Michael Johnson: From Gangbanger To Game Changer!

We sit down with former gang banger, Michael Johnson who at one time couldn't read or write  but through an amazing set of circumstances learned how to not only read and write but would go on to not only become a Harvard graduate but also become one of the biggest African American fund raisers in the country and become President and CEO of the Boys and Girls club of Dane county.

Read Michael Johnson's book The Audacity to Lead: From The Projects to the C Suite -7 Mindset Lessons on Love, Family, and Turning Adversity into Impact https://url.td/fi-OY

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Gangster Chronic goals. This it's not your average shows.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
You're now tuned into the rails.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Welcome to the gainst the Chronicles podcast, the production of
iHeart Radio and Black Effect Podcast Network. Make sure you
download the iHeart app and subscribe to Against the Chronicles.
For my Apple users, hit the purple Michael on your
front screen, subscribed Against the Chronicles and leave a five
star rating and comment what's apteron? Y'all know what it is.
It's another episode the Gangster Chronicles podcast. It's your boy

(00:37):
big Steal along with my guy yeer.

Speaker 3 (00:42):
Eight.

Speaker 1 (00:43):
I don't know if you remember a few weeks ago,
I was telling you about the brother man I met
through the homie Steve O out of Milwaukee. They're like
half the most incredible backstory ever. Man. His brother was
really running the streets and everything, and and he just
learned how to write. Correct me if I'm wrong anytime, Bro,
He just learned how to write. Read maybe ten fifteen

(01:05):
years ago. Now his brother has his degree mans bachelors.
One biggest fund raisers man from the African American community.
I want to correct me if I'm wrong. How much
manag you raised for the Boys and Girls Club.

Speaker 3 (01:19):
So so drive might creb about two hundred and fifty
million in the last for ten years.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
So I got to introduce this brother I know we have.
This is one of those guys I want to have
on because its story. This dude is really from the
turf and he just changed his life around it the
whole three sixty Michael Johnson. I had some applause. I
give you some applause and all that stuff. The first
thing I want to do is just go back, like
I want to just go way back, Kenny, because I

(01:44):
know you said you med eight first time you had
a record label, had a little hood record label.

Speaker 3 (01:50):
Well, let me let me first say, man, it's a
pleasure and being being on a gangster chronicles. I've been
watching all your shows, nor Yourn and what you've done
in the industry and then eight. Over the years, it
was just a iconic bro. Back in the day, I
used to own a record label called over the Records.

(02:11):
So I grew up in the projects on the West
Side of Chicago, and I really came across a large
sum of money after I sued the university that I
went to the coaches that dressed up in ku klus
Klan outfits. I was a wrestler and a football player.
They pretending like they were gonna lunch me and I
ended up. It made national news. I came home with

(02:34):
nice little bags, started a record label and with the
six months I was broke. During that time, when I
had that money, I ran across. We were recording at
def Jam Records on in Chicago, and somebody was like.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
Hey, you should get eight to you know, do a
sample for you.

Speaker 3 (02:51):
And he did it for us back in the day,
and the group that I was associated with, we sold
a lot of We were selling back then. They would
cassette tape. That just tells you how old I am.
And we were selling cassette tapes out of our table.
Having MC eight at the time MC eight name on
a cassette. They helped us to sell record.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
Per Se Height was out his fist grease at one
still how his fist grease?

Speaker 3 (03:17):
Man?

Speaker 1 (03:17):
You know it's funny me doing the show with him
and how people. Man. I've had major people like the
Homies come on the show and they just like, man,
they can't wait to meet they that's their biggest thing,
Like I want to meet them. Cate. I remember I
had this one brother on the eight couldn't be because
he was out of time doing the show. He was
so disappointed. I said, Damn, Man made me feel bad
almost for me. He was like, Man, damn, don't really

(03:38):
want me. They Hey, hey, cousin.

Speaker 3 (03:40):
I had a cousin, bro from Arizona. I had posted
I was coming on your show. He's like, Bro, fly
me down there with you. I wanted to meet eight
and I was like, man, were doing that zoning he
but he was so excited about me, you man, that
we all came up.

Speaker 1 (04:00):
Especially what was that movie Lorece Tate?

Speaker 3 (04:03):
Uh uh, Man, It's just you know, I worked with
Lorenz and his brothers. I helped them start their family
foundays and just watching you on that back in the day.
That was a movie. Man, you did your thing in
that movie.

Speaker 4 (04:19):
Been looking. We appreciate it, definitely, Mike.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
We all about community. A lot of people don't know.
Man eight has been coaching you football and mentoring kids
for a long time. You know, his son is in college,
you know, playing football now, and he chooses his weekends.
You know, this guy takes the time out of this
weekends just really go out there for the kids. And
I think it's so much bigger than thank just you know, football, right,

(04:44):
because I think we all have civic responsibility to a
certain degree to help kids that's coming up behind us.
I know, I had a whole bunch of people to
help me. I wouldn't be where I'm at without somebody
taking the time out to say, you know what, I'm
helped his young cat, you know. And I think it's
all our responsibility as black men, especially to go back
and kind of reach back with makes because you were

(05:05):
functionally illiterate at one time. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:08):
Man, So I went to one of the lowest performance
high schools in Chicago.

Speaker 1 (05:14):
I graduated. I couldn't read, I couldn't write.

Speaker 3 (05:18):
That summer when I was seventeen, eighteen years old, I
saw a lot of my friends, man, going to prison,
a lot of them. I mean not just getting two
three years. I'm talking about fifteen twenty and life censuses.

Speaker 1 (05:31):
And I knew I.

Speaker 3 (05:33):
Had to get about the projects because I was I
was running the streets, man, and I just didn't quite
know what I was gonna do with my life. I
was a big guy. I was lifting a lot of
weights at the time. I knew I was strong, but
we didn't have a real big, strong athletic program at
my high school. Because I got kicked out of every
high school I went to, so I went to four

(05:54):
different high schools. I landed at the smallest high school
in our city. It really only had about thirty six years.
It was a really small, small class. I was fortunate, man,
that I got accepted to the University of Minnesota. And
when that incident happened, I was taking Bog's courses like
three to wrestling because I thought I'm gonna go to

(06:16):
the NFL, So if I could just get to a
semester too, we'll figure we'll figure it out.

Speaker 1 (06:22):
So I come home and I find out.

Speaker 3 (06:24):
I came home, I met my wife at the time,
and she was she was going to school to become
a chemist, and at that time, I was pledging this fraternity.
And it was really her man who inspired me to
like stop running the streets and I was out there
just doing stupid stuff over about a two three year period,
so I enrolled in Malcolm X's College on the West

(06:46):
side of Chicago, and that's when I found out that
I couldn't read.

Speaker 1 (06:50):
I couldn't write at proficiency.

Speaker 3 (06:52):
It took me two and a half years to get
my associates degree. I mean two and a half years
before I was even accepted to get my associates degree,
and it took me four and a half years to
get that degree. Then from there, I went to Chicago State.
Then I went and got my master's in business. Then
I went to Harvard Business School. Then I went to
Cornell University. Then I went to the Center of Philanthropy

(07:15):
Indiana University.

Speaker 1 (07:16):
So I now got all of.

Speaker 3 (07:18):
These degrees and certificates because I knew if I wanted
to be a CEO, particularly as a black man, not
only do you got to have the experience, you got
to have the credentials.

Speaker 1 (07:29):
And so I wanted to make sure that nobody.

