Ahead of the Upwardly Global Gala Equity in Action: Beyond Welcome on October 12th, we sit down with the organization’s CEO & President Jina Krause-Vilmar and Board Member Tony Goncalves to talk about their mission of eliminating employment barriers for immigrant and refugee professionals and advancing the inclusion of their skills in the U.S. economy. The two also share personal stories of their families’ journeys and talk about the importance of diversity of background and experience in the workplace.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good Company is a production of I Heart Radio of
the growth and our working age population are going to
be immigrants and the children of immigrants. That is the
future of our workforce. So how are we setting them
up for success? Hi, I'm Michael Casson. Welcome to Good Company,
(00:22):
where I'll explore how marketing, media, entertainment and tech are
intersecting transforming our lives and the way we do business
at a breakneck speed. I'll be joined by some of
the greatest business minds and strongest leaders who will share
how they build companies from the ground up or transform
them from the inside out. My bed is you'll pick
up a lesson or two along the way. It's all good.
(00:45):
I have a great pleasure today to welcome to people
to Good Company. And I really think this is definitional
for what good companies about, because, as I've said to
you to our listeners before, I was trained by my
parents with one lesson, and that is one is known
by the company they keep. And I'm very pleased today
(01:07):
to be able to keep company with the two folks
I'm about to introduce you to. Upwardly Global is the
premier workforce development organization in this country. On a mission
to eliminate unemployment, but to eliminate employment barriers for immigrant
and refugee professionals and advance the inclusion of their skills
in the US economy and personally, I have to say
(01:31):
I'm inspired to support upparly Global because I've seen many,
many examples of the profound benefits when we include and
promote bright and diverse minds within our organizations. I'm honored
this year, particularly to co host Upwardly Global's annual Equity
and Action Gala in October and raise awareness for this
(01:51):
incredible organization. Today on Good Company, I'm thrilled and honored
really to welcome upwardly Global CEO and President Gina kraus
Wilmer and board member and longtime friend Tony can call
us to good Company, Tony, Gina. For those of us
who are not as familiar with upwardly Global, what I'd
(02:14):
love you to do is kind of kick us off
and give us a view of what the organization does
and how you're expanding that mission. Currently, upwardly Global is
here because there are two point two million immigrants and
refugees with professional backgrounds, but they're on or underemployed, so
you should think about your rideshared driver who also happens
(02:36):
to be a civil engineer from Venezuela. These are the
people who are really trying to get back into their careers,
and this population is really growing in the United States today.
Our country is accepting more and more newcomers, but we're
also seeing more refugee crises around the world. We accepted
seventy six thousand Afghans, who when with the followed couple,
(02:59):
many of them or more or professionals. We're seeing a
Ukraine crisis and folds in Europe, and we are accepting
and getting more and more Ukrainians in the United States,
and seventy of those individuals are also professionals and work educated.
So our goal is really to answer the question, how
do we make sure that we're welcome these individuals and
(03:20):
how are we making sure that we're integrating them into
our economy. I think what's really hard for people to
understand is how can you be educated and yet for
a lot of the people we have worked with have
been homeless. It's incredible to imagine people living in homeless
shelters and then studying at the same time to retake
medical exams or re license as engineers, or up skill
(03:42):
in cybersecurity. I think what's incredible is is that this
story is so personal so many of us, that Tony
has a personal connection, I myself have a personal connection.
My family immigrated from India. My dad had a degree
and was an engineer. My mother had a master's degree
in English literature from a prestigious school. And when my
(04:03):
parents got divorced, my mom couldn't find a job at
her skill level, so she ended up working three low
wage jobs to put food on the table and to
raise us. And you know, now my any good Asians.
My two sisters are doctors and another one is a nurse.
And I'm the outlier of the family, of course. But
it's a really personal story. And I know Tony you
also you also have that personal journey. You know. My
(04:25):
my story is a little even closer to home. I mean,
I I landed at JFK when I was four years old,
uh in ninety and I had the great fortune of
you know, coming with my parents and integrating into a
community that was ready to not only accept us, but
help us integrate into the United you know, the economy
(04:46):
of the United States. My father was a construction worker.
My mother was twenty one years old and trying to
figure out what to do because you know, women didn't
work in Portugal. Um, you know when when they came here,
and she ended up, you know, being a seamstress and
cleaning houses for a living. Um. And my dad, you know,
making driveways and building you know, masonry walls and you know,
(05:10):
you know, you're running concrete. And he actually it's pretty funny.
Right right right around the block from where we live.
He as kids, he would bring us to this little
lake that's here that I now go and walk and
sort of reflect on and do some calls when when
I'm home, and he would remind me that he he
built all the curb you know, in and around those sidewalks.
(05:31):
But I reflect on that, and you know, my parents
and my in laws paved the way for their children,
right they they're the ones that roll a dice like
we just benefited from it. And the struggle that I
see with folks in the upload community that are coming
into this country is finding that network and or that
(05:52):
community to ensure that they retain their dignity. And that's
the struggle, right that we're seeing when so many refugees
and immigrants come into this country. Right now, we consider
ourselves extremely fortunate. We're we're produde, We're product of chain migration. Um.
We had a family, we had a community. My dad
got work almost immediately, and we were able to begin
(06:16):
contributing very very very quickly, Tony. What I would also
say is there was a sentiment in in the in
the country that you were welcomed. Yeah, we were absolutely welcomed.
We never felt unwelcome. And I do believe that's because
our community had been welcomed right and had established themselves. Um.
