Vichi Jagannathan - Co-Founder of the Rural Opportunity Institute

Vichi Jagannathan, co-founder of the Rural Opportunity Institute, sits down with Ryan to walk through her path from Princeton, Stanford, and Yale to co-founding the Rural Opportunity Institute (ROI) focused on focused on trauma informed education in Rural North Carolina.

Connect with Vichi on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vichij/

Learn More about the Rural Opportunity Institute

• Website: www.ruralopportunity.org
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ruralopportunity
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ruralopportunityinstitute

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to the Good Fit Careers podcast, where we explore perspectives on work that fits. I'm
Ryan Dickerson, your host. Today's guest is Vichi Jagannathan. Vichi is the co-founder and co-CEO of
the Rural Opportunity Institute in North Carolina. ROI is a startup nonprofit that has trained over

(00:22):
15,000 people in trauma-informed practices in North Carolina and has partnered with more than
20 groups like schools, police departments, social services organizations, and community
nonprofits to implement those best practices throughout the state. Vichi started her career
as a high school science teacher with Teach for America after completing a bachelor's degree in

(00:43):
electrical engineering at Princeton and a master's degree in electrical engineering at Stanford.
After her Teach for America rotation, Vichi joined Microsoft as a regional director of the TEALS
program, focused on teaching computer science in high schools. After Microsoft, Vichi earned her
MBA at Yale. In 2017, Vichi and her co-founder started the Rural Opportunity Institute. Thank

(01:08):
you so much for being here. Would you give us an understanding of the work that you do today
to get us started, please? Yeah, so currently I am the co-founder of a startup nonprofit called
Rural Opportunity Institute, and we are operating in a pretty rural part of Northeastern North
Carolina around helping communities and community organizations become more trauma-informed. And so

(01:33):
basically what that looks like is working with them to shift from working with institutions like
police or schools or health departments to shift from more traditional practices that might feel
punitive to people to instead responding with more restorative responses, especially when people
are coming in with high stress, mental health challenges, that type of thing. Can you give us

(01:55):
a simplified description of the goal or what you're really trying to accomplish for the people
in rural North Carolina? Yeah, I think the ultimate goal of ROI is oftentimes people experience hard
things in life. It might be out of your control, things like homelessness or a hurricane or losing
your job. And right now, a lot of times when that happens, it sets off a kind of endless spiral for

(02:19):
people where they're not really able to recover. And our goal is to strengthen the different
community and public agencies around people, especially in rural communities, so that when
those hard things happen, they're surrounded by support and they're able to quickly recover,
get back on their feet and get back on track with what they were doing before that happened.
Oh, that's wonderful. Would you help us build our frame of reference and our understanding of you

(02:42):
as a person and how you came to be? And would you indulge us a little bit and tell us about
what you were like as a kid? Sure. Yeah, it's kind of funny to think about. Definitely when
I was a kid, I don't think I would have imagined doing nonprofit work. So I grew up just outside
New York City. Both my parents were IBM engineers and scientists. So what I remember most as a

(03:03):
little kid is they were coming home with chemistry sets and old computer chips and stuff like that
and doing a lot of tinkering. So I was always like mixing stuff together. I had a little toy,
like a play kitchen. And I'd be like pretending to mix stuff up and heat it up and things like
that. So I guess I was always kind of curious and somewhat willing to get my hands dirty in

(03:25):
terms of like trying out solutions and building things and things like that. But I think I ran
through a bunch of possible careers when I was little. But first I wanted to be a waitress
because they made a lot of tips. So now I better understand that whole ecosystem. I think there was
a part when I wanted to be a marine biologist and then a journalist and a bunch of different things.

(03:48):
So I had a lot of interests, but I think, yeah, just very curious. Right on. And what did you
imagine in terms of your educational career path? Did you have a sense of what you wanted to study
from early in life? I don't think I did early in life. I mean, I had a couple of influences around
me. So both my parents had PhDs and did research before transitioning into their careers. And so

(04:11):
I think there was a part of me that understood that research world and was
interested in that. But I guess the one thing that I always got hung up on, and
I guess it's kind of played out as I was really interested in the practical applications. Like
if we were doing something, I wanted to see people use it, or I wanted to build something,
or I wanted to be able to like watch it work in front of me, which I guess eventually led me to

(04:34):
think about engineering. But that wasn't, I think growing up, I was pretty open to understanding
what could be out there. I did have a small time period when I wanted to be a professional
basketball player. So I did that also. I had that phase. Wow. We all can dream.
Yeah. So I was very open. I don't think I was like, some kids, they're five years old and they
say, I'm going to be this and they do it. I was never really like that. It's like every year,

(04:58):
if you asked me, I probably had a different thing that I said I wanted to do. Yeah. That makes
sense. And such an interesting winding road that we all tend to follow to land where we're supposed
to be. Your educational pedigree, I would say is top of the world. Perhaps one of the most
impressive educational backgrounds I've ever seen. Princeton, and Stanford, and then Yale.

(05:20):
Tell me a little bit about, was that the plan? Was that what you expected your education to be like?
And what was that experience actually like for you? Yeah. I would say, yeah, that set of
universities altogether was definitely not the plan. But like I said, I think I was surrounded
by some influences that made that feel like a safe path. So both my parents, like I said before,

(05:47):
they have PhDs. Both my parents have PhDs. They also immigrated from India and so studied in India.
And one of the, I mean, they would always tell us growing up that they wished they could have
studied at a lot of the US universities. And they were naming the Harvard's, and Princeton's,
and Yale's, and all that stuff. So I think I had that around me a lot growing up. And so when it

(06:10):
came time to think about school and college, those types of big research universities were definitely
on my radar. I don't think I thought I'd hit three of them. That came later, but kind of had that on
my radar. And then when I was later in college, my older sister actually went to MIT. And so she

(06:30):
also had a lot of experience with the process and how she had navigated that. So got a lot of
guidance from her. So I think in general, this idea of like higher education, some of these
universities, that was in my head. The part that was less clear was how does that turn into a
career path? And I don't think we didn't really have that conversation much growing up. So that

(06:52):
was the part that I kind of had to figure out on my own. >> For the people out there who perhaps
haven't had the opportunity to attend schools like that, could you tell us a little bit about
what your experience was like and maybe some of your favorite or the most valuable components of
that kind of education? >> Yeah, I think attending a very elite university, it has its pros and cons.

