Hans Prahl has found the challenge and support he craved after a career in the military and as an entrepreneur
Hans Prahl
He had skills, he had experience, but Hans Prahl had no idea what to do with any of it.
Lost. Burnt out. Battling PTSD. Recently sober.
Prahl was a Marine and National Guard vet trying to rebuild his life. But he needed some direction, some practical application.
“I’m a fairly intelligent person and have a lot of drive. I know how to accomplish things and problem solve,” Prahl said. “I wanted to put myself in an environment where I was around people of the same caliber, of the same desire, of the same drive.
“Something I learned a long time ago is if you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room. I try to live by that.”
He found what he was looking for when he opened the door to the Daniels College of Business Executive MBA (EMBA), a part-time, 18-month and—importantly—in-person program, tailored to the strengths and needs of long-tenured professionals.
The curriculum is derived from each student’s lived senior leadership experience. Classes equip senior leaders with the tools they need to handle relevant, complex business issues, from leading large-scale change to balancing the needs of diverse stakeholders to confronting difficult ethical decisions.
It’s a cohort-based model, where students learn as much from their peers as they do from their world-class faculty. Together, they take on a sailing challenge in San Diego, a global trip to a country of their choosing and a social impact project with a nonprofit.
“This Executive MBA program is exactly what I’m supposed to be doing,” Prahl said. “I’m in the right place at the right time with the right people for the right reasons.”
Hans Prahl deployed to Afghanistan in 2002 and Iraq in 2009.
A wide-ranging resume
Prahl wasn’t always so motivated by the classroom. At 19 years old, he was living in his parents’ basement, after failing out of college. Things began to change after watching the Oscar-nominated movie “A Few Good Men,” which tells the story of two court-martialed U.S. Marines. The next morning, Prahl was sitting in a recruiting office; two weeks later, he was at Marine bootcamp.
Prahl excelled. He graduated as a platoon honor man, at the very top of his class, and became a Russian linguist. Almost immediately after his Marine career ended, Prahl enlisted in the National Guard, motivated by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He deployed to Afghanistan in 2002 and Iraq in 2009.
Life after service comprised a wide variety of jobs, from government contracting to construction to “digging holes,” in Prahl’s words. He also developed a passion for brewing beer.
“I started in plastic buckets in my backyard,” he said of his brewing hobby. “I woke up one day and said, ‘Let’s start a brewery.’ So I did it all on my own. Self-funded. I did everything from scratch.”
Florence Brewing Company became known as a friendly oasis serving simple, sumptuous beer.
‘Rebooting’ a career
After a decade behind the bar—and a brief stint in the restaurant business—Prahl was looking to level up.
So, he went back to “bootcamp.”
“That’s kind of what it feels like,” Prahl said, comparing the EMBA to his experience with the Marines, “because it’s tailored toward, ‘let’s take all the stuff you’ve learned, let’s shape it, let’s hone it, let’s concentrate it and focus it, and then let’s direct that toward what you want to do.’”
The journey has already been immensely enriching and fulfilling.
He loves coming to class—despite a six-hour roundtrip drive from Westcliffe, Colorado—where he feels he can show up as his full, authentic self. He connects easily with other veterans in the program, as well as his civilian classmates, all of whom are pushing toward a similar objective.
“I’m not doing this to check boxes or just get a piece of paper,” Prahl said. “I’m putting a lot of effort into this because I realize what I put in, I get out. I learn so well from my other cohort members. Being in class with those people really helps you absorb the material and [provides you with] different perspectives and viewpoints that you wouldn’t normally get.”
Above all, Prahl says he feels supported. He’s tapped EMBA faculty and staff to help him map his future, and knows he will lean on an expansive network of Daniels alumni when he graduates.
“It’s exactly what I need,” he said. “I have belief in myself that I have the ability to do whatever I want to do.”