(06:36):
And it's different, Um, I think now as you're alluding to,
I mean, it's a sign of the times when political
sort of affiliations aside, when you know, fifty Venezuelan refugees
get you know, get shipped to Martha's Vineyard. But with
that community in Martha's Vineyard did for those people is
(06:56):
what our community and our family did for absolutely And
again what it was the domino of the great fortune
that I've had and that I've been able to sort
of pay forward, you know, getting to the to the
good work that Upglow does and the importance of it
because we have the circumstance of less welcoming arms. It
(07:20):
makes the work that Upglow does ever more important and
ever more critical because you don't have that community. I'm
certain it's what my grandparents had. But that's why, you know,
looking at the issue and knowing what something, what Upglow
can do to help, because that is the welcoming arm
(07:42):
community that now you don't necessarily have. If you're those
Venezuelans who were sent to Martha's Vineyard. You know, I'm
often asked like why, you know, why did up Golo
speak to me? Right, which gets to the point here
of having this organization, you know, And first it was
it's an opportunity to share my story. I had never
shared my story, right. I often say that I tell people.
(08:05):
I always told people that I am a graded here.
I was an immigrant before it was cool to be
an immigrant. But I but I never really had a
platform or took advantage of the platforms that I had
to tell my story to hopefully inspire, and so they
gave me an opportunity to do that. Second, I'm a professional.
I was in a you know, it wasn't and am
(08:25):
in a very large sector of our economy that always
struggled to hire and to diversify, and I stepped back
after seeing what Gina and the team at Upload were doing.
They were essentially handing us I'm a silver platter, a diverse,
qualified employee based right prospects, right. And then third, I
(08:49):
mean ship. It's just the right thing to do, right,
to start to try to help people bridge and integrate
into their new home. And so that's where I think
the Upload platform, you know, really started speaking to me.
And you know, I've been at this five years with
these guys, and you know, I took a little while
(09:10):
for them to convince me to join the board because
I wanted to make sure that I could add value.
Not quite sure if I'm out of value just yet.
Oh you are Tony, Gina, as as Tony is telling
his story and you told your story. You know, this
is like that old lead into the show The Naked
City on television in the fifties. There's a thousand stories
in The Naked City. This is just one of them.
(09:31):
There's thousands of I want maybe there are thousands, but
there are, you know, dozens, multiple stories that you could tell.
But I wonder if you could share with you know,
with our audience a couple of stories, maybe one or
two that are just indicative of the work you're doing
and the challenge you're you're rising to. Yeah, we have
(09:52):
so many stories. I mean, one story that I really
love is there was a man from Zbekistan who had
arrived in New York City and he had worked as
a criminal analyst for the police department, and when he
got here he ended up being homeless on the streets.
He would collect recycling and he would spend ten hours
a day collecting that recycling and get about twenty dollars
(10:14):
for it a day. So that was obviously enough to
to make ends meet in terms of food, but it
wasn't enough to rent a place. So he was living
chronically on the street for a year. Then he heard
about up with the Global Um. He was using the
public library system to access a computer and and then
ended up hanging out in our office is quite a bit,
and he got up skilled into cybersecurity and now he's
working at Amazon. And that's somebody who's going from very
(10:38):
very little into a job. For our job seekers is
generally sixty eight thousand a year. And the reason that's
important is not just because of the numbers it's because
of that second chance. And so you know, you know,
when I'm hearing you both talk, that second chance is
really important. And it's about how are we creating a
community and opening up doors to allow people to have
that second chance. The thing that I've always it is
(11:00):
in business, as we're trying to grow our businesses respectively,
I always say it's important to just get in the
consideration set. You know, if you're not in the consideration set,
you never get a chance to be considered obviously, And
and and you know, just that alone is so valuable
and important in terms of the work you do and
(11:22):
the work I'd like to say we because I feel
involved in the organization now the work we do, but
you do, obviously to give people that chance to be
in that consideration set. It's what I've always said about
sports or entertainment. There are a lot of great baseball players,
but the scout never gets to see them. They never
get considered. There are a lot of great actors or
(11:43):
actresses or directors or writers, but they never get their work,
you know, seen by the right eyes helping the right eyes.
And and and I kind of merging two questions together,
because what are the friction points when you you know
that you hit when you get to get that consideration
set and yet tony to your earlier point. So many
(12:05):
organizations today are focusing on the need for diversity. I
mean it's right here at you're freely asking, here's here's diversity. Yeah. Look, Michael,
I uh, you know when I was when I was
at a T and T I coined this term, you know,
diverse diversity, right, because you know, as you start thinking
about diversity, it's very easy to very narrowly sort of
(12:27):
define it as you know, gender for lack of a
lack of a more elaborate example. But when you think
about diversity, you want diversity and all corners of the
office and the beauty and of this community. Tapping this
community as a resources, you get it all right. You
get folks that want to work, our skill to work
(12:50):
can fill one of the five point five million open
jobs in this country. Uh, you know open high level
positions right for skilled you know, skilled and educated professionals.
And you get the sort of rounding of the diversity
element here as well. And look when when Michael, when
I introduced myself from people ask me to sort of
give my elevator speech. It really is an elevator speech,
(13:12):
but it's largely the fact that I came to this
country I was for and my work ethic comes from
the fact that I have to fight for everything I had, Gina.
Given that there's such demand for skilled workers, what am
I missing? Why are companies not realizing that this this
audience is there to tap into. And what can we
(13:32):
do as a community of you know, I'm speaking to
a large group of people here, but two as a
community to to get the word out, to make sure
people realize that this is a pool you should be
you know, swimming in because if you're having a hard
time fighting fish on another pool, and and and these
fish are the kind you want, I a diversity, etcetera, etcetera.