(07:14):
So I think in terms of what it was like, prior to that, I went to a really big public school.
Like my graduating class was about 550. And it was a good public school, but the whole wide range
of types of offerings and people that are there. And there wasn't really like one thing that they're
pushing you to do, which I loved. And I think the difference going to a place like Princeton,

(07:35):
that's where I went to first, there is a lot more funneling towards certain very high profile career
paths. And a lot of them I hadn't even heard of. So it was interesting like going in freshman year,
people are already talking about, I'm gonna do consulting, or are you gonna do finance or

(07:57):
consulting or grad school? That's like the 30 things people talk about. And I didn't know
anybody in finance or consulting. And my parents went to grad school. So to me, it was like,
there's not that many choices, you kind of pick your lane, you're going really hard to that,
there's a ton of support for the one that you pick. And that was great. Like I got a lot of

(08:18):
support to think about grad school and things like that. But the part that I didn't really get was
exposure. And I didn't really realize until much later in my career, that there's all these other
things you can do besides, well, I guess besides law school, med school, finance, consulting,
and grad school. So pros and cons. I think in terms of like favorite part,

(08:40):
the quality of the teaching wasn't always super high, but it is something else having
the person teaching your course or lecture win a Nobel Prize. And that is something that was wild.
Like I am lucky enough to have had at least two professors who were Nobel Prize winners.
Like I said, not always highest quality in terms of teaching the material, but just,

(09:04):
it's pretty miraculous to be in proximity to people like that and go to their office hours,
and they're making jokes, and they're fairly normal people. That's probably one of the
experiences I most take away or remember was just like how cool it was to actually
be physically in those spaces. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. So let's

(09:27):
transition from your educational experience over into your first full-time job. And if I'm reading
your resume right, it sounds like you did some school and then some work and then back to school
and then back to work. Can you bring us along in that journey?
Yeah. Yeah. It was actually a little while before I got my first full-time job. So I
did my undergrad in engineering, electrical engineering, and then I graduated in 2010

(09:51):
and was very interested in working at that point and applied to a lot of tech jobs.
Again, I didn't have a lot of guidance around the range of things I could be applying to. So
I think that was a factor, but I was applying to a lot of just tech companies to be an engineer.
And because of the recession and the 2008 financial crisis, many of them mid-process

(10:14):
were coming back to me saying they had a hiring freeze. So I was hitting a lot of dead ends,
and it was getting pretty close to senior year, graduation, like people were lining up for
their stuff. So at that point, I decided to also apply to grad school. And when push came to shove
at the end, that was the only offer I had was to go to grad school. So what I ended up doing right

(10:38):
out of school was starting a PhD program. But even when I was there, I was pretty sure that
that probably wasn't what I wanted to end up doing, but I was hoping it would give me more time.
And around that same time, I encountered a Teach for America recruiter. And I think if you look

(10:59):
back in time, that 2010-ish period was like the height of TFA. A lot of people doing it,
very highly regarded. And so I met a recruiter. They were very convincing. So I decided to submit
an application to that as well. I also am not sure that I really thought I would do it, but at that
point, it was like I was just trying to get options. And ended up getting into TFA. So at the

(11:23):
time, I had this choice between doing a PhD at Stanford or starting Teach for America. I visited
Stanford. I had never been to California before. It was just so cool. So I was having a hard time
turning it down. And so I called up Teach for America, and I'm like, "Look, I have this other
opportunity." And they were very understanding. They were like, "That's fine. Why don't you try

(11:45):
grad school and you can defer. You can defer going to Teach for America. It would strengthen your
teaching experience if you had this grad school experience. So give it a go for a year and then
call us back." So that felt very safe. So I went to Stanford for a year. Loved California, loved
studying on a campus that felt like paradise. Did not feel super welcomed within electrical

(12:09):
engineering there. It's still pretty tough, but I think at the time, it was a big class.
So my cohort was about a thousand students, and it was like over 90% men. So just very few women.
And that was within the student body, but also reflected in the faculty. So encountered a lot of,
I think you'd call them like microaggressions at this point, but small examples of toxicity.

(12:32):
I didn't have the words for it. I don't think I consciously realized that, but it just, over time,
it wore on me. And I felt like, "I don't think this is what I want to be doing for like five
or more years." So built a lot of confidence in that. So I ended up calling TFA back and saying,
"Hey, yeah, what do you got?" And so they offered me a placement in Eastern North Carolina, which I

(12:53):
had never been to North Carolina. I didn't know anything about it, but sounded good to me.
And took that offer. So I left Stanford, packed up all my stuff, drove cross country,
came to North Carolina. So my first job was a high school teacher in rural Eastern North Carolina.
- Well, that's wonderful. And I mean, such an important and valuable thing. And
what a great opportunity for a lot of those students to get to learn from someone like you.

(13:16):
What was your experience as a high school teacher?
- Man, teaching high school couldn't be further from doing your PhD in electrical engineering.
It was super challenging and different. And especially we were in, so I was teaching in
a rural region. Most TFA placements are urban. So in our case, it was like I was living in a town,

(13:39):
I guess even a county of probably less than 10,000. The town I was in had about 700 people.
The school I was in had, they graduated about 30 to 50 students a year. So very, very small
compared to where I'd grown up. I was on a hallway teaching where almost everybody was a TFA teacher.
So there was like eight to 10 of us on one hall just teaching the same kids. So it was an

(14:02):
interesting, like intense bonding growth experience. I lived in a house with six teachers.
We were the majority of young professionals our age in the area. So we built this really strong
support network. A lot of my, I mean, my co-founder today did TFA. The other organization I started,

(14:24):
she also did TFA. A bunch of my best friends now did TFA. So we got really close friendship-wise.
I think the hard part was teaching is a really hard job. And then teaching in a rural low resource
environment is really hard. Teaching in a community that you're not from is really hard.
So it was like a fire hose of learning, not just how to do the job, but also learning a ton about

(14:50):
myself. I hadn't really been in a situation where I'm constantly speaking in front of people and
interacting with people. And it's like, you're coming in every day, entertaining 20 to 30 high
school students. And you got to come up with how to engage them and do this stuff. You're the one
adult in the room. And so I grew a lot in terms of like finding my own voice, understanding my

(15:11):
identity, building relationships, getting comfortable with failing really hard and then
coming back the next day. So yeah, just like a ton of growth, particularly in skills
that I had never really practiced before. So I think that ended up being very positive.
So it sounds like the circumstance itself, the place that you were doing the teaching was

(15:35):
challenging. Your audience, the people that you were teaching specifically was challenging. And
then also making that transition yourself, going from being the student to being the teacher.
Would you share on any of those categories, what specifically was so hard about any of those?
I would say probably one of the harder parts was actually the teaching. And I think something

(16:02):
that's especially hard about it is that you have to be on every single day. And so I just remember
like you come in on Monday morning, you got three classes to teach. Every single one of those
classes is a very long, like if you imagine you're in a job and you have to facilitate a like 90
minute meeting, there's at least that amount of time of prep that goes into it. And so you're

(16:25):
like, you've spent for me, you know, so if inefficient the first time, maybe I've spent
four hours prepping for that 90 minute lesson that I need to do three times. And then you go and do
it and it doesn't go so well. And it's like, okay, then I spent a lot of time re-explaining
everything because the kids were confused and they didn't learn anything. And then I'm like,