Speaker 3 (07:33):
Was going to close a door on me, but if
I got the opportunity to serve in a CEO role,
that I was going to compete at the highest levels.

Speaker 1 (07:43):
I've been in my role for about sixteen years.

Speaker 3 (07:46):
I raised about two hundred and fifty million dollars for
various causes throughout the country. With Glint, Michigan at their
water crisis, my crew was the first one there that
delivered fifty thousand gallons of water to those residents and
we got a key to the city. When those tornadoes
happened in like Joplin, Missouri, or down in Texas, I

(08:10):
went down there with firefighters and raised hundreds of thousands
of dollars to rescue people out of their houses.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
When when mad Avery.

Speaker 3 (08:19):
Was killed in Brunswick, Georgia, we raised the money for
his sister to get her graduate degree.

Speaker 1 (08:27):
And Ferguson, Missouri, Reverend.

Speaker 3 (08:29):
Jackson and the mayor of Saint Louis and Urban lea
president called on me to raise money for Makeel Brown.
He was killed by the police officer there, and we
raised money for you know, his family. So as a
black man, I feel like when we're in these rows,
we first and foremost have a responsibility as black man,

(08:51):
step up, especially when our community is a crisis, but
also made sure that our kids and our babies need
the resources that they This season right now is my
favorite holiday season. Every year I go out and I
raise money and sometimes we buy houses for people.

Speaker 1 (09:08):
We give away cars. We go into restaurants.

Speaker 3 (09:11):
If you Google, you'll see sometimes it's made national and
international news. We walk in restaurants and give restaurant employees
two three, four, five thousand dollar tips and none of
that money come from my job. I use the power
of social media to ask people to utilize their wealth
to bless and give people a hand.

Speaker 1 (09:33):
And that's what I've done all my life.

Speaker 3 (09:34):
Man, In the last twenty five years, so I worked
at Philly, I worked at Chicago, I worked at Indianapolis.
We've just built the largest youth workforce center in the
history of history of Boys and Girls clubs, teaching kids
how to become plumbers, carpenters, electricians. We raised thirty five
million dollars in sixteen months, and now we're getting kids

(09:55):
jobs paying twenty five thirty dollars an hour. And it
was we have the largest racial achievement gap in the
United States, where black and brown kids are not graduating
from our high schools. We invest about two million dollars
a year in our schools.

Speaker 1 (10:12):
And my kids. I'm not talking about ten or fifteen kids.

Speaker 3 (10:15):
I'm talking about over a thousand kids a year that's
graduated from our program, and we tracked them and now
have kids that's in twenty five states that we tried
to make sure they persist.

Speaker 1 (10:27):
They're graduating from college. Oh that's awesome, man. You know
one thing I want to go back to you played
high school football, you was able to get a scholarship,
and you were functionally illiterate. You do know how to read,
and they just pass you on through because you could
play footballs. Yeah it is. I don't think people understand
how common that was, especially back in the gap. You
know remember Dexter Manly, Yes, of course way NFL. He

(10:50):
couldn't read it write what the college if I think
they gave him a degree, man, I think that they
just and you know what, at the time, people think
is cool because oh they give them opportunity. They're not
helping them use me. Yeah, the US. But like that,
usually they don't go back and like you actually had
somebody to actually pushed you to go get yourself together, right.

(11:10):
A lot of those people, man, they get that money. Man,
they married somebody and they take them for the money.

Speaker 3 (11:15):
Man.

Speaker 1 (11:15):
They wound up just by the self loan and bront
because took advantage of them the whole time.

Speaker 3 (11:21):
Man was one of the reasons why I went to
school to get my degrees and business man. When I
got my little bag when I was nineteen, I tried
to do the right thing.

Speaker 1 (11:30):
I bought a record label.

Speaker 3 (11:32):
I bought a record stuff, bought a bunch of cars,
bought a bunch of this and that, tried the whole
street entrepreneurship thing.

Speaker 1 (11:38):
And it didn't pan out.

Speaker 3 (11:40):
It didn't pan out because I didn't I didn't earn
that money and I didn't respect it. And so when
it was gone, I said, Man, I'm gonna go back
to school and get all my degrees in business and
so like now I understand profit and lost statements, I
know how to do budget projections, I know how to
manage millions and millions of dollars. And honestly, man, it

(12:02):
was a it was a blessing to that. I mean,
I hate to say it was a blessing because I
learned from it and I'm glad it happened to me
when I was older. And so now I've learned to
respect wealth. I've learned to when you earn it, to
try to do the right thing for it. And we
try to teach the same thing to our young people.

Speaker 1 (12:21):
That's why in.

Speaker 3 (12:21):
This workforce center we build if you google it, it's
called the McKinsey Regional Workforce Center, we have an entrepreneurship
center in that because we want to teach young people
about financial literacy. Man, if you don't know how to
manage your own check book and manage your expenses and
know how to go out there and fish and make
your own resources, you don't always be dependent on somebody.

Speaker 1 (12:45):
Yeah that.

Speaker 2 (12:49):
Unfortunately, like we wasn't taught a lot of that back
when we were coming up. This youngs like I'll say,
all the time, signing a record time track or getting
involved with motherfuckers, you don't necessarily have the people who
would want to teach you.

Speaker 4 (13:05):
About sustaining wealth, taxes.

Speaker 2 (13:09):
And the value of a dollar, you know what I'm saying,
Like you said as a young as a young kid
will come into some money, especially if you ain't never
had no money. You know what I'm saying, You're gonna
want to be You're gonna want to do with the
Joneses to cars.

Speaker 4 (13:24):
And jewelry and all that. You know out twenty thirty years.

Speaker 2 (13:29):
From now, you know where if this ride don't last
or whatever, or you can easily go broke. Even if
you try to indulge in the street motherfucking aspects.

Speaker 4 (13:42):
Everybody's not the best street motherfucker.

Speaker 1 (13:44):
You know what I'm saying.

Speaker 4 (13:45):
When it comes to money, in the streets.

Speaker 2 (13:48):
So it's good that you're in a system right now
to where you can teach young well fuckers about how
to sustain.

Speaker 4 (13:59):
Well and control laid money and what's the right shit
to do. Period.

Speaker 2 (14:04):
Just if you come into some money, just a hard
working motherfucker period. You know what I'm saying, Because niggas
still fuck off money when they're in a normal situation.

Speaker 3 (14:12):
No doubt, no doubt about that. Now you spot on, man,
and what I've learned a when you get in to
these positions, man, you got to pass that well, throwing
that from what you've learned from your mistakes. Right when
I got my bag, I came home and I don't
know if y'all remember knew Jack City and Nino Brown.

(14:33):
I just remember that scene, man, when he was in
that truck with that gold chain, now, and that I
went and bought that same truck.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
I went bought that.

Speaker 3 (14:41):
Same chain, and it came home and gave away a
quarter million dollars the first day, Bro, everybody was lined
up in my mama apartment and I just, man, this
just dishing out money. So I'm like, man, it felt
like a lot of money, and it just quickly went
through my hands. So what I decided to do man,
and like one of the reasons I wrote this this

(15:02):
book called The Audacity, you know the lead and the
title is from the Projects to the c Suite, right,
So these are the actual high rise buildings that I
grew up in and man them buildings was my foundation.
And I talk about how it's seven mindsets. Seven mindset
left is on love, family and turn the adversity into impact.

