Veterans Run the Fortune 500: Four CEOs Forged in Uniform

Jim Taiclet logged more than 5,000 flight hours as an Air Force pilot before running Lockheed Martin, the defense giant ranked No. 61 on the Fortune 500. Roughly one in five of its 120,000 employees is also a veteran, according to the company.

This Veterans Day, several Fortune 500 CEOs said the habits they built in uniform—attention to detail, accountability, composure under pressure—still drive how they lead thousands of workers.

How did Taiclet's Air Force years shape Lockheed Martin?

Taiclet grew up in a military family and attended the U.S. Air Force Academy. He flew the Lockheed C-141B Starlifter from 1985 to 1991, including missions during the Gulf War.

The job put enormous responsibility on him early. "In my mid-twenties, I was commanding multi-million dollar aircraft and experienced air crews on classified missions all over the world," he said in a 2017 interview, when he ran American Tower. "On a few of these, the mission briefer's parting words were, 'If anything happens, we never heard of you.'"

He left the Air Force for a consulting role at McKinsey, then held leadership posts at Pratt & Whitney and Honeywell. He became CEO of American Tower in 2020's predecessor move—in 2004—and took the top job at Lockheed Martin in 2020.

Taiclet argues veterans offer more than technical skill. "If you learn those skills about responsibility, leadership by example when you're in your 20s and you can actually take those forward your whole career," he told CNBC in 2023. "The mission dedication that you have whether it's Lockheed Martin or any other company—[if] you get a veteran on your team, they're going to be committed."

What did Darren Rebelez carry from the Gulf War to Casey's?

Rebelez has led Casey's General Stores, No. 282 on the Fortune 500, since 2019. He graduated from West Point in 1988 and spent three years as an infantry officer, including a Gulf War deployment to Saudi Arabia.

His first civilian job was restaurant manager at KFC. He then moved through leadership roles at ExxonMobil, 7-Eleven and IHOP before taking over the convenience-store chain, now valued around $25 billion.

"West Point was where I learned leadership," he told Chief Executive in 2024. "A lot of people think of it as a liberal arts school or an engineering school, but it's really a leadership school that teaches you all that other stuff."

His formula starts with trust: listening to employees, treating them with respect and giving them the tools to succeed. "80 percent of leadership is just showing up," he said. "If you're not there, you can't lead."

In a 2023 Spencer Stuart report, he listed what service instills: "In the military, you learn resiliency, for sure. That, along with toughness, mission focus, work ethic, teamwork, a can-do attitude, decisiveness. Those are all things that I think fit really well in any sort of leadership role."

What drives Advance Auto Parts' Shane O'Kelly?

O'Kelly leads Advance Auto Parts, No. 461 on the Fortune 500. He graduated from West Point in 1990 with a degree in mathematical economics and served seven years as an Army infantry officer. He then earned an MBA from Harvard and worked at McKinsey and The Home Depot before reaching the C-suite.

His leadership style leans on Army lessons: humility, listening, leading from the front. "You have to be able to follow before you can lead and you have to listen before you can talk," he told Business North Carolina in 2024. "And don't ask people to do anything you wouldn't be prepared to do yourself."

Why does Sempra's Jeffrey Martin build leaders, not followers?

Martin heads energy infrastructure company Sempra and its roughly 20,000 employees. The Iran Hostage Crisis pushed him toward service; he entered West Point in 1980, earned a general engineering degree and was commissioned in 1984. His unit helped defend Western Europe against a potential Soviet threat. He left the Army as a captain in December 1989.

"People often make the mistake of associating leadership with creating followership, and unfortunately that can lead to an over-reliance on one's title or position in an organization to accomplish things," he said in a 2022 Sempra Q&A. "Instead, what is far more important is being intentional about creating new leaders at every level of an organization."

That logic travels, he argued: "Whether your focus is on winning on the battlefield or in corporate America, leadership is all about raising up those around you and bringing out the best in people, teams and organizations." With veteran talent already embedded at firms like Lockheed—one in five employees—the pipeline from service to the C-suite shows no sign of slowing.