(16:46):
oh, nevermind, sorry. Like that was poorly thought out. And then you go home and you're like, man,
that was rough. And guess what? You need to put in four more hours to like wake up tomorrow and
run it back. And it's the same people in the room who remember that you confused them yesterday.
And you're like, okay, it's like you're doing that every single day, day in and day out. I mean,

(17:10):
the cool part is over time and you get better fast, you build relationships, confidence,
all that stuff. But I remember the first month or two, it was like from 6 a.m. to 10 or 11 p.m.
I was constantly working. Like I was either, you know, preparing for a lesson, teaching a lesson,

(17:33):
prepping for the next day. It just was like, I remember feeling like I couldn't spare a single
second. And you're just like, if I spend a single second doing something else, I'm not going to
stay on the treadmill. Because like the class comes whether you're ready or not. And the less
ready you are, the worse it goes. So it's like, yeah, it was just a really rough getting a hang

(17:59):
of things in the beginning. I mean, eventually you get to develop a system. It gets a lot easier.
Like by the end of my second year, I wasn't, it was way smoother. Like I could spend a Sunday
planning the whole week and I wasn't, you know, I'd leave work at three, do a couple hours of work.
I could do stuff in the evening. But in the beginning, it was just like so much to learn

(18:22):
and get better at. And the knowledge that like the kids are going to be there every single day
waiting for you. So you can't be like, hey, can we push this back to next week? It's there. And
it's like, that is the, you have to be ready for the moment. Yeah. The show must go on. And I
imagine at least just remembering my own experience that high schoolers tend to be the most forgiving

(18:43):
and gracious and gentle, you know, crowd that you could possibly be, you know, fumbling in front of.
Man, my favorite would be like, you know, I would have thrown something together fast and they'd be
like, did you even make these slides? And I'm like, ah, I swear I did. I just forgot what it says.
They'd be like, are they, did you even come up with this? I was like, oh God.

(19:06):
Oh, yikes. If there's somebody out there who sees themselves in you and sees their own desire to
consider Teach for America or to go down the path of teaching as a profession, do you have any advice
for them or anything that you might be able to share that would help them make what is a very
challenging adjustment and a challenging transition, maybe a little bit more easy?

(19:28):
Yeah. I mean, I think the biggest thing is ask for help. Like I had just been used to
figuring things out on my own. Like, oh, okay, this is hard. I'm, you know, if I spend a little
extra time, I can teach myself. I probably know better, you know, I have my own way of doing
things. I'm the best person. With teaching, it's just like absolutely not worth it. There's so

(19:50):
many people who have already done it, even in your own school building. Like it took me a long time
to build a relationship with older teachers. I should have done that much sooner. And they're
very willing to help. We're all teaching the same kids. So I think it's all very overwhelming. Some
things you just have to learn on your own, but there's no reason to feel like you have to figure

(20:12):
everything out on your own. So just kind of like build relationships with other people doing the
job, ask for help, lean on each other. Ultimately, it's a cool opportunity to build a really strong
community. Like you work, you collaborate with coworkers, maybe a little more than in some other
jobs, but it's just a matter of like, are you going to be the person that closes your door
and sits in there and figures it out? Or are you the person that's like door open, going to the

(20:36):
teacher's lounge, hanging out with people, building relationships and ultimately like helping each
other out. I think that makes all the difference. What did you learn about yourself in that Teach
for America experience? I learned a lot about myself from TFA. I think one of the bigger path
changing things was building a lot of confidence about speaking and interacting with people.

(21:00):
Like I had previously, I think, especially being an engineer, I didn't even have a lot of experience
doing a lot of public speaking or a lot of collaborating with others. And so I kind of
assumed my strength or the thing I liked the most was just working on stuff on my own,
sitting in my computer, figuring it out. But I actually got a ton of energy. I built a lot

(21:22):
of confidence and I got a ton of energy out of facilitating or interacting with students on a
daily basis and doing a lot of relational work. It was much more relational than it was sitting at
my desk. And I don't even think I had a chance to explore that before. That really put on my radar,
like a different set of roles that maybe are less individual contributor and more like leadership

(21:50):
or external facing, strategic. So I just never had exposure to that as an engineer and especially not
in a research PhD kind of program. That was maybe my biggest takeaway. Let's talk a little bit about
your inflection point. And I think most people in their careers will have a moment where
they start to find where they want to be and they start to get that reinforcement that they

(22:13):
are in the right place, they're doing the right work, they've found their calling per se.
What was your inflection point like? I finished Teach for America and was very confused.
It was kind of felt that teaching wasn't the thing I wanted to do forever.
But I also felt that going right back into engineering was so disconnected at that point.

(22:34):
I was very unsure. I ended up finding a middle ground. I guess you could say it was a middle
ground. I took a job back in California with a Microsoft program that was trying to get high
school computer science classes started. And so that was a role where I was connected to tech and
some of that computer science knowledge was helpful, but I was also working with schools,

(22:55):
supporting teachers, things like that. I thought that was a perfect fit.
And when I was doing that job, I felt a really strong disconnect being away from rural communities.
I didn't expect it to be so jarring, but it was like every, even though we're talking about
equity in schools and access to computer science and all these barriers,

(23:20):
very rarely was the urban rural gap coming into the conversation. And even more rarely when it
was coming in, people weren't talking about the rural South. And after a while, it just wore on
me. I just started to wonder, do people in these rooms even realize that there are communities,
like the one that I had taught in, that have tremendous assets, tons of kids and families

(23:45):
who are eager to learn and do stuff. And none of us are even thinking about how to get them access
to this type of skill, computer science, or even internet access and devices and stuff.
That really wore on me. And I think around then is when I started to realize that maybe whatever
future career path I was heading towards would need to be connected back with the rural communities

(24:10):
that I had taught in or similar. It took a little longer, I think, to connect those dots. But I just
remember that dissonance. I stayed in that job for about two years, maybe a little less, but
towards the end, it was almost like constant. I just felt like I can't do this forever and I need

(24:31):
to figure out a way to not necessarily go back to Eastern North Carolina, but do work that honors
and is connected to communities like that one. What a beautiful thing. I think that gives us
a very nice segue to talk about ROI, the Rural Opportunity Institute. Would you tell us a little

(24:52):
bit about you and your co-founder and how you approached building the ROI?
It's kind of a funny story. My co-founder, Seth, at ROI, he also did Teach for America.
He was a year behind me, but we overlapped for a year. And the way we met, actually, was at the
very end of my second year. TFA is a two-year program. So, at the end of my second year of

