Are You Looking Hard Enough for America's Hidden Talent?
Civic-minded businesses such as Sweet Beginnings are demonstrating that people from underserved communities have a lot to offer startups that are looking for people with entrepreneurial mindsets.
BY HOWARD
TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH
INVESTORS@TULLMAN
There's an old line attributed to various authors (science
fiction writer William Gibson gets my vote) that "the future is already
here - it's just not evenly distributed." To a very large extent,
notwithstanding bold and impressive efforts by organizations like Comcast creating its Lift Zones and
other such efforts, you could say the same thing about ubiquitous connectivity
in general. We think the web is everywhere, but that's just because most of us
live in a bubble where the web exists.
I'm not talking about the three billion people globally who will
be added to the Internet by 2030 according to the United Nations - that's an
exciting prospect and one that will enrich the lives of millions throughout
Asia, Africa and Latin America as well as creating extensive new markets and
exponential demand for U.S. developed-and-delivered digital products and
services. What I'm talking about -- and far more troubled by -- are the tens of
millions of people in our own backyards who lack ready and consistent access to
the web and to the education, connection, community, and employment
opportunities such access can provide.
This isn't purely an unselfish concern. These underserved
populations (which are massively minority) are untapped markets of young,
diverse, and hungry talent that our country and our companies will need over
the next several decades just to keep up with the world. A world in which, in
case anyone has missed it, isn't sitting still or waiting for us to lead any longer. Government
statistics just prior to the pandemic made it clear that the pace of creating
new startups had slowed significantly while they continue to fail at about the
same rate. There were plenty of new business formed during the pandemic, technically,
but we're going to have to wait to see whether those entities are around in
another year or two or whether they were just a lot of unemployed or unemployable people kidding
themselves.
This is not net good news for our nation. We've got a solid
business and a substantial moral obligation to bring far more people with us
into the promises of the digital future. And, here again, this is not really a
choice - it's essential and inevitable. In fact, it would be hard to imagine
the adverse consequences and the political implications of a continued failure
to serve and provide fairly and adequately for all our
citizens - especially when, as the MAGA morons fear, the U.S. is likely to be
majority minority by 2045.
But the good news is that, if you're willing to invest the time
and trouble to look, you will find that it makes a great sense for startups and
rapidly growing businesses to look for new and untested talent in diverse and
different areas. Because, lo and behold, there's a wealth of
unrecognized, unlabeled, and underappreciated entrepreneurial talent right
under our noses.
Talent is universal, but opportunity is not.
Don't feel bad about missing the boat. It hasn't sailed just
yet, and many of these folks themselves don't know what they know and what
amazing skills and talents they have. If only those abilities were identified,
encouraged, and appreciated. You can teach someone any kind of technology, and
even all the skills needed to build a business; but you can't teach them to
have the passion, perseverance, and desire required of a successful
entrepreneur. And, of course, you need to give them the chance, the access, and
the opportunity to show the world what they can do. Just like the future,
entrepreneurial talent is everywhere if you know where to look.
I realize that we hear this same kind of conversation regularly
and that it all sounds swell, but it's much rarer to see businesses putting
their money where their mouths are and really trying to prove the basic
proposition. One organization in Chicago is doing just that and providing an
interesting model for social and civic entrepreneurs across America. Led by Brenda
Palms, Sweet Beginnings runs the beelove café and
uses the production of honey-based products to provide job training to
community residents who, due to former incarceration or other circumstances, have
found it difficult to procure gainful employment. By providing training and
transitional, stable jobs for its clients, SB prepares them to
eventually move into more mainstream employment. They're equipped with the
tools, abilities, and attitudes which they'll need to be successful.
And they and the program have been quite successful to date.
Some 75% of Sweet Beginnings workers transition to regular employment after
three months in the program and more than 75% remain in their new positions for
more than 180 days. Interestingly enough, whether it's the reality of the new
gig world or the low rate of unemployment or the great resignation or quiet
quitting, these SB employee retention numbers are actually far more favorable
than those presently being experienced by traditional businesses in general.
In addition, in the last seven years, fewer than 6% of the
workers have returned to prison in a state where the overall recidivism rate is
about 52%. Without overstating the case, in today's erratic employment economy,
where large segments of the workforce are beyond fluid and transient, having
new employees who are loyal, reliable and, above all, grateful for the second
chance to work hard and make something of their lives is a tremendously
attractive source of talent for young businesses. Probably more than most,
these folks appreciate both the risks of starting something new and
untraditional and also the possible rewards available in a results-oriented
culture where your ultimate success depends on your own commitment and efforts
rather than on your past.
But the most remarkable thing that you learn in listening to
their stories is that, whether they knew it or not, they've had to be
entrepreneurial in their own journeys, employing many of the same attitudes,
skills, and talents that the best entrepreneurs rely upon every day as well.
They were never afraid of hard work or unwilling to take risks in order to get
ahead; they learned to pick themselves up and keep going even after the hardest
of knocks, and they never gave up on their dreams.
They were, however, in their heart of hearts lacking one thing.
In their most honest moments, they'd admit that they didn't really believe in
themselves or think that they were good and worthwhile people. Not such a giant
step from the impostor syndrome that every entrepreneur occasionally faces.
What ultimately turned them around is when they discovered through the Bee Love
program that others - caring strangers - actually could and did believe in them
and in their prospects for a safe, stable and secure future. They had a
second chance if they were as willing to invest in themselves as others were
willing to help them along the way.
Brenda Palms tells a story about a former drug dealer entering
the SB program who confessed that he didn't know how to do much of anything and
that he worried that he lacked the skills needed to succeed. She explained to
him that, in fact, his prior "work," while not legal, involved many
of the organizational, leadership, and planning skills required of any good
business. And that he was actually pretty adept at those things. He had what it
took to do the jobs if he had the desire and the will to put himself out there
and try. The transition wouldn't be smooth or easy, but he'd have peers who'd
been in the same places and made the same journey by his side.