Operation Relief Fund (ORF) is a nonprofit organization committed to helping Special Operations Forces (SOF) and Shadow Warriors find relief from PTSD and trauma. Through advanced stellate ganglion block (ASGB) treatments, ORF offers a path to healing and improved quality of life for post-combat veterans. Listen to the podcast series to hear participants, partners and leaders share impactful stories of resilience and the mission behind the ORF. Discover how the ORF is providing life coaching along with ASGB to help veterans transition to civilian life. Fill out the form to unlock the ORF podcast series and learn how your organization can create an impact by helping those who protect us.
[Matt Weaver]
Good afternoon and welcome to the Operator Relief Fund podcast series, Stories with an Impact, powered by Carahsoft. We are once again on location in Northern Virginia at Carahsoft. Today's story is a little different.
We have Jeff Conroy, CEO of the Operator Relief Fund, but he is a man who really doesn't necessarily need this position, and we're going to kind of get into why. I do want to start with something light. Jeff and I were having coffee this morning, and his beautiful wife, Jen, was there.
And as we were leaving, she made a comment that today you're wearing pants, and that was a significant milestone in the week. Is that a seasonal thing or just more a testament to, you know, half foot in retirement life, half foot in corporate life?
[Jeff Conroy]
I think it's just generally a goal. If I can wear pants a few times a week, that's good. Shorts most of the time.
I'm like an old high school football coach.
[Matt Weaver]
I love it.
[Jeff Conroy]
That's the goal.
[Matt Weaver]
You know, I had a football, so I was the water boy. True story. In high school, or in middle school, I was the water boy for the high school football team.
Our football coach in just out of Cleveland, Ohio, you know, two feet of snow, he's always wearing shorts, right? It's just shorts thing. I get it.
I love it.
[Jeff Conroy]
So January, same thing.
[Matt Weaver]
I got it. I got it. I love that.
I love that.
[Jeff Conroy]
So these are for you.
[Matt Weaver]
Thank you. You're a gentleman and a scholar. What I want to start with, Jeff, is kind of what created the man, right?
And so you have a strong entrepreneurial drive. You've obviously created companies, and you've been very successful with that. What was the life like, you know, maybe college years or even before college years?
What was that entrepreneurial drive, and where did that come from?
[Jeff Conroy]
Well, okay. Great question. You know, I'll start even sooner.
I mean, I grew up in an entrepreneurial family. Both grandfathers had their own businesses. Dad had business interests that he was always trying.
My mother had her own law firm. And so, you know, the message is from the earliest days where you could do anything, and you can be in control of your future. And so those started kind of at home.
I would say a lot of my business interests and business drive was also formed just from growing up a middle-class kid who was aware that resources were tight. And I think from very early on, I wanted to figure out how to not have those problems. And that kind of formed a big part of my life.
Started business activities in college, and whether it was selling t-shirts or attending bar, the ability to create cash flow quickly becomes a superpower. And then, you know, I also out of college combined an interest in biology and science with business and finance. And that set me on what was the next kind of 30 years of life science, biotechnology, the intersection of science and business, and starting companies.
[Matt Weaver]
What, so kind of touching on that. You know, how many companies do you think, or have you started, you know, were they all successful? Well, what, you know, so I take that as they were not all successful.
I mean, what, you chuckle, you know, are you chuckling at a success or are you chuckling at a failure?
[Jeff Conroy]
No, I think, you know, very famous sentence in our family is life is what happens when you don't get what you want. And so I think that I've started, I don't know, been involved in five or six different companies that had been ideas that we tried to launch with differing levels of success. And, you know, I don't know whether it's apparent or whether it's just a law of thermodynamics of entrepreneurship, you know, failure is the best training ground for success.
And so, you know, you don't get things right often the first time. And so, you know, I had a very good run being a part of a team that created a consulting business, a services business that is very successful and continues to run. But for me, starting a company was always about a product, creating a product, solving a problem with a thing.
And so, you know, over probably 20 years of working on my own, you know, touched on a lot of different, am I going to, I was the CEO of a drug company, I was the CEO of an analytical chemistry company. And, you know, you need seasoning and maturity to figure out how to make this work, what's going to work. So sure, most things don't work.
[Matt Weaver]
Sure. Well, one thing I would argue, you know, is working is obviously operate really fun. So how did you go from, you know, entrepreneur, CEO of numerous companies, you know, successful in your own right to CEO of a nonprofit?
Where did that jump begin? And I don't think it was a year ago when you became CEO. Where did that jump from business drive to your own, you know, mission focused giving?
Where did that begin?
[Jeff Conroy]
Yeah. So probably 10 or 12 years ago, when I zeroed in on sports medicine and the problems around tendon ligament repair, and got together with a very group, smart group of people to create embody. We did that in partnership with DARPA.
And we had a lot of cooperation and data and worked with surgeons around naval special warfare. And part of what helped us secure significant funding from DARPA was the business case around the role of soft tissue injuries and Navy SEALs. And so the DARPA innovation ethos and the whole DARPA culture became a big part of embodies culture.
We really reveled in the fact that we are creating not just products, but we're creating the manufacturing methods to make those products. And so the naval special warfare and the special operations community as a whole became, you looked at what the wear and tear on our tendons and ligaments. And so that also led to us getting involved in Spookstock and supporting the IC community and the special operations community.
We also had some dual use. We took our technology and adapted our technology for some other special needs in the U.S. government that we did through a separate company. And so what it gave me over 10 years of building a body was a great appreciation for folks who've chosen your path and worked in the SF community and in the IC community.
And you also get to meet incredible individuals, patriots, folks who sacrifice for their country. So knuckleheads like me can go and create businesses and go and do things. And over that 10 year period, and we just had an incredible run at Embody.
Over 10 years, we built a company that demonstrated some great value for patients and things like rotator cuff and Achilles and ACL repair. And when we were fortunate enough to sell that company to Zimmer Biomet, it was a great reset for me. Gave me an opportunity to think about, what do I want to do again?
What do I do next? Retirement's not really an option, but figuring out a new operating system about how you're going to spend your days, what's your purpose, and what are you going to do to give back was important. Having been involved in Spookstock and the great work of educating children of Gold Star families, Spookstock had spurred the idea that treating operators with an advanced stellate ganglion block was going to be a help for PTS.
And we spun this out of Spookstock as a way to really focus, find one thing, do it really well, try to help as many people as you can. And it just so happened, timing in everything is what life is about. And so I was on the board of ORF, we spun it out of Spookstock, and there was a little bit of a transition and a need.
I kind of looked at the ORF opportunity very much like a startup. It's like, you need team, you need process and financial sustainability on an incredibly important mission focused on an incredibly interesting and rich community. And for me, it actually gave me some purpose at a moment when I was trying to figure out what was next.
I do not, I think we talked about this. I'm not at this point thinking my path is to start another company and spend another 10 to 12 years doing this. I'm interested in taking the skills that I have and the time that I have and trying to help improve lives, help people one at a time, help this community.
And so for me, ORF has given me purpose and it's filled a void for me, which is, I want to be a part of a team of high-performing individuals doing really important work who can measure their impact and get recognized as doing good. And so I don't look, I'm not doing ORF any favor. ORF has given me more than I'm giving it.
The last thing I'll say on this topic matters. I appreciate the, hey, you don't have to do this. You can do anything.
When you have tons of options, it's as much pressure as when you have few options. And so you have to really think about, what do I want to do? And for me, I didn't want to go and chase a dollar again and figure out how to do what I had spent the last 12 months, 12 years doing.
What I wanted to do is figure out, what can I do both with my time and with our resources and with other relationships that we have that would help be a multiplier of good and not really focus on dollars? Now, don't get me wrong. What we're learning is that this is the hardest thing I've ever done.
And raising money for a nonprofit is the most difficult, challenging thing. Anyone who's raised money for a company thinks this is hard. This is much, much harder.
But it works. Like everything, there's an algebra equation. You put a team on a problem, tell a story, repeat.
And we've been able to fund this. But anyway.
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah, no, I love that. Let's get into a little bit of Operator Relief Fund. CEO of Operator Relief Fund, so I'll call it at the strategic level.
What makes ORF different from other veteran support organizations that either you do have personal experience with or that you're familiar with? What makes ORF different?
[Jeff Conroy]
So first of all, what you learn when you enter this space is that there are tens of thousands of veteran support organizations and everyone is helping someone somehow. Everyone's doing good. They're raising money and doing good.
What we chose to do at ORF is develop a team and a process and an understanding of one thing, which is to master the process of systematizing and delivering and bringing access to an advanced stellar ganglion block for people who are dealing with PTS and other trauma, but also at differing levels of emergence. We kind of think of it as tip of the spear. We want to take care of tier one and tier two soft units and all of the IC and DOD special mission units.
And oftentimes a community that doesn't get enough resources focused on it. So what's unique is that we've really, really specialized. And so as people are dealing with all of the aspects of trauma that affect their lives, hypervigilance, irritability, lack of sleep, challenges at and around home, spouses who are dealing with secondary PTS, how can we be the laser focused go-to organization that then can work with dozens of other nonprofits and say, when you have someone in your community who has these issues and related to these traumas, we are here to bring them into a process, get them qualified, get them onboarded, organize their travel, organize their treatment, and then provide some follow-up to go on.
And we're very proud of the fact that in the last three years, we've done nearly now a thousand people. And so that's a thousand families that we've been able to impact one family at a time and with care and personal relationship with each of those folks. And so I think what's unique about us is that there's always a great pressure when you have some success to do more.
And I think with us, our vision has been, let's perfect a process. Let's be recognized in our community as kind of a go-to resource for this expertise. Let's open the doors to other organizations and make this available to their communities.
And then let's just look at scale because the fact that we've done a thousand now means we've earned the right to do ten thousand. And the only thing that's keeping us from doing 2,000 next year or 5,000 in the next two years is our ability to raise money. And so you really have to want to have a kind of a three-year perspective of how are we going to do this so that we can say, is this in scope?
Is this out of scope? Are we going to get the resources to do this? How do we excel?
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah. You know, at your position now, was there a conversation or a story or an email that has made this a little bit more personal for you? Like, is there something that you could put your finger on that's like?
[Jeff Conroy]
Yeah. There's actually something every 10 days or so that does that, which is, you know, we get these emails from participants and we have our dad back. We have our mom back.
We have our family is together. Oftentimes people find themselves in a conversation with the ORF team because, you know, one spouse may say to the other, this is your eighth last chance to keep your family together. And so for me, what's really interesting is we're not the special people in this.
What's really crazy is we're watching the individual operators and spouses who are saying, OK, at this moment in time, this is my accountability moment. I'm going to take charge of my journey. And then we're a guide on a phase of that journey.
And as their mental health care journey progresses, the idea is that the ASGB, the dual stellate ganglion block, advanced stellate ganglion block gives them a reset, gives them a pause, and then we can start to introduce some mindfulness tools and training and some other resources that help them advance and grow and manage a process. So for me, it's incredibly, incredibly rewarding to see that we're helping give people access and tools so that they can gain confidence that they're in control of their own personal mental health journey in an environment where they're often in a void, like they don't have institutional solutions. And the other thing that's become incredibly powerful is that most of those people are coming through partner organizations and so communities that are very family-like or direct friends.
And so this is not some I found you on the internet because of Google search. This is Bob had great success. Susan had great success.
I'm having some of the same issues. And I want some awareness and some ability to kind of follow in their footsteps. It's a one at a time.
And the community of participants that we've created is a very nurturing, protective community that wants to help the brothers and sisters get access to this. So again, what do we talk about? Having a process that works is not the challenge that exists.
Having customers that need what we do is not the problem that exists. It's that how do we go from being able to pay for 30 or 40 people a month to do 100 in a month, right?
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah. What do you see five years from now? Where do you see ORF?
What's next for ORF? I mean, you mentioned a little bit earlier you know, we've done a thousand. We have the right to treat 10,000.
Is that possible?
[Jeff Conroy]
It is possible. It is possible that there's certainly 10,000 people who need our help. It's all a matter of fundraising and our algebra equation.
I'll tell you what it also makes important is that the fact that we from inception have been focused on evidence-based data to support the effectiveness of the Dual Stellate Ganglion Block. So we did a first study last year, 155 people demonstrating six and a half month effective period only because that's as long as we study. And so now we have designs on how do we over the next three to five years do two or three additional studies that generate more evidence.
Our goal would be to put ORF out of business because if we had enough data to demonstrate to DOD and the VA and TRICARE that the Dual Stellate Ganglion Block is one of the best options for these patients suffering from these traumas, they should be covering it. And you know, think about that for a second. We're treating oftentimes active duty special operations personnel and we're paying for their travel and we're paying for their treatment and we're happy to do it because it works and benefits them.
But they're getting oftentimes, I may be biased, they're getting as good or better care in our hands than they can in their own situations, right?
[Matt Weaver]
I mean, you know my story as I'm sure, you know, other people may, I was active duty, right? I was stationed at Fort Bragg, learned about Operator Relief Fund, signed up from onboarding to going down to the provider in Florida to get my procedure, you know, right around a month, month and a half, like that's faster than what a military treatment facility could do. It was easier, you know, the connecting to the provider, so streamlined.
Yeah.
[Jeff Conroy]
And so, you know, our goal, hey, incredible success for us would be four years from now, we're irrelevant because the institutions that care for you and veterans in your position are providing access to best in class options and tools. And so, well, and that's a marathon for us. And so what that means is, if we're on a path to try to treat 10,000 people over say the next five years, I've got to raise, you know, we, excuse me, have to raise the money to pay for those treatments and then probably another $2 million to pay for the data that we will need to make the case.
That evidence doesn't have to just be clinical evidence that passes peer reviewed analysis. It's got to be distilled so that policymakers and politicians and chain of command can all understand the benefits. And so, you know, in a world where there's no shortage of people who want to say force readiness, mental health of our personnel and caring for not just operators, but families is a priority.
We're kind of jumping up and down going, help us do more, help us do more of those things. Help us generate more data that makes you want to do more of this, right? And benefit more.
[Matt Weaver]
I want to jump back briefly to some of the, like the biomedical, the biotech work that you worked on. Right. And you were creating these products.
Did you ever run into barriers, whether that was like entry to the market or just telling people like, Hey, I have this new idea. And then like, do you see any similarities with ORF and DSGB? Right.
Cause from, from my experience, stella ganglia block, the dual stella ganglia block is kind of put into the family of like ketamine and psychedelics. And so it's, it's, you know, not traditional, you know, healing modalities. And so do you have experience with that and how, how can we overcome that?
[Jeff Conroy]
Yeah. Great question. First of all, the, the, in the startup world, I think what everybody has to acknowledge is that your comfort with uncertainty and just embracing the fact that in our, even in the last, you know, the life of embody every 18 months, you're going to have an existential crisis.
Something's not working. Study's not working. A process is not working.
We're, we're not communicating with a regulatory agency the right way. And the message is there's always a way. And so you just put your head down, you grind through it and, and team wins the day.
Right. And so the parallel and my experience getting to lead a medical device company where we had to do studies and evidence for FDA is a lot of the same mindset that we brought. And actually it was one of the, I think one of the contributions I made in the early discussions about spinning this out.
It's like, we've got to be evidence-based and we've got to be data based. And so, you know, that just gives us the ability to create studies, generate evidence, and then be able to tell the story long-term. We also have to, as I said, manage these constituencies, right?
We've got clinical perspectives and we've got policy perspectives and who's going to pay. And then, you know, the, the, the, the DSGB, I think, you know, I agree it gets put into the, the kind of the ketamine psychedelic ether. But what I would say is that I don't think there's enough conversation around the fact that a stellate ganglion block started to be used to treat TBI and PTS in about 2006.
This is after nearly 50 years of FDA approval. This is a procedure that was used to manage chronic pain, mostly head and neck related. And so this is not like we had an idea two years ago to start to use this.
