 2020, and despite the pandemic, our strategy to diversify resources provided depth, and versatility in revenue streams with no budget requirement shortfall.

Our FY 2020 revenue came from multiple reliable sources: 58% corporate giving; 15% major gifts; 3% individual giving; and 24% from foundations. We did experience a decrease in individual giving that we attribute to the pandemic. Fortunately, we were able to anticipate the pattern change and compensated with direct appeals.

Key to our flexibility is that our President ensures everyone on the staff participates in seeking funding opportunities and supports the efforts of our command council leadership who serves as our chief fundraiser. Our pipeline is formally reviewed every month. This way, if we have a shortfall in one funding source, we can adjust our asks before it is too little, too late.

In 2020 by diversifying operations and revenue streams we captured some lessons that Dixon Center will carry into the future:

  • As the economy changed, the giving patterns of the people change. Diversification into several partnerships and approaches helped create a balance for Dixon Center during financial ups and downs.
  • There are always unpleasant surprises with a single approach to problems. Being diversified allows the Center to anticipate these surprises and address them before they become a crisis.
  • Diversification allows the Center to maximize the use of partnerships and potentially underutilized resources.
  • Due to economic factors, certain social sector organizations may struggle for a period. Diversification allowed the Center the opportunity to move away from activities where there may not be a need and use resources in a more efficient manner.

Achieving our goal of diversification of operations and revenue streams has allowed Dixon Center to operate with autonomy and take advantage of all that come with that.

The Fedcap Group has always embraced our Center of Excellence approach and encourages freedom of action. The ability to call our own shots is essential to our mission accomplishment, meeting our command councils’ guidance and more important, enabling veterans and their families so they can succeed where they live. 

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Leveraging and Strengthening Program Networks

Leveraging and Strengthening Program Networks

In 2012, the Office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Warrior and Family Support published a White Paper, Channeling the “Sea of Goodwill” to Sustain the “Groundswell of Support” Transitioning from Concept to Application written by Captain Chris Manglicmot, Major Ed Kennedy and Colonel David W. Sutherland, now Chairman of Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services. The concepts discussed in this white paper, in part, created the concepts, ideas and thoughts enabling the goals and objectives of the Center for Military and Veterans Services (Dixon Center).

One of our goals at Dixon Center is to leverage and strengthen program networks. This concept came from pages 3 in the aforementioned white paper.

“American business, education, healthcare, and community leaders can be better informed of the needs and innovative examples that produce solutions for veteran reintegration and transition. Within communities, connecting ideas and tasks that will have a meaningful impact requires the following: Building public awareness Encouraging community involvement and promoting community-based services.”

This idea resulted in the concept of a Community Action Team (CAT), an organization, that pulls in the various community services to discuss and assess the needs of veterans, families, and families of the fallen, and then develops a plan to meet those needs. The CAT identifies gaps and aligns existing services and programs to increase their impact.

At the Center we have taken this from being geographic to functional. In other words we are focusing on networks that have national reach but local impact reinforcing Dixon Center’s five focus areas: workforce development and career placement; housing solutions; wellness research and development; expanding funding streams for veteran entrepreneurs; and, advancing impact via service networks.

Dixon Center relies upon local, regional, state and national contacts to grow solutions from within communities and through organizations—a must for creating sustained impact and for replicating solutions.

Dixon Center maintains a robust network of diverse players, each of whom helps us achieve our mission in a unique way through their networks. Here are some key findings during the past 12 months, despite the pandemic, we are using to leverage networks to create greater impact in 2021:

  • Prioritizing work with networks and building a collaboration model of new solutions, into our strategy for achieving impact
  • Building a diverse network with a wide array of expertise, and we are frequently canvassing our network to tap experts who can fill gaps in knowledge, capacity, or resources.
  • Nurturing both ground-level partnerships, as well as larger strategic partnerships. The deep knowledge for successful solution implementation can be coupled with extended access to resources.
  • Seeking frequent feedback from our networks to gain valuable insight from diverse vantage points. We will be hosting peer shares to drive discussion relating to evolving veteran and military families needs. Then we will act on the results.
  • Networks aren’t a panacea, context matters. Just as Government is not a panacea when it comes to veterans and their families, networks help bring diverse groups to the table. Networks need to adapt and find innovative ways to move beyond their silos and involve stakeholders without overtaxing them. This includes constantly asking, “Who else should be included?”

