Full Transcript for From Running a $1.3B Corp to Growing Homeboy Industries to $35M with CEO Tom Vozzo

--> 00:04:26.682 In many ways I thought I hit the top of my career, did everything I ever wanted to do. 00:04:27.283 --> 00:04:30.250 Successful in the business speak way of thinking about it. 00:04:30.250 --> 00:04:36.584 Being a corporate executive has a certain shelf life and I had a yearning to do something more different in my life. 00:04:36.584 --> 00:04:41.569 I love businesses, I've always loved businesses, and I think well-run companies are good for our society. 00:04:41.569 --> 00:04:51.413 So as I left Airmark, I was never going to leave the business world aside, but I didn't want to be that guy who spent their whole career just climbing the corporate ladder and going around the country. 00:04:51.413 --> 00:04:52.762 But I was looking. 00:04:52.824 --> 00:05:06.810 I had a yearning to do something different and so a friend of mine who was on the board of Salvation Army with me, of Los Angeles, invited me down to Homegirl Cafe and I can still remember that lunch 11 years ago, like it was yesterday. 00:05:07.480 --> 00:05:16.884 So I'm sitting there at Homegirl Cafe which is, by the way, we're at homeboy industries, where we help former gang members and felons leave that life behind and change your life in a positive way. 00:05:16.884 --> 00:05:19.807 We do that in the context of a job and we have businesses. 00:05:19.807 --> 00:05:21.685 One of our businesses is Homegirl Cafe. 00:05:21.685 --> 00:05:28.012 It's a cafe run by mostly women and it's run fully by gang members and felons. 00:05:28.012 --> 00:05:33.667 And so I remember sitting there with Victor having lunch and back to my for profit world. 00:05:33.667 --> 00:05:38.064 I had in my businesses, acquired 40 companies over the past 10 years. 00:05:38.064 --> 00:05:44.228 So you get a certain sense for a good workforce is what companies you want to acquire and what companies you want to partner with. 00:05:44.228 --> 00:05:53.172 But I remember they were sitting with Victor having lunch, looking around and looking at the workers and just observing and seeing how they were heads down doing a good job. 00:05:53.172 --> 00:05:54.678 They were smiling at customers. 00:05:54.899 --> 00:05:58.108 Did you know the mission of the restaurant when you went there? 00:05:58.108 --> 00:05:58.891 Never heard of Homeboy. 00:05:59.884 --> 00:06:03.319 Victor said I wanted to sort of bring you down and talk about this nonprofit. 00:06:03.319 --> 00:06:06.228 Clearly you wanted to get me involved and be on the board. 00:06:06.228 --> 00:06:24.833 And so I'm looking around and seeing that here's a thriving business and I'm also realizing, back in my corporate job, I would have never hired any one of those folks because they had tattoos on their face and criminal records and there had been party gangs. 00:06:24.833 --> 00:06:27.548 So it's like we just never would have hired them. 00:06:27.548 --> 00:06:33.906 And yeah, I'm seeing that in the context of a job they're helping Homeboys, helping these

folks move their life forward. 00:06:34.040 --> 00:06:39.826 And so when Victor asked me to get involved and be on the board, I had done enough work on nonprofit boards. 00:06:39.826 --> 00:06:53.090 I wanted to really do something different and I very much admire the folks at the Salvation Army who dedicate their careers and their life to kind of serving people without food or without housing. 00:06:53.090 --> 00:07:00.263 And so I kind of thought do I have that sort of skill set or ability to do so anyway? 00:07:00.263 --> 00:07:03.251 So I said to Victor I don't want to be on the board but I'm willing to volunteer. 00:07:03.251 --> 00:07:17.211 And because Homeboy had struggling business at the time and I was an old guy with gray hair business experience, I started as a volunteer, but it was only to learn more about how Homeboy really helps people move their life forward. 00:07:17.211 --> 00:07:19.927 That kind of launched me into my Homeboy career. 00:07:20.819 --> 00:07:25.732 And when you say at the time they were struggling, like paint that picture, like what did that look like? 00:07:25.792 --> 00:07:31.033 then so Homeboy at the time about 11 million dollar a year, nonprofit. 00:07:31.033 --> 00:07:42.652 Two years prior if anybody is living in LA who's hearing this, they'll have remembered that two years prior Homeboy went to a very public near bankruptcy, near running out of money to do its mission. 00:07:42.652 --> 00:07:54.870 A lot of foundations dove into help, had funding for a couple of years, but then that money was running low and running out, matter of fact, and the board was concerned about and moved this forward. 00:07:54.870 --> 00:08:03.973 And so Father Greg and the board decided they need somebody else to kind of help come in and find a way of financially getting on solid footing. 00:08:03.973 --> 00:08:06.853 And so I just look, I've learned and we'll talk about that. 00:08:06.853 --> 00:08:08.280 I've learned so much about homeboying, about life. 00:08:08.280 --> 00:08:12.775 I just feel lucky that they needed somebody like me at that time with those skills. 00:08:12.775 --> 00:08:23.855 I had to come in and help out and it's the sort of clear edge of my life to be part of this community and actually add value by doing something I just know how to do is run businesses. 00:08:24.841 --> 00:08:25.443 That's amazing. 00:08:25.443 --> 00:08:32.879 So when you first started and you said you were going to volunteer, was it in the capacity as an unpaid CEO or was there a different role? 00:08:32.879 --> 00:08:33.279 That was first. 00:08:33.279 --> 00:08:35.284 No, it was really in the capacity of volunteer of. 00:08:35.806 --> 00:08:39.314 let me back up still to this day, homeboy is an interesting collection of. 00:08:39.314 --> 00:08:51.259 We have a set of social enterprise businesses and we're also human services, nonprofit agencies, so all the full amount of wraparound services you need to get someone who reenters back