(25:12):
teaching, there was a startup weekend in Raleigh, which is maybe an hour from where we were teaching.
And it was focused on education. And so, I'd never been to a startup weekend. They're kind of these
54-hour sprinty hackathon things focused on a theme where you try to meet people and come up
with a startup idea you want to pitch. Had never been, me and a bunch of teacher friends were like,

(25:37):
"Yeah, let's check it out." Went for a weekend. Seth was also there. I'd never met him before.
And Seth ended up being on the winning team. And I was on... I don't think my team was even...
I was on a team that didn't do very well. But I heard him pitch and stuff, and then we caught up
after. And there was just a lot of alignment. He was very entrepreneurial and was interested in

(26:05):
kind of thinking about different ways to create solutions in the classroom. A lot of what he was
saying resonated with me. And he was coming back for another year to teach. And I had already
accepted that Microsoft job. And interestingly enough, the thing that he had pitched at startup
weekend was some sort of coding thing. So, he was very interested in the job I was doing. He's like,

(26:28):
"Hey, let's stay in touch. I want to know more about this Teals thing and whatever you end up
figuring out." So, I was like, "Yeah, sure." So, I'm in California working on this program. And
he reaches out to me and he's like, "Is there any way we can use your coding program in my high
school?" And I'm like, "I don't know. Let me ask." And it turned out we were piloting this thing

(26:51):
where you could... Like, normally, the way the program worked is we would train
teachers physically in schools. So, we'd find a science teacher. Maybe they'd say, "Hey,
I want to learn coding." We'd hook them up with some Microsoft volunteers who'd help them
at a computer coding class. There's no Microsoft volunteers in rural Eastern North Carolina. So,
it's like, "Okay, how do we do that?" They were piloting a remote thing where Microsoft engineers

(27:16):
could Zoom into... I guess it wouldn't have been Zoom at the time. It's probably Skype.
Could Skype into a high school classroom in a rural place and coach the teacher remotely.
And they would offer this class. So, I was like, "Well, do we want to try that?" He was really into
it. So, Seth figured out everything on his end to make it possible. And they actually were one of

(27:39):
two, I think, rural pilot schools that we had doing that program. I mean, that was probably...
You know, when I was saying that the work we were doing was super disconnected, that was probably
like the one area of connection. My hope would have been that that grew into a huge thing.
It didn't really. But he and I stayed connected through that class. And it was really neat to just

(28:00):
have a window into Eastern North Carolina still, even though I was over there. So, I ended up
connecting with him quite a lot at the time, just hearing how things are going. And then he,
at the end of his second year of teaching, his now wife got a job in California. And so,
he moved to Oakland. And I was living in San Francisco. So, he hits me up like, "I'm living

(28:23):
nearby now." He was still teaching. And we started meeting up regularly. And Seth is funny. Seth is
very intentional about relationship building. So, we'd meet up and he'd say, "Okay, let's do
one hour where we talk about business ideas and one hour where we hang out as friends."
And so, we'd meet up and like, you know, have these structured times or whatever.

(28:45):
And it was pretty cool. I think those like regular one hours to talk about business ideas
really started to pull some common themes out. And then the one hour talking with friends,
it was like, "Well, we actually have a lot of compatibility. We have a lot of shared values.
It could be a good..." I don't know that I was explicitly searching for a co-founder, but

(29:09):
in some ways, it was kind of a process of thinking through like, "Okay, if I was going to start
something with somebody, would we be able to do it?" So, we were building this relationship and
also, you know, talking about ideas. And I had this like one person in California who had the
same shared experience. And I think that gave me a lot of energy. And so, basically, we continued

(29:32):
to talk and we had a lot of bad ideas before we had a good one. But we were, you know, we were
very interested in supporting kids outside of the classroom. We were very interested in early
childhood education. People in the Bay were starting to talk about this idea of trauma
and the way that challenging events can impact the nervous system. And there was starting to be
this discussion about, you know, trauma-informed classrooms and understanding that what we might

(29:57):
view as a behavior problem or a developmental delay is actually like kids dealing with a high
level of stress. And so, our response needs to be different. That narrative was happening in the Bay.
It wasn't really happening in Eastern North Carolina. We got curious about what would it look
like to implement some of those things in rural. So, I think for like six months to a year,

(30:20):
we got, we were very enamored by all the lean startup. You know, we're like, "Oh, let's be the
Mark Zuckerbergs of education." And so, we would like go online and download these different tools
that help with early childhood development and put them into a little kit. And then we were finding

(30:42):
all these parent groups and saying, "Hey, can we come in and show parents the stuff we came up with?"
And we'd get feedback. And most of the time, they'd be like, "You guys clearly aren't parents
because this would never work." Like one thing I remember is the kit, you know, the different games
that we had were inside a Ziploc bag. And the parents were like, "Yo, you cannot bring that

(31:03):
Ziploc bag near my kid. That's choking hazard." And we're like, "Oh, didn't think of that." Or
like one time we made this little book, but it was stapled. They were like, "I don't want my kid
near staples." So, we were learning a lot. I mean, just learning a lot about how to create products
for people. No good ideas, but very fun times. And I think through all that, it's like, it solidified

(31:27):
our working relationship. At some point, we had spent enough of our own money and time on this
without hitting anything that we took a break. But, you know, I ended up leaving my job,
went to business school, was hoping to just like change paths. But I stayed in touch with Seth
through all of that. And it was kind of over the years that we got clearer and clearer about what

(31:50):
a business might look like that would actually be successful. And so, you know, 2017, we raised some
money to come back to Eastern North Carolina. Originally, just to start out as a research
project. It was just like, let's spend a couple months getting to know people and figuring out
what is needed. And that is what ultimately turned into ROI. I think one of the bigger

(32:12):
things we had learned was like, you got to take the time to get to know people. You can't just
think of ideas at home and sell them. So, yeah, it was like several years, kind of us building
that relationship before we got to the thing that actually took off.
That makes a lot of sense.
We'll get back to the conversation shortly, but I wanted to tell you about how I can help you

(32:34):
find your fit. I offer one-on-one career coaching services for experienced professionals who are
preparing to find and land their next role. If you're a director, vice president, or C-suite
executive, and you're ready to explore new opportunities, please go to goodfitcareers.com
to apply for a free consultation. I also occasionally send a newsletter, which includes

(32:54):
stories from professionals who have found their fit, strategies and insights that might be helpful
in your job search, and content that I found particularly useful or interesting. If you'd
like to learn more, check out goodfitcareers.com and follow me on LinkedIn. Now, back to the
conversation. Before we dive into what the business is, what the not-for-profit looks like,

(33:15):
how you've structured the organization, would you help give us a few definitions,
some of the key terms that we're going to go through in terms of how to frame the work that
you're doing, just to make sure that the audience can follow us along?
I think when we're talking about trauma or generational trauma, there's a lot of
definitions out there. We're a little broad about it, but it's basically any sort of event

(33:37):
or thing that happens that creates a feeling of stress that is, a lot of times what they say is
too much, too fast. And so you can experience a lot of regular stress that our bodies and
nervous systems are able to navigate. You know, like you find out you missed a deadline, or
you have to, you slept through your alarm. That's stressful stuff, but it's over quickly.

