Build a Better Tribe, Build a Better World

Posted On Oct 20, 2019 By admin With Comments Off

Women of EO Kimberly Smith In August 2019, Kimberly Hickok Smith spoke at the MyEO Women of EO Summit in Bogota, Colombia. While sharing her professional journey–from tween inventor to international executive–she also spoke to the audience of men and women about corroborating one another and making a difference in the world.

I was the first elected president of EO and the first chairman of the Global Board. Given that I am also a woman, I guess that determines me the first Woman of EO. I wasn’t the first female representative, but I was the first of any gender to hold these important leadership positions–and I believe that says something important about the ethos of EOand how the organization identifies everybody as equal and of value.

Live every day

When I was 8, two of my brothers were killed in a car accident at ages 12 and 16. My parents divorced soon after. These occurrences really structured the way I contemplate life. It schooled me to live every day in case there is no tomorrow. And I learned to live outside the box and to sometimes divulges rules.

I started my first business when I was 12, Kim’s Katering. I was basically cooking and unionizing defendants for my mother’s friends, but it originated enough that I had to hire college student to serve drinks because I was underage. At 16, I started a trading busines buying and selling prowes from Brazil and other places in Latin America.

Eventually, I moved to DC to study international relations and usages at Georgetown and accomplished six months in Brazil for fiscals. One of my part-time college errands was as a receptionist for an international trade firm. Within three months I was promoted to vice president and I was secured on commerce. After graduation, I got married and was hired by a big firm.

Then I was in a car accident and I divulge my cervix. Six months in research hospitals changed the road I looked at life yet again–from living one day at a time to looking toward the future. I knew I needed to start my own firm that acted and reacted the room I craved, that worked to build fair trade in Latin America and Africa.

My mother lent me US $1,000 and I was off! My firstly contract was in Honduras, and all the bid docs were in Spanish. Imagine my bombshell as I changed that among other things I had to purchase 3,000 artificial vaginas–for cows! Get financing for the contract was a struggle. All the banks said, “you are a 23 -year-old girl with a “companies “; no coin for you! ” Even so, the company eventually did very well and less than two years later, I was flying my mother to DC to watch me be awarded the exporter of the year award!

UNSDG Finding your beings

Intercon International trading and consulting was a force to be reckoned with–that “young blonde woman” traveling all over the world, on the shield of business periodicals and doing lots the working day on my five-pound car phone. My patrons were all in the then “under-developed world” of Latin America and Africa and a ordinary jaunt was 16 countries in 18 periods. We focused on south-south trade, built technical training institutes, sold Brazilian cow dip to Somalia, spawned pastes in Guatemala, sold fuel bladders to Zambia and just about all you could imagine.

Days were exciting, frenetic and amusing but often challenging with no one to talk to or to answer the many questions that arose in my recollection every day.

My father, Ray Hickok, likewise had that need to share with his peers, and he founded YPO around the time I was born. So I met from an early age the importance of support and camaraderie with like-minded managers who are likely grow together by learning from each other. I understood the need for a safe gap to discuss issues and learn from peers. I also understood that the chances of my qualifying for YPO at that point were slim, and plus I realized that the challenges faced as an financier, someone who started their own business, are very different from those shall be punishable by a hired executive.

By the late 80 s, Verne Harnish approached my father about being the honorary founder of YEO( in those periods, you had to be Y for young ). Dad came to DC to have a meeting. Charming Verne persuasion my father, who loved the idea of working with young people with big ideas. As for me, I met all the criteria of YEO–a 20 -something-year-old doing more than US$ two million per your year–apart from having at least 15 employees. So they changed the criteria so I could meet!

A few months later, Verne was feeling like he wanted to start his own business so he asked me if I would take over the controls and grow the fledgling arrangement and professionalize it. I said yes.

It was clear that EO could be something of real value and I climbed in to help grow it. Starting by providing space in my corporate “barn ,” hiring the first executive director and hosting some of the first international events. I was elected the first chairperson of the organisation with my father and about 40 YEO members in the room, which was very special for both of us. I am proud to say we created the succession schedule which is now EO Path of Leadership and we likewise started the Entrepreneurial Masters Program( EMP ) at MIT platform , among others.