Inside DoD, there's been evidence that's been generated over the course of nearly 20 years that this has had some level of effectiveness. I would say that one of the things we've benefited from is in the last six to eight years, we've had the transition to dual bilateral procedures. And so how do you take a single shot, single side stellate ganglion block that might work for two to three weeks and do two shots, both sides, all of a sudden, I'm in a position now to demonstrate that the effective rate is closer to six months or longer.
And so I think one of the things you asked about what's unique about us is that by focusing really on this modality, and how do we not just perfect a procedure that elicits a certain effect in a patient, but how do we also perfect how we communicate about a DSGB and the benefits not just to the participants, but to the institutions that manage them. So that's a, you know, some people might call that a marketing issue, right? How do we, what are our words?
How do we define our language? How do we talk about the benefit of the outcomes? So I think, you know, in a way, the next phase of maturing for us is to say, we've got a process that works.
We have participants who are benefiting. We need to supersize the evidence collection, the data collection, the fundraising, and then we need to kind of perfect our words. How do we talk about the value of this in a way that makes more people stop and say, I want to be a part of that.
I want to help more people. And, you know, and we're making great progress. We're two years into this.
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah. Other than dollars, right? Who needs to hear that message?
I mean, if you had a, you know, a crystal ball and you could put, you know, the, you know, 10 people in a room, not necessarily by name, but what are the capabilities of those 10 people to get ORF to where you see us going in five years?
[Jeff Conroy]
Yeah. You know, we talk about this a lot. I mean, you know, our, our view is that everyone we meet represents the ability to donate something.
And everyone we meet represents the ability to introduce us to one other person who might help us be the next clue.
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah.
[Jeff Conroy]
But in our world, we're also looking for every room that we're in, there's an opportunity for a couple of people to do something extraordinary. And so for us, that may mean connecting us with another veteran service organization that has a community that needs access to our services. It may mean helping us tell this story.
I mean, one of the things I think I'm representative of is a segment of people who want to help this community. We don't have military backgrounds. We're business people.
But we want to see progress and help in the community. We have an entire council of business advisors who, out of caring and love for this community, connect us with partners and connect us with donors. And so I think our goal is to just build the community, find the most diverse group of folks.
Listen, we've got also, we need to talk a little bit about the clinics that we work with, because we have, you know, there are a number of clinical providers in the DSGB space who are the leading edge of treating PTS in the SOF and veteran space, and they don't get enough press. And now, part of that is also based on the fact that sometimes it's an advanced stelic ganglion block. Sometimes it's dual stelic ganglion block.
Sometimes it's a stelic ganglion block. So we can sound as if we're talking past each other because we're doing different things. I think, you know, controlling our language and normalizing what we do and what the benefit is, is a great help.
There are more clinical partners that we need to find and work with. There are more community partners that we need to find and work with, and corporate, right? And so there are so many companies in America that care about veteran health and SOF operator health.
How do we figure that out? So, you know, I don't have seven people that I could tell you I'm trying to meet tomorrow, but I think what we have been able to do is demonstrate an incredible return on investment for donor funds in a community that is underserved by America generally. And so a perfect example is us taking this story on the road and doing Philadelphia tomorrow, and Atlanta in a couple weeks, and Austin and LA soon to come.
And it's, we just need to find, you know, there are people who care about us and our participants. We just need to get in front of them and we need to tell the story. And the more we do that, the more likely we find the extraordinary opportunities that we're looking for.
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah, I love that, right? You know, I think a lot of people, when they think of, you know, volunteerism, when they think of donations, it's always like, oh, I don't, you know, I don't have enough to give, right? But when you look at, you know, time, talents, and treasures, the different capacities in which you can actually make an impact in your organization, right?
Like, it's not just check writing, it's, hey, get us in a room, introduce us to people. How about, you know, our main mission, right? I guarantee you, everybody knows some special operations veteran or spouse or a member of the intelligence community who's struggling, right?
Like, it's as simple as connect them to us for that.
[Jeff Conroy]
Exactly, host an event, introduce us to your brother-in-law who may have a connection. And, you know, these seemingly small things, they start to snowball when you put them into a process. Perfect example, you know, there's never, it's never too early to support an organization.