(34:00):
We're able to recover. There's another level of stressful thing, which could be more like
experiencing homelessness or domestic violence or flooding from a natural disaster.
Those kinds of things in other countries, very often it's like being in close to or near a
conflict zone. That is like too much for too long. That's not over quick. It's very overwhelming.

(34:24):
And those types of stresses have, they leave a lasting mark on your nervous system. And so
it actually changes how your body physically handles stress in the future. Often it leads
to people being on higher alert, more sensitive to certain things. And so the lasting outcome is that
you could then be in a situation that isn't actually stressful, but your body feels like it

(34:48):
is. And so it's like constantly in a fight or flight mode. Doing that has behavioral implications.
You might be quicker to get angry or run away or be stressed, but it also has physiological
implications. So our nervous system being on higher alert like that can tax our organs,
can lead you to be more likely to have heart conditions earlier. It can lead to more

(35:11):
difficulty with metabolism, digestion, all these different things. So there've been studies that
have shown that trauma, especially in early years, is correlated with a whole host of long-term
health outcomes. And unfortunately also like economic and educational ones because of that
behavioral aspect. Now bring us along to the business, the ROI as it stands. Would you tell

(35:33):
us a little bit about where you fit within the company and what your team looks like, please?
Yeah. So I am one of the co-founders of ROI along with Seth. He and I still are the co-leaders of
the organization. So we've been running it for about seven years. Currently are a full-time
team of four. He and I were the only two employees for about four years. And then we were able to

(35:56):
bring on one full-time director of operations who's still with us. So she's the best. And then
about a year ago hired another director of programs and innovation. And so right now it's the four of
us and he and I, Seth and I do probably a lot more now of the strategic and administrative

(36:19):
support functions. So we're doing a lot of raising money, hiring people, thinking through what are
the next projects we want to take on, building partnerships, stuff like that. And then Naomi
and Graham, our two employees, are doing a lot more of the day-to-day on the ground, running
projects, running operations, going locally to meet with folks and keep a lot of things going.

(36:42):
So our roles have kind of transitioned a little bit over the years, but currently that's a lot
of where I'm at. Tell us a little bit about some of the initiatives or some of the broader projects
that you guys are working on. When Seth and I first started ROI, we came in with this idea of
we want to help students and families experience more success, starting out in classrooms, but also

(37:04):
just in general. But we actually aren't sure what support is needed. And so I think over years of
trying and failing, we built a fair amount of humility about, you know, we got to understand
this. And so we spent that first year just talking to people, did a ton of interviews
with a lot of parents, a lot of kids, a lot of support staff, teachers, nurses, police,

(37:25):
things like that. And we heard very consistently, people weren't using these words, but we heard
very consistently these stories of trauma. And, you know, parents might tell a story like,
you know, I'm a single parent. I left my partner due to domestic violence. I had a little kid.

(37:48):
For a little while, we were homeless in a car. And during that time, my son started demonstrating
signs of, you know, stress and erratic behavior in school. He's acting the way any three or four
year old would if they were living out of their car, but that school labeled that as ADHD. So

(38:08):
we put him on medication. He wasn't responding to it, so they kept upping the dose. I mean,
in reality, he didn't have ADHD, but the school is starting to see that as like,
this kid has a behavior problem. No matter what we do, he's still acting out. So, you know,
when you're three and four, it's one thing. As he gets into kindergarten and first grade, they start

(38:30):
suspending him from school. And so, you know, this mom that we're talking to, by then, she's like,
you know, I've gotten a job as a nurse. We've moved into a stable home, but my kid's already
been labeled. And as he experiences more and more of those examples of being sent out of class,
he also starts to kind of lose trust in the system. And so, she's kind of struggling with

(38:53):
that. And then the school finally says, you know, when you get a little bit older, they say, hey,
if you, you know, the parent needs to come in for a hearing to deal with this, and that is during
the workday. So, this mom is saying, well, I can't take time off work. I need to like negotiate with
my job. But if I don't take time off, then my son might end up expelled or sent to some sort of
alternative program or, you know, labeled on some other track. But if she does take time off to go,

(39:18):
she might lose her job. And that puts them back into this cycle of disruption. So, that story is
one of a ton of stories like that that we were hearing. And it's like, people are really hoping
for support from the schools or their job or the police or social services. But what ends up
happening is all of those systems are not equipped. You know, we have biases, we don't understand

(39:42):
what's going on. And so, we end up making things worse for people. And then it just builds. The
school becomes overwhelmed with these situations. Employers are saying, I don't know, we can't,
you know, we're having a hard time with people who have to keep taking off work. Social services and
police are saying, we have all these disruptions we have to respond to. The whole system is
overwhelmed because of this trauma. And none of us know how to deal with it. That was the big

(40:06):
takeaway. And we shared that out with some different community groups, those findings.
And in a positive, maybe even surprise, a lot of different systems leaders across those,
you know, exact stakeholders, schools, police, health, were all kind of saying, yeah, you're

(40:26):
right. How do we deal with this better? And that was kind of the switch to like what ROI does now.
So, we were able to take that initial input and momentum to raise some additional funds. And
since then, what we've been doing is working with these different agencies to help them understand
how is trauma showing up for them and what are ways they can respond better. So, that might like

(40:49):
look like doing trainings for staff. That's usually the starting point. But then we can also think
about implementing some actual practices. We might be able to say, okay, in a different area,
here's an example of a school that switched away from suspending kids to this alternative way of
responding. And, you know, if that seems like a good fit, we'll then help the school implement

(41:12):
something like that. Walk alongside them for a little while, measure the data, adapt and stuff
like that. So, there's a handful. We probably worked with about 20 organizations to date to
pilot and design some of these different interventions. That's basically our process
is kind of understanding where the trauma is showing up and then building the capacity of

(41:33):
agencies to respond differently. What have you found actually makes a difference and what actually
works? Yeah, it's healing from trauma is actually surprisingly, it's not easy, but it's somewhat
simple in terms of the basic concepts. So, what it is at the end of the day is traumatic

(41:54):
events are creating a burden on our nervous system. And somebody said this to us very early
in the work. And I think it took me years and years to really understand what they meant.
But they were like, the basis of healing from trauma is safety and connection.
It's like in any moment, people need to feel, they need to convince their nervous system that

(42:14):
they're safe. And one of the main ways humans do that is by having a connection with somebody
in the moment. And so, at the basis of a lot of the things we're doing, it's figuring out how to
downregulate someone's nervous system so that they feel safe and then giving them a connection to