into society from the prison system. 00:08:51.259 --> 00:08:57.279 Case management, navigation, tattoo removal, anger management, substance abuse, therapy all those things we do as well. 00:08:57.279 --> 00:09:00.749 So we're two things in one legal structure. 00:09:00.749 --> 00:09:10.429 And so at the time the businesses were sort of costing too much running relative to the programs, and so they needed somebody to kind of help straighten the ship on the business side. 00:09:10.429 --> 00:09:12.073 So I started volunteering running the businesses. 00:09:12.780 --> 00:09:15.125 At the same time homeboy was going through another financial crunch. 00:09:15.125 --> 00:09:21.279 Consultant who was working with the board kind of whispered to Father Greg hey, you might want to ask Tom to come and help out. 00:09:21.279 --> 00:09:30.174 And so too much later I'm sitting with Father Greg's office and we're chatting and he asks me to come in to be the first CEO of homeboy ever had. 00:09:30.174 --> 00:09:32.665 And I kind of say, well, I have to think about it Now. 00:09:32.665 --> 00:09:36.744 I don't think many people have ever said no to Father Greg To me. 00:09:36.744 --> 00:09:40.111 I just wanted to make sure, hey, I want to do a gut check For sure. 00:09:40.111 --> 00:09:42.222 Do I want to go work at a nonprofit? 00:09:42.242 --> 00:09:48.270 You know I went from big time jobs to now doing this nonprofit work to the need. 00:09:48.270 --> 00:09:53.384 Somebody with more nonprofit experience than me because I'm a for-profit type guy Did he want it? 00:09:53.384 --> 00:09:54.045 Did the board want it? 00:09:54.045 --> 00:09:58.164 So I went through all those things and a week later sat down his office. 00:09:58.164 --> 00:10:02.273 I couldn't pass up the opportunity to be in the same orbit with Father Greg for a little bit of time. 00:10:02.273 --> 00:10:04.241 Yeah, so I said yes and I. 00:10:04.241 --> 00:10:06.466 You know I say this quite a bit again. 00:10:06.466 --> 00:10:08.972 It kind of reflects on where I was coming from to now. 00:10:09.943 --> 00:10:12.279 Look, I went into this role with all the hubris of a corporate CEO. 00:10:12.279 --> 00:10:19.279 I thought, okay, I'll do this for six months to a year, I'll straighten them up, I'll move things around and then go off and do something different. 00:10:19.279 --> 00:10:21.279 And here I am, 10 years later. 00:10:21.279 --> 00:10:26.259 Just go loving what we do, helping and moving the organization forward. 00:10:26.259 --> 00:10:34.052 You know, now we're three times size, we triple the impact and doing all those things, but it's oh my gosh, it's been the best chapter in my life. 00:10:34.581 --> 00:10:36.252 That's amazing and I want to dive into all that. 00:10:36.272 --> 00:11:20.947 But I think what's actually really interesting and I I did a little thought leadership work with a CEO that retired from a nonprofit recently and she grew the nonprofit from I think it was three to 25 plus million within an eight year period and something that she said that I thought was really profound and smart was it would be really interesting if every for-profit like Fortune 500 CEO had to do a year or two of service leading a nonprofit, like you would, as you were exiting your role, if there was like or in some way like a sabbatical, something in which you took your experience and your skills and you applied them to an organization. 00:11:20.986 --> 00:11:22.228 I don't know how this would happen. 00:11:22.228 --> 00:11:49.649 If there's some sort of like application process of what you could happen, where Fortune 500 CEOs or high level executives could come and literally share their expertise, what do you think I mean, coming from that world and I worked in the for-profit industry too before working with nonprofits what do you think skills, wise as a leader, like when you first started, were really important for you to the things that you saw maybe differently and the things that you were really working with them on to improve from the get go. 00:11:50.440 --> 00:11:51.725 Yeah, man, there's a lot there. 00:11:51.725 --> 00:11:54.333 In fact I'll do a little self promotion here. 00:11:54.333 --> 00:12:12.048 I've learned so much and so I, even from the first year of being a homeboy, I should write a book about how to go back into the for-profit world, what lessons I would take back to the for-profit world that I learned from working with gang members, right and non-profit sense, and so I wrote the book. 00:12:12.048 --> 00:12:14.807 It took me eight years of finally getting around to writing the book. 00:12:14.807 --> 00:12:24.279 That was the genesis of that and it's like there's so much learning about what you take in the non-profit world and about people and about how you treat people. 00:12:24.279 --> 00:12:26.889 How do you motivate people, how do you help people. 00:12:26.889 --> 00:12:30.009 That's really important for the for-profit world to know. 00:12:30.009 --> 00:12:38.253 Similarly, it is equally as important to take in the best practices of the for-profit world into the non-profit space. 00:12:38.253 --> 00:12:54.259 Everything about understanding strategy and tactics, leadership development, organizational design, sort of being, clarity of mission, clarity of description of people's jobs and having those fundamental skill sets are extremely important in both worlds. 00:12:54.259 --> 00:12:58.230 But the non-profit world needs to learn more from the for-profit world. 00:12:59.004 --> 00:13:00.615 I was lucky enough in the for-profit world. 00:13:00.615 --> 00:13:01.279 I was in Aremark Corporation. 00:13:01.279 --> 00:13:04.279 We did food services, uniform services and facility services. 00:13:04.279 --> 00:13:06.104 So nothing sexy. 00:13:06.104 --> 00:13:16.192 It's about a service business, how you grow your businesses by word of mouth and reputation, but how you get good reputation, how well they perform their jobs on

