As an arts writer who frequently interviews playwrights, choreographers and musicians and a business writer who often sits down with entrepreneurs, I’ve noticed some striking similarities.

First, these are driven people. Vexed by a vision, propelled by a purpose, these folks often make your hair stand on end by the sheer magnitude of their attempts to connect their work to the world at large.

The best in both fields often are also extremely independent, some might say bull-headed, ready to charge ahead in the face of naysayers, confident in their vision.

Also, entrepreneurs and artists need an audience, feed off the feedback and get better as they adjust to what excites emotions or piques the intellect.

The only difference, you might say, is that entrepreneurs often make millions, while artists generally do not. But in my 40-plus years interviewing people who are successful at both art and business, my observation is that making money is often only a byproduct of listening to their audiences, taking them seriously and adjusting accordingly.

For many, even the ones who have made millions, the money is only secondary to the excitement of creating something new.

Take the cases of the artist and entrepreneur I interviewed last week in New London, 46-year-old writer and film producer Alessandro Andriulli of Rocky Hill and manufacturing entrepreneur Bill Leahy of Quaker Hill.

Andriulli, who works frequently in the New London and Mystic areas with a variety of movie makers including Firesite Films in Groton, is currently working on a visual poem film project “Open Letter” he hopes to see to completion by the end of the year. Leahy, whom I’ve written about before, just finished launching Renaissance Reliability, a company that tries to connect military veterans with manufacturing jobs.

Coincidentally, both men are in the process of fundraising to support their projects. Leahy, in his late 30s, hopes to produce an educational film to be shown in March during a reliability conference at the University of Tennessee at which he will be a keynote speaker, and Andriulli is doing a $9,000 crowdfunding campaign (seedandspark.com/fund/open-letter) for his project, which will include dance and music as well as a powerful poem he wrote.

Though neither of these men knows the other, both projects were seeded by trauma. In the case of Leahy, the death late last year of his older brother Sean by suicide after a career in the military got him thinking about what he could do for veterans; for Andriulli, he said it was his experience of childhood sexual abuse at the hands of a trusted physician working out of St. Francis Hospital & Medical Center, associated with the Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford.

Andriulli said he repressed thoughts of his sexual abuse for years, and it was only after a cache of pornographic photos of children was discovered at the late Dr. George Reardon’s former home that he began to piece together his own shattered life, with the help of therapy. Andriulli said he has suffered with disassociative identity disorder, sometimes known as a split personality, which led him to become emotionally closed to other people.

Now he hopes to start conversations about the effects of trauma by showing his short film to various groups and then talking about the path to healing. The film revolves around a poem Andriulli wrote about 10 years ago, shortly after realizing he had been abused and who his abuser was.

He hopes to start filming within the next month, mostly in the Hartford and Bloomfield area. Choreographer and creative co-director Jolet Creary, owner of Studio 860 dance school in Bloomfield, will be a big part of the project, he said, and dancers depicted in the film will represent Andriulli’s experience as both a child and an adult.

“I want to inspire other folks who have gone through trauma,” he told me. “This piece is basically like a victim statement.”

Leahy, a retired military officer, also is looking to help trauma victims, specifically veterans who are at risk of suicide upon their return home because of isolation and a lack of purpose. His solution is to help find them meaningful jobs in an industry that rewards their loyalty, attention to detail and adherence to step-by-step processes.

His company, Renaissance Reliability LLC, just graduated its first class of veterans Aug. 10 from on-the-job training at a manufacturing plant in Green Bay, Wisc., offering academic credit at the University of Tennessee. He said a second cohort of veterans will start training in November, likely at a Weyerhaeuser manufacturing site.

Leahy’s program is tied to Skillbridge, a U.S. Department of Defense program that connects veterans transitioning out of the military into training programs and jobs.

His ultimate goal is to see about 200 veterans a year receive training in reliability, which he sees as a key way to drive America’s manufacturing industry forward to overtake other countries that are currently dominating. And with 200,000 veterans retiring every year, he sees a fantastic opportunity for companies like Electric Boat, Lockheed Martin, Georgia Pacific and Weyerhaeuser to tap into a new pool of talent.

“We have a model that works.” Leahy said confidently. “It’s an unbelievable program.”

Now Leahy, an expert in reliability engineering sought out by key manufacturers, wants to fund a series of films about the program that he hopes will spread the word nationwide. Having spent a lot of his own money to get his company off the ground, Leahy is reaching out to the public to help back three films: one educational, for an academic audience interested in manufacturing, and two others that would be more documentary in nature for different types of audiences (see https://www.unturningsteel.com/ for information).

So in the end both Leahy and Andriulli are looking at filmmaking as a way to open eyes and drive societal change. The entrepreneur and the artist ― I guess they really are one and the same.

Lee Howard is The Day’s business editor. To reach him, email l.howard@theday.com.