(42:35):
usually an adult that they can trust to work through what happens next. And so, for an example
of what we're talking about here, we work a lot with schools. And one of the most common
responses to stress and trauma in classrooms is to send somebody out of the classroom.
And so, like a kid might be, they might have experienced something very difficult in the

(42:56):
morning and they're coming in stressed and then they're trying to do their work and they mess up
and a teacher yells at them. And that might be it. That might be enough to kind of set them off
and maybe they yell back. And the teacher says, "All right, you need to go down the hall. You've
been sent out." And so, the kid is out of class. In that moment, they don't feel safe because of

(43:20):
whatever just happened and they've just been isolated. So, when you get sent out, you are
disconnected. And so, those two things can really set their people's nervous system off into this
fight or flight. Like, how do I recover from this? That often leads to these like escalating behavior
problems. So, what we were able to implement in a middle school was we set up this separate room

(43:44):
with a staff member whose like whole job basically is instead of being disciplined,
it's more like restorative justice. But their whole job is kind of like support students through
this moment. And they have this classroom and it has a bunch of tools in it that can help with
self-regulation. And one of them is this technology called biofeedback. It's actually

(44:06):
used a lot in military and athletes and stuff. And like if anybody uses the whoop tracker
or the aura ring, like those are all examples of biofeedback where it's in the moment measuring
your nervous system and it's telling you, you know, "Are you good to work out today? Do you
need to take some more rest?" So, there are these devices that you can get that can in the moment

(44:29):
measure the state of your nervous system and then tell you, you know, maybe some exercises you can
do, walk you through some breathing or things like that. And so, we got some of those devices
in that classroom. So, when a kid gets sent out and they know this ahead of time, when a kid gets
sent out, now they're going to that room. And so, immediately, the first thing they have is a
connection. There's an adult there who didn't send them out and who has no interest in punishing

(44:52):
them. And that person is someone they can build a relationship with. And then, they have these
tools where they can, you know, sit down quietly, pop in a little biofeedback device, take a look at
an app, look at some soothing colors, do some breathing exercises, and they can say that as
long as they need to. Usually, it only takes like 10 or 15 minutes. The room might have some

(45:12):
comfortable chairs, calm lighting, maybe a couple of, you know, fidgety things that you can move
with your hands. All of that are things that regulate our nervous system. And they're doing
that with a trusted person. Spend 10 to 15 minutes of that room. Usually, kids would themselves say
at some point, "Okay, I'm good. I can go back." And when they're ready, they, you know, pop their

(45:38):
biofeedback stuff off. They head back over, sit down, jump back in. And the alternative is like,
we send them out. Now, they're getting yelled at by the principal. Their parent is being called.
The whole thing is like more and more and more and more stressful. And they are becoming
disconnected from all these adults because they don't feel safe. And so, it's different in

(45:58):
different scenarios. But at the end of the day, it's like, where are people feeling, you know,
stressed out and unsafe? And how can we give them a moment to regulate and build a connection?
And that pretty much, if you do that repeatedly, it retrains our nervous system to realize that
some of those situations that seem stressful are actually very safe and we can work through them.

(46:25):
Wow. That is fascinating. And I think such a contrast to, at least in my experience,
growing up in the United States in kind of the public school education system, so contrary to
what it used to look like. I'm so glad that there are people like you who are figuring this out and
finding a way to make this better. That's such a wonderful thing. To take a step back and think

(46:50):
beyond just the tactical or strategic day-to-day work, let's think a little bit more philosophically.
What does your work mean to you? Yeah, that's a great question. I think
something I was searching for for a long time in my career was a kind of personal connection to the

(47:11):
work. And for a while, it was thinking about building products that are in people's hands,
so I can see how they're using it. But I think even more than that, I was looking for a relational
connection to the work. And so, one of the things that's been really powerful about working in
rural Eastern North Carolina in a specific community for so long is I have a lot of

(47:35):
personal relationships with the people and the places that we work in. So, it's not just about
working with the school or a police department to do a program. It's like I personally know the
police chief. I personally know a lot of the teachers. I know some of the students and families.
And I'm not only seeing in the data the outcomes of the work that we're doing, but I'm seeing it

(47:57):
through actual personal stories. So, there's kids now that have, for example, the biofeedback
restorative program in a middle school. I know kids who were there when that happened who are
now in college. And I can kind of see and feel and hear about what that meant and how they have,

(48:19):
you know, in many cases, they have become advocates for trauma-informed practices wherever
they are. In the beginning, it was like, "Oh, this is cool. Let's see if we can make something
happen here." But over the years, it's built into this like very personal experience where I feel
like I'm not a person running a business in the community. I'm a community member,

(48:42):
and we're all doing this thing together. >> I'm so glad the world has people like
you and that you found the people that need your help. That's tremendous. For anybody out there who
is interested in helping and contributing and building those personal relationships with the
people that they want to serve, and maybe it's through a startup or maybe it's through joining

(49:03):
a startup, do you have any advice or a lesson for them that might be helpful as they consider
embarking on this journey and then perhaps as they try to make it real? >> Yeah. I mean, I think one
of the big things I learned over the course of, you know, as I – early on when Seth and I had a lot
of bad ideas and then coming to where we are now, I definitely learned the value of like you can't

(49:24):
sit in a room with your door closed and think forever to get to a solution that works. It's
like you got to get out and hear from people what their experiences are, riff with them about what
might work, and it's like over time, collectively, you'll get to a solution. That sounds simple,
and then the first thing that comes to mind is like, "Okay, so how do I do that?" And I was stuck

(49:47):
in that for a long time too. I'm like, "I get it. I get that you're supposed to get out of the
building, but what am I doing?" And I found a lot of support around these proven methodologies that
give you tools and processes for doing that. So, one of the big ones that I've used a couple times
and now we follow pretty closely at ROI is all of the humans that are design and design thinking

(50:10):
methodologies. And so, you can like – in my case, I learned a lot of this from IDEO, and they have a
lot of their stuff open online, but there's some other – Stanford D. School has some stuff. There's
some other, you know, examples of people that have open tools, but it's basically a set of
steps you can follow to start to systematically get input from people. And, you know, they have

(50:35):
little interview guides so you can think through the questions that you need to ask people. They
have activities you can do with people to help get feedback in a different way. And so, for me,
it's like very intimidating to say to a parent or a person that I don't know, "Can I – yeah,
can I talk to you for a few minutes?" And then I'm making up what I'm asking. But in this case,
it gives you like a little bit of legitimacy. It's like, "Hey, I, you know, want to learn more

(51:00):
about your experience. Can we sit down for 30 minutes? I have some activities I want to do with
you." And then they're like, "Oh, okay, cool." And then you go and you're not making it up. Like,
you can pull the activities they have. You tailor it for what you're trying to learn. You do it.
They have processes for, you know, once you get all this input, what do you do?
And there's some systematic ways to, you know, pull out themes, identify what's bubbling up,