the front line. 00:13:16.192 --> 00:13:23.700 So a lot of what I learned at my corporate job was about management development, talent acquisition, talent development which. 00:13:23.740 --> 00:13:27.150 I've kind of bring in a full boat into the non-profit space. 00:13:27.150 --> 00:15:06.121 So I'm really pleased to say now that 10 years later, over two-thirds of our management team are former clients, People lived experience, people who've gone up from being a client to now being a manager in upper level. 00:15:06.121 --> 00:15:19.413 So that's something you definitely take out of the for-profit world which is really beneficial in what a resource constrained, bandwidth constrained, non-profit has to have Investing back into your people. 00:15:19.413 --> 00:15:20.034 Without a doubt. 00:15:20.836 --> 00:15:22.700 Yeah, absolutely, that's huge, I agree. 00:15:22.700 --> 00:15:40.536 I agree that, unlike the overhead conversation comes up all the time in the non-profit world, which is not discussed in the corporate world, nobody cares what the overhead cost it is to make this hair clip or the iPad, yeah right, right, but it's so talked about in our sector which blows my mind. 00:15:40.536 --> 00:15:41.859 It takes people to do good work. 00:15:42.320 --> 00:15:42.961 Yeah, no, no. 00:15:42.961 --> 00:15:46.158 And then set back to your point about having non-profit. 00:15:46.158 --> 00:15:46.991 We're having for-profit. 00:15:46.991 --> 00:15:49.578 People kind of do a year or two of service. 00:15:49.578 --> 00:15:50.140 That'd be great. 00:15:50.140 --> 00:15:52.503 I mean, it's so much to be learned both ways. 00:15:52.926 --> 00:15:58.821 Absolutely I also want to say a big advocate of people coming out of the for-profit world to enter the non-profit space to help. 00:15:58.821 --> 00:16:02.776 But you have to have a mindset about it, and particularly in a human services agency. 00:16:02.776 --> 00:16:13.081 It's about the person, it's about the individual, and so a lot of us who have jobs and big time jobs in the for-profit world, we come in with, like I said, hubris and expectations. 00:16:13.081 --> 00:16:21.329 Yeah, we know a lot, and what I've come to learn is it's not about wagging your finger at people and telling them exactly what has to get done. 00:16:21.329 --> 00:16:28.820 It's about being in a relationship with them so they can feel positive about who they are and they can move their life forward. 00:16:28.820 --> 00:16:30.403 Yeah, dramatic way. 00:16:31.329 --> 00:16:34.338 Yeah, and I want to talk about that because you mentioned so I was reading, I did some research talk. 00:16:34.338 --> 00:16:47.205 Yeah, yeah, sure, I read a recent article and you shared the important values that make a huge impact on an organization our kinship, second chances, grace, laughter and joy, which I love. 00:16:47.205 --> 00:16:50.998 How do you think each of those are really integrated within Homeboy? 00:16:51.960 --> 00:17:02.766 Yeah, there's all the values we have here at Homeboy and let me say it's been a sort of basic level thing about our clients, all our clients who have our gang involved. 00:17:02.766 --> 00:17:14.559 We have a very narrow client base that they have been incarcerated, jail system, prison system and have been gang affiliated and what we do at Homeboy is we bring them in. 00:17:14.559 --> 00:17:20.587 We have about 400 people clients every day on our payroll so we pay people to work on themselves. 00:17:20.587 --> 00:17:23.519 Essentially we take the toughest of the tough cases. 00:17:23.519 --> 00:17:30.559 You know, father Greg sort of started all these years ago and realized if we're not taking that hardest case out there, no one else is going to take that person. 00:17:30.559 --> 00:17:32.447 So we're helping that person. 00:17:33.020 --> 00:17:35.950 And so all these people are victims of complex trauma. 00:17:35.950 --> 00:17:41.171 They don't have a father or a grandmother who has ever loved them or cared for them. 00:17:41.171 --> 00:17:44.459 They joined a gang thinking it was their family and that's a false hope. 00:17:44.459 --> 00:17:48.459 They get into trouble with the gang and realize the gang kind of sold them out along the way. 00:17:48.459 --> 00:17:50.269 They go to prison. 00:17:50.269 --> 00:17:52.559 They come out and they don't want to go back to that lifestyle. 00:17:52.559 --> 00:17:55.539 They want to actually live what they call a normal life. 00:17:55.539 --> 00:17:57.519 But to draw the gang is great. 00:17:57.519 --> 00:18:01.480 Now we're there on the other side trying to draw them in and lean into their goodness. 00:18:01.480 --> 00:18:13.950 So what really helps people change is the safety of our organization, but also finally, for the first time, having a positive relationship in their life, trusting relationship that we trust them. 00:18:14.660 --> 00:18:17.595 Our secret sauce is kinship, love and non-judgment. 00:18:17.595 --> 00:18:18.559 People walk through our doors. 00:18:18.559 --> 00:18:21.990 We don't care the color of their skin, the tattoo on their face, the felony they had. 00:18:21.990 --> 00:18:24.468 We're going to help them in some sort of way. 00:18:24.468 --> 00:18:32.206 And so it's really, then, this community of those values kinship, not judging giving a second chance. 00:18:32.206 --> 00:18:39.149 Really, for our folks it's a first chance they've ever had to do something and earn an honest day's wage and then lean forward. 00:18:40.504 --> 00:18:45.224 And, to be clear, it's not a sort of everybody doesn't come in, it's all of a sudden change overnight. 00:18:45.224 --> 00:19:02.350 Of course, it is a two-step forward, one-step back, two-step forward, one-step back along the way, but we do this in a very loving, trusting way, individualized, case-by-case method, and what's remarkable is, if anybody's listening, please come visit us. 00:19:02.350 --> 00:19:03.924 We take a lot of visitors in every

year. 00:19:03.924 --> 00:19:06.086 You're going to walk in and you would feel the vibe. 00:19:06.086 --> 00:19:27.724 There's a lot of laughter and there's a lot of joy and a lot of tears of sorrow and people get to express themselves in a really human way, versus when they leave our doors, have to go back to their neighbor, they get to put on that armor that kind of closes everything down, and so laughter is actually a good tonic for the soul and it helps people through the day. 00:19:28.547 --> 00:19:29.209 Absolutely. 00:19:29.209 --> 00:19:31.745 I love that Within Homeboy. 00:19:31.745 --> 00:19:34.559 I know about all the work that you do once they get to you. 00:19:34.559 --> 00:19:37.128 Is there prevention work done as well? 00:19:37.780 --> 00:19:39.226 We stretch the definition of prevention. 00:19:39.226 --> 00:19:53.411 Let me say it this way many, many, like 90% of our folks who come to us are looking to get out of gang life because they don't want their kids to go through the same thing, and so really it's about stopping the generational cycle of violence. 00:19:53.411 --> 00:19:58.077 We do have a charter high school and we do have a youth reentry program. 00:19:58.077 --> 00:20:02.190 That's more on the reentry side, but it's mostly at rehabilitation. 00:20:03.060 --> 00:20:05.728 I was always curious about that as to both sides of that. 00:20:05.728 --> 00:20:07.070 Okay, very interesting, Thank you. 00:20:07.070 --> 00:20:19.509 You did mention earlier which I want to talk about and quote me, if I'm wrong, 15 million Homeboy Ventures and Jobs Fund, and you did mention triple the size of the organization from when you got there. 00:20:19.509 --> 00:20:27.247 Now listeners might look at this or hear this and say like that'll never be us, that could never happen. 00:20:27.247 --> 00:20:30.692 Like what contributed, do you think were the success to make that possible? 00:20:31.074 --> 00:20:31.355 Yeah. 00:20:31.355 --> 00:20:32.539 So there's two parts of that. 00:20:32.539 --> 00:20:35.559 The first part is so we've tripled in size along the way. 00:20:35.559 --> 00:20:39.480 So now we're you know we spend $35 million a year. 00:20:39.480 --> 00:20:42.950 I'm quick to say we raised $35 million each and every year. 00:20:42.950 --> 00:20:48.951 We have three sources of revenue donor support, business revenues and government funding. 00:20:48.951 --> 00:20:52.488 Look, only 5% of our budget is from government sources. 00:20:52.488 --> 00:21:03.539 So the way it works out about 22 million is donor support, about $8 million is our business revenues and the rest is government all federal, state, county, city. 00:21:03.539 --> 00:21:10.539 It's been my frustration over these 10 years that I haven't been able to crack that knot and get government more government revenues. 00:21:10.539 --> 00:21:14.480 But thankfully we're blessed with great many donors who support our mission. 00:21:14.480 --> 00:21:17.973 They see the value of having

mentorship, so we have a second chance. 00:21:17.973 --> 00:21:21.076 They see how we sort of take the money. 00:21:21.076 --> 00:21:26.559 We hire folks, we sort of pay people why they work on themselves and then they are able to move their life forward. 00:21:27.461 --> 00:21:28.644 Quick question on the donors. 00:21:28.644 --> 00:21:32.694 Did that significantly change from a decade ago? 00:21:33.517 --> 00:21:39.531 the percentage of each of those you know it's all three have grown about the same in ratio from a decade ago. 00:21:39.531 --> 00:21:55.519 So along the way with raising that money and again we're generous donors people would say me, tom, here I'm going to donate this amount of money to you, but if you ever come up with a business idea where you can put your people to work and you need some capital to spend, come to me. 00:21:55.519 --> 00:21:57.539 And so I heard that more than once. 00:21:57.539 --> 00:22:03.553 So for the longest bit of time, every nickel we've raised went to the program side of what we're doing. 00:22:03.553 --> 00:22:07.559 The business side was sort of starved of resources and capital. 00:22:08.523 --> 00:22:27.046 And so now, a number of years ago, four years ago, we started our Homeboy Venture and Jobs Fund, and what I want to do is model that legal entity after venture capital does, because back in the world I came from, there's a lot of bets being placed on businesses and Of course, not that they all don't work out. 00:22:27.046 --> 00:22:30.470 And so why are people risking capital dollars on businesses that don't work out? 00:22:30.470 --> 00:22:31.785 They're going to risk capital dollars. 00:22:31.785 --> 00:22:34.526 How about on a business that helps people along the way? 00:22:34.526 --> 00:22:36.230 Yeah, the way I think about it. 00:22:36.230 --> 00:22:52.207 And so we've now raised 12 of that $15 million just to be allocated towards business growth, acquiring new businesses, running new businesses and thankfully I have sort of a board of directors, have an advisory board who understand how to invest in businesses and grow the business side of it. 00:22:52.559 --> 00:23:00.165 And so our goal is to create more job opportunities and quality jobs for our folks, because they leave Homeboy after some 18 months. 