As we move into 2021, we are looking closer at the systemic impacts of COVID-19 which are widespread when considering veterans and their families. Here are just a few…

  • As evictions rise, the homelessness rate is expected to rise dramatically while shelters are full.
  • Mental health experts are concerned about the long-term impacts from isolation, for example increasing loneliness and death by suicide.
  • As voluntary extensions of service members staying in the military through the duration of the pandemic come to an end there could be a surge of transitioning service members who might be entering a rough economy.

2020 has challenged us all to rethink systems and how every organization can integrate veterans into their organization, direct-services, and programs. Dixon Center will continue to leverage and strengthen program networks. In the coming months we will continue our collaborative innovation. We will double down on this process in which multiple players (within and outside our existing national network of community-based programs) contribute towards creating and developing new products, services, policies, processes, or business solutions leading to veterans and their succeeding where they live.

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Stronger Together

Stronger Together

As a Center of Excellence, Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services provides and coordinates technical assistance/training, resource sharing, and strong leadership to our partners, who, with our ongoing support, operate direct service programs. We work at local and national levels in five focus areas:

Workforce development and career placement: Helping organizations and institutions with programs that recruit, integrate, train, and retain transitioning service members, veterans and military families.

Housing solutions: Collaborating and building partnerships with national partners to expand affordable housing opportunities and services for veterans.

Wellness research and development: Assessing, advising, and assisting organizations as they create, or expand, products and services across the eight dimensions of wellness: emotional, spiritual, intellectual, physical, environmental, occupational, financial, and social.

Expanding funding streams for veteran entrepreneurs: Partnering with financial institutions on reaching veterans with small business funding, planning, and mentorship programs.

Advancing impact via service networks: Facilitating the integration of military and veteran services into existing organizational programs in order to increase impact.

One of Dixon Center’s seven goals is to Strengthen the capacity of our partners who deliver services in focus areas like ours. Our strategy is to partner with business and industry, service providers, and training institutions to develop and operate direct service programs for veterans and their families in our five focus areas. Our goal is not to create new programs. Rather, the goal is to enable the integration of military and veteran services into existing programs to increase impact.

Within the framework of the five focus areas, our approach with each partner is different based upon their specific goals and desired outcomes. A common objective in our work with all of our partners is to increase their visibility and impact by assisting them in being able to rapidly respond to the emerging needs of veterans and their families.

Despite the pandemic, we have helped increase impact in the five focus areas by collaborating with strong partners such as CONSENSYS Health, Hope for The Warriors, Angel Force USA, Burn Pits 360, Soldier On, Opportunity Finance Network, University of Chicago, Single Stop, Teamsters Military Assistance Program, the Utility Workers Military Assistance Program, and the AFL-CIO, to name just a few.

Given all our work with these partners with shared interests and focus areas we have identified these lessons during 2020:

  • During the challenging times of Covid-19, some of the focus areas have moved to a higher priority than others. For example, there are less organizations wanting assistance in providing capital to veteran entrepreneurs. Yet, we have seen an increased demand for assistance by organizations with goals relating to veterans financial, emotional, and social well-being.
  • Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services must remain agile with a versatile staff. We have a keener sense of what is important. Sacred cows have been killed off. Conferences, collaboratives, logos and egos, have to a large degree faded to the background and organizations are again focused more on impact…not on brand.
  • While the national sense of community is under pressure; local sense of community has never meant more. Neighbors are engaging with ‘their’ at risk populations more than they ever have. There is more awareness of the challenges impacting quality of life for veterans and their families now because most people are feeling the same kinds of pressures: isolation, financial challenges, disconnection from family members, almost random impacts to health and death that civilians never have to contemplate regularly.


We are excited about continuing to create real change. As we look to the future, we will continue to collect data and apply lessons learned. Our collaboration and capacity building with our national network of community-based partners is making an impact for veterans and their families.

For more information about Dixon Center and our outreach and awareness efforts, please contact Duncan Milne, President, dmilne@dixoncenter.org.

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Engagement and Awareness

Engagement and Awareness

In our recent eNewsletters and into the next month we are sharing our goals as they relate to our work as a Center of Excellence. We are doing this to build awareness and then, to inspire the reader by demonstrating that Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services is accountable for something big. One of Dixon Center’s seven goals, and one of two focusing on awareness and engagement is: Steward and build strategic relationships that support partner organizations & advance their fiscal results.

Our goal is not to create new programs. Rather, the goal is to enable the integration of military and veteran services into existing programs to increase impact. As a Center of Excellence, we provide and coordinate technical assistance/training, resource sharing, and strong leadership to our partners, who, with our ongoing support, develop and operate direct service programs.

This includes working at local and national levels in five focus areas: workforce development and career placement; housing solutions; wellness research and development; expanding funding streams for veteran entrepreneurs; and advancing impact via service networks.

Despite the pandemic, our team during Fiscal Year 2020 has been able to maintain meaningful engagements with social, civic, private, and public sector decision-makers and people of influence to expand services by our partner organizations. One of the lessons our team has learned is that to have the greatest impact these engagements must be documented, interactive, and includes a follow-up based on a prescribed timeline. We have also determined that attendance tracking tools; pre and post gauging of activities; online survey tools; and follow up communications (email, phone, in person) to track change/outcomes assist in our accountability, as well as our partners.

Leveraging technology, we have increased outreach and awareness of more than 100 new partnerships in FY 2020. These support organizations, who with our help or encouragement, are including veterans and their families into their existing community-based service programs. This is different than the 300 organizations we referenced last week whose work we are promoting. These are 100 new partnerships who have been encouraged at the community level to include veterans and their families.

Our outreach and awareness are assisting organizations in adjusting their programing to focus on the evolving needs of veterans today, shaping their organizations goals and objectives, and helping them adjust to a new fiscal landscape created by COVID-19. While many organizations have hunkered down and adopted a fortress mentality to ride out the impacts of COVID-19, Dixon Center’s collaborative approach has kept a keen eye on opportunity and emergent needs while leveraging existing community-based programs that have national reach and local impact.

For more information about Dixon Center and our outreach and awareness efforts, please contact Duncan Milne, President, dmilne@dixoncenter.org.

Also, be on the look out! Our newsletter will start going out on Tuesdays instead of Fridays. We hope you continue to look for it on its new day in your inbox.

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Enabling the Enablers

Enabling the Enablers

Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services is enabling the enablers. One of our goals for the past eight years is to leverage & strengthen the Center’s network of partners, supporters, and community-based programs serving veterans and their families.

In 2020, Dixon Center has been working, despite the pandemic, to increase brand awareness, engagement, philanthropy and program impact of our national network of community-based partners. Many of these are service providers, who with our help, are now including veterans and their families in their direct-service programs. Most of this work has been in workforce development and career placement, affordable housing, and financial, emotional & physical well-being.

As a Center of Excellence, we are leveraging our communications and marketing reach to showcase the work of others. Case in point is the production of our podcast series, Service Before Self.

We are using this podcast to build public awareness, encourage community involvement and promote community-based services. These biweekly broadcasts are addressing the evolving needs and solutions improving the quality of life of veterans and their families, the leaders who are creating impact, the innovative ideas, and philanthropic change agents.

Since October 2019, via multiple mediums every week, Dixon Center has promoted and increased the collaboration of over 300 organizations and individuals now serving veterans. Much of our communications and marketing strategy includes webinars, virtual panel discussions, conferences, convenings, collaborative video conferences, blogs, movie screenings and now podcasts. We also utilize social media and host receptions and award ceremonies. These partner organizations come from all sectors of society including business and industry, direct service wellness providers, training institutions, philanthropists, faith based organizations, and nonprofits that we have helped develop and operate direct service programs for veterans and their families.

We have more to do. Yet the fact is that we continue to validate our founding premise, we are much stronger together than apart. Dixon Center’s approach to breaking down barriers and making connections works. Since 2012, our collaboration and capacity building has impacted nearly 1.7 million individuals and organizations at the end of 2019. As we prepare to end the 2020 Fiscal Year watch for our operating highlights which are part of The Fedcap Group’s comprehensive financial statement package. Based on audited financial statements ending September 30, 2019, 86% of Fedcap’s total expenditures went directly toward programming.

Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services is a subsidiary of The Fedcap Group, a global network of top-tier nonprofit agencies. The Fedcap Group serves as the fiscal agent for Dixon Center and as a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization. The Fedcap Group is committed to promoting transparency and integrity in our fiscal practice and we are proud of its GuideStar recognition with the 2019 Silver Seal of Transparency.

For more information about The Fedcap Group or Dixon Center, please contact Duncan Milne, President, dmilne@dixoncenter.org.

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Achieving Dixon Center’s Goals

Achieving Dixon Center’s Goals

One of Dixon Center’s goals is developing, designing, and delivering relevant, objective, and trusted expertise to assist organizations so they can find and focus on veterans and their families in employment, education, wellness, and housing. While the pandemic has presented challenges in achieving this goal, it has also created opportunities for Dixon Center and our partners to interact with the individuals and communities we serve in unique and innovative ways.

For example, recently Dixon Center presented at the National Association of State Workforce Agencies Annual Conference to raise awareness about the challenges that military caregivers face. We were able to connect to over 1,100 state workforce professionals during this virtual conference; this would not have been possible at a “in-person” conference.

In this calendar year alone, a sample of some of the organizations we have worked with in the areas of employment, education, wellness, and housing: Teamsters Military Assistance Program, AFL-CIO Union Veterans Council, ConsenSys Health, Hope For The Warriors, Yellow Ribbon Network, University of Chicago, American Legion, Clear2Connect Coalition, Utility Workers Military Assistance Program, Toxic Exposures in the American Military (TEAM) Coalition, National Association of State Workforce Agencies, Easter Seals Greater Houston, Burn Pits 360, Single Stop, University of Pittsburgh Center for Military Medical Research, ABF Freight, U.S. Army, and MVLE.

Through innovation, agility, courage, and concerted effort, these organizations have been able to pivot their programs to address the evolving needs of our veterans and families and also ensure those needs don’t begin to devolve due to the pandemic.

We’ve learned over the course of the pandemic, that much of the work we have had success with over the last decade is once again is coming to the forefront. Under/unemployment, homelessness, wellness, and other challenges loom on the horizon. But we have an opportunity to have a ‘do-over’ on the way we approached those challenges previously. For example, instead of just cranking out large numbers of jobs, we can focus on careers, and careers that are resilient regardless of external challenges.

For more information about The Fedcap Group or Dixon Center, please contact Duncan Milne, President, dmilne@dixoncenter.org.

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Listen to Our First Podcast

Listen to Our First Podcast

The first episode of the new podcast from Dixon Center for Military & Veterans Services has launched!

Service Before Self tackles the evolving needs of veterans and their families, based on the idea that veterans can succeed in the community where they live.

In the first episode, host Sam Whitehurst is joined by Rick Passarelli, the director of veteran affairs and workforce development at Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA) and the chair for the workforce development subcommittee for the AFL-CIO Union Veterans Council.

Rick is the architect behind one of the most impactful workforce development programs for veterans in the country, the Utility Workers Military Assistance Program (UMAP).

Episode #1, titled “Rick Passarelli: Forging New Pathways to Careers with Purpose for Veterans and Their Families,” covers Rick’s distinguished career of service to his country as well as what has made UMAP such a successful program for veterans.

We invite you to download the podcast on your favorite distributor – the two most popular ones are below.

Episode 1 on Apple Podcasts
Episode 1 on Spotify

Let us know how we’re doing by leaving us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or one of the other distributors where you found us. Then stay tuned for the next episode where we will recognize some of you in the show notes and on air.

For more information about the podcast, please contact its host and producer Sam Whitehurst, swhitehurst@dixoncenter.org.

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Subscribe To/Follow Our New Podcast

Subscribe To/Follow Our New Podcast

Whether you are an avid podcast fan or new to the medium, we invite you to give the new podcast from Dixon Center for Military & Veterans Services a listen.

Our biweekly podcast spotlights an organization or program that is having a meaningful and lasting impact on ensuring that veterans and their families succeed in the communities where they live. Each episode will highlight the evolving needs of veterans and their families as well as best practices and lessons learned from successful programs.

The podcast’s name, Service Before Self, recognizes the commitment demonstrated by veterans and their families during their military service as well as their potential as they reintegrate back into their communities when military service ends.

We invite you to listen to our two-minute trailer and subscribe to the podcast. Our first episode will post soon, so you’ll want to subscribe to or follow us to ensure you are one of the first to be alerted. We welcome your feedback and will be reading your reviews and comments on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or one of the many other distributors.


Trailer on Apple Podcasts

Trailer on Spotify

Trailer on Google Podcasts 


For more information about the podcast, please contact its host and producer Sam Whitehurst, swhitehurst@dixoncenter.org.