(13:54):
What am I missing? So? I think there's a couple
of things. One is is that you know, companies are
not as mind to recruit this talent. Part of that
is because a recruiter is trained to throw away a
CV if there's a gap on that CV. If you've
been legitimately working as a rideshare driver or a hot
dog stay in vendor and you're trying to become and
get back into your career as a data analyst. That's
(14:16):
going to be a journey that you're going to struggle
with because we're really working with employment systems that are
not meant to understand or value this talent, nor they
meant to value the education systems of other countries, right,
and so that could even be somebody who has trained,
you know, at the University of Lisbon or somebody who's
trained at the University of cobble Um. It's not something
that people can access just on a website to apply
(14:38):
to organically. Uh. The other thing is eight of jobs
in this country are placed through social networks. So if
you're an immigrant or a newcomer, you don't have access
to social networks, nor do you have an entry point
to be able to make connections with people that are
at the professional level in the same way. And so
that ends up being another barrier. So for people who
(14:59):
want to do something first, I'd say join us at
our in person gala in New York on October twelve.
Pay attention, Pay attention everybody who's listening. October twelfth in
New York. Upglow and I said it at the beginning,
right that I get to be co chairman of that
event with with Tony, So please keep those cards and
(15:19):
letters flowing and keep going. Gene. I'm sorry, yes, no, no,
we love plugging it in um so attend that in
person or if you can't join us online on October.
The second thing is has become a mentor. You know,
part of the challenge for people is not only accessing
individuals in the professional market, but also understanding what does
that professional market and what are those expectations in that
(15:41):
industry look like? And how do I start unpacking and
understanding that and then making connections with people in that
So mentorship can be huge. You bring up two things.
I'm involved in a couple of important philanthropic organizations. In
addition to Upwardly Global, I happen to be fortunate to
be on the board of directors of Big Brothers Big Sisters.
(16:02):
We talk about mentorship. This is an area that I'm
very you know, focused on in my own life, proud
to say that, and it's something that I spend a
fair amount of time on in the real world in
my in my day job. So I understand that importance
and always open to having that opportunity. And you're so right.
It makes a difference in people's lives when you can
(16:24):
take that mentorship role and take it seriously. The other
organization that I've become recently involved in is something called
Project Healthy Minds, and Project Healthy Minds is focusing on
the destigmatization of mental health issues. And as I hear
you tell your story and Tony tell his story, and
(16:45):
as Tony said, he may not always have told that story,
there's so many of those stories, and we need people
to know those stories. It's kind of like mental health issues.
People don't talk about them. Hearing you know your respective stories,
you should be screaming it from the rooftops. It's it's
it's prideful. And and that's something else that I think
(17:06):
people need to focus on. The person next door to you,
the gentleman who's here taping this conversation for me is
an immigrant, and and you know, I'm not even gonna
look up at him because you know we'll get emotional.
But well, that's the great thing about immigrants, And that's
what you know, Tony. You always talk about this, like
(17:26):
the grit and the resilience that comes from this community
on top of all those other wonderful things, and the
idea that when we're thinking about diversity, equity, and inclusion
and companies, like, the value add for a company is
not the revenue. That's a downstream value add. The value
add is in the people that we employ. And the
more people we employ with diverse experiences and the ability
(17:49):
to really have resilience, creativity, different perspectives is only going
to strengthen how we are competitive as companies and in
the media industry in particular, authenticity is critical in terms
of thinking about storytelling, and so how do we integrate
more of these stories so that we are showing the
diversity of the authentic selves that we have in our
(18:10):
community and what we can do to lift up each
other as we're building out this community and recognizing that
these people are not invisible, right, These people are visible
and they have a story, and these stories should be
on a map, and not only should be on a map.
There's some urgency around this because we're looking at and
you were asking about numbers like of the growth and
(18:31):
our working age population are going to be immigrants and
the children of immigrants. That is the future of our workforce.
So how are we setting them up for success and
how we recognizing that they come to us in many
different ways. And then that old narrative of you have
to start from the bottom, you have to start from scratch.
If you're lucky, your kids will make it doesn't have
to be the way we do it anymore. Gina, you
(18:53):
said something that is so critical, and you know we
have organizations like this. Just think of one that comes
to mind. In the media and marketing industry. We have
a group that the A and A, the Association of
National Advertisers created in partnership with the Female Quotient UH
and it's called see Her. It was about if you
(19:14):
can't see her, you can't be her, right. And the
other piece of it is if you don't see people
at the mid in the high skill level and leadership,
you're not going to see a journey for yourself. No,
that's that's my point. And then the retention rate of
a lot of other communities that get in at the
entry level is only right. So you've got to change
that the image that we have at all levels in
(19:36):
our companies if we really want to continue to retain
that great time. No, it's it's the truth, Michael, just
as an example like that was another reason why I
felt it was important to use the platform that I
had uh to begin telling my story because I was
not sort of an NBA from a top ten school,
did not graduate, you know, top ten in my class,
(19:58):
did not go into consulting and then in or into banking.
I worked, and I worked hard, and I probably worked
a little harder because I didn't have that built in
network and that built in community. But it's possible, right
and so um you know that is that has become
a bit of my leadership journey and my leadership story
(20:20):
because there are people like me that didn't go to
Harvard or didn't go to Princeton that can sit in
these high level executive roles. The challenge, which is what
Gina was pointing to and what my parents were so
fortunate to have. My parents had a built in community,
hence a built in network and built in mentors. A
(20:43):
lot of these folks coming into this country these days
do not have that built in community. And you, as
much as anyone, know how important the network is when
you're looking for work, when you're looking to grow. I mean,
a conversation over lunch can trigger an idea. When you
don't have that, you need somebody to nurture it. That's
(21:04):
one of the critical values of this organization is it
sort of begins, It creates the community, and it creates
the non existing network for these highly skilled individuals to
sort of get a jump start. Well, look, Tony, on
that note, I'm going to double down in my ask
of our listeners to please please help support the important
(21:25):
initiatives we have the opportunity with this event coming up,
but this is something we should be focused on every
day of the year, not just on October twelfth with
the virtual and the live I'm going to be there.
We're doubling down on our commitment to this initiative, but
to this overall opportunity because I look at this as
(21:46):
an employer and as a business person as an opportunity
for me to be doing what we need to do.
