Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams is a compelling podcast series that brings listeners into the world of accessibility, leadership, and social change through the lens of one of the most influential voices in blindness advocacy. Dr. Kirk Adams, former President and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind and a lifelong champion for the rights of people with visual impairments, hosts this insightful and inspiring program.
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Sheldon Guy, Director, Women's Athletics, Improve Her Game
12/18/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Sheldon Guy, Director, Women's Athletics, Improve Her Game
🎙️ Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Sheldon Guy, Director, Women's Athletics, Improve Her Game In this deeply moving episode of Podcasts by Dr. Kirk Adams, Dr. Adams speaks with Sheldon Guy, Director of Women's Athletics with Improve Her Game and, by his account, one of the only blind basketball coaches, about the sudden, life-altering loss of his vision and the raw, real-time process of rebuilding a life. Sheldon recounts how quickly his world shifted, the heartbreak of what that meant for his son, and the moment he reached a breaking point, only to find a reason to keep going through messages of love and belief from his son and the players he coached. From there, he made a conscious decision to “pivot,” return to the gym, and keep his commitments, launching a story of resilience that later drew major media attention and led to documentary coverage of his journey. The conversation expands beyond personal triumph into advocacy and systems change. Sheldon shares how he's pushed major organizations to improve accessibility (including voice-enabled options that reduce barriers for blind customers) and how his guiding philosophy, “see something, say something”, turns everyday friction into concrete progress. He also speaks candidly about the added reality of navigating disability as a Black man, including harassment and safety concerns, while continuing to pursue hard goals, speaking to schools, inspiring young people, and taking on athletic challenges like obstacle races as a fully blind competitor. Together, Dr. Adams and Sheldon explore the evolving question of purpose, and how vulnerability, community, and relentless forward motion can become a lifeline, and a platform for change. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody, to another episode of podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am, said Doctor Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in rainy Seattle, Washington. And today I have a really interesting guest, Sheldon Guy. He's director of women's athletics with Improve Her Game and as far as I know, he's the first and only blind basketball coach that I am aware of. And Sheldon, say hi. Hello. Thanks. We'll be back to you. So I, I was born when my parents were in college, attending Western Washington college at that point in Bellingham. And my dad was a basketball player, college basketball player, highly competitive. He held a single game rebound record at Western for over 40 years. 29 rebounds in one game. Sheldon. Wow. And then my dad was a high school basketball coach. For for his career. He's he's passed away four years ago, but I I spent a lot of time at the gym. I spent a lot of time at basketball games. I, I had a I always had a hoop in our driveway, and I shot lots and lots of free throws and I was totally blind since age five, so my dad rigged up. It was actually like a light weight chain that you would use to chain for a dog, and he attached it to the bracket and the back of the back of the basket. Dr. Kirk Adams: And then I would hold one into my hand and tug on it so it would make a noise so I could know where the hoop was, and I'd release it and I'd shoot. And I owe many, many thousands of baskets as a kid. So I read about you in access Information news. And for those who aren't aware, that's a weekly publication that talks about what it sounds like new news about accessibility, disability inclusion. And I'm a sponsor. My consulting company is called Innovative Impact, LLC. And I'm a I'm a sponsor of Access Information News. And I read it weekly, and I read about a blind basketball coach who happens to live just north of Surrey, B.C., British Columbia. And so I reached out to Sheldon via LinkedIn and said, just read about you in Access Information news. I want to get to know you. So we had a call and chatted a little bit and invited Sheldon onto the podcast and really want to hand the microphone over to you. Sheldon would love to hear about your journey. Looking at your LinkedIn profile, it looks like you've been a sales sales executive. Very successful. You talk about public speaking, you talk, you use the word pivot. Which of course is also a basketball term, but just would would love to love to hear your story. Sheldon Guy: Well, thank you Mr. Adams, and thanks for having me on your podcast. I really appreciate it. I'm not a I'm not as polished as maybe some of your your other guests may have been on your podcast. And the reason I. Dr. Kirk Adams: We look for authenticity. Sheldon. Sheldon Guy: Yeah, well, I think. Dr. Kirk Adams: You're. Sheldon Guy: I think you're you're going to get it today because my story is real. It's raw, it's authentic, and it's mine. Three years ago. Let's just go. Three and a half years ago I was at my dining room table putting together all of my player packs for my team, meaning backpacks, hoodies, pants, socks, all that sort of stuff. As I just finished tryouts and I just selected my team. I then started to notice something, but didn't pay too much attention to it because I was more focused in on getting into Into the season, so I didn't pay much attention to really anything other than basketball like he mentioned, because I spend a ton of hours at the gym. I was able to drive around, do what I needed to do to get prepared for the for the season. A few, a few weeks went on and I flew up to a city called Kelowna. It's north of me for some meetings with some customers. And I rented a vehicle and we were driving from Kelowna down to Penticton to see some product and a customer and all that sort of stuff. And I noticed that I couldn't really see the passenger beside me or the road. And so I just kept rubbing my eyes and thinking, okay, you know, maybe there's something in my eyes I didn't really understand, but I could see, I could still see. Sheldon Guy: I was still fine, but just I would I'd have to turn my head to look over instead of seeing her in my peripheral. So that was very scary. And I think that's what prompted me to go and see my ophthalmologist. And so I went in and saw my ophthalmologist when I got back. So I flew back the next day, and then I went in and saw my ophthalmologist and she, she did some tests. And then, you know, she got very concerned telling me that my optic nerve was inflamed and that I needed to go see I'm trying to remember the the the series of doctors, but it was an ophthalmologist. And then I went and saw an no, I saw an optometrist. Then I saw an ophthalmologist. Yeah. And then I moved on to a couple other people and ended up seeing a neurologist. And so you know, that's when stuff started to go really sideways. And the neurologist wanted to admit me into the hospital, and I just didn't want to go in the hospital. So he's like, okay, you know, take these prednisones. See if we can bring down the inflammation. And things are happening very, very quickly. This is in a span of three weeks. Dr. Kirk Adams: Okay. Sheldon Guy: And so it was so I, so I took the prednisone. I felt really bad because at the time, I was out for dinner and I drove to dinner and you know, they gave me all these, I don't know, it's 30 tablets that I had to take three times a day. And there is a steroid to bring down the inflammation or stop the inflammation. So I'm at the dinner table in this restaurant. I'm counting out 30 pills on a table. I kind of felt like it felt felt like, oh my gosh, people are gonna look at me like a drug dealer or something like that. But it wasn't the case. I was. Those were legal drugs that I was, I was on, so I took the prednisone and that didn't work. And so after that process it was a Saturday morning, I woke up and I went to make my bed, and I, I couldn't see my bed. And so, like, I could see, but I couldn't see. And I knew something was happening. Like something was going on. So I went down to my laptop, emailed the neurologist and said, hey, listen, like I think I got to go in because I think something's happening. I think we got to act pretty quickly. And so he emailed me back right away and said, yep, I've got you on the list. Go, go now. Like go today. I said, okay, I just obviously had to get some stuff together. And I'm a single father of a son, so my son was with me at the time. Sheldon Guy: He had to work that day and he didn't really know what was going on either. It was just a regular Saturday. He got up, I made him breakfast, we hung out and he was getting ready. He had to work that evening and I didn't want anything to happen until he actually left for work. So I waited the day called for a ride to to go to the hospital, but told them to keep it, you know, to themselves and under wraps and packed my bag the best way I could to go to the hospital. Didn't really know what I was packing, but just packed it just in case they were going to admit me and then ended up going downstairs. Just before Jayden was and my son's name, Jayden. And just before he left we were standing. I live in a townhouse, so I live, I have one flight, two flights, three flights, four flights of stairs. And I was on the main level at the stair, and he was at the top level of the stair going down. And he looked at me with this concerned look. He's like, is everything okay? And I said, everything will be fine, buddy. I'm just going to go to the hospital. And something's happening with my vision. And he started to joke, and we just joke back and forth, and he came back with with a rebuttal. He's like, I love you, and I hope everything's good. And I'm like, you know, buddy, I don't know if I'll ever be able to see you again. Sheldon Guy: And one tear came down my eye when I said that, and he was the last thing I ever saw. Oh, I then went into the hospital, and they did. I was in there for nine days, and they did all sorts of tests. Like, I had a couple spinal taps. I had all sorts of MRIs all sorts of CT scans. They the, the province even paid for a $500,000 test for hereditary test to see if this is hereditary. They did a ton of tests. Test me for Ms.. Test me for glaucoma, macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy you name it, they went down the list and they couldn't find anything. And so I can't remember what exactly what day it was. But I went to see after all these tests, I went to see the neurologist and have a meeting with them. Yeah. And so I went in and had a meeting with him, and he was very he he didn't have. I remember this, like, as clear as mud. He had no bedside manners. He Which probably isn't surprising, but no bedside manners. And he basically said to me. He basically said you were destined for this. There was nothing we can do. This is going to be the way, the the way you're going to be for the rest of your life. Excuse me, Mr. Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. No. Sheldon Guy: So? So that was. It was super hard to take. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: My life had just turned upside down within a matter of weeks. So I remember. Being in the hospital transfer bus back to Sir Memorial. And I walked into Sir Memorial and There were two doors, sliding doors. And the first one that opened, I walked through, or I was in a wheelchair that I didn't need to be in a wheelchair, but I walked, they wheeled me in and the first doors open, and I thought to myself, I'm back here. And the second doors opened. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: And I said to myself. I'm not leaving this place. This is it. I'm not leaving this hospital. So sorry. Dr. Kirk Adams: No worries. Sheldon Guy: Just emotional because it's my story and I'm still living it. And so I went. I went to my room. And I closed the door. Sheldon Guy: I felt where my bed was, and it turned the bed toward toward the window. Sheldon Guy: And I climbed into bed and then I went and had all these medications still on the side table. So I, I decided that this was it. This is my destiny and this is how it was going to go out. I'm sorry, Mr. Adams. So. I grabbed. All the bills that were on the left side, and I grabbed my phone and I left a couple messages. I prepared a couple messages on my phone. One was to Jaden. And the message was. That I loved him and that I hope that he grows up to be exactly what I want him to be. It was. It was my goodbye message. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: So I climbed into bed and I pulled the sheets up to my shoulders. And I had the pills in my left hand. And I had my hand on the button on the right hand. And I was just going to press send. Pop. And just wait to go home. Because I knew I couldn't live like this. Like. I just made that decision that I couldn't live like this anymore. Or at all. Moments. Moments before I was about to put the pills into my mouth, my phone went off. It vibrated. And? I listened to the message. Still had the pills in my left hand. And listen to the message. And it was Jaden. And his message was. I love you, dad. God's got this for you. You'll be okay. And. I listened to it again to make sure I heard what I heard. And then I didn't even look. I didn't even look to my left hand. I just dumped the pills on the floor. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: And then I said, I gotta figure this out. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: I can't do this. I gotta figure this out. And so. I made that decision in the hospital to continue to pivot and to persevere and to somewhat find purpose. It's been three years of pivoting. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: Persevering and finding purpose. I have after I came out of the hospital before I went into the hospital, I resigned as the head coach of the Langley Secondary Thunderbirds. I called the athletic director, and then I actually resigned as a basketball official with Fraser Valley Basketball Association as well. Dr. Kirk Adams: Okay. Sheldon Guy: And resigned from both of those before I went to the hospital, literally as I was leaving my house. So they didn't really know what was going on, but they knew I resigned because I was losing my vision and I got out of the hospital. One of the things I said was after days being at home is I want to go coach. And people around me were like, what? What do you mean you want you just lost your vision. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right? Sheldon Guy: I want to go, coach. I can't leave him. I can't leave the girls like this. I committed to them. I need to figure this out. I need to pivot. I need to figure this out. So I went to the school. I called the editor, Mark wise, and told him what my plans were, and he was super excited to have me back. And I walked into the school. I want to back up for a two messages. Actually came through on my phone. Jaden's was the first one. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: But the other one were from my basketball. Girls are sent me a message as well, and as a group. And they were just wishing that I was going to be okay and to feel better soon. Those two messages saved my life. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: So when I went in to when I walked into the gym two girls kind of fainted kind of fell to the gym floor, and everybody started crying. And I just had a talk with them and let them know that I'm here for them and that I'm committed to them. However, I have to. However, whatever I have to do. And so I had the talk. We had some tears, we shared hugs and then it was back to work. To the baseline. And I had some troubles. I had a friend there and he was helping me with practice, but really, not really. He was just on the sidelines and he was crying because once he put me in a position of where I, where I needed to be, I just, I felt like I had vision. I knew the gym. I knew where the girls were. I knew what the girls looked like. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: I knew my stuff. I just had. Dr. Kirk Adams: To figure out. Dr. Kirk Adams: You ran practice. Sheldon Guy: I ran practice, and my friend Gabe Gibbs he's the founder of G2, and he was on the sidelines tearing up because he was so amazed at just the resilience I had to get back on the court and just to run, practice, run my drills, run the skills. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: Clearly I can see what I was doing or what they were doing right. And he would step in once in a while and correct. But I ran the hour and a half practice by myself. Dr. Kirk Adams: Cool. Sheldon Guy: From that time we were registered in a tournament. Howard summer tournament. And I had phoned Howard up with me getting out of the hospital, and just confirmed that our team was still going to be in, and then I told him what had happened to me. Well, he was shocked. He's a news column journalist up here in Canada. He's he's followed sports since I was in high school. Like he wrote an article on me when I was in high school. I'm not aging myself. Just you know just a few years ago. But he was astonished. And so he wrote a massive article. And you're more than welcome to go read it. It's in verse varsity letters, and you just search up Sheldon Guy. And he wrote a magnificent article on me. And then he came out and actually, like, witnessed me. Yeah, coaching a game. And so I had that tournament and I confirmed that I was in the tournament. So word spread very quickly because the basketball community is very small. Right? So we're we're word spread very quickly. And We had the, the a game. Jaden and I had a game. So Jaden then obviously found out what had happened to me. And he. Dr. Kirk Adams: Was. Sheldon Guy: Very concerned. He's my best friend. I love him to death. Yeah. But we we got to the gym, and Jaden obviously drove my truck. So backing up, when Jaden went to work, I allowed him to take my truck because he just got his driver's license. So I think he was shot. He was shocked there that I would just let him take the truck, because normally I would be in the truck driving him, right? Or he'd be driving, and then I would wait or go home and then come back, pick him up, and then he would drive home. But he was given the truck all by himself, so he kind of knew something was up. So anyway, we got to the gym and we're walking across the parking lot toward the gym, and I had the balls and my bag or my coaching bag, and Jayden whispered to me, he's like, dad, there's a bunch of guys with cameras and they're looking right at us. And I'm like, what are you talking about? And he said, dad, now they're coming at us. And I said, okay, we'll just go to the gym like, let's just go. I don't know what they're for. Let's just go to the gym. And then they actually ended up coming up. And I had cameras all around Jayden and I, and it was TSN, which is your ESPN. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Sheldon Guy: It was global. It was city TV. It was all sorts of news people that got wind that I was coaching and I just lost my vision. I don't know how, but they did. And so TSN and global were the ones, the forefronts that were kind of the bullies of the group. And they said, listen, we'd like to film you. Sheldon Guy: Our executive producer heard about this and wants to push all our stories aside and follow you. And I was like, awesome. So I laid on the ground outside and I was crying because I just didn't know I was overwhelmed. I didn't know what was going on. So anyway, TSN ended up filming me for the whole tournament and then and and so they came to the house, they had drones following Jaden and I, they interviewed us and that's where my documentary got produced. Dr. Kirk Adams: Oh. So tell us about tell. Dr. Kirk Adams: Us about. Dr. Kirk Adams: That. Sheldon Guy: Yeah. So I have a documentary that was produced by TSN and W5. If you Google Sheldon, Guy, W5 and pivot,...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Alyssa Dver, Founding CEO, Speaker, Educator, Motivator, Spokesperson, ERG Leadership Alliance
12/04/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Alyssa Dver, Founding CEO, Speaker, Educator, Motivator, Spokesperson, ERG Leadership Alliance
🎙️ Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Alyssa Dver, Founding CEO, Speaker, Educator, Motivator, Spokesperson, ERG Leadership Alliance In this insightful episode of Podcasts by Dr. Kirk Adams, Dr. Adams sits down with , Founder and CEO of the , to explore how employee resource groups (ERGs) can drive both inclusion and business performance. Alyssa breaks down what ERGs are, why they're different from social clubs, and how volunteer leaders navigate the paradox of doing “extra” work that still has to align with business goals. She and Dr. Adams discuss the current backlash against DEI, the recent U.S. executive order that both constrains and reinforces the importance of inclusive ERGs, and why organizations that were already committed to DEI are now doubling down on ERGs as engines of belonging, innovation, and retention. Throughout the conversation, they connect ERGs directly to disability inclusion, emphasizing that disability crosses all demographics and that every ERG can and should be disability-ready. Alyssa also shares her personal journey, from a traditional marketing career to brain-science-based confidence research sparked by her son's neurological disability, and explains how belonging and psychological safety are literally “hardwired” performance factors in the brain. She and Dr. Adams connect this science to everyday workplace realities: when people feel safe and included, they think more clearly, collaborate better, and are more likely to raise tough issues or innovative ideas. Alyssa describes how the ERG Leadership Alliance supports organizations at every stage, starting, restarting, or optimizing ERGs, through research, training, tooling, and a global network of more than 100 million ERG participants. Dr. Adams closes by urging listeners, especially disability advocates and employers, to leverage ERGs as a powerful, practical mechanism to build truly inclusive workplaces and accelerate disability employment. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everyone, to another episode of podcast by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am that Doctor Kirk Adams talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And I have with me today a remarkable person that I'm getting to know better and better who's doing great things in the world. Alyssa Dver. She's founder and CEO of the Leadership Alliance. Alyssa. Alyssa Dver: Remarkable. That's one of my favorite words. I would use that to describe you too. Dr. Kirk Adams: Well, there we go. Well, I I'll. In full disclosure, Alyssa and I had a conversation about employee resource. Resource groups and the Leadership Alliance several weeks back, and the recording disappeared. So we're doing it again. But I'm going to call it a blessing in disguise, because so much has happened in the last last six weeks as our our topsy turvy world continues to turn. And so I wanted to touch on a couple of recent insights and get your take on it. Alyssa. Yeah, yeah. Before we do that, just to let people know I am Doctor Kirk Adams. I am the immediate past president and CEO of the American Foundation for the blind. Prior to that, the same roles at the Lighthouse for the blind here in Seattle. I have a consulting practice called Innovative Impact. Focus on fun, innovative, high impact projects that will lead to greater inclusion of people with disabilities. I have a PhD in leadership and change. My doctoral work was an ethnographic study of blind adults employed in large American corporations and ergs. Employee resource groups came up quite often in my ethnographic interviews of blind people working in big companies. And in a in an appendix of my dissertation is called Journeys Through Rough Country, by the way, and you can find it by searching Journeys Through Rough Country by Kirk Adams. And in an appendix, I, I have a fictitious scenario when I'm talking, when I'm talking to parents of a young blind child who are very fearful about their child's future and very uncertain because like my parents, my my retinas detached when I was five. Dr. Kirk Adams: They had never met a blind person before. They didn't have any experience in that area. And most parents of blind kids don't. And so I, I focus on employment. So I this fictitious scenario is talking about employment and the things they would need to do in order to prepare their child to be successful in the world of employment and be independent and to be able to thrive in the way that that they want wanted to thrive. And we talked about developmental stages and having kids. Do the blind kids do the same stuff other kids do? You know, for four year olds playing on the playground and playing in the sandbox, and the blind kid should be in there, you know, fighting over the toys with the sighted kids and, you know, the 12, 12, 13 year old kids going to meet their friends you know, at the mall or wherever. The kid needs to have the orientation, mobility, skills and the confidence to be able to go and independently join them. And you know, we talked about early work experience, and then we talked about the expanded core curriculum, which is the great news that blind kids get to hear in school, which says you have to learn all the things the sighted kid learn, sighted kids learn. Dr. Kirk Adams: And these nine other things like orientation, mobility skills and use of assistive technology and self-advocacy skills and you know, work, workplace and career awareness and development. And then we talked about the workplace, and I talked about you know, some of the things to look for when you're when your child is going to be looking for work. Is disability inclusion formally stated at a leadership level by, by the company? Do they have a centralized accommodations process and budget? And do they do they have a employee resource group focused on disability inclusion? And that is one of the signs of a potentially good workplace for a person with a disability is to have that erg. So ergs. Ergs have been present in my mind as an important piece of the employment picture. And as most of you listening probably are aware, only 35% of us with significant disabilities are in the workforce. We're in a much narrower band of occupations. We tend to stick closer to the bottom of the org chart. A majority of us work for non-profits or government where awesome places to work, salaries and incomes are limited there. And so when I encountered Alyssa and had an opportunity to to talk about ERGs in a larger context and to talk about how intersectional intersectionality plays a part, that disability knows no demographic boundaries and covers all demographic characteristics. Dr. Kirk Adams: And how can we make all employee resource groups inclusive of people with disabilities? Just really started to unpeel an onion here. And then in the last last week there was a study that came out about Gen Z people in the workforce and the very dim view they have of their future in the workplace. Compared to past generations, as far as their what their opportunities are going to look like. And then disability in came out with a study just this week that showed that using data drawn from LinkedIn that in order to advance in careers, people with disabilities need to change employers more often than people without disabilities in order to have upward mobility. So all kinds of factors and dynamics and I'll just say the the full frontal assault on diversity, equity, equity and inclusion. And I know when we spoke last, Alyssa, you said that in response to that, there seems to be more interest than ever and more engagement and more momentum and traction around ergs than ever before. So with, with with that blast of words from me, I'd like to just turn it over to you, Alyssa, to, to ask if you could tell us a little bit about your journey and how you became defined found the ERG leadership Alliance. And what you're doing, what you're seeing. Any reflections on on any of those things I've said and anything else you want to share? Alyssa Dver: Oh, wow. Well, thank you for that. Well, let's first ERG for anyone who's listening that doesn't know what an ERG is. Employee resource group is what it represents, and there's at least 40 or 50 names. I've lost track that they go by that are not erg. It could be ERG nrg erg. We've seen associate resource group and inclusion resource group and you name it business resource group of course is very popular. But there's also employee networks, which is very popular in the UK as the moniker. So, you know, they are groups, associations as we say traditionally set up like any kind of an association where you have volunteer leaders. The difference between what these are is that they are within a bigger entity. And the entity could be a for profit, non-profit, academic government entity. They do get funding from that entity, some funding. They are governed. In other words, they have rules and directions and plans and things that they live by and operate by. And then they're also accountable to the entity in terms of, well, I gave you X number of dollars, what did I get in return? And that's the difference between an ERG or any kind of employee group versus a club. There's another type of group called affinity group that sometimes can be either a club or an erg. It's very confusing. And sometimes companies have a little bit of each, but an ERG by definition as an association comes with some interesting characteristics. I mentioned that the volunteer, the leaders are volunteers, so they have a job in that entity. Maybe they're an accountant or a marketer or you know, a know, delivery person, whatever it might be. Alyssa Dver: And then they also have this role as a group leader or on the leadership team. And that leadership team role is, by and large, voluntary. They don't usually get paid very unusually get paid, in fact in paid could be a spot bonus or a gift card. So just, you know, having a volunteer set of leaders, if you've ever run a nonprofit, you know, it's a different beast, right? You have to motivate people that you don't really have any authority over, per se. But it's a very different set of leadership skills. It also is a little tricky to navigate. Even your boss, if you're, you know, a group leader, you report to somebody who has PNL in some way, you know, profit and loss responsibility. So you have to kind of negotiate with them. This is the amount of time that I'm going to be doing this ERG work. And this is why it's important to me as an individual and professional development, and this is how it's going to contribute to my regular job. So there's a lot of nuances in paradoxes in this space. And again, we're not going to go into all of them today. But ERG has been around since the 1960s. And for the large part of their history, people kind of just assumed they were social clubs, that they were there to support people who needed support. Typically people would say they're for underrepresented groups. Underrepresented could be, of course, disability individuals. It could be people who are black people or Hispanic women. But I always said that it may have started for those reasons, but even long back, some of the original groups had nothing to do with underserved populations. Alyssa Dver: You see a lot of young professionals, groups, Gen X, for example, you see, and Gen Z for that matter. You see you know, religious groups, Bible study groups, Jewish groups, Muslim groups you see groups for hobbies, groups for and I say religious but interfaith. And, you know, I have a hard time saying that a young professionals, interfaith, even caregivers groups, those are not underrepresented by definition. They never have been. So the commonality is that there's an affinity. There's something that they all share, that they feel that they want to get liked minded people to discuss share their experiences, share their frustration, share their victories, even with and then advocate for the things that they need in the workplace. And of course, disabilities. Groups tend to advocate for tools and, and functionality in their business, you know, day to day business, whether it's furniture and ramps or translators captions, things like that. But it goes well beyond that. It goes into what do you need for benefits? You know, how can I better participate in meetings? Where you know, other individuals aren't making those kind of accommodations for me. You know, I need to have somebody basically make sure that those are in place. So advocacy. Big deal. As well as as supporting the business. You know, maybe the business does have a need to develop new products, whether they're accessibility products or not. You know, every single group, particularly the disabilities group, should have some way to say, hey, well, if it did this, I could use it better, right? So all many, many ways. And again I'm skimming the surface here. So the thing that attracted me. Dr. Kirk Adams: So question. So you said early, early on that these are not a club, these groups, you're going to use ERG as the umbrella term to cover the 200 different terms. They're they exist to meet strategic business objectives, to help the business operate more effectively. Be be a better, stronger organization. So does that have to do with allowing people to bring their best selves to work? Is it around belonging? Is it around psychological safety? I imagine if you wanted to do metrics, you might think about turnover or absenteeism or innovation. So I'm just curious. I'm just curious about what what are some of the kind of proven I guess our ROI type outcomes that result from good, effective ERGs being in place? Alyssa Dver: Well, you know, you started kind of the conversation by saying there's been a lot of change this year. And no kidding, right? And one of the things that, you know, with the directive in the US, the executive director on Dei. Everyone kind of panicked and said, well, you know, what do we what's going to happen to ERGs? Well, it turns out in the directive, it actually encourages people to have ERGs. But it's very clear about making sure that that ERG is that every year G is inclusive. So inclusivity isn't just allowing people to participate in programming. You know, I have a session on you know, presentation skills. Everybody should be allowed to come. Sure. But if I'm talking in a women's group on menopause pre directive, I could say this particular topic is for members only. Right. So I could basically exclude people. You can't do that anymore. You can't you can't have only leaders or even executive sponsors for that matter where you say only people of this type. You know, if I'm the black group, the leaders have to be black. No, you can't, because what the director basically said is you have to make it so that if this is something that helps people and the company is spending money on it, it has to be available to everybody. And leadership opportunity is considered something positive. So needless to say, the inclusivity of it was really what was called out and continues to be the the thing that we need to make sure all groups are open and available to everyone and everything that they do. With that said, the history of the groups again started with underserved populations, but very quickly became recognized for ways to people to connect and find friends and belong. Alyssa Dver: And, you know, my background comes from that brain science circling around confidence. So that was what attracted me to these groups in the first place. I looked at them and I said, wow, this is where people can find a sense of belonging in the workplace. Place. But at the time when I was really kind of pondering this about 2017, 2018, there really wasn't any organization around them. So different companies had them. They were very random, and the way they were run, the random in the kinds of types that they were the there really wasn't anyone in the organization that was chartered to kind of keep an eye on them or kind of make them a little bit more consistent across groups. And there wasn't really an industry. So, you know, I started the ERG Leadership Alliance as a way to try and formalize things, but more importantly, get people talking to start setting up some sense of benchmarks, some sense of governance, and really professionalize it into an industry. And, you know, again, maybe fortunately, in some sad way when we got into Covid, people were remote. They needed that sense of belonging desperately. We had Black Lives matters. It became, okay, how do we make sure people's voices and their need to express themselves? In safe spaces. We had a series of other unfortunate situations that kind of, again, encouraged people in the workplace to say, we need to have people feeling safe, psychologically safe and belonging. So the ERGs got kind of a lift out of all of that. Dr. Kirk Adams: All right. Alyssa Dver: With the executive order, as you kind of said earlier, you know, I did say on our last recording that we got a lift out of it, right. Alyssa Dver: What what I think is true. And we saw this back also in the same pattern when corporate social responsibility CSR was kind of the rage. Yeah. Is organizations that are committed to it to begin with. Like it's part of their DNA. The founder says we are going to do you know, this is who we are. You know, it could be, you know, organizations that whether or not their products or their services even aligned, it was just part of their who their identity. Csr and again with Dei. Those are the ones that have said we are doubling down because we know that this is really important to keep our employees motivated and productive. And the ROI numbers speak for themselves. We we know that employees that are more engaged have higher levels of productivity, and we know how much we know how much more profit they contribute. And they and these organizations have stuck by that. Unfortunately, the ones that never were committed got permission to basically let go of the wheel and be like, I'm not going to do this. I'm not going to do Dei at all. And ERGs are part of Dei. So we're, you know, we're going to either downsize or we're going to get rid of them. And that's a shame because, you know, it's a shame for those employees. I feel sad for them. I also feel sad for the organization as a whole, because I think when the pendulum swings, which it always does, they're going to be caught with their pants down, as the saying goes, right? They're going to be scrambling to fix the situation. And ERGs aren't there just for the sake of underrepresented groups. As we've said over and over again, already there for the sake of having employees know that they matter. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right? Dr. Kirk Adams: Right. So you you you said and it's true, I, I'm aware of your background, brain science and confidence, but the people listening are not. So I would love to take a step back and have you talk about that part of your life a bit. Alyssa Dver: Well, you know, I, I followed a very standard, I would say standard, typical path in terms of, you know, college education, dabbled in a couple of things, found marketing interesting, went into marketing, became part of many corporate engines. I was the chief marketing officer, ultimately of a couple companies, both public and startups. And, you know, I can't say it was bad experience. I don't I, you know, but at the same time, I always knew that it was just a job. Right. And and like, you spend so much time at work and working that...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Ssanyu Birigwa, M.S., Co-Founder, Narrative Bridge
11/05/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Ssanyu Birigwa, M.S., Co-Founder, Narrative Bridge
🎙️ Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Ssanyu Birigwa, M.S., Co-Founder, Narrative Bridge In this illuminating episode of Podcasts by Dr. Kirk Adams, Kirk shares how a stressful season leading the American Foundation for the Blind and pursuing his PhD led him to the healing work of guest . He recalls powerful half-day sessions in New York that began with reflective writing and moved into energy practices like the hara seven-minute meditation, creating “energy bodies” with the hands, and chakra work. Those tools, which he still uses most mornings, helped him re-center, move from heaviness to lightness, and live with greater intention and body awareness. Birigwa, co-founder of Narrative Bridge, weaves her lineage as an 80th-generation Ugandan bone healer with her roles in narrative medicine at Columbia University and research on clinician well-being. She explains her Pause Three method, gratitude, intention, forgiveness, which downshifts the nervous system in under three minutes, then shows how story, slow reflection, and deep listening build trust inside teams. The conversation connects personal healing to organizational change, reframing “wealth” as health, relationships, spirit, and material capacity leaders can actually hold. Listeners leave with a palpable invitation to pause, tell truer stories, and align values with daily practice at work. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am that Doctor Kirk Adams talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And today I have the most special guest I've had so far, a very important person in my life named Sonya Gregoire. And Ssanyu is co-founder and CEO of Narrative Bridge. She is an architect of systemic transformation frameworks that enable organizations to operate with authentic alignment between their stated values and their daily practices. And the more organizations who can do that, the better for all of us. Ssanyu, if you just could say hi, then I'll talk a little bit about how awesome you are. I'll turn it back over to you. Ssanyu Birigwa: Thank you. Kirk. Hello everyone. It is a deep pleasure to be here with you and your audience. Just having the opportunity to connect is really important, especially during times of such change that we are all feeling, you know, beyond what I think we can describe with words. Thank you for having me. Ssanyu Birigwa: All right. Dr. Kirk Adams: So as many of you may know, I am a totally blind person. Have been since age five, when my retina is detached and had a lot of surgeries, unsuccessful, painful surgeries, a lot of hospitalization between age five and 12, which, of course, I didn't think of it as childhood trauma at the time. But now now I know I experience some significant childhood trauma. Went to a school for blind kids for second and third grade and then into public school where it was sink or swim. I was always the only blind student. And I had a family that really did some great things for me, including holding high expectations for me and treating me on an equal footing with my sighted siblings. Didn't didn't attend to a lot of psychosocial elements of having a significant disability and weren't equipped to do that, but made my way through school and got an academic scholarship and went to college. And then you know, had a lot of challenges around finding meaningful employment, as so many of us do, with only 35% of us in with significant disabilities in the workforce. But but made my way and with a lot of support from a lot of great people with a big investment by the lighthouse for the blind, Inc. here in Seattle and my professional development, I was was able to become the president and CEO of of that organization here in Seattle. Dr. Kirk Adams: And then I was hired by the American Foundation for the Blind AFB, Helen Keller's organization, to take on those same roles for AFB and lead them through a financial turnaround and an organizational transformation which involves strategic planning and restructuring and doing lots of hard things like eliminating positions and closing programs and the hard things that needed to be done. So in the midst of all that, I, before I was hired by FBI, started a PhD program, a PhD in leadership and change through Antioch University. So I was in the middle of that dissertation process. My wife, Roz, and I moved from Seattle to New York City and lived in a tiny apartment in Park Slope in Brooklyn. I learned how to take the F train to the A train up Penn Station, up to the office at two Penn Plaza. And we lived there about a year and a half. Our strategic plan led us to relocate our headquarters to the Washington, D.C. area. So we moved again to Arlington, Virginia, and was working there. Culture shock for a person born and lived always in the Pacific Northwest and a weather shock, the hot, humid summers and Virginia in particular, and the very cold winters. We did not own enough clothes, but I was attending to implementing the strategic plan very assiduously. Dr. Kirk Adams: I was working on my PhD work, and I would get up every morning and kind of prepare for the day. And I got in the habit of listening to podcasts when I when I was getting ready. I use a great app that's very accessible for people who are blind called eye catcher. And I would just put in a keyword in the search engine and kind of go down the list of what popped up and just tap on something that kind of resonated with me that that morning. And I honestly don't remember the podcast, but the guest was Ssanyu. Gregoire and the host had spent some time with you, Ssanyu, and had had had some experiences with the healing work that you do. And she said, after my session with you, I could just feel all. I was just cleared of all the mucky muck. I remember that phrase, and I said, that's what I need because I feel like I am in quicksand. So I emailed the host and said, I'd like to talk to you, Ssanyu. And she can she emailed you and said, this dude, this dude reached out and he wants to talk to you. So you kindly set up a phone appointment, and we talked for about half an hour, and we determined that it would would be a good fit for us to work together. Dr. Kirk Adams: So I remember having an experience with you at the Four Points by Sheraton and Chelsea on 25th, and we spent about four hours together. And you started out by reading a poem to me and asking me to write a reflection. And I read you my reflection, and that led us into a deep conversation. And then, you know, you took it from there. And we had several of those kind of half day sessions in person. And so one of one of the greatest memories I have is you know, you didn't touch me with your hands, but you were you were moving stuff around. I can feel it in my body. I could feel things opening and loosening, and I could feel energy flowing like it hadn't in a long, long while. And then you and I had a regular virtual series of virtual sessions, and you taught me a number of things. I the horror meditation, the seven minute meditation. I did it this morning. Lit the palo santo, did the meditation. I probably do that five out of seven days a week. And you taught me how to create energy bodies with my hands and move that energy into my chakras, which I, I remember the first time you taught me how to do that. I said, that's trippy. Yes. I said something like, it's real. Ssanyu Birigwa: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: We're not making this stuff up. Yeah. So, you know, you really had a huge impact on the way I live as far as thoughtfulness and intention and paying attention to energy and paying attention to my body and using some of the techniques that you taught me. And now a blessing to the world. You are taking this knowledge and wisdom. Your cultural heritage, what you've learned academically, what you've learned from experience and others. And you're taking it into what I would call the organizational development world. And I would just love to hand the microphone over to you. I'd love to hear, hear about your journey. I learned I learned some bits and pieces along our our time together, but we'd love to just have you recount to the people listening the journey that's brought you to the place you are now and how what what is the present like for you and and your vision of of the future? And what what's working well for you? And if there are any challenges. I would love to have you tell people how they can get in touch with you, so I will I will hand you the talking stick. I will reserve the right as a host to pop in with the question from from time to time. But please, please tell tell. Tell us the the legend of Sonja. Ssanyu Birigwa: Kirk. Thank you. I have to say, you are a great storyteller. And listening to your reflections, listening to the ways in which. The offerings that were placed between us has continued to be truly of support. And I'd even say service to your own well-being, which I know has expanded out to the people that you love and care about, work with, connect with. And that's that, that's that's that. That is what I hope to be able to infuse in the world as my passion is to create healthier communities. And we can't do that until we've actually taken a good look at the eye, our personal self, and to listen to you in your journey. Just made me smile and made me laugh. It brought me back to those moments in person with you. And I loved how you said she wasn't touching me. That that is true. And not. There are a few moments where I would have to. I feel the energy, especially when we're able to be with the physical body. Needed the the place of holding and listening to a story a family member shared with me recently about meeting an older woman who was being helped in the car to put her seatbelt on, and she held the person's hand tightly before they let go of having put the seatbelt on her. And she said, hold on a while. I haven't touched a person in five years. Ssanyu Birigwa: Wow. Ssanyu Birigwa: And it makes me think about why we do also need touch, and also to how when we focus in on the connection between the self and other, the thought in itself is almost as powerful as touch. So thank you for sharing those moments of of reflection that we've had together. I am an 80th generation healer from Uganda. And what this lineage has taught me about Western medicine. Has taken me probably the last five years to really deepen my understanding of how the nervous system determines what we can hold. And what do I mean about what can we hold? Well, right now. I am doing a lot of research and. Understanding through being a lecturer and adjunct professor of narrative medicine at Columbia University and this lecture that I teach every spring at the medical school spirituality and health is around the self to have the ability to listen so we can be fully present with the other. And in this case, whilst I teach, it's it's, you know, the physician and patient. But what I've trained to understand that has taken me beyond narrative medicine and the clinical understanding and the research that I'm doing. With University of Michigan, to be specific, around the support we can give through narrative medicine practice to doctors who do telehealth visits. There's a lot that is happening with the AI telehealth connection and building healthier communities. That narrative medicine practice really helps to embolden and support the well-being of the physician. And so, as I've steeped my my experience in teaching and research and also experimenting and connecting what I understand about my lineage to help those. Connect, sometimes Extract, sometimes dissolve, sometimes just recognize the stories that live in our bones. And my clan of the bone healers now know the potency that which our body holds information. Ssanyu Birigwa: And it's been almost a decade or so since I've created and built what I call narrative Bridge. And it began with my colleague and dear friend cohort from Columbia whilst we were in grad school. Us to really look at how to bring leadership into healthcare. But first, we needed an entryway and that entryway into leadership and support of the healthcare systems and individuals who are a part of the system Is the framework of narrative medicine, which is the paying attention to oneself so they can pay attention to the other, to. Then, once that connection is made of observation, one creates an understanding of who is before them. And that one I speak is the clinician or the leader or. The mother? The father. It's all of us. We are that one who, when we are able to deeply listen to ourselves, we are able to listen to the other. And somewhere in that process, trust is developed. And once we create that trust and that deep listening, that happens when we are present in the moment with the other. So much can happen. And in terms of the health care field healing, specifically healing, connection information being exchanged. Begins to support that container. And people will then begin to have positive stories to tell, whether it's within the health care space or technology or equity and diversity and inclusion, wherever that might be. We are building trust. And so where I understand we need a protocol. Allowed me to deepen into creating the pause three method, which Kirk, I know that we worked with quite a bit. It's usually how I like to set the tone, and the tone is deepening into a gratitude state to create an intention for ourselves, or maybe for our community. Dr. Kirk Adams: So for those who haven't had the experience, can you describe the pause three method a bit? Ssanyu Birigwa: Yes. So there are three parts and I call it the GIF. I was trying to be a little cheeky so GIF. Ssanyu Birigwa: Yeah. Ssanyu Birigwa: And it's based in gratitude intention making and forgiveness. And as this protocol is enacted within our nervous system, mindfully we downshift this nervous system in under three minutes. And we've practiced this. I've trained different clinicians and physicians in this. And my students, I. I offer this as a tool to learn how to evoke, literally within the body, what it feels like to be in gratitude, to then shift into a moment of presence within ourselves, to create an intention and to use our imagination to feel into what it would feel like to be in action of that very intention. And from that, there's the forgiveness. We all make mistakes. We are not perfect, and we can be very honest with ourselves and the other and take accountability. And part of that accountability is also then to forgive ourselves and then release, not to hold on to these bags of shame and, and discomfort that which actually creates literally disease within the body that then can manifest oftentimes into something very real that a clinician, a doctor, needs to pay attention to. We all have read different, you know I think, you know, many of us have read different articles and or if you're really into the science of mindfulness but also energy and also how oxygen, when brought into the body at certain rhythms, can literally change the molecules in our bodies and create healing. So the method is based on science and also the ability to tap into something that some might call woo woo. And I have a student who, who, who really stands in that space of saying, yes, I am woo woo. Well, what if we made the woo woo natural and normal? What would it look like for us to accept that we are energy that we can feel and address, some of which we may never have addressed before through the lens of story? Ssanyu Birigwa: Right. Dr. Kirk Adams: And that that that resonates with me and my experience. And when you said narrative medicine and what I, what I thought about was the elements of our time together, where you would read me a piece, read me a poem, and ask me to write a reflection and read that back to you that led to it, led to a dialogue. And I think you just said something about a feeling. I don't know if you just said feeling things you haven't felt before or realizations you haven't realized before, but I, I certainly had that experience. Ssanyu Birigwa: Yes. Ssanyu Birigwa: And we say in narrative medicine practice that this is not therapy, but it does feel therapeutic. And I think that's what the intention is. When we tell stories. I've witnessed actually that is the intention that we are holding within when we are telling our own personal stories, whether it's comfortable or not, to share that story and what we're seeing. And when I say we my colleagues, those who I've worked with beyond the institution and teaching at Columbia but when facilitating trust building for executive teams or running wellbeing initiatives for hospital systems. Something keeps shifting, and I keep meeting leaders who've who've built not just material wealth, but really the wealth of of their wellbeing systems, family, you know, connection. And still there there's a piece of misalignment. Because in these four areas that I call this wealth frequency that I bring into leadership teams we, we sometimes feel depleted. Ssanyu Birigwa: And what are the four? Ssanyu Birigwa: So where I, I begin is understanding wealth frequency from the lens of how wealth in itself can also be an extractor if we're not understanding, you know, where we might be depleted. And it's not about bringing in more tools to find, you know, ways to connect to the to the body. But it's it's more about refining. And so the four areas or I'll start with the three right now is health is relational. So the health, you know, we have our physical health, you know, we work out maybe we we eat well, eat clean, as one might say. But sometimes our nervous system is in disharmony. We might feel often that we are oscillating between fight or flight maybe having a hard time resting. What I'm witnessing in leaders that I work with is this piece of health. Because the material wealth. And that's the fourth, the material wealth, actual money is there. However, perhaps there's a little more attention that needs to be placed on the health frequency, which I just spoke about. But then there's that relational, you know, our family is intact. You know, we we are in loving relationships. But maybe there's a shift that's needing to be had in, in our work. Perhaps you might be noticing and what I've witnessed and many people that I've worked with in the last, I would say 3 to 5 years that the relationships at work are, are a bit more extractive than they used to be. Ssanyu Birigwa: There's more of this giving, giving, giving and less reciprocity. And I also believe it's the time in which we are in globally. There's there's a global shift happening. And then there's the spiritual. Sometimes we are disconnected to knowing ourselves. Not like knowing who we are. Who are we? You can see the signs sometimes through, often a link to the work that one does where you're feeling the need to shift and change. Maybe not necessarily leave the organization that you work for. Or if you're an entrepreneur, you know, you know, just, you know, bag your, you know, your endeavors and start something new. But a reiteration maybe we are seeing the signs, the individuals seeing and feeling the signs. But maybe there's a bit of distrust within ourselves. Whereby we don't actually act upon what one might call intuition and also real lived experiences. And so what I'm, I, I'm really focused in on and bridging into leadership and development is that most people think...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Vanessa Abraham, Speech Language Pathologist
10/23/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Vanessa Abraham, Speech Language Pathologist
🎙️ Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Vanessa Abraham, Speech Language Pathologist In this candid episode of Podcasts by Dr. Kirk Adams, Dr. Adams sits down with speech-language pathologist, author, and ICU survivor to trace her extraordinary arc from clinician to patient and back again. Abraham recounts the rare Guillain-Barré variant that left her paralyzed and voiceless, the disorientation and aftermath of Post-Intensive Care Syndrome, and the painstaking work of reclaiming speech, swallowing, mobility, and identity. She explains why she wrote Speechless, to humanize the critical-care experience, and makes a compelling case that communication access in the ICU is a basic right, not a luxury. The conversation moves from story to strategy: how lived experience reshaped her practice, how she founded A Neu Healing Therapy to bring neuro-rehabilitation innovations to survivors, and what clinicians, hospital leaders, and families can do now, build trauma-informed teams, ensure reliable ways for non-speaking patients to be heard, and measure recovery by dignity as well as function. Throughout, Dr. Adams draws out practical takeaways and a wider systems lens, leaving listeners with both hope and a concrete roadmap for more humane, effective care. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody, to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. And I am said Doctor Kirk Adams talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And I have a I say amazing guest today, Vanessa Abraham, who's a speech pathologist who's not only practiced speech pathology but has experienced the need for speech therapy herself, and I'll let her tell her story. I did want to acknowledge Mai Ling Chan, who is the source for me knowing Vanessa. Mai Ling is a an amazing disability advocate and she has created a platform called Exceptional Leaders Network ELN and it's a very small monthly subscription fee to be amongst some amazing people and get to spend some, some focused time with Mai Ling as well. So I, I met I met Vanessa through the ELN and she has brought her talent, skills and passions to the world to help support individuals who need support in their in their speech and articulation. And she's developed some amazing new technologies. And I was just speaking to the disability ERG at Russell Investments here in Seattle yesterday. And we talked about the fact that anyone can join us as disabled citizens at any time and people can become disabled and non-disabled, and it's very fluid. Dr. Kirk Adams: And we talked about the difference between impairment and disability. For instance, I have a visual impairment. I'm blind, I can't see, but if I have my Jaws screen reading software, my Refreshable Braille display, and my computer with the tools I have, I'm not in a disabling situation. If you take those things away and I just have a regular computer with no screen reading technology and a monitor, I am in a disabling situation. So Vanessa, I just want to turn it over to you. I know you were working with students in public schools for quite some time, and then something, something really transformational happened in 2019. And if you could take, take us, take us through your journey. Where? Where have you been? And where are you at now? Where? Where do you hope to take things? Where are you planning to take things and what? What's what's working well for you? And are there any any challenges you'd like us to know about? Vanessa Abraham: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for having me here today. And you're right. My journey began in 2019. So a little over six years ago as you mentioned, I am a school based speech pathologist. I work with school aged kids with communication challenges. So anyone from using things like text to speech or eye gaze, augmentative communication devices to students that may be working on stuttering and producing smooth speech or articulation. So that's kind of where my world has been for the past 15 or so years, just working as a school based speech pathologist until one day 2019, when I became the patient in the bed receiving speech therapy. And that's really when my world got turned upside down, where I realized what it was like to have a communication impairment not only a communication impairment, but a voice and swallowing impairment, too. And I required extensive speech therapy. How it all began. I talked extensively about this in my book, speechless, that I launched about ten months ago. Launched in January. It began just as a virus. And this virus slowly paralyzed my brainstem and spinal cord. As you said, it can happen overnight. It's very fluid. You just never know what tomorrow will bring. And for me, within a week's time, I was intubated and in my. Or on my way to ICU you at UCSD, San Diego where my life completely turned upside down. And as I said, I became the patient in the bed. Never imagined when I was in grad school that I would be the one sitting in the chair having a barium swallow study. And eventually I was to. Dr. Kirk Adams: What is. What is that? Vanessa Abraham: So the barium swallow study is a study that you do in the ICU or in the acute setting that looks at your swallowing muscles. How? And it tests your swallowing. Are you safe to swallow? Are you safe to be eating orally? For me, due to the nature of this virus that was paralyzing my brainstem, spinal cord, it paralyzed all the muscles in my neck that are used for voice and swallowing. So I was no longer able to swallow food safely. My vocal cords experienced significant atrophy, so they weren't working quite as well as they should be. My upper body was paralyzed. I was not able to move my right arm to right, to point, to do much of anything. And this all happened within days or a week. I was fine. I was out, like I said, I was. I talk about this in my book. I was out camping with my family, and then all of a sudden I woke up and I thought, I've got a cold. I need to go home. Well, that cold quickly progressed into this upper body. It's called what I have is the pharyngeal cervical brachial variant of Guillain-Barré. So most people with Guillain-Barre, their feet have extensive paralysis. My feet were fine. I was actually able to walk. I just couldn't move my upper body or swallow foods. So, again, I was the patient in the bed. I had to learn to talk again. I used I gaze, I used text to speech. I had to write my words down and eventually I used this thing called a passy-muir valve. Dr. Kirk Adams: Vanessa, I'm I'm pretty immersed in the in the blindness world, and I, I've spent a lot of time with the deaf blind community, but the the speech and communication challenges are, are not as familiar to me. So you mentioned eye gaze. You mentioned text to speech. You mentioned, I think augmentative communication devices. Could you, could you just spend a few minutes talking about the various technologies? Vanessa Abraham: Yeah, absolutely. So eye gaze. I was not able to communicate verbally. I was also not able to use my fingers to point to gesture. I was pretty locked in, so the only way I could communicate was by looking at a word on a piece of paper or looking at a letter like Y for yes, N for no, or the word yes and for no. And my family had to track my eyes. Dr. Kirk Adams: Okay. Vanessa Abraham: They would ask me a question like, are you in pain? And I had to look at the word yes. And they would track my eyes to see because I wasn't able to point to the word yes. And I progressed from using eye gaze to being able to point to letters on a piece of paper. When my fingers were able to move a little bit better, I was able to point to letters for like, yes, or you know, when I had a burning question what's happening to me? I could type in every letter for a sentence. It was a very slow process to communicate that way, and very frustrating. However, it was a modality of communication for me, which was very important. I progressed from using the the little letter board to writing on a whiteboard, and eventually I was able to use my phone. And being a speech pathologist, I knew that there was greater technology out there than just writing things on a piece of paper. So that was a point where I decided to ask for my phone. I asked my family and give me my phone. I want to download a text to speech app, which I did. I got a free app and I just was able to type very fast questions on my phone and ask questions, and after that I was they gave me the speech pathologist there, gave me a passy-muir valve to trial. That's a valve that goes on your tracheostomy that allows you to vocalize. So that was the point that I was able to communicate with the tracheostomy. And that was a very, very hard, scary period of my life, learning just to go up again and hear my voice again. That was something I'll never forget, honestly. Dr. Kirk Adams: How long was that process from waking up intubated and paralyzed to being able to use the the valve? Vanessa Abraham: Close to a month, three weeks or so. Dr. Kirk Adams: Three weeks of hard work, I imagine. Vanessa Abraham: Oh, extremely hard work. Extremely hard work. And eventually that was removed, and I was able to vocalize without any type of assistive technology. But that's when I also had to experience a lot of speech therapy for voice. So I did that, and I did a lot of swallowing therapy, probably for about, oh, let's see, three, four months of swallowing therapy before my peg tube was removed and I was able to swallow foods orally, safely. And from there on out it was just a lot of rehab, a lot of physical therapy, a lot of occupational therapy. Speech therapy lasted about 4 or 5 months. And then I was able to once I was able to eat food safely, then I was discharged from that therapy. But it was a experience that I'll never forget. I've really learned as a speech pathologist what medical trauma is, and the associated depression and anxiety that goes along with being critically ill. And an experience in the ICU when you really weren't planning on that. I talk about this thing. It's called pics Post-intensive Care syndrome. I talk about that pretty extensively in my book, and that's the psychological aspect of an ICU stay. And a lot of the depression, the suicidal ideation that we go through, a lot of the brain fog and forgetfulness that ICU survivors go through. And that's just something that I never learned about in grad school as a clinician. Vanessa Abraham: I've never I never really realized that this existed until I got out of the ICU and I was experiencing all of this myself. And the doctor and the ICU met with me. And she goes, Vanessa, I think you have this thing called Pics Post-intensive Care Syndrome, and she sat down with me and explained it to me and I said, yes, I definitely am experiencing all of that. A lot of that suicidal ideation where my, you know, my life was completely flipped upside down within days. I was very healthy. I never experienced anything more than like a runny nose my whole life, maybe an occasional flu or cold or something, but definitely never experienced trying to rehabilitate back from a swallowing disorder, a communication disorder, paralysis. It was very, very hard journey to to say it lightly. And six years later, I am a lot better. I still advocate heavily for pics and pics. Survivors, ICU survivors. I do a lot of speaking about it now, just trying to educate the next group of graduates and schools and families as well. It's really important to me to, for family members to understand that their loved ones that are getting out of the ICU have experienced trauma, and what that trauma may look like for them. Dr. Kirk Adams: Is that send them fairly newly identified. I, I've been in the disability spaces a long time. I've certainly heard about trauma informed design and trauma informed programming, but I've never heard the term before. Vanessa Abraham: Yeah, I'm so glad you asked that because it is. Well, yes and no. Is it new? It's something that's not talked about heavily. However, it has been out there. Okay. I am working with a group of individuals that are working on getting an ICD code for picks right now, and we're really hoping that that will be out in 2026. Okay. And if that happens, then it will really it'll really put picks pics on the map. It'll get people to start talking about it and understanding it because as you know, people haven't heard about this. They don't understand. They think that you got out of ICU, you fought, you lived. You should be great and grateful and happy and and look what you accomplished. And that's right. Yes, I am grateful. My team was phenomenal. They saved my life. My family was wonderful. However, I'm not the same person. No one's the same after they've experienced trauma. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right? Right. And my trauma came early in my life. Just to let you know, my retina is detached. When I was five and I had a lot of surgeries and was hospitalized for lengthy periods of time between age six and 12. And I was speaking with a therapist some years ago dealing with some issues, and she said, have you done anything to address your childhood trauma? I he said. What? Childhood trauma? She said. You were six years old, operated on and in the hospital with your head in a clamp for ten days at a time. So it's it's interesting that pix has been identified, and I will be reading your book and learning much more about it. Vanessa Abraham: That is what you just said to about childhood traumas and addressing those that is so important and so real. Because even if you're a child and you've gone through a medical, medical trauma or traumatic event that still sits with you as an adult, right? It truly does. Medical trauma. I've talked with significant people about this same topic, that medical trauma can be an adverse childhood experience, and that's something that really needs to be talked about. Kids when they're born babies and they're in the NICU, they're not able to be held by their mothers, their fathers. They're not getting that skin to skin that can be traumatic for kids. A two year old that's getting that, that is admitted to the ICU for a medical condition, a car accident, watching loved ones go through an ICU stay that is very traumatic and needs to be talked about because these traumas stay with that person until they're 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 years old. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right. And the ICD code, is that some sort of formal diagnosis? What is the ICD code? Vanessa Abraham: Yeah. So the ICD code is what the insurance and medical professionals use for billing and medical research. So that's going to really help in the future because it's really going to it's going to put pics on the map and people are going to start understanding it and and addressing it appropriately. Here's a here's a classic example. When I got out of the ICU I went to try to find mental health services because of the significant depression, the suicidal ideation, and the first therapist that I went to. Mind you, I had lost significant weight because I was in the ICU. I had a lot of atrophy, and at this point in time I was tube fed still and, you know, very, very frail. And I walked into her office and sat on her couch and, you know, was very emotional. And she asked me how much I weighed. And I told her and she said, well, what did you weighed before? And I told her, and she starts doing these medical or these calculations on her calculator. And I thought, I wonder what she's doing. And then next thing you know, she starts speaking. And she wanted to put me in a support group for eating disorders, and I wanted to just cry because I have an eating disorder. I had a swallowing disorder where I couldn't safely eat food, and this is where people are just so uneducated, as you know, The world is uneducated on what the difference between a swallowing disorder and an eating disorder, right? I walked out of her. I walked out of her office crying. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. So misunderstood. Vanessa Abraham: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: And not. Not seen. Not heard. Vanessa Abraham: Yes. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right. You mentioned working with a group of people to establish the ICD code. If people are listening, and this is a striking a chord with them or resonating with them, and they think that that might be me, or are there groups that people can connect with or resources that you would recommend? Of course. Please tell people how to find your book. Absolutely. Other resources in this? I have not seen the term, I think ICU survivor either, until I looked at your LinkedIn profile. Vanessa Abraham: So yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Absolutely. Where can people connect with community? Vanessa Abraham: Yeah. Great question. Because my community, honestly, is what kept me alive. Knowing that there were support groups out there for picks and people that understood me is what really got me through those very, very dark moments. They encouraged me to write the book and help me launch the book. And but in terms of support groups, I can always be reached through my website, WW. Dot com. I'm also on social media. Speechless SLP so please anybody reach out to me? That's one resource. But also the support groups that I have been through, there's one in Pittsburgh at Mercy, and there's another one in Vanderbilt. And they have weekly support group meetings that you're definitely encouraged to call and contact, and you can join their support groups. There is another girl that does a medical trauma support group. She does a weekly meeting as well. She's in And in Austin, Texas. Her name is Sarah. She can be reached at Medical trauma Support. Com. So there are a lot of resources out there. Dr. Kirk Adams: That's great. Vanessa Abraham: The big problem is, is that this is just not talked about enough. People don't realize that. Yeah, you've lived, but there's there's the after effect of of rehabilitation and how traumatizing that is, how many flashbacks we have PTSD very significant PTSD of sights, sounds, smells just triggers that we see. For me, if I see an ambulance, that's a trigger for me because I wrote in three different ambulances. One of them was very traumatic, where I was hallucinating. Just on on heavy, heavy narcotics just for the pain that I was in. So it's just important to realize that you're not alone and that there is support out there. Also, something that's really important to realize as well is that family members can experience picks too. And that's called picks family. And it's normal for a family member to have some of this PTSD because they watch their loved ones fight for their lives. They may have seen a very scary medical procedure. I talk about one in my book with my husband and what he saw and what he experienced, and that's real. And it's okay to talk about it and join support groups, because those support groups and building that community, for me, it was everything that's. Dr. Kirk Adams: It is very heartening to know that there are resources available for people. I did want to ask you about. You've developed some new therapies based on your experience. And I think a new healing. Can you talk to us about that? Vanessa Abraham: Yeah. I've learned an entirely different way of treating voice and swallowing disorders just because of what I have been through. So, of course, me, the speech pathologist. I relied on the literature of what I learned in grad school to address voice and swallowing disorders. But I came across that direct current direct current e-stim device is...