(15:26):
And sometimes when people see me in these roles, they sit,
they are sung. I've come from some middle class or
some upper class community. I'm proud I grew up in
the projects. I'm proud that I live a street life.
I'm proud that I got friends who are still gang members.
But I also got friends who are billionaires and millionaires.

(15:48):
I got friends who got GEDs and PhDs, and I
learned from all of them broke. And what I try
to do was bring all these folks together. So I
think about this brother, they ain't gone. Gold got a
prison about six or seven years ago, spent ten years
as a hole, came out and he was like, I

(16:10):
think he wanted to work for me. And I said, Man,
when I listened to this, I said you should start
your own nonprofit. And I said, you should do something
for black men, because in Wisconsin, every time I turn
on the news, you just hear all these negative stories
about black men. This brother starts the Black Coalition of
Dang County. He's now raising millions and millions of dollars

(16:35):
impluy in dozens and dozens of black people.

Speaker 1 (16:39):
Now has found jobs for hundreds of black.

Speaker 3 (16:41):
People, started a youth baseball program which is one of
the largest in the country.

Speaker 1 (16:48):
That most people would have wrote him off.

Speaker 3 (16:50):
And so sometimes, man, we got to use our connections
to help give people a hand up. And when I
see what this brother is doing today, man, it's phenomenal.
And I got dozens of stories I can tell like that,
even as a young black girl who her name is
doctor Matieva Bojange, who went through my program, and about

(17:12):
three months ago she invited me to her graduation. Now
I'm thinking, this young woman is graduating from like college,
and so my secretary was like, no, she graduated from
Mad's School, and I was like wow, So I go
to her graduation.

Speaker 1 (17:28):
I was blown away.

Speaker 3 (17:29):
She been out of med school for two months and
she's already delivering eighty one babies in our community at
the University of Wisconsin Health System. And so when I
reflect back and see like how the resources we raise
is touching young people's lives, that's what it's about. And
even like with what y'all doing on this podcast, Man,

(17:51):
it's about educating people. It's about inspiring people. And I've
seen some of the shows y'all, y'all I've done, and
I just applaud job man for you was that this
platform to help educate people.

Speaker 1 (18:04):
And that's a real honor man, for me to be
on y'all show. Straight up, Man, we appreciate you. He's
an honor for us to have you as well. One
of the things I want to talk about, man, because
when people like us usually have success, right, you would
think it'll be a lying around the corner of people

(18:26):
waiting to congratulate you and a plug and you, right,
But it's the people from our very same communities that
often become your biggest detractors. You getting to handle large
sums of money, man, especially in the space to where
you're you know you're doing for people, right, Yeah, how
often have you been a ridicus man and people coming

(18:46):
up and choosing you with stef I know you're not
doing this with the money. I ran a new football program.
And an interesting thing is this, Me and my wife
spent so much of our own money. But checks you
to have people coming to you telling you are hurt
y'all for the house league money, oh that new cir
cup and the league money. And it's always the ones
that's playing for free. They're always the ones wh ain't

(19:09):
paying no money. They just think you just getting all
this money in, but you spending money? Yeah? Yeah, has
that been the case with you? Went all bro?

Speaker 3 (19:19):
I get hated on every single day. You know what, man,
I'm just learning to step there for what it is.
I like, somebody was just hating on me. Yes, his
brother did a I just said, man, God bless him.
So he makes this post and pretty much I guess
somebody must have beat him up. And he's making me
sound like I'm some kind of nonprofit kingpan And he

(19:42):
was like, I can't get into these shows because Michael
Johnson is blocking me from getting into like these big
production shows and time. And I was like, I was like, brother,
you're giving me too much power. First, I don't even
really know who you are, and whoever blocking you it
ain't me, and and usually I would responding go toe
to toe with people like that, but now I.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
Just ignore them, man, because they're dealing with.

Speaker 3 (20:06):
Their own trauma. I get example, where George Floyd was killed.
I was raising some money around that, and right before that,
we had for COVID. We had raised about three million
dollars to help pay people rent and help get people
face masks and food in their houses. And there were
some people that was criticizing me because there were some

(20:28):
young people tearing down statues downtown and some of those
same business owners are friends of mine. So I simply
put up a go fund me paid we raised about
three hundred thousand dollars to kind of get all of
their windows and stuff fished. So some of the young
activists was upset with me that I was helping those
downtown businesses. So they challenged me and was like, meet

(20:49):
us on the streets, and anybody know me in Wisconsin
or Chicago, where I'm from, I'm not.

Speaker 1 (20:54):
Afraid to go anywhere.

Speaker 3 (20:55):
I'll go at any neighbor at anytime, any boardroom.

Speaker 1 (20:59):
That's just how I wrote.

Speaker 3 (21:00):
So I go out there, I meet with them, and
it was about ten thousand of them at about fifty
of oz, and I think they were shocked that I
was out there, and so they.

Speaker 1 (21:10):
Ended up giving me the bullhorn.

Speaker 3 (21:12):
And one of the things they shared with me is
that there was no black representation at our state capitol.
And they were like, if you really want to do something,
make sure we got some black people on our capitol.
So at first I was like, I'm not the governor,
the mayor, I don't bill statues. Then I had to
reflect man and say, Okay, they're criticizing and saying nobody

(21:32):
is listening, and I just, honestly, bro I just had
to shut my mouth and try to understand where they
were coming from. So I literally picked up the phone
that next morning. I called the governor. I says, any
black people in our state capitol. He straight up told
me no. So I lobbied our state legislat try to
put together a team of business and community leaders, and

(21:54):
we built the first statue of a black woman anywhere
in the United States at our state capitol, about a
million dollar statue that's standing there.

Speaker 1 (22:03):
Her name is bil Phillips.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
Veil was the first woman in the United States of
America to ever be elected to a state wide office
when John F. Kennedy and pointed her to the Democratic
National Committee, and she was the first of many. So
sometimes criticism can be a good thing. But sometimes, man,
when you're doing stuff, people want to just hate on you.
It comes with the territory as a black man. I

(22:26):
get accused of stilling all the time. People say, you're
raising money.

Speaker 4 (22:30):
In there, soul.

Speaker 3 (22:32):
If you help this person, you took some money off
the top. And when I tell people, bro, I got
one hundred people I report. So I got a very
big board with a governance committee of about seventy people.
I run a public, nonprofit organization. I'm not gonna put
my reputation on the line to steal five hundred dollars,
one thousand dollars or one thousand dollars. So I just

(22:55):
I ignore them to some degree, and I keep it
moving and I just let the work speak for us.

Speaker 1 (23:00):
If that made sense, doing and correcting me for a room.
You do that a lot of the comptability with this stuff, Yeah, yeah,
you do.

Speaker 3 (23:08):
So like one of the things I do, And some
of it might be fair criticism. So one year we
bought our maintenance guy and it was all on the news.

Speaker 1 (23:18):
This is a guy that's been rocking.

Speaker 3 (23:19):
With me for years, and sometimes, man, you got to
take care of people on your own team. So we
presented him with a half a million dollar house. We
didn't pay for the whole house. We came up with
about two hundred and fifty thousand. He couldn't afford the
down payment. We got owners that stepped up, and on
Christmas Day we fully furnished that surprise and his wife.

(23:40):
So that people's on social media and it was like,
he could have gave a house to a homeless person.
Why didn't he pick somebody on his team? And the
first thing I said was, you could do the same thing.
So if I'm raising the money, don't tell me who
I can give it to and who I get. But
then I read some of the things and I'm like, okay,

(24:00):
if I'm out there publicly raising money, what I decided
to do after that, I said, I'm gonna put together
a little committee and it will allow people to send
me nominations and say, hey, send me your stories, and
then I'll let the community kind of fat some of
those stories and then they'll rate them and say, okay,
if you raise the money, these are the top fifty

(24:21):
families you should help. And so what it does It
takes responsibility off me. So people will say, oh, he's
just choosing his friends and his family members, which I've
never helped any of my family members.

Speaker 1 (24:33):
But what happened.

Speaker 3 (24:34):
There is so much need out there, man, and people
just want to be helped, and they see these blessings
happen publicly, and sometimes bro hurt people.

Speaker 1 (24:44):
Hurt people, And I've.

Speaker 3 (24:46):
Just learned, man, sometimes you got to ignore them and
sometimes you take them off face to face.

Speaker 1 (24:51):
And it just comes with the territory. Well, you know,
one of the things that I want to allude back to,
you talked about the technical programs that you're doing going
back there. I'm a firm believer that not every kid
man that's high school is meant to go to a universe. Yeah,
that's not for every kid man. You got kids. I
know when I was going to school, we had programs

(25:12):
in Cleveland where you had shop class, the wood class,
you had the brothers and there, you know, yeah, making
you know, doing projects, making shares and stuff and fables. Right,
they was making some dop fifth from that class made
My mama still got automotive class too. Ship niggas was
in there working on cars, building cars, ship metal class.

(25:34):
I remember all.

Speaker 4 (25:35):
The type of class.

Speaker 1 (25:36):
Yes, good classes, man, because we all I knew in
Cleveland wanted to graduate. I think you had to have
six units of that, you know, before you graduated. Right.
I loved going to the middle class. I loved doing it.
I remember when of the homies was so good man.
He made my mom's a wood chair and she still
got to this day. She still got a big share
to be like a rock and share. You know. I

(25:56):
think we need more of those. I think we need
more of those in the I'm not mistaken. If you
can get enough money together, you can open those up yourself,
can't you. Yeah, no doubt, no doubt.

Speaker 3 (26:08):
Let me say this, man, I'll tell you a story
about this brother name Staying Whey out of Philadelphia. So
I used to run facilities for the Philadelphia public schools.
And when I left for this job, there was this
brother named Staying who happened to be married to my
Antelo's niece. And right when I was leaving, and he

(26:29):
was like, man, Bro, I'm walking out with you, and
so my mindset to I was like, man, Bro, you
got kids, don't leave your Julian's job and go start
a business. And he was like, no, brond of doing
it on the side. If I if I do this
full time, no, I'll make millions. So over the years

(26:50):
he would give me updates. While I was in Wisconsin,
said magne, I got six trucks. Now I got twenty trucks.
So one one year friend of my old boss ran
for Chicago and he said, man, you got a couple
of friends phone numbers I can get see if I
get to the donator used to work for us in Philadelphia.

Speaker 1 (27:08):
So I gave him ten names. So he calls me back.

Speaker 3 (27:11):
He said, man, thank you. One of your guys came through.
He gave me fifty thousand dollars. He said, ool, he said,
statement that cost I said, Bro, you in a position
to get fifty plus plus to somebody.

Speaker 1 (27:24):
He said, Mike, I ain't playing something up to like
two hundred employees.

Speaker 3 (27:28):
And I'm now the largest owned black I'm the largest
black age back.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
Company in the Tri state area. He did that, and no.

Speaker 3 (27:36):
Matter fifteen years, Bro, and he's getting money and he
don't even have a college degree. And also, no Norman
in this country, only fifty one percent of working age
adults got college degrees. So we know historically every kid
ain't gonna go to college. Every kid a gonna graduate.

(27:56):
And some of the richest people I know on landscaping
company are in real estate and they don't have the grades.

Speaker 1 (28:04):
You know what's funny When I tell people I know
a couple of billionaires, everybody always assume, mister rep people
that I knew these dudes man, Like one of them
is in the real estate man, the other women is
into HVAC. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they think you know like that,
like something like seventy locations expect locations and started from

(28:25):
one truck, right, How difficult is it. Let's say me
and eight one started a technical college and compt the
man for the kids to have somewhere the kids can
comp to Long Beach and wife to go to school.
The ones that ain't necessarily going to college something get
into men to learn the trade and actually get their
certification to go out and make some money. How hard
is it to do something like that? It ain't.

Speaker 3 (28:47):
So I just went through that, right, And so one
of the guys I pribn do shot too. It's this
guy named John Mackenzie, who's uh that's the got to
help me raise the thirty five million dollars in sixteen months.

Speaker 1 (29:00):
So Johnna's a developer.

Speaker 3 (29:02):
He owns a bunch of commercial real estate properties. So
I went and stayed out of his house in Florida,
and I was trying to get a couple hundred thousand
dollars from him and he and I really didn't want
to go to Florida to meet because I didn't really know.

Speaker 1 (29:16):
Him at the time. And so what I learned is.

Speaker 3 (29:19):
That you really don't give money to people that he
don't know. So I go out there, I hang out
with him and his wife. Man, I honestly bro They
showed me such a great time. I felt like I'd
do that for a long time. And by the time
I left, I didn't even have to ask him for contribution.
So then he approached me and said, man, we should
build like a vocational school, teach kids out to become

(29:41):
plumbers entrepreneurs.

Speaker 1 (29:43):
And so he said, man, you should lay out a plan.

Speaker 3 (29:45):
So at the time, I was going to just buy
like a warehouse building, put some new pain on it,
and then figure it out.

Speaker 1 (29:54):
So at the time brought was in this.

Speaker 3 (29:55):
Program at Harvard Business School, and I learned about this doctor.

Speaker 1 (29:59):
Named to Be who in Indonesia.

Speaker 3 (30:03):
Pretty much had put up his house built this one
hundred million dollar hospital, and to be honest with you,
it inspired the shit out of me. I was like,
a million ain't enough. We already thirty five million. So
the first person I called it was this lady named
Pleasant Rowland who started this company called American Girl Down,
and I straight up asked turning her husband for ten

(30:24):
million dollars on zoom. She committed to five, her husband
committed to one, and he pretty much said, if you
started the project, I'll give you the other four million dollars.
And so that was pretty much a ten million dollar
phone call. And that inspired me to build a state
of the art facility. But I did not have the
credibility as a profit leader. So we ended up partnering

(30:48):
with the Madison Area Builders Association, who have hundreds and
hundreds of builders as part of their membership.

Speaker 1 (30:57):
But we created that with.

Speaker 3 (30:58):
Them, and I got John for Ken's on board, and
then we got Doughters behind it. We built that facility
really quickly, and then they helped us. We put together
the board and before you know it, we was having
a ribbon cutting ceremony. And it happened that quickly by
partnering with the right people. So the possibilities are there.

(31:19):
There's not a lot of people doing it. They've now
replicated our program. Betweenty two other cities across the United States,
and I think y'all could do it in your neighborhood too, Bro.

Speaker 1 (31:30):
Well, you know that's the biggest thing I see, right,
I know. The big thing now is the government cutting
people's food stamps snap benefits. In one of the things
I said, I said, we sitting up here arguing, man
of some folks giving us something. It's not livermit. Our
situation no better. Really. You know how many generations of
people I noticed on welfare, Bro. They mamas was on welfare.

(31:51):
Now they on welfare, and then their kids on welfare.
It's just a cycle piece itself. Right. What if we
had a situation where I know that pop was he's
a truck driver. He made pretty good money, right, Yeah,
let's start showing people you don't necessarily have to open
on your own truck. I heard Walmart they truck drivers

(32:11):
make good money, real good money. Right, A talk about
with your jobs, right? Yesish, I know a couple of eggs. Fact,
people are doing real well for theirself, got big house
out and corona and stuff. They own their own business.
I always thought it would be real dope, man to
establish a program like that, even if it meant thus
partnering up with somebody that really knew the background of

(32:32):
that stuff and saying, you know what, Bro, I don't
want to be the face of it, but I want
you to come and, you know, help help us establish
this right. You know, I think if we had that
mindset man versus on you know, because giving somebody to
play the food or a turkey on Thanksgiving it's cool, man.
We got to start showing people how to fish man,
real talk, real talk. Nobody out there giving up turkeys.

(32:56):
They look like you want to say something, Bro.

Speaker 2 (32:57):
I'm sorry, no, I mean, but that's definitely a star,
you know what I'm saying, because we were lacking some
of that, you know what I'm saying in the communities where,
like you said, motherfucker used to be able to beat,
could learn the trade and learn how to do shit,
not necessarily have to go to college. So I think

(33:18):
that's a great start, and especially if it's in this
day and age where you're saying shit is profitable for motherfuckers,
and like you said, those businesses are age back, you know,
teaching people how to beat plumbers or whatever.

Speaker 4 (33:33):
Shit. It's a start, you get me. It's a way
to show a motherfucker.

Speaker 2 (33:38):
That you're trying to give back necessarily to to the
point of trying to help a motherfucker have a future,
because you know, sports ain't for everybody. Wrapping damn show
ain't for everybody. And we see how that's going nowadays.
So like I say all the time, well, people hate

(33:59):
to be more normal nowadays, but we need Norman motherfuckers.
We need business owners and motherfuckers who can start their
own businesses and see that that shit is also profitable.

Speaker 4 (34:11):
You get me.

Speaker 1 (34:13):
Yeah, that's that's real talk, man. And you know, not
to cut you off because one thing I noticed now,
and this is glaring to me. And I'm one of
those type of people. I believe people can do what
they want to. It's a freak country. But I notice
a lot of the rappers whose careers are kind of
on the decline, you know, they shows not coming in

(34:34):
like The Use or whatever else. They're trying to podcast now,
and I think everybody believes that it's all this money.
I hear people say, oh, man, it's such and such
twenty million dollars to this podcast. I don't say nothing
because it's not my job pocket watch nobody. But ain't
no way to recoup that money. Ain't nobody getting twenty
million dollars unless they rogan and they'll have this this

(34:55):
like huge audience right to get that money. So I
see everybody doing these podcasts now because nobody else literally
asked anything else to do. And you figure, if you've
been rapping since you was eighteen and nineteen and you
thirty five forty now and that's all you've been doing,
you don't have no job skills to go do something.
So you figure, I'm gonna go do a podcast and

(35:16):
try to make some money. Right. We have to start
really man, expanding our boundaries. Man, yes, sir. We can't
think about just dribbling the basketball and towing the football
or picking up a microphone. There's so many of the
ways to make money. Man, everybody, I know, you know
how many people I know outside of a few big
and airs, I know, I knew a bunch of people

(35:37):
with that make really good money. Man. They don't have
college degrees. They just work really hard. Man. They have
long care they have They cut people's grass and they're
paying houses. They're electricians, plumbers, all these different people in
order to put you know, know, how to do roofing.
And it's a lot of opportunity out there, man, the

(35:58):
people that just put their mind and started expending me
mine and look at different things. Man, you know what
I learned knowing like.

Speaker 3 (36:09):
Coming I lived in all these different cities, but coming
to Wisconsin was a little different for me, right, And
sometimes man, you gotta expand your horizon and be around
people that you're not normally around. I remember, bro, I
got invited to this. I always tell this story. I
got invited to this farm party. Now, I had never
come in from I've never been the goddamn farm party

(36:31):
in my life. So I perceived that this farm party
was gonna be like horses and shit and cows and.

Speaker 1 (36:40):
O this open land.

Speaker 3 (36:43):
And I get there in this dona add DJ's out there,
a lot of bands. That was my first time on
a four wheeler. I'm out there on these four wheelers
and I'm like, man, it was one of the dope
best parties I ever went to and what happened When
I first got to West Caude. It was so many
donors at that party. Here was something I was telling

(37:05):
my wife. I was like, man, I really don't want
to go to this shit. And when I got there,
I met so many people. And when I think about
the people that was in that room, those folks end
up raising like tens of millions of dollars for me
over the years. So sometimes, man, we gotta be willing
to go in rooms that we may not be comfortable with.

(37:27):
And I've also learned, man, if you're the smartest person
in the room all the time, you not with the
right people. So I'm always trying to just diversify how
I spend my time, who I spend my time with,
who I.

Speaker 1 (37:42):
Can learn from.

Speaker 3 (37:43):
So I'm personally growing so I can pass the torch
to somebody else to help them grow.

Speaker 1 (37:51):
You know what I was just thinking, right, I knew
this guy that I played high school for all with
and he had scholarships. He was a really good football player.
But it's hard wasn't really going to be in a
football player, right, they just really wasn't. He has some
big scholarship officer and he turned him down. I'm not
gonna say the school because then people start figuring out

(38:13):
who he was. Right, he said, man, really, because he
always had a car in front of his grandma's. He's
always had some kind of recordy car. He was fixing
on man. Right, he said, Man, I really just want
to be a mechanic. I'm done playing all. I got
my head hurt all the time. I don't really want
to do that no more. Right, And I was like, dude,
you tripped me, because I swear if this dude had
kept playing, he probably have been in an NFL. Man,

(38:35):
This dude opened up the first like automotive shops and Knowhio,
they had like the small check thing in there, so
everybody all around and surround the counties had to go
to him to take car small. Right. He wound up
opening one in Northeast Ohio. He opened one, another, one
opened up another one. I think this brother got like
fifteen shops. I know he's had more at one time,

(38:57):
but he sold a lot of them off and he's
doing really well for himself. Now, what if he'd a
listener what everybody else told him and continue us playing well,
just going along that regular path. Everybody was telling them, man,
my postle telling me man that dude don't lost his month. No,
he wanted to follow this heart and just did what
he wanted to do. Yeah, everybody's path different, man, And

(39:18):
I think that a lot of times, especially as black folks. Man,
I think we we just get too caught up in
what doing trying to do with looks sexy?

Speaker 2 (39:26):
Yeah, and I think some of the times if if,
like I said, with this day and age, you know,
motherfuckers want to get rich quick.

Speaker 4 (39:36):
Skill, you get me, Uh got.

Speaker 2 (39:39):
You need people want to put in the hard work
and dedication that it might take to get to a
certain You tell the motherfucker today how you'll give you
one hundred thousand right now, or give me ten years
and and you can have ten million.

Speaker 4 (39:54):
Motherfucker might go, nigga, give me that hundred right now.
You give me.

Speaker 2 (39:59):
Of them. We're in the dage of get rich quick.
Back in our days, we were kind of taught that
the path might take you some time, but that's a hustler,
you get me. We were taught that shit's not going
to be an overnight success, you get me. So you

(40:23):
learned that value. But today and age, a lot of
shit is get rich quick.

Speaker 4 (40:28):
You feel.