You know this, Tony, because we've been friends now for
many years and Gina's new friend. But I've always been
a believer if someone has the good fortune of doing well,
they have the obligation to do good. And this is
(22:10):
something where I'm able to help, and I would ask
all of our listeners to figure out a way that
they're able to help. And yes it's by donating money,
but it's also by finding that person you can mentor
by by actually paying attention to that, to those communities,
to putting yourself in the shoes of that person who
doesn't have the network, who didn't have the Ivy League opportunities.
(22:33):
You know, I'll leave you with one thing. As we
started to really address a couple of years ago, the
necessity of diversity and the necessity of opportunity, I think
it was Blackstone made, a very private equity firm, made
a very important statement. They said, look, if you look
(22:55):
at the process of how somebody ends up working at
a place like black Stone, and this really goes to
what you were talking about, Tony. They said, start the journey.
That person probably went to a prep school, which was
already a filter. That prep school probably led them to
an IVY school, which was another tighter filter. That IVY
(23:16):
school led them to an analyst job at a bank,
tighter filter. By the time they then get the opportunity
to be in a private equity place like Blackstone. The
filter is this that you can't get through. If you
didn't start at the front end, you're never getting into
the middle. And that goes to the opportunity that we
(23:37):
have to look and fish in different ponds as employers,
as business people, and that's really what we need to do. Look, Mike,
I think that's actually a great it's a great way
of sort of bringing to life the the opportunity I
think that we're seeing here to sort of grow that
diversity of thought. Right, this happens to be a ripe
(23:57):
population for that. And I step back and it's like, yeah, look,
we want folks to go to the gala. We want
folks to donate to this organization. It's a nonprofit. It's
a grassroots nonprofit. You know. They don't run this organization
on a hundred million dollars like this is. This is
a Every dollar that comes in gets utilized um. And
they scrape um, you know, for every dollar that they
(24:20):
can get, which is why I'm really uh, I'm really
focused on helping them. However, it's not just about the money, right, So, yes,
we want to raise funds because this thing has to
operate and it's got a scale. But we need mentors, right,
These people need mentors, they need a network. But I
would say specific to this particular audience, and Gina does that,
(24:44):
I'm extremely passionate about this help this this organization tell
their story. Right, we are in the media business. I
would like nothing more. Of course, we'd love people to
buy tables at a LA. But I think getting a story,
you know, sort of told on one of our you know,
(25:07):
one of our colleagues many news stations, and having genus
sort of articulate the state of the immigrant and refugee
population in the world and in the country as an expert,
great opportunity. So that's an example or our marketing colleagues, right,
that are out there helping this organization scale their message
(25:27):
and get their message into more homes, right, and into
more people. I'm gonna end on this note. Everybody has
the ability to become a mentor. Everybody has the ability
to to to help one in need, and that that's
really what we're saying here. Yeah, look exactly. I'll I
had a couple that came to the gala, I think
(25:49):
three or four years ago. Uh, you know it was
Carly sent me an email the day after It's like,
how can I get involved? And so of course, like
we give a list of all the things, and you know,
some of it was quite extravagant. Right, you can do this,
you can do this She's like, how about I just
look at resumes and like help people tweak resumes because
I don't have time to do X, Y or Z.
(26:10):
That is more valuable than a thousand, two, three, four
or five thousand dollar donation, right, And so it's it's
it can be that small. And like I said, like,
I think we've got a storytelling opportunity in this ORD.
We're trying to figure out, you know, what you know
with what the longer term strategy is and sort of
how to how to articulate what we do in a
(26:32):
bit more of a crisper sort of fashion. You know.
Arguably I stepped back and I go, we're probably we're
a website in the content company that does networking. So
I'm working through that, Gina. We'll we'll we'll talk through
that stuff in our next board meeting. But any you know,
back to like the non monetary sort of sideed this
that media, the media industry can specifically sort of do
(26:55):
for this ORD. It's in and around that, right, building
the narrative and scaling the part and tapping on Gina
as an expert. Yeah, and I'll add to that, which is,
you know, when people meet our community, they're floored. Right,
they are the smartest person in the room and they
put us to shame. Um. And and you know, we
have this wonderful woman. She's an Afghan surgeon. She was
(27:17):
working at a hospital and a professor. She was a
first female professor at her university and she's working in
New York City now. It took her a year um
of hustling and we've just been able to help place
her in a clinical research role at New York Crisbyterian Hospital. Um,
we have these wonderful Afghan pilots. Shapoor who's living in
(27:39):
Arizona taking care of his eight family members. He flew
wing to wing with our Air Force in Afghanistan for
missions and he's a dispatcher, but he wants to get
back in the air. Right. And So when you meet
these people and you understand their journeys and you start
to realize that they are systemic barriers that hold them back,
(28:00):
start to question yourself, like, man, why does this exist?
Like what's crazy that somebody like this should not be
working in a hospital. A woman in up from Afghanistan
whose fought tooth and nail to access her education and
said she actually wanted to be a surgeon where she
saw no woman being a surgeon in her life. Right,
those people deserve better, and I think we can do
better a thousand percent, Gina, Tony. I could keep going
(28:24):
for hours, but I can't thank you enough. And I know,
as I have the good fortune of having this audience
hopefully listen to this and learn, there could be some
good results here and I'm counting on it. And I
want to thank you just for spending this time, but
as well for the privilege of getting involved in this
(28:44):
amazing organization. So I want to thank you both. Yeah
and Michael on behalf of Upwardly Global, Gina and her
team and the board. I want to thank you for
so openly jumping into this. You're a great friend, Tony,
and Gina a new friend. But I've got a feeling
it's going to be a long term. I'm hoping for
(29:05):
a long term relationship. Michael. This is an amazing thank you.
I'm Michael Casson, thanks for listening to a Good Company.