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One National Door, Local Results: How Kathy West-Evans' NET Turns Inclusion into a Hiring Advantage
09/25/2025
One National Door, Local Results: How Kathy West-Evans' NET Turns Inclusion into a Hiring Advantage
Here Dr. Kirk Adams frames disability inclusion as a hiring advantage powered by one national door and local execution. He spotlights CSAVR's National Employment Team (NET), led by , as a single gateway into every state and territorial public VR agency, with TAP (the Talent Acquisition Portal) and on-the-ground VR specialists turning postings into interviews, OJT, accommodations, and retention. The article walks leaders through why inclusion breaks at the national-to-local seam, how the NET's “one company” model fixes it, and where the ROI shows up—shorter time-to-fill, stronger 90/180-day retention, and reduced compliance risk. Case patterns from Hyatt (1,000+ trainees), Microsoft (dozens of hires), CVS Health (hundreds of hires), and Kwik Trip (300+ hires across 600+ stores) demonstrate repeatable designs: employer-built curricula, alternative assessments, role redesign, and national agreements executed locally. He closes with a six-step playbook (name a national sponsor, execute a NET agreement, activate state POCs, instrument training/OJT, pre-plan retention, measure and scale), rebuts common objections (“we already have job boards,” “accommodations are costly,” “multi-state is messy”), and shows how to integrate the NET into ATS, accessibility roadmaps, workforce pipelines, and governance. Compliance is the floor; performance is the flywheel. The invitation: join the September 25 LinkedIn Live with West-Evans, bring one stubborn multi-state requisition and a draft KPI set, and leave with a 90-day plan to pilot the NET in two regions—because inclusion isn't charity; it's recruiting math at enterprise scale. TRANSCRIPT Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Hello, everybody. This is Doctor Kirk Adams talking to you from my home office in sunny Seattle, Washington. And this is my monthly live streamed webinar, which I call Supercharge Your Bottom Line through Disability Inclusion. And today we have an expert in the area of disability inclusion and employment, Kathy West-Evans, my dear, dear, long time friend and colleague. Say, say. Say. Hi, Kathy. I'll be back to you in a minute. Kathy West-Evans: Okay. Hi, this is Kathy West-Evans, and I'm joining you from east of Seattle. A long time partner of Kirkson. Thank you for having the conversation today, Kirk. We both know that this we we supercharge the bottom line working as a team. So thank you. Dr. Kirk Adams: That's right. So I just wanted to reflect a little bit. So Kathy is involved in the vocational rehabilitation system which is a powerful engine for disability inclusion and employment. She'll be talking to us about how the vocational rehabilitation system works and how they work with employers and all of the resources they can bring to the table to assist people with disabilities and and their employers make successful employment outcomes. But I when I was at the American Foundation for the blind. So I am the immediate past president of AFB, and I was privileged to hold those roles in the same roles at the Lighthouse for the blind, Inc., here in Seattle, where we employed hundreds of blind and deaf blind people in various business activities, including aerospace manufacturing, which was a lot of fun making parts for all the Boeing aircraft. But when I was at AFB, when we did our strategic plan, you know, we wanted to support blind children in education. We wanted to support older people who are visually impaired. Most people who are legally blind have become so as part of the aging process, not not lived their lives as a blind person as I have. But we really decided we wanted to focus on employment because only 35% of us with significant disabilities are in the workforce, and that's that's compared to 70% of the general population. Dr. Kirk Adams: So as far as working age people in our country, about 70% are working. And in the folks with significant disabilities, only about 35% of us. So half. And for the official unemployment rate, people seeking work. The Bureau of Labor Statistics if it's 4% for the general population, it will be 8% for us who are actively seeking work. So how you slice it, our outcomes and employment are half as good or twice as bad as the general population. But in preparation for designing our employment related strategies, we did a literature review. We hired a brilliant blind researcher named Doctor Ariel Silverman. She did her doctoral work here in Seattle at the University of Washington, and now she is a head of research at AFB. But we we asked Ariel to do a literature review on employment, Unemployment, and she synthesized probably 120 different peer reviewed research based articles on employment and one. One statistic that really stood out for me that among those employers who formerly say some sort of statement that they are inclusive of hiring people with disabilities or proactively seeking to hire more people with disabilities, less than 10% were connected with our vocational rehabilitation system. It was 9.2% of the employers that said they want to hire disabilities were actually connected to our greatest resource for employing people with disabilities, which is our vocational rehabilitation system. Dr. Kirk Adams: So I really want to turn turn the microphone over to Kathy and really ask you, Kathy, to talk about three things. And I'll I'll pop in with questions as they as they arise, as they occur to me. But I'd love it if you could tell our listeners and viewers describe the vocational rehabilitation system, how how it works, how funding works, how how federal funds flow to the states. We'd like you to talk about all of the resources that vocational rehabilitation can bring to the table in working with individuals with disabilities, seeking employment, and working with employers who want to successfully employ people with disabilities. So paint paint is the general VR picture. And then we'd love for you to talk about the national employment team. Was was happily joined you all in your two day summit over on the Microsoft campus earlier this month. So the national employment team is very fresh and current in my mind. And then the the talent acquisition portal, which is another powerful tool that people can use. So I'm going to I'm going to turn it over to you, Kathy. I'll pop. I'll pop back in with a question or two from time to time. Kathy West-Evans: Good. Keep me on track, Kirk, because, you know, I get excited about this, this work and the work that we've done together. Yeah. So the Rehabilitation Act, which funds public vocational rehab. The acronym is VR. And no, it's not virtual reality. It's vocational rehabilitation. Who was funded in initially in 1920 because people recognized that disability happens. You could be born with a disability. You can acquire a disability at any time during your life, but your goals are the same employment, independence, living in your communities. And so that act was built around the person thinking about the whole person. So as Kirk well knows, Kirk and I work together supporting the employment of people who are deaf blind here in our Seattle community. You know, you've got to think of things like, if someone doesn't drive, how do they get to and from work? It seems simple to us in the field, but not always. Not always simple transportation systems, navigating everything. We work hard to do that. So it's thinking about the whole person. What are their goals? What are their skill sets, what are their career aspirations? And then looking and working with business to understand their their needs for talent as well as their needs to retain talent. Kathy West-Evans: So this system is a federal, state funded system, roughly 80% federal, 20% state. It's 2070 8.7 and 21.3 state. So I'm not going to get into those details, but the program is decided, the structure of the program is decided at the state level. Understanding the states know their resources and know how to best support the success of the individual and the business. So we have 78 agencies. We're in every state, the territories and District of Columbia. And in some states, like here in Washington, we have two states because the state has decided to have a general agency, but also an agency that specializes in serving people who are blind or have vision loss. And that may be, again, in independent living, it could be in that career track. And there's also a program for individuals who are older, blind. Like Kirk says, we have an aging workforce and an aging population. And vision and hearing are two of the sensory functions that tend to be impacted by aging. So really looking at two things. Dr. Kirk Adams: So you mentioned in our state we have two vocational rehabilitation agencies, one that focuses specifically on people who are blind and the other that addresses people with, with other disabilities. Now, some states only have one agency. I think it's something like 30 states have two and 20 have one, something like that. Yes. Kathy West-Evans: Something like that. Dr. Kirk Adams: Correct. Yeah. Kathy West-Evans: Yeah. And again it's decided at the state level understanding how they're structured. So like for example in California we have a combined agency okay. Dr. Kirk Adams: And then the other thing I don't know if it was if it was at your summit or somewhere else, but I just recently heard the statistic that the fastest growing age group entering employment, people over 75. Kathy West-Evans: Yes. So it's not just entering employment, Kirk, but I think staying employed. Okay. Right. Dr. Kirk Adams: Okay. Right. Kathy West-Evans: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Good. So as a you know again we're we're researchers here. So to statistics. So some like 16% of people over 65 years old have some sort of visual impairment some sort of low vision situation primarily. And then something like 23% of people over 85 have a visual impairment. So many, many, many people enter our community. Yes. Of legal blindness later in life. Kathy West-Evans: Yes, yes. We talk about disability being the one community that you can hinder enter at any point in your life. Right. So yeah, it's, you know, life changes in an instant, right, Kirk. Right. It's like, as you know my brother had an accident at the time. He had his accident. He owned his own business. Now he's a quadriplegic with a traumatic brain injury. He he fell working on a building. And guess what? He's back working Because that's what he wanted. And living independently and driving and, and you know, I, I like to have people think, what would you want for yourself? Yeah, I think all of us want to have control of our life. Right? Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. I didn't mean to to derail you, but I just wanted to to talk about the fact that some states have one agency, some states have two. So if you're if you're in a, if you're in a two state state with two agencies, you you have double. Double the fun, double the people to talk to if you're an employer. But I'll get back to you. Kathy West-Evans: Okay. But it's, you know, it's working together. And even if there are two separate agencies, then we work together. And that's the key thing, particularly when we're working with business. And I'll talk about that a little bit when we talk about the net and what we learn from the national employment team in our conversation with business. So but the vocational rehab system serves a wide range of individuals. So I'm glad you brought up the aging population, Kirk, because we're working with individuals who are transitioning from high school into their first career. And I think a key thing there is helping them understand the careers that are available and connecting them with, you know, what a career looks like from the perspective of a business and what you would need to do to enter that career and grow within it. So what's the appropriate training? What you know what? What will get the person the skill sets they need to be productive and and have the career of their choice. And we all know career a career is a journey, right, Kirk? You never you never end up where you think you're when you start. So you know, preparing people for that and supporting them in being successful. And then, you know, we serve people throughout the age range again to the aging population. Yes. Vision, hearing you know, mobility. Kathy West-Evans: Several things happen when you age. I'm wearing a lovely pair of glasses, but they're there for a reason, right? So, you know, it's it's thinking about how you continue to help keep people successful. And we work with a lot of businesses where people have acquired a disability. They may have had an accident or an illness or an injury or it's the aging process. And then how do we keep them working? Because these are often very, very talented and experienced people in a workplace. So the businesses want to keep them working. So we have that wide range of services. We also work with veterans. And I want to bring this one up, Kirk, because a lot of people don't know this, but we support veterans who have acquired their disability after service. The Veterans Administration supports veterans who have a service connected disability. But we work together. Okay. And as I said, my brother had an accident, but he's a veteran, so he receives medical support from our Seattle VA, which has been wonderful. But his voc rehab services come from our public vocational rehab program. So again, you know, it's how you help connect the systems to support the success of the person. And each state looks differently. Does that. Kirk, did you have something you wanted to add there? Thinking? Dr. Kirk Adams: No. Kathy West-Evans: Oh, okay. Okay. So there are a wide range of services for the individual