Speaker 2 (40:30):
Some people might have have patience to take that route
of going through that normalcy. You feel me, like you said,
more fucker like, oh shit, then you go to the NFL
or open an automotive shop, motherfucker Like, Okay, Now, I'll
give you two years in the NFL or ten years
as a motherfucker all in the shop doing all changes. Nigga,

(40:54):
you give me that two years in the NFL. You
feel me that longevity, You know what I'm saying. That's
what's the problem. A lot of opportunities are on offered.
So you said, you know, you gotta be told like
it's okay to be north, Like some motherfuckers just don't
want to be normal and like nine to five or
doing small checks or motherfucker's doing h back, It's okay

(41:20):
to be normal. And I think that's what some of
the youth need to be taught today. You know, I
got a wrong boy. It's a popping rapper, right. He's
a popular rapper and him and his wife in itself,
they owned one of the most successful They started off
doing the Amazon stuff, right. They started off with four trucks, right,
and you know, of course that's his business. So he's

(41:42):
gonna go out there, go on the truck and do
delivery sometimes. Right, especially when they first started, one of
his fans recognized them and say it, man, what happened
because he still deliver the package. Right, So he just
assumed because you see this man delivering the package that
something press don't happen this man.

Speaker 1 (42:00):
It's making way more money because now they got it
fleeted like one hundred vehicles, right, they have a fleet
of one hundred vehicles, and he's the stuff for post office.
Now it's just an Amazon. That's just one of the
things he does. Right. They have a logistics company, and
there's one of the biggest companies like actually in Louisiana now.
And I think people see stuff like that sometime hapened

(42:20):
assume as somebody fell off, and it's just like, I
think that's real, just ignorant mindset to whereas somebody will
literally clowned if they think you got a job, Oh man,
you fell off. You're doing this and that not knowing
that that man owned a company or not knowing he
just there's nothing wrong with having a job real, y'all.

Speaker 3 (42:38):
Ye man, I heard somebody on social media say I'd
rather have a plastic bag with five thousand dollars in
it than to have a Louis Vutan, a five thousand
Louis Viti perse with a dollar in it, right, And
so sometimes, man, and at these sometimes when we come
from living and challenging circumstances, when we do get some money,

(43:00):
we want to flash it and we want to show
people what we got. And I think it's a it's
a mindset thing, man, And that's why, like most of
the wealthy people that I know, it's crazy. Almost all
of them look broke, you know, and it's like it's
almost like they're shame that they got wealth and they
don't want people to know it. And at first I'm

(43:20):
be like, man, you got the three million dollar boat,
I would show this shit.

Speaker 1 (43:24):
Oh and there's one guy.

Speaker 3 (43:27):
He told me why he didn't want his boat on
social media and he didn't want to blast because he realized,
like I was fortunate that I've been able to earn money,
but there's so many people who don't got it. And
he kind of gave me his ten reasons why he
doesn't like to show his will.

Speaker 1 (43:45):
And so I think part of it is, man, when
we do get it.

Speaker 3 (43:48):
We want to show people that we got it and
it looks sexy, and even the people who are wealthy
folks don't understand what it took to get these positions.
Like there's some people that work for me who want
to be a CEO right away, and sometimes people don't
understand the journey. Like in this role, it wasn't just
handed to me. I had to move to four or

(44:09):
five different states. I had to learn how to read,
I had to learn how to get speeches. I had
to go get all these credentials. I had to learn
how to raise money because you're getting the seat, but
you got to be to maintain earn the right to
sit in that seat every single day. Bro, if you're
going to be impactful, you know what I'm saying, I

(44:30):
think the biggest like you said, with our people, Man,
it's a lot of times we don't have patience and.

Speaker 1 (44:34):
A wear thought. It just whether they's thump. Everybody wants
stuff to quick. Mel I know when me and a
first started doing podcasts, there wasn't no bunch of money
involved and we was on a major network. Though we
had to really just kind of just go, Like this
had to scale, It had crow. It just didn't happen overnight.
And I think when people people get really disappointed when
stuff just gonna happen as fast as it thinks and

(44:56):
if you think it shit. And I think a part
of that is because there's a lot of misinf information.
There's a lot of misinformation on the Mounto Minion the
rappers make. I think people just get so caught up
in the fantasy aspect of everything. They seen this guy
in this big guardy chain and the video with him
and the rose first, they gonna know as soon as
the cameras turn off, all that stuff gotta go back yeah, yeah, yeah,

(45:18):
Or where you do get a check?

Speaker 3 (45:20):
The taxes, right, they're gonna tax you thirty five forty There,
you got an agent, he's gonna get his cut. And
then if they put up any expenses, you gotta rainburst
them dead. If you got a house and a car,
by the time you pay for all that stuff, whatever
little money you got, it's gone.

Speaker 1 (45:38):
And then to your point on if you're used to
making whatever the numb.

Speaker 3 (45:42):
Is right, half a million a year, quarter million dollars
a year, and as you get older, you lose that
job and it goes away. Now How are you gonna
maintain all those things? How are you gonna pay the
mortgage to the maintenance on the house, the card note,
the insurance your kids were, they're in private school, whatever
it is. You gotta find multiple ways, multiple incomes trains

(46:06):
to be able to sustain your liveyhood or you got
to do a good job at best and the money
that you made when you were making that kind of money,
and a lot of times we don't do that. I'm
really big gonna have a multiple streams of income.

Speaker 1 (46:22):
I've always believed in not stopping what I'm doing just
because I may come up on some money on something.
I know a lot of people, if they start making
money at something, they're gonna quit their job. And I'll
tell them, man, you're only doing that. What you're doing
a couple of hours a week. You don't have time
to continue. You're doing that other thing. You gonna stay man,
Because I'm a believer in not that I just have
a negative mindset, but I believe that sometimes man, stuff

(46:44):
just don't work out. And always I would rather have
a safety net man in chase something don't work out
to where I'm not starving, you know what I mean?
And it took me really, man, when I was working
in the music publishing business, I was a and R
a bunch of years, right, and it took me literally
almost loosely everything I had, my house being the foreclosure
and everything else to say I'm never going through that again.

(47:06):
I am never going through that again. Or where you
just don't know where your next dollar coming from, and
you're really kicking yourself in the ass because you look
back and say, man, I squandered thousands of dollars, hundred
thousand dollars literally just going out doing a bunch of
dumb shit. I got cars. I don't even know where
that car is at now. I don't even know where
that shaine is at now. It's just not even here.
Know what I was thinking about that the other night,

(47:28):
I was like, whatever happened to that truck? I asked,
I think I lest somebody parl. They never just gave
it back. Stuff that you not tripping, man. And I've
heard stories home boys, man, where they might have moved
from my house in Florida and just left for Rose
Royce back to some of the Mercedes or something. They
thinking like, damn, man, this dude got my car or
this differ. I don't look this dude, oh this nieche

(47:50):
Is never brought it back because we really don't know
how to even though you're working really hard as an
entertainer for that money, it's come so fast you just
don't appreciate it. And I think people get caught up
and trying to file with other people, right, because it's
a lot of people, man, but let's spend money. As
soon as they get some money, they want to go
spend it on something bro because it was funny.

Speaker 3 (48:12):
Man.

Speaker 1 (48:13):
I had Aileen Iverson came up to see me.

Speaker 3 (48:18):
Back in July, and I had them up here for
an event and he was and he was telling me
how back when he played for the Philadelphia seventy six
is he had a hard time saying no to like
family members, know, to friends, and before you know what,
if you're singing yes to everybody, you end up going broke.