00:23:00.600 --> 00:23:11.345 We need to land them into a quality job, and a good example is a number of years ago now, about four years ago, we acquired Homeboy Electronic Recycling, the recycling company Electronics. 00:23:11.345 --> 00:23:14.593 That was about $500,000 of sales at the time. 00:23:14.593 --> 00:23:15.774 Now it's $3 million. 00:23:15.774 --> 00:23:21.132 We'll keep on growing it because after homeboy, our folks need quality jobs. 00:23:21.132 --> 00:23:27.553 The minimum wage job doesn't allow them to move their life forward without enough resources. 00:23:27.553 --> 00:23:29.806 So that's what we're looking to do as well. 00:23:30.980 --> 00:23:33.403 That's incredible, Coming from the for-profit industry. 00:23:33.403 --> 00:23:43.331 Has there any conversation or work been done about reentry in other for-profit businesses from people coming from homeboy? 00:23:44.031 --> 00:23:44.720 Yeah, so what? 00:23:44.720 --> 00:23:58.451 We're always looking so we're bringing more people than we can place in our own businesses so we find felony-friendly employers and part of that is the recognition that our folks have different struggles in life. 00:23:58.451 --> 00:24:01.326 And this is to me a big learning coming out of the business world. 00:24:01.326 --> 00:24:04.073 Now in the nonprofit world there's two Americas. 00:24:04.073 --> 00:24:11.348 No great insight there, just I'm sort of now seeing how it plays out in America that we all live in and it's America of the poor and the demonized. 00:24:11.348 --> 00:24:18.486 And being poor in our society is so hard to get through and to even actually get to a job and to do a good job. 00:24:18.980 --> 00:24:19.804 Can I tell a story? 00:24:19.804 --> 00:24:26.847 So one of our businesses is we have an artist in bakery, so we bake bread by hand. 00:24:26.847 --> 00:24:37.466 There's nothing better about breaking down barriers of two guys rival gangs, standing at the rolling dough shoulder to shoulder, rival gangs but they know they got to get a certain amount of bread baked each day. 00:24:37.466 --> 00:24:39.143 That breaks down those barriers. 00:24:39.143 --> 00:24:47.206 That start causing positive relationships among them, because you can't demonize somebody in relationship with so that's our bakery. 00:24:47.206 --> 00:24:53.069 So we also do farmer's markets and so we sell our bread at various farmer's markets around the city. 00:24:53.660 --> 00:24:56.287 So I remember within my first year of being a homeboy. 00:24:56.287 --> 00:25:06.653 I was walking through the bakery management by walking around, and I overheard one of our best guys who clients trainees, home trainees, who goes out to the farmer's markets George. 00:25:06.653 --> 00:25:10.768 I remember George asking the bakery manager if he can have the weekend off. 00:25:10.768 --> 00:25:14.728 And now, farmer's markets, weekends are the busiest days. 00:25:14.728 --> 00:25:21.142 And so manager said yes, and I went up to George's just to be friendly, say hey, what are you doing In my mind? 00:25:21.142 --> 00:25:22.246 Are you taking the kids away? 00:25:22.246 --> 00:25:24.066 You're going away for the weekend, that type of thing. 00:25:25.019 --> 00:25:28.851 He looks at me and says no, what he's going to do is he's reporting in for the weekend. 00:25:28.851 --> 00:25:30.747 I gave him a strange look. 00:25:30.747 --> 00:25:32.486 I said I'm reporting in, what's that mean? 00:25:32.486 --> 00:25:39.512 And he was reporting into LA County Men's Central Jail because he had been in prison. 00:25:39.512 --> 00:25:45.610 It came out within that past year and the amount of debt that he owed was high.

00:25:45.610 --> 00:25:50.463 And so here's the other crazy thing these guys, men who had come out of prison. 00:25:50.463 --> 00:25:57.976 The amount of money they owed was pretty amazing, not just for institution costs but court costs, parole officer costs, bailouts costs. 00:25:58.039 --> 00:26:00.027 I mean, it's like I have a friend going through this right now. 00:26:01.702 --> 00:26:04.091 And as a society we think they're earning money in prison. 00:26:04.091 --> 00:26:08.591 They can come out and they have to use their money for housing and food to pay those costs. 00:26:08.591 --> 00:26:12.728 So at the time you can report into LA County Jail and earn. 00:26:12.728 --> 00:26:16.284 Burn off the dollars you owe by spending four days in jail. 00:26:17.187 --> 00:26:17.568 Really. 00:26:18.019 --> 00:26:28.111 So I went home that Thursday thinking about that, thinking that is a massively responsible thing to do because, listen, he didn't go steal money to pay the debt. 00:26:28.111 --> 00:26:29.403 He knows he's got to pay the debt. 00:26:29.403 --> 00:26:34.490 He didn't go to his former gang and say borrow money because then he knew he would be indebted to the gang. 00:26:34.490 --> 00:26:37.420 Right, he didn't go to a loan shark. 00:26:37.420 --> 00:26:40.464 He said I'm going to do this the right way, I'm going to earn off the money. 00:26:40.464 --> 00:26:41.966 So he's going to report into jail. 00:26:41.966 --> 00:26:46.071 So I'm thinking all weekend, wow, I'm thinking to myself should I have like offered money? 00:26:46.071 --> 00:26:50.891 I didn't think fast enough on my feet at the time, but it's sort of realizing it. 00:26:50.891 --> 00:27:01.690 So then first thing Tuesday morning I come back in and I make a beeline and I want to go find George and just say he's kind of say hey, that was really good of you to do that. 00:27:01.690 --> 00:27:02.672 How to go? 00:27:02.672 --> 00:27:06.146 So when I asked how to go, I can see the stress on his face. 00:27:07.589 --> 00:27:11.910 And here's the thing so he has, like a lot of the guys and men, went to come out. 00:27:11.910 --> 00:27:13.487 They work hard to get custody of their children. 