DoD SkillBridge · HOH Corporate Fellowship
DoD SkillBridge · Community

Community Builder Fellow

Build the community of transitioning service members PowerTechs is here to serve — twelve weeks, on active-duty pay, in a role built to convert into an offer.

Austin, TX · hybrid 12 weeks Active-duty pay continues Mid/senior professional
Apply » 2 minutes · no résumé needed to start
Heads up: you can create your profile on your phone, but the skills assessment needs a laptop or desktop. Start now, finish step 2 when you're at a computer.

About PowerTechs

PowerTechs is an Austin workforce-tech company. Our game-like assessment measures the durable skills transitioning service members already have and translates them into what civilian employers screen for. We are an approved DoD SkillBridge provider.

The fellowship

A mid/senior professional placement: roughly four days a week with our team, one day on HOH cohort huddles if you're placed through the Corporate Fellowship Program. You own a real function, and strong performance is designed to lead to an offer.

One note on timing. Community-building has the most leverage once there's an active user base to build around. This role works best for someone who wants to help stand that up — not someone who wants to maintain something that already runs.

Why this role exists

The people we serve are veterans and transitioning service members. The person building that community should be one of them. You'll turn our earliest users into an engaged community and a feedback loop that makes the product sharper.

What you'll do

  • Grow and steward the community of veteran and transitioning-service-member users — recruit early users, onboard them, and keep them engaged.
  • Build the feedback loop: gather what users experience in the assessment and route it clearly to product, so the simulator keeps getting closer to the real transition.
  • Recruit and support a first set of community ambassadors and advocates from within the fellowship and veteran networks.
  • Create lightweight community touchpoints — office hours, small events, base-adjacent meetups at Fort Cavazos and Joint Base San Antonio, and online spaces where members actually show up.
  • Partner with Employer Outreach so that a growing, credible community becomes proof in employer conversations.

Check yourself against the requirements

Hard gate
DoD SkillBridge eligibility

This fellowship is for transitioning service members within 180 days of separation who can get their command's approval. Everything else on this page is something we can work with; this one we can't.

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Tick what applies to you. It takes ten seconds and tells you whether this fellowship is worth your time before you start an application.

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What success looks like at 12 weeks

A small but genuinely engaged core community. A working feedback channel into the product. And a first group of advocates who bring the next members in.

Sound like your next twelve weeks?

Create your profile »

How this works

01 Create your PowerTechs profile Name, service branch, separation date, and how you're coming through — HOH Corporate Fellowship or SkillBridge directly. No résumé, no cover letter. 2 minutes · phone or computer
02 Run Operation Compass A game-based skills assessment set in a scenario you'll recognize. You make calls under time pressure; the system reads how you reason, communicate, and coordinate. ~15 minutes · laptop or desktop required
03 We read your profile against this role Your skill profile plus the experience you're bringing gets weighed against what this fellowship actually demands. We reply either way. Every applicant hears back
04 Talk to the team A direct conversation with the founder, with your skill profile already on the table — so it starts at what you can do rather than at translating your service record. Founder-level conversation

The assessment

Operation Compass

PowerTechs isn't a résumé screen — and we don't make an exception for our own hires. Before we talk, you run a short mission set on a forward operating base. An air-defense site loses its data link to AWACS. You work the problem with your squad, under a clock, making the same kind of calls you've made for real.

Every decision feeds a skill profile. It's the same assessment we ask employers to trust, so it would be strange to hire off anything else.

Operation Compass mission start: an overhead view of a forward operating base with aircraft, helicopters, hangars and fuel storage.
The mission starts on the ground you know. No abstract puzzles and no personality quiz — a working base, a squad, and a data link to AWACS that went dark at 0600.
A decision point in Operation Compass with four response options, a countdown timer, and a live skill profile panel showing scores for analytical reasoning, communication, team coordination, problem-solving, adaptive learning and composure.
Your skill profile builds as you play. Eight decisions, roughly fifteen minutes. What you choose — and how you handle a fix that created a new problem — is what we read before the first call.

What the assessment maps to in this role

The six skills Operation Compass measures aren't generic soft skills. Here's what each one predicts in this role.

Measured in the missionUsed in this fellowship
Team CoordinationHolding a community together when everyone in it is mid-transition and pulled in four directions.
Clear CommunicationRunning a group conversation and a one-on-one with equal ease, and being understood in both.
Analytical ReasoningHearing forty pieces of user feedback and working out which three the product should act on.
Resourceful Problem-SolvingStanding up office hours, meetups, and online spaces from a blank page, with an early-stage budget.
Adaptive LearningAn early-stage company changes weekly. What worked last month is evidence, not instruction.
Composure Under PressureSupporting people through the hardest part of their transition while you're going through your own.
SkillBridge participation needs your command's approval, and that paperwork takes time. Start as early as your window allows — applying now costs you nothing and holds your place while approval moves.

Questions people ask first

Is this paid?

Not by PowerTechs — that's how SkillBridge works. You remain on active-duty pay and benefits for the full twelve weeks while you work here.

Does it actually turn into a job?

It's offered with genuine intent to hire the right person, and strong performance is designed to lead to an offer. It isn't a guarantee, and we'd rather say so plainly than imply otherwise.

How big is the community today?

Small — we're early. That's the honest answer, and it's why the role exists. If you want to inherit a running community, this isn't that job. If you want to stand one up, it is.

Do I need a résumé?

No. Your profile plus the assessment is the application. Add a résumé or LinkedIn later if you want to — nothing is blocked without one.

How long does the assessment take, and can I do it on my phone?

About fifteen minutes, and it needs a laptop or desktop — the mission environment doesn't run properly on a phone. Create your profile from your phone now and come back to it at a computer.

Do I have to be in Austin?

The fellowship is hybrid out of Austin and remote-friendly. Tell us your situation when you create your profile.

My SkillBridge window hasn't opened yet. Should I still apply?

Yes. Create your profile and run the assessment now — your skill profile doesn't expire, and we'll line the start up with your separation date.

Twelve weeks, a real function, and a team that already knows what you can do.

Start your application · 2 min
You'll be asked for your separation date and whether you're coming through HOH or SkillBridge directly.

This is a DoD SkillBridge fellowship with PowerTechs. It is unpaid by the employer: you remain on active-duty pay and benefits for the twelve weeks. PowerTechs is an approved DoD SkillBridge provider.

SkillBridge participation requires approval from your chain of command. PowerTechs cannot authorize your SkillBridge window on your behalf.