(51:22):
and then move from that to like the brainstorming of solutions. And it actually, like, with all
those processes, doesn't take very long and is a great way to build relationships with people.
And so, for me, it was like I needed a tool or something to follow. And I found it in
Human-Centered Design. I think there's other methodologies as well. But it's just like,

(51:42):
I think of it as almost like a group project. Like, it's like, "Okay, we have this assignment.
We need to talk to five people and do this interview." Great. Let me, like, get to work on
that. That makes it a lot less intimidating. And it's like, once you're out there doing it,
you just get more and more confident. You might talk to somebody and then they're like, "Hey,
I have two friends you should talk to." And so, it all kind of builds on itself. But just to get

(52:06):
started, I think drawing from some of those existing methodologies can make it a lot easier.
Fantastic. Wonderful advice. How do you believe the world
sees your job as a co-founder for a not-for-profit?
You know, it's interesting. I think being – so, in my current role, there's a couple of

(52:27):
different hats. There's this co-founder of a startup identity and then there's the non-profit
part. And I think there's a lot of messy stuff in there about how I'm perceived. And so, if I
lead with co-founding a startup, I think people think of that as very brave, very cool. They're

(52:50):
like, "Oh, wow. That's awesome." That is really put on a pedestal. Like, if you are somebody that
started a company, you're – it comes with all this good stuff. But there's an interesting
expectation that like, "Oh, you're going to make a lot of money, right? You're going to grow really
fast. Make a lot of money." And I think if you say, "I'm running a non-profit," it has a totally

(53:11):
different set of perceptions where people are like, "Oh, I'm assuming you don't make any money
and you are a very giving, generous person who's sacrificing a lot to do this like very hard,
hard-needed, but maybe not super cool work." And people often aspire to be the startup founder

(53:36):
and they're like, "Oh, I want to talk to you to learn how you did it." But for the non-profit
part, they're like, "Oh, that's cool. I don't think I want me or my kids doing that, but
good job." And so, I struggle a lot because I think it's very – we need to be more
realistic about all the range of what non-profit work is. And just because it's non-profit doesn't

(54:02):
mean that you're just sacrificing. It doesn't mean that you can't earn any money. It certainly
doesn't mean that it's easier or less prestigious than founding a for-profit company. And a lot of,
I feel like for me, it's like that's the thing I'm always running up against is depending on
how I frame it, I get really different responses and I find that the for-profit startup path is

(54:28):
just valued so much higher. It's considered more prestigious than the non-profit part.
But I very intentionally moved away from that tech startup kind of world. And so, I don't
necessarily want to be associated with that, but it's a challenge because people just – depending

(54:48):
on what they hear, it's like they immediately assume different things. And it's pretty hard
to find the nuance between like, "These things can intersect and here's what it means." And that
is not very mainstream, I think, in people's minds. I really appreciate your reflectiveness
on that. I think seeing the contrast, having the duality between part of your title and then part

(55:10):
of your company and seeing how we as a broader society perceive those things, I think that's
very fascinating. And I'm also – I think if we were to give somebody the question, "What's more
important for the world?" Doing not-for-profit work or making a bunch of money in a high-tech
startup, I think the test question people would say, "Oh, absolutely, not-for-profit work. That's

(55:32):
really what matters." But then at the end of the day, our actions and what we actually see tend to
be a little bit different. Tell us a little bit about – you've hired two people for your team.
And I'd love to learn a little bit about how you approached finding, evaluating,
and hiring your team members. >> Yeah, hiring is super hard. And

(55:52):
for kind of additional context, we've hired two people right now that are our two employees.
We have gone through a few other hiring processes with folks who are either on for less time or it
didn't quite work out. So right now, I feel like we have a solid team in place, but I don't feel

(56:12):
like we've mastered hiring at all. It feels like we got a little bit lucky. But I mean, it's a hard
thing. So especially in the position that we're in, because we're trying to hire for a small
organization that's a startup. It's also a nonprofit. It's also based in a rural place.
And so you're looking not just for people who have the skills, but also people who are willing

(56:34):
to do that kind of work. And in some cases, that is going to come with some trade-offs. We're not
going to pay as much as if you were going to a consulting firm or a big company. We try to create
remote work opportunities so you can live in the Raleigh-Durham area, but you're not going to be

(56:56):
able to live in New York City probably. And the work you're doing may not fit into the traditional
work experiences people are looking to build early in their career. It's just not at the
same scale. I think in a lot of ways, it's tough because we are pretty unapologetic, I think,

(57:20):
about getting excellent talent. And personally, I believe that the people that we serve and the
community we work in deserve excellent talent. And so we have a pretty high bar in terms of
when we think about the characteristics we're looking for in a candidate,
we expect whatever skill they're coming in with the skills that are needed.

(57:41):
They have some ability to kind of self-manage. They have some work experience, all that stuff.
And we realize that in that pool, we're competing with a lot of organizations that are cooler places
to work on average. We're competing with Google and Facebook and McKinsey and Deloitte and all

(58:01):
that stuff. And so it's like, how do we... I think one of the bigger challenges is how do we make
ourselves stand out in that pool? And like I said, we've had some success. I think the candidates
that we have on board right now really do see the additional value in working for us, whether that

(58:24):
is because we're small, the opportunity to have more autonomy and leadership, the opportunity to
be really hands-on in the strategic parts of the organization as well. Yes, they might be managing
a program, but they're also reporting to the co-founder. And so they're in conversations where
they might not otherwise be if they were working at Amazon. I think a lot of them see value in the

(58:47):
community work and the impact that we're having and building expertise around rural disparities
and getting a chance to innovate a lot faster than they might somewhere else.
And we try to... One of the harder things is around compensation. I think we try to differentiate
ourselves by offering really generous benefits. We have unlimited vacation. We try to think about

(59:10):
creating flexibility in other ways, giving people access to professional development,
sending them to conferences, speaking opportunities. So it's just kind of like...
The hardest part I think is getting a diverse, high-caliber applicant pool to then be able to
find folks that are the right fit when we're especially... Yeah, when the job market is

(59:36):
strong, when we're competing with all of these other cool places to work that people might be
more likely to want to take a chance on. Being a bit of the underdog in the hiring
space, while there's still meaning and purpose and value to what you're creating, there's still
opportunity to do things far above or greater than you would have done in other size corporations.

(59:57):
I imagine that makes accountability and performance management pretty tricky. Can you
teach us a little bit about how you approach accountability and performance management in
the not-for-profit space? Yeah, it's a hard problem. So actually,
when we first started and we first started hiring, I think we had a little bit of a hesitation

(01:00:18):
to set really high performance standards. I think we were almost operating in a way that maybe a lot
of people see the nonprofit field where it's like, "Listen, if somebody's willing to work for you
and they're trying hard, you can't really expect a super high level of performance or you have to
be very forgiving. You got to give people a million chances because it's nonprofit."

(01:00:41):
And I think early on, we fell into that a little bit, maybe even unintentionally. And what it
created was a culture where it was like, "Hey, if you gave it a good try, that's good enough."
And Seth and Vichi are never going to actually hold anyone accountable. They're very forgiving.

(01:01:03):
They understand all the time. And it's not like people were intentionally taking advantage of us,
but it creates this culture of like, "I could put in that extra bit to make this really solid, but
it's fine. I'll just submit what I have." And it took us a while to see that. But I think our
initial operating had a... We hold ourselves to a super high standard, but it was almost like

(01:01:28):
we can't expect that of anyone else. And more recently, particularly, I think with some of
the leadership of our recent hires, like our director of operations, we have people coming from
previous work experiences that were very rigorous. They bring with them some of the things they've
learned. And I think now we've started to put into place, what does actual accountability look like?

(01:01:52):
So we've started to look at performance reviews and people setting goals and reflecting on that
and feedback. And there's a part of that that I don't like. I don't think we want to get super
into the... There's all kinds of evaluation and people are always being evaluated and everybody's

(01:02:13):
scared of being fired. That's a direction we don't want to go in, but we do want to be able to set
really high goals and then be honest about it. Are we meeting them or not? Let's have an honest
conversation about that and hold the expectation high. So we're still working on putting those
systems into place. The folks we have on board right now are very open to that and bring some

(01:02:33):
past experience in work environments like that. But it's hard to find the sweet spot of,
"We want to hold people accountable and we want to provide the support for people to grow.
We don't want to become a place where everyone's just scared of being fired and trying to cover
themselves constantly." So what's that middle ground? That's tricky to figure out.
And setting the course for the company culture, setting the standard for what is acceptable,

(01:02:58):
what is outstanding, what is unacceptable, and holding people to that. I feel like that's one
of the biggest challenges in any company, in any profession today. As we bring this
conversation to a close, I want to switch gears a little bit and think about three categories.
The first is going to be the future. The second is what you think your field's going to look like
in 2030. And the third is how you like to waste time. So in terms of the first one there, tell

(01:03:24):
me a little bit about what you're most excited about for the future at a macro level.
I think for the future at a macro level, a shift I'm seeing, well, particularly among younger folks,
people like to hate on Gen Z, but I'm seeing a really positive shift among younger folks
of rejecting the way we have always thought about work and employment and labor and our

(01:03:50):
relationship to society. And I am excited about seeing how that plays out. I already enjoy being
pushed by some of the younger folks we hire on how we run our company, but also just how we relate.
It used to be not okay to come to work and talk about how you're feeling or what might be going

(01:04:13):
on. And it's like, people are bringing that and it makes me feel uncomfortable, but I think that's
positive. I'm excited to see how our whole society gets pushed towards more meaningfully connecting
with each other, more meaningfully bringing our full selves and not just being obsessed with
productivity and being busy and all that stuff. It's like, what's a more holistic version of how

(01:04:39):
we live life? So I'm very hopeful that our generation, but also those younger than us
can really make that shift across work and life. To think through the future in your field,
specifically, it is July of 2024 when we're recording this. We're just about five and a
half years away from being in 2030, which blows my mind. Would you tell me a little bit about

(01:05:05):
what you think your field is actually going to look like in 2030? Yeah, I am sensing some shifts
already in the social innovation, social entrepreneurship field. I've been doing this
last 10 to 12 years or so, and I already see a lot of shifts in terms of putting support behind

(01:05:30):
folks who are living and experiencing challenges to be in the positions to be able to solve those
challenges. My hope is that by 2030, we just have way more of that. If you were to zoom out and look
at the landscape of social entrepreneurs, social innovation, nonprofits, that you would see way

(01:05:51):
more of the folks in leadership and on boards and things like that being from the communities that
the work is being done for. Adjacent to that, I also am very optimistic and hopeful
about shifts in philanthropy. I'm already seeing a lot more funders think about who's on their
boards, who are they giving their money to, can they be more flexible about the type of funding

(01:06:17):
they offer and what they're expecting from grantees. I'm also hopeful that by 2030, we see
way more community representation on foundation boards, a lot more money going directly to
entrepreneurs who are from communities. Maybe they don't have the same degrees and qualifications
and credentials, but they have lived experience. Just elevating a lot more of those leaders.

(01:06:41):
Giving them the same access to social capital networks, resources that a lot of us currently
in the field have. It sounds like a bright future. How do you like to waste time?
I love to waste time. I'd say some of the favorites. I have gotten really into...
Some backstory. About a year ago, I tore my Achilles tendon. Really tough injury. It's a

(01:07:08):
long recovery. It's only been in the last couple of months that I feel like I'm fully recovered.
In that whole experience, got to really think about how I was spending all my downtime. I think
now it's like I have a ton of personal value and excitement around just sweating,
being active and sweating. My most recent fun thing to do has been these boxing classes.

(01:07:36):
It's not like fighting people. That's very stressful. But just going to a gym and punching
a bag and doing that for an hour and getting really sweaty. That hour goes by super fast.
I forget everything. Just enjoy getting out of my head and finding a way to sweat,
which currently is boxing, but open to other stuff.

(01:07:59):
That sounds very far from wasted time to me, but I'm glad you're finding a new pursuit you enjoy.
In terms of the way that people can help you and the way that the people out there,
if they're inspired by your story, if they're excited about the work that ROI is doing,
what's the best way for them to get involved or to help?

(01:08:20):
Yeah. Quickest way to learn about ROI is to our website, which is just www.ruralopportunity.org.
You can read a lot about our programs there. We also are on Instagram and LinkedIn.
And then my email is just [e-mail]. So also happy to talk to anyone directly.

(01:08:41):
Great. We'll put all those in the show notes. Vichi, thank you so very much for
joining me and sharing your perspective.
Yeah. Thanks for having me. This was fun.
Our next episode is with Ankit Sethi,
Enterprise Account Executive with Alphabet's Google Cloud Platform.
We think about this giant machine of Google, but there are these people behind it.

(01:09:04):
Who are just so fantastic to work with.
If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe for new episodes,
leave a review and tell a friend.
Good Fit Careers is hosted by me, Ryan Dickerson, and is produced and edited by
Melo-Vox Productions. Marketing is by StoryAngled and our theme music is by Surftronica

(01:09:25):
with additional music from Andrew Espronceda.
I'd like to express my gratitude to all of our guests for sharing their time,
stories and perspectives with us. And finally, thank you to all of our listeners.
If you have any recommendations on future guests,
questions or comments, please send us an email at [e-mail].