Good Company is a production of I Heart Radio Special
thanks to Lena Peterson, chief brand Officer and Managing Director
of Medially, for her vision I'm Good Company, and to
Jen Seely Vice president Marketing Communications of Medialy for programming,
(29:28):
amazing talent and content
Good Company is a production of I Heart Radio of
the growth and our working age population are going to
be immigrants and the children of immigrants. That is the
future of our workforce. So how are we setting them
up for success? Hi, I'm Michael Casson. Welcome to Good Company,
(00:22):
where I'll explore how marketing, media, entertainment and tech are
intersecting transforming our lives and the way we do business
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the greatest business minds and strongest leaders who will share
how they build companies from the ground up or transform
them from the inside out. My bed is you'll pick
up a lesson or two along the way. It's all good.
(00:45):
I have a great pleasure today to welcome to people
to Good Company. And I really think this is definitional
for what good companies about, because, as I've said to
you to our listeners before, I was trained by my
parents with one lesson, and that is one is known
by the company they keep. And I'm very pleased today
(01:07):
to be able to keep company with the two folks
I'm about to introduce you to. Upwardly Global is the
premier workforce development organization in this country. On a mission
to eliminate unemployment, but to eliminate employment barriers for immigrant
and refugee professionals and advance the inclusion of their skills
in the US economy and personally, I have to say
(01:31):
I'm inspired to support upparly Global because I've seen many,
many examples of the profound benefits when we include and
promote bright and diverse minds within our organizations. I'm honored
this year, particularly to co host Upwardly Global's annual Equity
and Action Gala in October and raise awareness for this
(01:51):
incredible organization. Today on Good Company, I'm thrilled and honored
really to welcome upwardly Global CEO and President Gina kraus
Wilmer and board member and longtime friend Tony can call
us to good Company, Tony, Gina. For those of us
who are not as familiar with upwardly Global, what I'd
(02:14):
love you to do is kind of kick us off
and give us a view of what the organization does
and how you're expanding that mission. Currently, upwardly Global is
here because there are two point two million immigrants and
refugees with professional backgrounds, but they're on or underemployed, so
you should think about your rideshared driver who also happens
(02:36):
to be a civil engineer from Venezuela. These are the
people who are really trying to get back into their careers,
and this population is really growing in the United States today.
Our country is accepting more and more newcomers, but we're
also seeing more refugee crises around the world. We accepted
seventy six thousand Afghans, who when with the followed couple,
(02:59):
many of them or more or professionals. We're seeing a
Ukraine crisis and folds in Europe, and we are accepting
and getting more and more Ukrainians in the United States,
and seventy of those individuals are also professionals and work educated.
So our goal is really to answer the question, how
do we make sure that we're welcome these individuals and
(03:20):
how are we making sure that we're integrating them into
our economy. I think what's really hard for people to
understand is how can you be educated and yet for
a lot of the people we have worked with have
been homeless. It's incredible to imagine people living in homeless
shelters and then studying at the same time to retake
medical exams or re license as engineers, or up skill
(03:42):
in cybersecurity. I think what's incredible is is that this
story is so personal so many of us, that Tony
has a personal connection, I myself have a personal connection.
My family immigrated from India. My dad had a degree
and was an engineer. My mother had a master's degree
in English literature from a prestigious school. And when my
(04:03):
parents got divorced, my mom couldn't find a job at
her skill level, so she ended up working three low
wage jobs to put food on the table and to
raise us. And you know, now my any good Asians.
My two sisters are doctors and another one is a nurse.
And I'm the outlier of the family, of course. But
it's a really personal story. And I know Tony you
also you also have that personal journey. You know. My
(04:25):
my story is a little even closer to home. I mean,
I I landed at JFK when I was four years old,
uh in ninety and I had the great fortune of
you know, coming with my parents and integrating into a
community that was ready to not only accept us, but
help us integrate into the United you know, the economy
(04:46):
of the United States. My father was a construction worker.
My mother was twenty one years old and trying to
figure out what to do because you know, women didn't
work in Portugal. Um, you know when when they came here,
and she ended up, you know, being a seamstress and
cleaning houses for a living. Um. And my dad, you know,
making driveways and building you know, masonry walls and you know,
(05:10):
you know, you're running concrete. And he actually it's pretty funny.
Right right right around the block from where we live.
He as kids, he would bring us to this little
lake that's here that I now go and walk and
sort of reflect on and do some calls when when
I'm home, and he would remind me that he he
built all the curb you know, in and around those sidewalks.
(05:31):
But I reflect on that, and you know, my parents
and my in laws paved the way for their children,
right they they're the ones that roll a dice like
we just benefited from it. And the struggle that I
see with folks in the upload community that are coming
into this country is finding that network and or that
(05:52):
community to ensure that they retain their dignity. And that's
the struggle, right that we're seeing when so many refugees
and immigrants come into this country. Right now, we consider
ourselves extremely fortunate. We're we're produde, We're product of chain migration. Um.
We had a family, we had a community. My dad
got work almost immediately, and we were able to begin
(06:16):
contributing very very very quickly, Tony. What I would also
say is there was a sentiment in in the in
the country that you were welcomed. Yeah, we were absolutely welcomed.
We never felt unwelcome. And I do believe that's because
our community had been welcomed right and had established themselves. Um.
(06:36):
And it's different, Um, I think now as you're alluding to,
I mean, it's a sign of the times when political
sort of affiliations aside, when you know, fifty Venezuelan refugees
get you know, get shipped to Martha's Vineyard. But with
that community in Martha's Vineyard did for those people is
(06:56):
what our community and our family did for absolutely And
again what it was the domino of the great fortune
that I've had and that I've been able to sort
of pay forward, you know, getting to the to the
good work that Upglow does and the importance of it
because we have the circumstance of less welcoming arms. It
(07:20):
makes the work that Upglow does ever more important and
ever more critical because you don't have that community. I'm
certain it's what my grandparents had. But that's why, you know,
looking at the issue and knowing what something, what Upglow
can do to help, because that is the welcoming arm
(07:42):
community that now you don't necessarily have. If you're those
Venezuelans who were sent to Martha's Vineyard. You know, I'm
often asked like why, you know, why did up Golo
speak to me? Right, which gets to the point here
of having this organization, you know, And first it was
it's an opportunity to share my story. I had never
shared my story, right. I often say that I tell people.