It doesn't matter if it's $10 a month or if it's $1,000. And so, you know, our goal is, again, community storytelling and outcomes. How are we enabling outcomes for SF and IC operators to be able to have the opportunity that they deserve after 15, 20, 25 years of extraordinary service and experience to be able to enjoy their family lives, be able to balance the stresses that we all deal with, to remove the risk of anything bad happening as a result of trauma.
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah.
[Jeff Conroy]
So, yeah.
[Matt Weaver]
Quite the mission, right? Quite the mission.
[Jeff Conroy]
It's incredible. And it's not a, you know, the, this is not a person, a personality-driven thing. This is a team and process.
Sure. And the stars of this operation are the people that we treat, right? And I think we've been very successful in highlighting the stories of these participants in a way that say, what are those guys doing?
Because we need to do more of that. So that's, that's what we're trying to do.
[Matt Weaver]
I love that. So we're going to close each episode with three specific questions. Now I'll preface this with simply saying, you know, you know, trauma, trauma is trauma and it doesn't matter if it was on the battlefield or, you know, in the home life.
And so with these questions, just think of, you know, reflect on your life and question one, what does healing mean to you today?
[Jeff Conroy]
Oh, great question. So I think healing means being able to own your bad experiences or whatever you've had to deal with and focus it in a way that moves you forward. Right.
And it doesn't mean you forget about it, but it means you don't work for it. It works for you. And so healing for me and trauma that I've had to deal with is, acknowledge it shaped who you are, acknowledge that it makes you stronger, acknowledge that you won't be in control of it all the time and move on and do better.
[Matt Weaver]
Love that. Number two, what advice would you give someone struggling, but not ready to ask for help?
[Jeff Conroy]
Struggling and not ready to ask for help is start to look inside. You've got to, you've got to figure out what your priorities are in your life. And most likely that's going to be the most important people to you.
And so if you're not ready to do it for you, think about the one or two people in your life that deserve you to be ready to do it. Right. And so the folks you love want you to succeed.
And so the sooner you figure that out, you will be ready to take a step.
[Matt Weaver]
Yeah. Yeah. Last question.
What does impact look like in your life now?
[Jeff Conroy]
You know, impact for me is, is purpose, belonging, and, and evidence. And so I would say, uh, having spent most of my life trying to create companies or find financial success, now my purpose is, is really using resources to multiply good effects. And that is, you know, how do you, how do you, how do you just amplify doing good and helping people?
Right. Um, I also think that, um, impact is if you can do it a little, you can do it a lot. So how do you figure out how to find scale?
And maybe that's my, my entrepreneur's mind of, Hey, if we can do this a hundred times, we can do it a thousand, we can do it a thousand, we can do it 10,000. Um, and then evidence is that, you know, um, I have, uh, you know, most people who know me, I love to say I'm 90% driven by optimism and 10% driven by spite. And I will, if you said something mean to me on October 7th of 2001, I will remember what it was.
Um, so evidence to me means we've got to have the data, we've got to have the language, we've got to have the stories, and we've got to have the participants who validate what we're doing, why we're doing it, and that it's helping. And so, so to me, you know, really purpose, impact, evidence, that's what it means.
[Matt Weaver]
Well, you've heard it straight from the horse's mouth, right? Jeff Conroy, CEO of the Operator Relief Fund, about to celebrate a huge milestone in treating a thousand operators and spouses, the goal of 10,000, right? My, I have two asks for the audience.
If you know of a special operations spouse or intelligence community member who might be struggling, have them reach out, www.operatorrelieffund.org. They can request support, get connected with our team, and we'll get them connected to the exact resources that Jeff was just highlighting. And then number two, if you want to be a part of this mission, right?
Jeff set us an ambitious goal of 10,000, right? And you, you've seen the man, you know, the story behind how we can achieve that, but the reality is we need your help. And so if you're in a position to help, same thing, go check out our website, connect with us, learn more.
This has been the Operator Relief Fund podcast series, Stories with an Impact, powered by Kairosoft. Jeff, thanks for being with us.
[Jeff Conroy]
Great job, Matt. Thanks.