(48:39):
And he said one of the best things that happened
in his life when he just started telling saying no
to people.

Speaker 1 (48:46):
It was a word. Man, It's the powerful worrying. While
it might be challenging.

Speaker 3 (48:51):
Man, it was hard for me to even at one
point in my life to start singing no to people,
because people will drain you, especially if they know you
would just freely give it away or they perceived that
you got all these resources, and because they're related to
you and they're connected to you, it's almost like, hey,

(49:11):
I deserve this. And what I've just learned, Man, if
you do it, you do it. If you can't, you can't,
And it's okay to say no. And one things, Man,
I respect him bout my son. My son is a
hip hop artist, and my son is a junior at
the University of Cincinnati. I remember asking him a couple

(49:32):
of weeks ago. I saw he was in Miami and
he was recording, and I was like, man, don't you
got school on Monday? And I look on whatever, Twitter
or whatever. I was like, it's like you all over
the place, and I said, are you doing this school now?
My wife was like, don't worry about I can look
at his whatever, the little account. Parents can look at

(49:52):
the say if he really is his business And he said,
Dad is all about time and I I learned that
from your mom, So don't worry about it. I'm gonna
get my a's and b's, but I'm out here grind
that because music is one thing. And then he was
telling me. I said, man, well, you making a little
bit of money music? Why you He works at a

(50:15):
bar as not a bodyguard or whatever they are, bouncer
and he's like one of his friends is making fun
of him, and he was like, man, why are you
doing that? He was like, Dad, I made twelve thirteen
hundred dollars a month part bouncing and I invest that money.
And I was so proud to hear him say that, man,
because that's his little side hustle. And he was like,

(50:38):
I don't know what's going to happen to my music career.
I may go to college, it may not be a
job there. And I'm just so thankful. Like he got
that mindset, man, And a lot of times, man, we
got to just figure out how do we inspire people
change their frame of thinking and not be materialistic. So
like I recently built a house and me and my

(51:02):
wife for about a decade live under our means. And
I was like, when we do buy a house, I
don't want no fifteen thousand dollars a month mortgage. My
mortgage be the same mortgage is somebody that got a
one bedroom apartment. But we planned we saved. We strategically

(51:24):
made the right business decisions to make sure that when
we wanted to invest in something, we were in a
position to be able to do it, and we didn't
over overspend outlive like our income. And sometimes I made
that mistake, Bro, when when I started working, I would
buy back in the nineties, Man, I would go buy

(51:46):
these Chevy and Apollos. I would put the rams. I
was spending seven thousand dollars on rams. I was spending
four five thousand dollars on sixteen inch speakers with the
six bys and all those accessory costs more than a
damn car. And I went to fifteen twenty of those cars, Bro,
And I think about all that money I spent on

(52:08):
all those cars.

Speaker 1 (52:09):
What if I would have simply put that money in
the stock market.

Speaker 3 (52:13):
The stock market over the last fifty years have grown
on average seven percent seven percent, And so just imagine
that's seven percent snowballing year after year after year. All
those cars I bought, they'd appreciate it. And if even
if I would have kept them, their cars will probably

(52:34):
be worth nothing.

Speaker 1 (52:35):
Right now, that's the thing about it, You know what.
I had an interesting thing that happened to me. I
remember when I first started making a little bit of money,
and you look back at it, I really wasn't making
no money. I thought I was the right. There was
a guy that had a laundry map man that I
used to take, you know, I used to go to,
you know, when I was younger, right, And I ran

(52:55):
to him one day. He was like, oh man, he's like,
you're doing pretty good for himself. He said, Man, you know,
whyn't you by the laundry man? And so I went
and sat with him and you know, talked about it,
and I said, well, man, what's showing every month? He said, man, well,
I knited about four thousand dollars every month, right, But
I'm only putting maybe three hours into this every week, right.
And I looked at that, and at the time I

(53:16):
was making so much money, I said, four thousand dollars
a month. I said, man, that's not even worth my
time for me to be doing that. But what I
was thinking about, especially me now being Olga old man, right,
older man, I think it. Man, it's been nice to
have that little four thousand. They just have it for
when you retired, right, that would have just been the

(53:38):
one little you know, one of my little lum four
fix you know, send them out portfolio of the robbers
like from He said, Man, all he did was going
there twice a week to change the soapball, get to
change other things, put some sodas in there every once
in a while, making sure the machines is right. Now.
He said, that's a dude that worked in there. Man
hands all the other step kept the machines fixed. He said,
as long as you do that, man, you'll be straight.

(54:00):
And I thought about it, and I said, man, I
had a missed up mindset. I had a nigga mindset.

Speaker 2 (54:08):
It's not necessarily a nigga mindset. It's an uneducated mindset.
It's a motherfucking mindset. Oh of not being educated enough
to know what the food would be like. We all
went through that shit.

Speaker 1 (54:26):
Nigga.

Speaker 2 (54:26):
You could have told me a nigga who was making
records and making hundreds of thousands of dollars, nigga would
have said me the same thing, and I would have
been like, fuck, am I gonna do with a laundry?
Not making four grand and money late when I'm making
five six thousand a show for twenty minutes it's not
the mindset that you have. You get me because if

(54:50):
a nigga would have sat me down and educated me
and told me think about this motherfucking spot.

Speaker 4 (54:57):
In twenty years, you get.

Speaker 2 (54:59):
Me think about you're not thinking like that as an
eighteen nineteen year old motherfucker. You're not thinking that as
is back in And it's just that young mind state
of not being that you had a motherfucker who a
great uncle or a motherfucker who knew business and who

(55:21):
had ran up business for soul long. He would have
told you, niggas invest in that motherfucking laundry.

Speaker 1 (55:26):
Mack.

Speaker 2 (55:27):
You might not think it's right because you'll go take
motherfucking see like you said, you'll take twenty thousand and
then go put it in some speakers and motherfucking rhythms
real quick and a chain before mother say, nigga, give
me twenty thousand and you can take over the launch.

Speaker 1 (55:45):
And I think, man, and I think that's what it
was saying. He was literally because he was trying. He
was all black, dude. He was trying to excoose me something.
He was like, Man, give me twenty five thousand and
you can have this. You're like yours. You take over
the you know, the least on the building. You do
all that you take. He wasn't even really selling. He
wanted to get back out. He was moving back to
Mississippi or wherever he was from. Right, he was done, right,

(56:08):
And I thought about that, I said, Man, had I
took that thing, Man, I didn't necessarily need that little
four thousand dollars right now, but that was could have
been something I could have been putting up. Had X
amount of money, Yeah, I could have put that man
that wanted them into it like a you know, an
entry baring account or whatever. They had all kinds of money.

(56:28):
And when once you retire, it's always them little streams
of income. Like my wife is doing early retirement this summer, right,
and she has a nice retirement right, it's little retirement portfolio. Right.
And I thought about it. I said, a week, come
up upon that time to where the next ten fifteen
years we could be retired and it'd be nice. On
top of the stuff we got, the world were getting
an extra four thousand and five thousand, like the dele

(56:51):
and what there was, right?

Speaker 3 (56:53):
You know what I think it is, nor like I
don't know what your family situation, like almost all my
families still living poverty. And I'm probably I am the
most successful person in my family. And at the time when.

Speaker 1 (57:06):
I had those resources.