(08:05):
I always told people that I am a graded here.
I was an immigrant before it was cool to be
an immigrant. But I but I never really had a
platform or took advantage of the platforms that I had
to tell my story to hopefully inspire, and so they
gave me an opportunity to do that. Second, I'm a professional.
I was in a you know, it wasn't and am
(08:25):
in a very large sector of our economy that always
struggled to hire and to diversify, and I stepped back
after seeing what Gina and the team at Upload were doing.
They were essentially handing us I'm a silver platter, a diverse,
qualified employee based right prospects, right. And then third, I
(08:49):
mean ship. It's just the right thing to do, right,
to start to try to help people bridge and integrate
into their new home. And so that's where I think
the Upload platform, you know, really started speaking to me.
And you know, I've been at this five years with
these guys, and you know, I took a little while
(09:10):
for them to convince me to join the board because
I wanted to make sure that I could add value.
Not quite sure if I'm out of value just yet.
Oh you are Tony, Gina, as as Tony is telling
his story and you told your story. You know, this
is like that old lead into the show The Naked
City on television in the fifties. There's a thousand stories
in The Naked City. This is just one of them.
(09:31):
There's thousands of I want maybe there are thousands, but
there are, you know, dozens, multiple stories that you could tell.
But I wonder if you could share with you know,
with our audience a couple of stories, maybe one or
two that are just indicative of the work you're doing
and the challenge you're you're rising to. Yeah, we have
(09:52):
so many stories. I mean, one story that I really
love is there was a man from Zbekistan who had
arrived in New York City and he had worked as
a criminal analyst for the police department, and when he
got here he ended up being homeless on the streets.
He would collect recycling and he would spend ten hours
a day collecting that recycling and get about twenty dollars
(10:14):
for it a day. So that was obviously enough to
to make ends meet in terms of food, but it
wasn't enough to rent a place. So he was living
chronically on the street for a year. Then he heard
about up with the Global Um. He was using the
public library system to access a computer and and then
ended up hanging out in our office is quite a bit,
and he got up skilled into cybersecurity and now he's
working at Amazon. And that's somebody who's going from very
(10:38):
very little into a job. For our job seekers is
generally sixty eight thousand a year. And the reason that's
important is not just because of the numbers it's because
of that second chance. And so you know, you know,
when I'm hearing you both talk, that second chance is
really important. And it's about how are we creating a
community and opening up doors to allow people to have
that second chance. The thing that I've always it is
(11:00):
in business, as we're trying to grow our businesses respectively,
I always say it's important to just get in the
consideration set. You know, if you're not in the consideration set,
you never get a chance to be considered obviously, And
and and you know, just that alone is so valuable
and important in terms of the work you do and
(11:22):
the work I'd like to say we because I feel
involved in the organization now the work we do, but
you do, obviously to give people that chance to be
in that consideration set. It's what I've always said about
sports or entertainment. There are a lot of great baseball players,
but the scout never gets to see them. They never
get considered. There are a lot of great actors or
(11:43):
actresses or directors or writers, but they never get their work,
you know, seen by the right eyes helping the right eyes.
And and and I kind of merging two questions together,
because what are the friction points when you you know
that you hit when you get to get that consideration
set and yet tony to your earlier point. So many
(12:05):
organizations today are focusing on the need for diversity. I
mean it's right here at you're freely asking, here's here's diversity. Yeah. Look, Michael,
I uh, you know when I was when I was
at a T and T I coined this term, you know,
diverse diversity, right, because you know, as you start thinking
about diversity, it's very easy to very narrowly sort of
(12:27):
define it as you know, gender for lack of a
lack of a more elaborate example. But when you think
about diversity, you want diversity and all corners of the
office and the beauty and of this community. Tapping this
community as a resources, you get it all right. You
get folks that want to work, our skill to work
(12:50):
can fill one of the five point five million open
jobs in this country. Uh, you know open high level
positions right for skilled you know, skilled and educated professionals.
And you get the sort of rounding of the diversity
element here as well. And look when when Michael, when
I introduced myself from people ask me to sort of
give my elevator speech. It really is an elevator speech,
(13:12):
but it's largely the fact that I came to this
country I was for and my work ethic comes from
the fact that I have to fight for everything I had, Gina.
Given that there's such demand for skilled workers, what am
I missing? Why are companies not realizing that this this
audience is there to tap into. And what can we
(13:32):
do as a community of you know, I'm speaking to
a large group of people here, but two as a
community to to get the word out, to make sure
people realize that this is a pool you should be
you know, swimming in because if you're having a hard
time fighting fish on another pool, and and and these
fish are the kind you want, I a diversity, etcetera, etcetera.
(13:54):
What am I missing? So? I think there's a couple
of things. One is is that you know, companies are
not as mind to recruit this talent. Part of that
is because a recruiter is trained to throw away a
CV if there's a gap on that CV. If you've
been legitimately working as a rideshare driver or a hot
dog stay in vendor and you're trying to become and
get back into your career as a data analyst. That's
(14:16):
going to be a journey that you're going to struggle
with because we're really working with employment systems that are
not meant to understand or value this talent, nor they
meant to value the education systems of other countries, right,
and so that could even be somebody who has trained,
you know, at the University of Lisbon or somebody who's
trained at the University of cobble Um. It's not something
that people can access just on a website to apply
(14:38):
to organically. Uh. The other thing is eight of jobs
in this country are placed through social networks. So if
you're an immigrant or a newcomer, you don't have access
to social networks, nor do you have an entry point
to be able to make connections with people that are
at the professional level in the same way. And so
that ends up being another barrier. So for people who
(14:59):
want to do something first, I'd say join us at
our in person gala in New York on October twelve.