00:27:13.487 --> 00:27:16.371 So he had custody of his two children, a 10 year old and eight year old. 00:27:16.371 --> 00:27:27.819 And his caregiver not his family members, not his gang, not his neighborhood couldn't make it to watch his kids for that weekend, but he still reported into jail. 00:27:27.819 --> 00:27:29.306 He started reporting to jail. 00:27:29.306 --> 00:27:34.442 So here he left his 10 year old and eight year old in the apartment on their own for four days. 00:27:34.442 --> 00:27:41.773 Imagine the stress that parent would be under in that situation and what they would be thinking the whole time. 00:27:41.773 --> 00:27:44.027 Now I quickly get to the end. 00:27:44.027 --> 00:27:47.162 It was okay, the kids were okay, but the last. 00:27:47.182 --> 00:27:49.127 I say all that

story to say a couple of things. 00:27:49.127 --> 00:27:54.491 The rest of us in the privileged America, we sort of hear that story and our first instinct is the judge. 00:27:54.491 --> 00:27:55.865 Well, you shouldn't borrow the money. 00:27:55.865 --> 00:27:57.170 Well, you shouldn't be reporting to jail. 00:27:57.170 --> 00:27:58.364 Well, you should have found somebody else. 00:27:58.364 --> 00:28:06.799 We can't put ourselves in that situation because the amount of choice is just so hard to make each and every day along the way. 00:28:06.799 --> 00:28:24.390 So A not the judge and the choice and the difficulty that the poor in our society have to live with are mightily that affect their jobs, and so that's the whole point about this is like we want to create quality jobs and we want more businesses to hire on our folks. 00:28:24.390 --> 00:28:28.730 We have to provide a little more latitude, a little more support services around. 00:28:29.579 --> 00:28:35.903 The poverty rate in America has been the same for 45 years, hasn't changed Again 12%. 00:28:35.903 --> 00:28:53.287 And what's to me amazing about homeboys I look back and look at this is that homeboy has a way of helping people, lift them out of poverty, help them heal from their trauma, the restitution, and then get resilient enough to take on a side of those at them and get a quality job and then move their family forward. 00:28:53.287 --> 00:29:06.273 That's how you get people out of poverty, and so part of writing the book and doing all these talks it's get the message out that I think businesses should lead the way of helping improve the poverty rate in America. 00:29:06.273 --> 00:29:16.870 So for me it's like this challenge hey, any business out there, dedicate 15% of your next hires to the working poor, and that's going to make a measurable impact on how we move forward as a society. 00:29:16.870 --> 00:29:22.281 But to do that is you have to also bring a little bit of these support services around, not as much as homeboy. 00:29:22.281 --> 00:29:26.009 But a little bit more awareness and it's all going to work out for you. 00:29:26.571 --> 00:29:27.353 That would be incredible. 00:29:27.353 --> 00:29:28.060 I think. 00:29:28.060 --> 00:29:31.863 Something else that I think about all the time is how we talk about poverty hasn't changed. 00:29:31.863 --> 00:29:37.703 We still have massive hunger issues, we have water issues in the United States, like a lot of things. 00:29:37.703 --> 00:29:44.486 We still have massive homelessness issues, like a lot of things haven't progressed over the past decades and it's like why is that not happening? 00:29:44.486 --> 00:29:47.105 And there's more nonprofits than ever. 00:29:48.019 --> 00:30:20.531 That's why I think it would be interesting to have that different leadership perspective come in right when the venture fund I mean not to say that it couldn't have happened without you in some way shape reform, the fact that you were having those

conversations and knew enough about it to get it started, to get it going Like that takes somebody being in the seat to have the conversations, then to nurture them, to know the people that can start to like that's a whole other project right, like you have to have that type of perspective sitting down at the table. 00:30:20.660 --> 00:30:32.469 So, listener, if this is you, I guess what I would say to the listener and I would love your thought on this is take a look at your board and see if there's something missing. 00:30:32.469 --> 00:30:41.749 Is there a specific use or experience or perspective that's missing at the table that you're not seeing, that you think would be interesting to have. 00:30:41.749 --> 00:30:48.431 That could be like that's a $15 million venture fund, like that's unheard of in our space of something creative to do. 00:30:48.431 --> 00:30:51.641 And it's 13 different social enterprises right, that's right Currently. 00:30:51.641 --> 00:30:54.209 Was there 13 a decade ago? 00:30:54.961 --> 00:30:56.065 No, let's call it eight. 00:30:56.768 --> 00:30:56.968 Okay. 00:30:58.325 --> 00:30:59.602 Some of them are small, so we go out. 00:30:59.602 --> 00:31:09.467 I mean, we have our business, we want to look, we do $10 million business volume, hopefully over 20 million of business volume in a few years, right, yeah, what's the next thing we're investing in? 00:31:09.467 --> 00:31:13.660 We're trying to do recycling apparel right now, and so how do you change that around? 00:31:13.660 --> 00:31:14.722 So, anyway, there's those ideas. 00:31:14.722 --> 00:31:19.149 But, yes, you need on board, you need a bunch of different skills sets along the way. 00:31:19.149 --> 00:31:28.425 And yeah, and I think you know, when people put business people on the board, they're told, because they're either accounting type people or finance type, we also need sort of more general operators. 00:31:28.425 --> 00:31:37.448 That helps out and, like, I think the business world is full of good, good, skilled people who care about our society, want to make society better, and they have a hard time figuring out how they can get involved. 00:31:37.448 --> 00:31:43.440 And so, yeah, if nonprofit folks are listening, don't hesitate to go ask business people to get on your board along the way. 00:31:43.539 --> 00:31:44.545 Yes, yes. 00:31:44.545 --> 00:31:48.767 And I love specifically if you can approach somebody and say I need you because of this. 00:31:49.360 --> 00:31:50.464 Yeah, for sure. 00:31:50.799 --> 00:31:52.204 So in your book I do want to tout that. 00:31:52.204 --> 00:31:53.429 It's called the Homeboy Way. 00:31:53.429 --> 00:32:00.612 It was released last year and it talks about counterintuitive business ideas that are changing lives to the better. 00:32:00.612 --> 00:32:08.584 And I want to, as we get towards the end of our conversation what's the example of this that maybe other leaders that are listening can put into practice? 00:32:09.400

--> 00:32:22.848 Let me jump right into one that's more of a timely topic but also hard to talk through is this idea of hire the best person, be colorblind, and so a lot of this concept in corporate America is to be colorblind and hiring people. 00:32:22.848 --> 00:32:30.469 And I'm saying you've got to have a little more intentionality about looking at your workforce and your management team. 00:32:30.469 --> 00:32:36.720 You know I learned this also in the for-profit world your management team needs to be as diverse as your workforce, right? 00:32:36.720 --> 00:32:39.608 And your workforce would be as diverse as your customer population. 00:32:39.608 --> 00:32:50.248 So, similarly, nonprofit world, clients and frontline managers, and so to make that happen, you've got to kind of be intentional about lifting up the diversity within your management team. 00:32:50.248 --> 00:32:55.967 My point is let's not worry about being colorblind decisions, you need to be intentional, right? 00:32:55.967 --> 00:32:56.742 That's one example. 00:32:56.742 --> 00:33:00.007 Another example is this concept of sort of we didn't get on this. 00:33:00.047 --> 00:33:14.248 Hugs and laughter, right, and I think I love about homeboys, laughter and hugs, and like I'm not a good hugger, I grew up in corporate America with all the rules you don't hug, you don't comment on somebody's dress, you don't do any of those things, right. 00:33:14.248 --> 00:33:25.372 You dehumanize sort of this along the way, and I'm still not a good hugger, but I love getting hugs on homeboy and it's about kinship and it's truly about sharing that sense. 00:33:25.372 --> 00:33:35.446 And so that kind of also touches upon, very importantly, what learned a homeboy is you know, work with the individual, don't worry about setting precedent. 00:33:35.446 --> 00:33:44.107 And so in corporate America, where all time if you do extra one employee, you have extra employees, no, that's not really necessary. 00:33:44.107 --> 00:33:49.020 True, that's sort of a rule of thumb, but you don't have to deal with that, right. 00:33:49.020 --> 00:33:58.093 And so how do you sort of say it's about what you, how you help an individual grow within their team, be a manager, help them in their life. 00:33:58.480 --> 00:34:09.045 Obviously, everybody has struggles outside of the workplace, not that you got to bring all the struggles in the workplace, but if your workplace can help you through your outside struggles, you're getting a more low employee and most for profit organizations. 00:34:09.045 --> 00:34:09.568 Absolutely. 00:34:09.568 --> 00:34:16.271 We're from that totally, and what I've learned is no, we can help out in many different ways. 00:34:17.201 --> 00:34:18.326 Awesome, those are great. 00:34:18.326 --> 00:34:20.026 Everyone go pick up the homeboy way. 00:34:20.026 --> 00:34:23.316 I am so excited to dive into a more melody. 00:34:23.316 --> 00:34:30.632 Who connected us sent me a teaser of it, and so I've

read there a few, but not in enough time with having a two month old. 00:34:30.632 --> 00:34:34.971 Currently, my reading time is a little bit less than it used to be. 00:34:35.700 --> 00:34:37.704 You have a book on tape right, but digital book. 00:34:38.341 --> 00:34:38.829 That's right. 00:34:39.093 --> 00:34:39.480 That's right. 00:34:39.500 --> 00:34:44.903 Exactly so I wanted to ask you, speaking of professional development, we're talking about investing in our teams. 00:34:44.903 --> 00:34:47.347 What are you reading right now? 00:34:47.347 --> 00:34:51.612 Are you listening to podcasts or an audio book for fun or professional development? 00:34:51.960 --> 00:35:17.970 Yeah, so I just got back from a couple of week vacation in Hawaii and so I spent my time on vacation now at this point in my life, really Almost like I was reading an article about sabbaticals, where people kind of do deep contemplation and in reading so when I go on vacation I do a lot of reading and so it is read by was hesitating longest, but a time St Teresa of Avila, her inner castle, about the soul, on the multiple levels of the soul. 00:35:17.970 --> 00:35:19.943 And now I look at homeboy. 00:35:19.943 --> 00:35:47.759 I learned to really get on the spiritual path and I've now been on this journey for the last decade and obviously I learned that from Father Greg, but I also learned it from the homies and what so amazed me is how so many of our folks come out of prison and they have strong spirituality and to me that makes sense to me in that privileged world I was living in before, but seeing how it plays out, so I figured at the homies through all their trauma around the spiritual path. 00:35:47.759 --> 00:35:48.775 How can I learn by that? 00:35:48.775 --> 00:35:54.537 And so I go away and do my spiritual reading at the time and so it was very good. 00:35:54.590 --> 00:35:55.474 I'm gonna get two books here. 00:35:55.474 --> 00:36:00.539 So it's True Survival is, it's about inner castle spiritual soul. 00:36:00.539 --> 00:36:07.297 The other book I read while I was away this is not so much going away was the new book Professor Desmond out of Princeton on poverty. 00:36:07.297 --> 00:36:12.716 Really interesting calculation of poverty in America over the last 25, 40 years. 00:36:12.716 --> 00:36:21.579 Sort of a book sediments the sort of folks about staying in the level of poverty and its heart in the jump out of poverty, which is definitely true, you know. 00:36:21.579 --> 00:36:25.432 To me this whole thing about Maritime, another thing about counter wave thinking. 00:36:25.432 --> 00:36:30.999 Like I was a big advocate, coming home boy, of a meritocracy, because I knew through my own hard work and ability I moved ahead. 00:36:31.691 --> 00:36:35.181 A meritocracy really doesn't work for the poor of people in our society. 00:36:35.181 --> 00:36:38.197 It's hard for them to move ahead as much as they wanna work hard. 00:36:38.197 --> 00:36:43.614 And for the rest of us in our society to wag our fingers saying just work hard and you'll get ahead, that doesn't work either. 00:36:43.614 --> 00:36:47.717 So book on poverty is great, and a book on your soul is also good. 00:36:48.057 --> 00:36:48.399 Love it. 00:36:48.399 --> 00:36:49.412 It was actually interesting. 00:36:49.412 --> 00:36:49.934 You mentioned that. 00:36:49.934 --> 00:36:51.716 I'm gonna mess up the title of it. 00:36:51.716 --> 00:36:54.137 Did you see the Netflix series? 00:36:54.137 --> 00:36:58.074 I think Obama was helping to produce it Working America. 00:36:58.796 --> 00:36:59.378 I've heard about it. 00:36:59.378 --> 00:37:00.019 I haven't seen it yet. 00:37:00.019 --> 00:37:01.059 I think it just came out. 00:37:01.690 --> 00:37:08.336 Yeah, I just started to watch the first episode, but very similar to the context of what you're talking about, so I would suggest watching it. 00:37:08.336 --> 00:37:13.556 And then, last question, which is always a fun one, is called ask and receive. 00:37:13.556 --> 00:37:18.856 Is there one thing that you would like to ask for help or support on from the listeners? 00:37:19.789 --> 00:37:23.438 I wouldn't be a nonprofit CEO if I didn't ask for financial support for the organization. 00:37:23.438 --> 00:37:26.835 I wouldn't be a donors for, that being said, that always goes with the territory. 00:37:26.835 --> 00:37:31.336 It's really look, every nonprofit, if a lot of you audiences are nonprofits. 00:37:31.336 --> 00:37:36.736 It's hard work being a nonprofit leader, particularly a human services organization. 00:37:36.736 --> 00:37:48.236 I've recognized our team is really phenomenal about mentoring and helping people get out of gang life, and so much of our team takes on the trauma of the people we work with. 00:37:48.236 --> 00:37:54.673 They feel the pain, they absorb the pain, they put calming waters onto the fire of somebody to help out. 00:37:55.576 --> 00:37:59.576 It's hard work, and so if you're in that world, I want to thank you for the work. 00:37:59.576 --> 00:38:32.955 You do know that you have kindred spirits out there doing the work, and so what I'm asking you is sort of take a step back and sort of revel in the work you do and find joy in it, because it gets to be taxing, and in my sort of quiet dialogues with Father Greg, I've come to learn it's really about striving for joy, which provides that thriving workplace, and it's a mindset shift and once you can, find joy in everybody, find joy through people, and that's what kind of keeps the work going. 00:38:33.810 --> 00:38:36.740 What a beautiful way to wrap up the conversation. 00:38:36.740 --> 00:38:42.792 It has been a joy speaking with you and I hope the next time I'm in LA that I will definitely stop by. 00:38:43.415 --> 00:38:43.957 Absolutely. 00:38:44.110 --> 00:38:48.091 One of the restaurants are cafes and say hello, but this was wonderful, tom. 00:38:48.091 --> 00:38:51.553 What's the best way for people to get your book and reach out to you? 00:38:52.250 --> 00:38:54.097 Homeboyindustriesorg is our website. 00:38:54.097 --> 00:38:55.556 The book is the Homeboy Way. 00:38:55.556 --> 00:38:57.858 There's a homeboywayorg as well. 00:38:57.858 --> 00:39:01.276 It's on Amazon as well, so buy it via Amazon. 00:39:01.550 --> 00:39:03.337 And get the next day Amazon Prime. 00:39:03.630 --> 00:39:06.059 Get the next day and we move up in the rankings. 00:39:06.059 --> 00:39:09.959 The whole point of the book is it's about getting the message of Homeboy out there. 00:39:09.959 --> 00:39:14.015 And there's Father Greg's books Beautiful books, get Father Greg's books first. 00:39:14.015 --> 00:39:22.515 But it's a little more of a businessy angle of how do you run an organization, my 10 years at Homeboy and how that is played out. 00:39:23.198 --> 00:39:23.860 It's fascinating. 00:39:23.860 --> 00:39:24.934 This was your sneak peek. 00:39:24.934 --> 00:39:30.571 Now you've got to go get the book for all the secrets, all the secret sauce, amazing Tom. 00:39:30.571 --> 00:39:31.716 Thank you so much for your time. 00:39:31.716 --> 00:39:32.793 All right, thank you Dan. 00:39:32.793 --> 00:39:38.234 Can you tell I love talking all things digital To make this show better. 00:39:38.234 --> 00:39:40.200 I'd be so grateful for your feedback. 00:39:40.200 --> 00:39:50.119 Leave a review, take a screenshot of this episode, share it on Instagram stories and tag positive equation with 1e so I can reshare and connect with you. 00:39:51.733 --> 00:39:52.233 Thank you.