Speaker 3 (57:09):
It was nobody I really could look up to who
I could like visually see, And like I had a
brother in law who was a mailman and he was
telling me at the time invest in real estate. And
my mind is, you don't have real estates. I ain't
listening to you. And that was my mindset. And I
remember this bank I had out my money part that

(57:29):
was a black woman there, and she kept telling me
put this money in an interest band account, at least
get a CD put in the stock market. And I'm like,
I'm not gonna trust y'allt with my money.

Speaker 1 (57:40):
Man. I wish I would have listened to that lady.

Speaker 3 (57:43):
If I'd have listened to that lady in the nineties, bro,
that money would probably be tens of millions of dollars
right now. But because I didn't have somebody close to
me that It's just like like one of the reasons
you don't see black kids going into the trades. A
lot of times, we don't have black mothers and fathers
that's been in the trades.

Speaker 1 (58:03):
And you see a lot of white kids in that space.

Speaker 3 (58:05):
Is there their fathers and grandfathers, carpenters and plumbers and
all in the in that field.

Speaker 1 (58:12):
And that's part of the challenge, man. So I think
what it is we lack exposure to.

Speaker 3 (58:18):
How to create these types of investment account and we
also lack patients.

Speaker 1 (58:23):
Right.

Speaker 3 (58:24):
So to your point, if I got vice geesdude, I
don't have enough discretionary dumb to park that five thousand
dollars because I gotta pay my rent, I gotta pay
my track. No, I gotta get my nails done. I
got just the shoes. I want to go club it
this weekend. And I had that mindset. So it was

(58:44):
corn for me to think about what the next ten
to fifteen years is.

Speaker 1 (58:48):
I'm trying to live today, and that's part of the problem, man.
So when would you tell a person to they man
trying to establish a non profit Because I ran to
youth Football pro we never had enough money because half
the people in the community couldn't afford to pay there.
And I'm gonna tell you one thing that was really
disheartening for me. I had a few friends that it

(59:09):
was a means and they expected their kids to play
for free because they just assumed that, oh, you can
do it. You didnt play for free, But they didn't
know that each kid, every kid, pretty much costs one thousand.
I was fifteen hundred dollars writing you got three hundred
kids in the park, man. It costs a lot of
money to run those programs. Each kid gotta have insurance, man,

(59:30):
they get certified, this all kinds of stuff, they need, equipment,
And this dude just felt like his kids should pay
for free because he was the homie. No bro.

Speaker 3 (59:40):
So there's a little program called South Side Raiders where
I live at and I remember when I first moved
in town. South Madison is probably one of the poorest
neighborhood at the time in Wisconsin to.

Speaker 1 (59:53):
Tad and my son played for that tag. Ninety nine
percent black kids.

Speaker 3 (59:57):
And when I looked at their uniforms prepared to the
kids they were playing, it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:02):
Was night and day.

Speaker 3 (01:00:03):
So I ended up raising I think thirty forty thousand
dollars got the madul you're a farm. But I told
the commissioner of that team, I said, you got about
two hundred parents, and he said no, no, no, no, All these
parents live in poverty, they give and I said, give
me the microphone. I was at one of their banquets.
He said, Mike, they're not gonna give any money. I said, Bro,

(01:00:25):
you making that assumption because they're poor. I said, research
shows people who live in poverty or have the lowest
income give larger percentages of income than people with wealth.
And I said, I'll show you, bro. I picked up
that microphone. They were short ten grand. We raised that
money in stix and a half minutes. And so sometimes

(01:00:49):
I think we can't be afraid to even acts the
folks who if they believe in your program, some parents
would step up. I will also say there's one of
the reasons why a lot of churches don't do well. Now,
I'll never do a chicken don or a fish fry
for my boys and girls clubs.

Speaker 1 (01:01:06):
These days are waste of time, man. I'd rather go
right a grant.

Speaker 3 (01:01:10):
I'd rather go red my research and find out who
are the biggest donors in that community, prospect and go
to different people events and see who their sponsors are.
And then you go and you scout them out, and
you hunt them down until you get a meeting with
them and that's what I do. Bro Like, when I
go out and raise money, it's a hustle and sometimes

(01:01:34):
I play the loan game. Right some donors I know,
I can't ask them for money right away. I got
to build a relationship. And then once you build a relationship,
you don't even have to ask them. They'll see what
you're doing, follow you on social media, and they'll come
back and be like, hey, man, nor I see y'all
do with X, Y and Z. Man, my wife was

(01:01:55):
poking and we want to drop a meal on you.
And I've just learned. Man, you gotta learn who your
donors are. But you also got to deliver on the
shit you say you're gonna do. If you say you're
doing X, Y Z in the community, if the community
don't believe in what you're doing, the word to get
out and they'll bash you and they'll tell the truth,

(01:02:15):
and it'll be hard for you to raise money if
you ain't doing the things you say you don't do.

Speaker 1 (01:02:20):
Yeah, man, will you have this book? Where can people
go purchase your book at? Right now?

Speaker 3 (01:02:24):
None of th it is doing really well. Yeah man,
it's been out for a couple of weeks now. It
was funny just tonight Buzin. I don't know if you
remember bez Zeno, who's the uh Struts. He got on Facebook.
He read it and show us some love. So the
book that's called The Audacity to Lead and so Amazon.

(01:02:45):
You can buy it on Amazon or you can go
to my website M Johnsons CEO dot com. And when
you see the stories in the book, some people might
be like, this black man really raised this kind of money.
Everything I've done I got receipts for. It's off my website.
I've had a very high profile public person for over

(01:03:07):
fifteen years. All the stories that I talk about, from
the killings and my book, to the money that we've raised,
to the families that we've supported, it's all been documented.
And the book is about it's a real it's not
just a leadership book. It's about adversity, it's about love,
it's about relationships, and there's a reflection guy each chapter.

Speaker 1 (01:03:31):
And there's a leadership tool kit.

Speaker 3 (01:03:33):
So if you're a nonprofit leader, if you're a business
leader and you want to learn how to raise resources,
this is the book. And if you think the book,
if you buy and you think the book is garbage,
I'll be happy to refine you your money. Yeah, I
suggest you all walk there and get that, especially people
in our community, because I think we need to start
being more self dependent and start doing more for our

(01:03:55):
own because we got lack America.

Speaker 1 (01:03:57):
It's more money than anybody else, any of the racist people.
We appreciate you coming on, brother, checking in with us.
It was just as pleasure to have you tonight as
it was you coming on.

Speaker 3 (01:04:08):
They see with us, no doubt a if y'all ever
ever in Wisconsin and Chicago, I always got a place
to stay if it's a day I could do the support.

Speaker 1 (01:04:21):
Will give you all any knowledge that I have.

Speaker 3 (01:04:24):
I'm a phone call away and uh a friend of
Steve O as a friend of Monk and again, Man,
I've watched what y'all journeys over the years and that
was a real honor man to come on tonight ship
at eleven o'clock at night my time.

Speaker 1 (01:04:40):
Man, we appreciate you, Brovin. It's a big doubt, no doubt. Well.
That concludes another episode of the Gainst the Chronicles podcast.
Be sure to download I Heard app and subscribe to
the Gangst the Chronicles podcast. But Apple users find a
purple micae on the front of your screen, Subscribe to
the show, leave a comment and rating. Executive producers for
The Gangster Chronicles pod cast of Norman Steel Aaron m

(01:05:01):
c a Tyler. Our visual media director is Brian Wyatt,
and our audio editors tell It Hayes. The Gangster Chronicles
is a production of iHeartMedia Network and the Black Effect
Podcast Network. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio
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