Pay attention, Pay attention everybody who's listening. October twelfth in
New York. Upglow and I said it at the beginning,
right that I get to be co chairman of that
event with with Tony, So please keep those cards and
(15:19):
letters flowing and keep going. Gene. I'm sorry, yes, no, no,
we love plugging it in um so attend that in
person or if you can't join us online on October.
The second thing is has become a mentor. You know,
part of the challenge for people is not only accessing
individuals in the professional market, but also understanding what does
that professional market and what are those expectations in that
(15:41):
industry look like? And how do I start unpacking and
understanding that and then making connections with people in that
So mentorship can be huge. You bring up two things.
I'm involved in a couple of important philanthropic organizations. In
addition to Upwardly Global, I happen to be fortunate to
be on the board of directors of Big Brothers Big Sisters.
(16:02):
We talk about mentorship. This is an area that I'm
very you know, focused on in my own life, proud
to say that, and it's something that I spend a
fair amount of time on in the real world in
my in my day job. So I understand that importance
and always open to having that opportunity. And you're so right.
It makes a difference in people's lives when you can
(16:24):
take that mentorship role and take it seriously. The other
organization that I've become recently involved in is something called
Project Healthy Minds, and Project Healthy Minds is focusing on
the destigmatization of mental health issues. And as I hear
you tell your story and Tony tell his story, and
(16:45):
as Tony said, he may not always have told that story,
there's so many of those stories, and we need people
to know those stories. It's kind of like mental health issues.
People don't talk about them. Hearing you know your respective stories,
you should be screaming it from the rooftops. It's it's
it's prideful. And and that's something else that I think
(17:06):
people need to focus on. The person next door to you,
the gentleman who's here taping this conversation for me is
an immigrant, and and you know, I'm not even gonna
look up at him because you know we'll get emotional.
But well, that's the great thing about immigrants, And that's
what you know, Tony. You always talk about this, like
(17:26):
the grit and the resilience that comes from this community
on top of all those other wonderful things, and the
idea that when we're thinking about diversity, equity, and inclusion
and companies, like, the value add for a company is
not the revenue. That's a downstream value add. The value
add is in the people that we employ. And the
more people we employ with diverse experiences and the ability
(17:49):
to really have resilience, creativity, different perspectives is only going
to strengthen how we are competitive as companies and in
the media industry in particular, authenticity is critical in terms
of thinking about storytelling, and so how do we integrate
more of these stories so that we are showing the
diversity of the authentic selves that we have in our
(18:10):
community and what we can do to lift up each
other as we're building out this community and recognizing that
these people are not invisible, right, These people are visible
and they have a story, and these stories should be
on a map, and not only should be on a map.
There's some urgency around this because we're looking at and
you were asking about numbers like of the growth and
(18:31):
our working age population are going to be immigrants and
the children of immigrants. That is the future of our workforce.
So how are we setting them up for success and
how we recognizing that they come to us in many
different ways. And then that old narrative of you have
to start from the bottom, you have to start from scratch.
If you're lucky, your kids will make it doesn't have
to be the way we do it anymore. Gina, you
(18:53):
said something that is so critical, and you know we
have organizations like this. Just think of one that comes
to mind. In the media and marketing industry. We have
a group that the A and A, the Association of
National Advertisers created in partnership with the Female Quotient UH
and it's called see Her. It was about if you
(19:14):
can't see her, you can't be her, right. And the
other piece of it is if you don't see people
at the mid in the high skill level and leadership,
you're not going to see a journey for yourself. No,
that's that's my point. And then the retention rate of
a lot of other communities that get in at the
entry level is only right. So you've got to change
that the image that we have at all levels in
(19:36):
our companies if we really want to continue to retain
that great time. No, it's it's the truth, Michael, just
as an example like that was another reason why I
felt it was important to use the platform that I
had uh to begin telling my story because I was
not sort of an NBA from a top ten school,
did not graduate, you know, top ten in my class,
(19:58):
did not go into consulting and then in or into banking.
I worked, and I worked hard, and I probably worked
a little harder because I didn't have that built in
network and that built in community. But it's possible, right
and so um you know that is that has become
a bit of my leadership journey and my leadership story
(20:20):
because there are people like me that didn't go to
Harvard or didn't go to Princeton that can sit in
these high level executive roles. The challenge, which is what
Gina was pointing to and what my parents were so
fortunate to have. My parents had a built in community,
hence a built in network and built in mentors. A
(20:43):
lot of these folks coming into this country these days
do not have that built in community. And you, as
much as anyone, know how important the network is when
you're looking for work, when you're looking to grow. I mean,
a conversation over lunch can trigger an idea. When you
don't have that, you need somebody to nurture it. That's
(21:04):
one of the critical values of this organization is it
sort of begins, It creates the community, and it creates
the non existing network for these highly skilled individuals to
sort of get a jump start. Well, look, Tony, on
that note, I'm going to double down in my ask
of our listeners to please please help support the important
(21:25):
initiatives we have the opportunity with this event coming up,
but this is something we should be focused on every
day of the year, not just on October twelfth with
the virtual and the live I'm going to be there.
We're doubling down on our commitment to this initiative, but
to this overall opportunity because I look at this as
(21:46):
an employer and as a business person as an opportunity
for me to be doing what we need to do.
You know this, Tony, because we've been friends now for
many years and Gina's new friend. But I've always been
a believer if someone has the good fortune of doing well,
they have the obligation to do good. And this is
(22:10):
something where I'm able to help, and I would ask
all of our listeners to figure out a way that
they're able to help. And yes it's by donating money,
but it's also by finding that person you can mentor
by by actually paying attention to that, to those communities,
to putting yourself in the shoes of that person who
doesn't have the network, who didn't have the Ivy League opportunities.
(22:33):
You know, I'll leave you with one thing. As we
started to really address a couple of years ago, the
necessity of diversity and the necessity of opportunity, I think
it was Blackstone made, a very private equity firm, made
a very important statement. They said, look, if you look
(22:55):
at the process of how somebody ends up working at
a place like black Stone, and this really goes to
what you were talking about, Tony. They said, start the journey.
That person probably went to a prep school, which was
already a filter. That prep school probably led them to
an IVY school, which was another tighter filter. That IVY
(23:16):
school led them to an analyst job at a bank,
tighter filter. By the time they then get the opportunity
to be in a private equity place like Blackstone. The
filter is this that you can't get through. If you
didn't start at the front end, you're never getting into
the middle. And that goes to the opportunity that we
(23:37):
have to look and fish in different ponds as employers,
as business people, and that's really what we need to do. Look, Mike,
I think that's actually a great it's a great way
of sort of bringing to life the the opportunity I
think that we're seeing here to sort of grow that
diversity of thought. Right, this happens to be a ripe
(23:57):
population for that. And I step back and it's like, yeah, look,
we want folks to go to the gala. We want
folks to donate to this organization. It's a nonprofit. It's
a grassroots nonprofit. You know. They don't run this organization
on a hundred million dollars like this is. This is
a Every dollar that comes in gets utilized um. And
they scrape um, you know, for every dollar that they
(24:20):
can get, which is why I'm really uh, I'm really
focused on helping them. However, it's not just about the money, right, So, yes,
we want to raise funds because this thing has to
operate and it's got a scale. But we need mentors, right,
These people need mentors, they need a network. But I
would say specific to this particular audience, and Gina does that,
(24:44):
I'm extremely passionate about this help this this organization tell
their story. Right, we are in the media business. I
would like nothing more. Of course, we'd love people to
buy tables at a LA. But I think getting a story,
you know, sort of told on one of our you know,
(25:07):
one of our colleagues many news stations, and having genus
sort of articulate the state of the immigrant and refugee
population in the world and in the country as an expert,
great opportunity. So that's an example or our marketing colleagues, right,
that are out there helping this organization scale their message
(25:27):
and get their message into more homes, right, and into
more people. I'm gonna end on this note. Everybody has
the ability to become a mentor. Everybody has the ability
to to to help one in need, and that that's
really what we're saying here. Yeah, look exactly. I'll I
had a couple that came to the gala, I think
(25:49):
three or four years ago. Uh, you know it was
Carly sent me an email the day after It's like,
how can I get involved? And so of course, like
we give a list of all the things, and you know,
some of it was quite extravagant. Right, you can do this,
you can do this She's like, how about I just
look at resumes and like help people tweak resumes because
I don't have time to do X, Y or Z.
(26:10):
That is more valuable than a thousand, two, three, four
or five thousand dollar donation, right, And so it's it's
it can be that small. And like I said, like,
I think we've got a storytelling opportunity in this ORD.
We're trying to figure out, you know, what you know
with what the longer term strategy is and sort of
how to how to articulate what we do in a
(26:32):
bit more of a crisper sort of fashion. You know.
Arguably I stepped back and I go, we're probably we're
a website in the content company that does networking. So
I'm working through that, Gina. We'll we'll we'll talk through
that stuff in our next board meeting. But any you know,
back to like the non monetary sort of sideed this
that media, the media industry can specifically sort of do
(26:55):
for this ORD. It's in and around that, right, building
the narrative and scaling the part and tapping on Gina
as an expert. Yeah, and I'll add to that, which is,
you know, when people meet our community, they're floored. Right,
they are the smartest person in the room and they
put us to shame. Um. And and you know, we
have this wonderful woman. She's an Afghan surgeon. She was
(27:17):
working at a hospital and a professor. She was a
first female professor at her university and she's working in
New York City now. It took her a year um
of hustling and we've just been able to help place
her in a clinical research role at New York Crisbyterian Hospital. Um,
we have these wonderful Afghan pilots. Shapoor who's living in
(27:39):
Arizona taking care of his eight family members. He flew
wing to wing with our Air Force in Afghanistan for
missions and he's a dispatcher, but he wants to get
back in the air. Right. And So when you meet
these people and you understand their journeys and you start
to realize that they are systemic barriers that hold them back,
(28:00):
start to question yourself, like, man, why does this exist?
Like what's crazy that somebody like this should not be
working in a hospital. A woman in up from Afghanistan
whose fought tooth and nail to access her education and
said she actually wanted to be a surgeon where she
saw no woman being a surgeon in her life. Right,
those people deserve better, and I think we can do
better a thousand percent, Gina, Tony. I could keep going
(28:24):
for hours, but I can't thank you enough. And I know,
as I have the good fortune of having this audience
hopefully listen to this and learn, there could be some
good results here and I'm counting on it. And I
want to thank you just for spending this time, but
as well for the privilege of getting involved in this
(28:44):
amazing organization. So I want to thank you both. Yeah
and Michael on behalf of Upwardly Global, Gina and her
team and the board. I want to thank you for
so openly jumping into this. You're a great friend, Tony,
and Gina a new friend. But I've got a feeling
it's going to be a long term. I'm hoping for
(29:05):
a long term relationship. Michael. This is an amazing thank you.
I'm Michael Casson, thanks for listening to a Good Company.
Good Company is a production of I Heart Radio Special
thanks to Lena Peterson, chief brand Officer and Managing Director
of Medially, for her vision I'm Good Company, and to
Jen Seely Vice president Marketing Communications of Medialy for programming,
(29:28):
amazing talent and content
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