Kimberly Hickok Smith An evolving tribe

And look at EO now! We’ve had eight wives global members of the security council, a female world-wide chair and about 150 women in global leadership. And 1,859 women members!

The growth and development of EO is a beautiful pattern to seeing how a tribe progresses to meet the needs of its members. The whole MyEO concept and motion is progressive and will keep the organization moving forward. Its focus on inclusivity is so important in that we all have so much to share. Your vibe really does allure your tribe.

In the early 90 s, I am a 30 -something and my business is growing well. EO is growing well. I have two cute little blonde sisters and a house in Architectural Digest. I have it all right? Well, maybe not. Washington DC was all about dominance and coin, and I was very good at these things, but I missed my children to grow up with different priorities.

With the support and encouragement of my adventurous and inventive EO peers, I decided to follow my dream to eradicate poverty and hunger and move my family to Kenya. I known that the next three EO chairs were already in place and the management team had things under control. So I sold my EO-eligible firm and began my next pilgrimage, which would previous until today. I’ve been working all over Africa for economic empowerment and creating solutions one stair, one new inventor, one child at a time.

I recognized I needed to be purpose-driven not profit-driven. EO educated me the supremacy of coming together and working in conjunction, and I have leveraged that knowledge and insight to change mindsets and conduct millions in trade from Africa.

I feel consecrated to be a part of so many amazing initiatives–leadership transformation, managerial improvement, increasing international trade, helping develop self-sufficient associations, appointing industrialists and financial growing in 20 countries in Africa. I have realized that my main capacity is to bring parties together to reach consensus, essentially building a tribe around issues that need to be endorse for change.

A game-changer for girls

And it must have been a good decision to move my family to Africa because my daughters have returned to Kenya and want to raise their children there. Together, we have started a philanthropy announced It’s a Girl Thing, which provides menstrual bowls to girls and their the women and educators to enable them to stay in school with a sustainable eco-friendly solution.

In my years of working to eradicate poverty and hunger all over the African nations, our investigate has made it clear that the biggest fiscal game-changer is for a girl to stay in school. The UN anticipates around 131 million daughters worldwide are out of school. In Uganda, one country where I cultivate, the authorities have neighborhoods where 78 percentage of “their childrens”, both boys and girls, between senilities 8 and 12 report being sexually abused at school. If a girl can stay in school until “schools “, she can shunned early pregnancy and she knows how avoid HIV. Plus, with education, she can go on to a career and become a leader in her community.

My work in this field is one reason that I am just excited about EO working with the United Society to make progress on the Sustainable Development Goals.

We is important to remember that these girls I am talking about are part of our tribe and our future. We have the opportunity to do so much work together as a tribe–and some of this work must be to change traditional archaic “tribal” rehearses. What are the tribal traditions we should be considered? In Africa it’s marrying girls by kidnap, selling or raping them, female genital mutilation and male circumcision ceremonies. We still have positive tribal traditions in Africa, including caring for the extended family and keeping an open hearth for food.

What are those negative and positive tribal patterns in your different countries? How can you make a difference? Is there enough desire, patronize, concern, compassion mentoring to build this better world? You know that whatever you can do on your own will be much stronger and better if you find your tribe of like-minded people with the same vision.

kim hickok smith Lead the change

Consider this: It’s been proven that trees communicate. They spread their diverges just enough to touch each other without taking each others space and their branches become stronger as a result.

Let’s focus our attention on defining and building our tribal vision to build a better world together. Let’s cause and motivate one another toward our common goals, find our residence in the tribe and strengthen our branches.

Our tribe can lead the change and be the change. Maidens of EO is the tribe that can provide a world-wide pulpit for mentoring, build, innovating and financing the future we want our children to acquire. Now that EO is back in my life and on my to-do and To-BE list, I’m energized to help build new assemblies in Africa.

Together, let’s improved our tribe to build a better world.

Learn more about why financiers prefer EO and the MyEO Women of EO group.

The post Build a Better Tribe, Build a Better World performed first on Octane Blog- The official blog of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization.