A Business with a Mission: Construction Firm that Aids Veterans Grows with Bond Producer’s Guidance
HIEN MANH “HT” Tran understands firsthand the problems faced by service members leaving the military; his own life-threatening injuries, suffered while he was serving in Iraq, changed his life. Six years ago, when he started San Francisco-based Anvil Builders with two partners, one of his primary missions was to provide good jobs for veterans and to help them make a successful transition to civilian life.
Tran’s determination to build a solid business and to make a difference for other veterans has gained him the respect and support of many people in the construction industry. One of them is Mark Munekawa, Senior Vice President of Surety at Woodruff-Sawyer & Co. in San Francisco. Munekawa helped Tran’s fledgling company receive the surety program it needed to secure work and has provided advice and guidance that has helped Anvil Builders grow.
“HT has done things the right way,” said Munekawa. “He is building an organization that we hope will continue to grow and prosper as a sustainable business.”
Tran, the son of Vietnamese immigrants, has always had a desire to serve, so he chose to enlist in the Army infantry after earning a college degree in marketing. “As infantry guys, we were known as the jack of all trades,” he said. “People always ask me why I chose construction; it really comes from my survival of my deployment in Iraq.”
In May 2008, Tran and his captain suffered life-threatening injuries when an improvised explosive device exploded. Both survived, but Tran lost his right eye and had a titanium rod permanently implanted in his left femur. He spent 15 months recovering at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
“Dealing with the injury was the easy part,” he said. More difficult was contemplating a return to civilian life; he had told his family a short time before that he would be making the……
Read the full article at SURETY BOND QUARTERLY | WINTER 2016