that's sitting down and building a plan with the person and thinking about what they need. And so we look at you know, I think a key thing is not to get stuck in the medical diagnosis, right? Because you don't want to make assumptions about what a person can or can't do. That's the biggest barrier that people face in the workplace. And the one that we need to really talk about more. Kirk, so I appreciate you having this podcast because it allows us to open that dialogue. Yeah. But it's building around the person. And and again, you know, it could be training. It could be, you know, going to a university, it could be an apprenticeship and internship online classes you know, actual work experience and building from there. We could be looking at. Dr. Kirk Adams: People, and young people with disabilities can start receiving vocational related services. Is at age 14. Is that correct? Kathy West-Evans: It can. Yes. Again, the the definition of youth varies state to state in terms of how long they may be covered. If they're if they've been if they're born with a disability or acquire a disability at a young age. So. Dr. Kirk Adams: But we'd like to thank the Washington Department of Services for the blind, which was called Commission for the blind at the time. I went to graduated from Snohomish High School and went off to Whitman College in Walla Walla. Thank you for providing me with the cutting edge technology of the day, which was the IBM Selectric typewriter with the erase ribbon. So I was I was well equipped to head off to college with my slate and stylus to take notes during class in my Perkins brailler to recopy my notes and then to type my papers and tests. I had the amazing IBM Selectric provided to me by the Department of Services for the blind. Kathy West-Evans: Yes, we have a great we have a great Department of Services for the blind here. Yes. Yeah. So and again, that's an example of setting someone up for success. And, and Kirk, look where you've gone with your career. I mean I see so many people in their career journey who are now in, you know, they're they're leading initiatives and leading the work that we do with business and partnering and really supporting businesses in being successful. And I think, you know, that's one of the key things we want to focus on is how we support talent and retention of that talent. So on the business side, what we did was, as I said, you know, I started my career here in Washington State, but I always had a connection with business and, and worked with people who were deaf, hard of hearing, deaf, blind. So that's where I connected with Kirk early on. And the the goal of the program, though, was really listening to business. And that's the experience that I carried to my role in vocational rehabilitation. And from there, we built a program working with business and started to connect around the country. And when we started connecting around the country, because you've got to think of 78 different agencies, 15,000 staff, you know. But those of us who are working with businesses started thinking, you know, we're working with the same business. How do we do this better? How do we do it in a more coordinated fashion? So it's not as confusing for the business. And we're really understanding what they need. And it's not just putting someone in a job. First job, any job. Right. It's helping with that career strategy. Dr. Kirk Adams: And I've heard the term dual customer approach. Dual customer. You're you're serving two customers. You're serving the person with a disability who wants to be employed and live live their lives as a employed person earning a salary. And you also serve the business who needs to identify, attract, hire and retain talent? Kathy West-Evans: Absolutely, absolutely. And so that's where we started having that conversation. And some of us got together nationally and said you know, it's great that we have all these national employment conferences. Why don't we invite business to them so we can really hear from the business partners. So 20 years ago the we had a group of 35 businesses join us. And that included CEOs. It included, you know, HR, it included floor level managers, federal agencies. It included a wide range small, large businesses from different geographic areas. And we asked them, we're building careers. You know, what careers look like. You know the talent you need. What do we need to do differently to support you as a customer? And we heard a few really key points. Number one, build the trust. We want to have an open dialogue about what this all means and how we can best be successful. Build the partnership and build the strategy with the company. So really listen. Right. Don't assume that you know what a company needs, but really listen and make it easy to find you because every one of your agencies has a different name, right? And who do I call and how can it if I'm a state that if I'm a company that has a multi-state presence, I don't want to reinvent the wheel in every location. How do I build a strategy that I can move across the footprint of my business? Right. So that's where we started building what we now call the National Employment team or the net. You'll notice we use the net because business said VR virtual reality. What is it? Dr. Kirk Adams: So national employment team makes it pretty clear what you're doing. You're a team of people who focus on employment. So. Right. Kathy West-Evans: Right. And supporting business as a customer. Right. So and again we have. Dr. Kirk Adams: A wide range. Kathy West-Evans: Of services. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. I just wanted to mention another study. So this is a this is what you're addressing at the net. So there there was a study. It's probably about 20 years old. But they asked...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Elizabeth Whitaker and Rachel Buchanan, Vispero
09/09/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Elizabeth Whitaker and Rachel Buchanan, Vispero
In this engaging episode, Dr. Kirk Adams sits down with and of Vispero to explore how AI and JAWS' 30-year legacy are converging to expand employment and independence for people who are blind or low vision. After Kirk shares a personal JAWS origin story from 1995, Liz and Rachel trace their own paths through VR and training, then introduce Freedom Scientific's new "Learn AI" series: live, first-Thursday-at-noon ET webinars that begin with fundamentals (terminology, prompting, hands-on practice) and progress to specific tools, ChatGPT in October, then Gemini and Copilot in November. Each session is archived with step-by-step exercises and resources, and early interest is strong with 900+ registrants for the kickoff. They also preview FS Companion AI, built into JAWS/ZoomText 2025, which delivers up-to-date, task-level answers for JAWS, ZoomText, Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, and web navigation. The trio candidly addresses AI's fallibility and bias, underscoring the need for accurate, representative training data, while swapping pragmatic tips (e.g., using an iPhone's Action button for instant Voice Mode) and hinting at forthcoming features to streamline interaction with web pages and apps. The conversation closes with a shared commitment to evolve the series and tools so blind users can turn AI into a practical, competitive advantage at work. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody, to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am Doctor Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And I don't use the doctor title too often, but I use it sometimes. And it's because I have a PhD in leadership and change from Antioch University and my dissertation is called Journeys Through Rough Country, an ethnographic study of blind adults successfully employed in large American corporations. So I talked to lots of cool blind people working at lots of companies that we all know and found out what their elements of success, were. First I asked them, why do you how do you identify success? What what what do you use as your criteria to say I am successful, employed, and everybody said money in one form or another, to have enough income to have economic independence and freedom and to be able to make decisions about how to spend the money they earned. Looking at the success factors, everyone talked about family and friends support. Many of them, talked about working on a team like a sports team or a choir when they were younger. Many of them talked about having a strong internal locus of control, a real sense that they could overcome obstacles, solve problems. Dr. Kirk Adams: And many of them attributed that to some experiences when they were young, usually in the teen years, and often to do with outdoor experiences like horseback riding and rock climbing and downhill skiing and things like that. And before I get to the next success factor, I will say that they all expressed disappointment that things were so difficult still, that they were perhaps the only blind person who'd reached their level in their company, that they didn't see role models in the C-suite or on the board who were blind that they continually had to battle for accessibility and accommodations, and many cited instances in which their employers would make changes to systems without considering accessibility, rendering them unable to do their jobs. And another factor everybody talked about was accessibility, the need to master assistive technology and to be able to access systems. Which leads us to today's guests. And we have Rachel Buchanan and Elizabeth Whittaker with us today from Vispero. And say you say hi, Rachel and Elizabeth. Hi. Elizabeth Whitaker: Hello. And thank you for having us. Rachel Buchanan: Yeah, we're so happy to be here. Dr. Kirk Adams: So for those who don't connect Vispero with JAWS. Vispero provides us with Job Access With Speech, JAWS, screen reading software. This is year 30. I am a proud, proud to say that I use JAWS version one. Rachel Buchanan: Oh, wow. Elizabeth Whitaker: Right. Dr. Kirk Adams: And what would that be? 1995. And. Rachel Buchanan: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Working for the Seattle Public Library Foundation. And I had a refreshable braille display and JAWS. And I was able to do my job access systems, and and it's been it's been my constant daily companion ever since then. I have a daughter named Rachel who's 35, and she grew up she was born in 1990. So she's she's her, her, her JAWS as she grew up. And she told a story of she moved to the Bay area and she walked in to to connect with a friend of mine who was executive director of the World Institute on Disability. Nita. Aaron. And when she walked into the office, she heard JAWS. She said she went running in and said, I feel like I'm at home. I hear JAWS. Elizabeth Whitaker: So she knew what that was. She recognized it right off. Dr. Kirk Adams: That's how important it is to our our family. Rachel Buchanan: But yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: I'm really, really excited today to hear about your AI learning training series. So I'm going to hand the microphone over to the two of you. I will reserve the right as podcast host to pop in with a question or two if you if you what you're most likely to do, say something that's over my head. Technically, I may have to ask for some clarification, but yeah. Elizabeth Whitaker: As many questions as you want. Yes. Dr. Kirk Adams: In any case, the floor is yours. Elizabeth Whitaker: All right, well, thank you for having us here. And I just wanted to mention something that you said that was really important, talking about success and how people view success. And I think that, you know, what we're able to do in our training department because that's, you know, we we create a lot of training events and training content. And what we're able to do in our training department is provide people with the skills and the tools that they need to be successful. And so it's great to be a part of that. Rachel Buchanan: It definitely is. And this initiative kind of to look into AI and add to our training webinar series is because we already do our regular monthly training webinar was born because we just wanted to look at the way AI is going to impact the employment space for people who are blind and low vision, negatively or positively. Just because, you know, we all hear like, oh, it's going to take jobs. And in some cases it is, but also in other cases it's just going to change them. Right. So we want to dive into what that means. We've looked at a bunch of research from AFB. Thank goodness. They've they've already, you know, gotten into that space somewhat and turned over a few stones and done some research, but we've looked at a lot of that and landed on. You know, learning skills and embracing AI as a tool as part of that solution. Dr. Kirk Adams: Before we dive into that, let's let's hear a little bit about the two of you. And how did you come to be involved in accessibility and disability inclusion and doing the work you do? Elizabeth Whitaker: Sure. Okay. So I wasn't sure who was going to go first. So I'm Liz and I actually after graduating from college, I was looking for ways to learn more about technology because I knew, I mean, I'd been using it for quite some time, but I knew it was going to be very important in my career, whatever I did. And I also knew that it was really important to keep up with technology. So I started out by working in vocational rehabilitation in Arkansas, and after number a number of years working there as the Director of technology, I was able to come to Vispero, where I was able to create training on a more global level. So it was very exciting in that aspect. Dr. Kirk Adams: And are you are you a at user yourself? Elizabeth Whitaker: Yes, I sure am. I use JAWS, I use Braille and all different types of technology because, you know, it's all about using the tools that we have available to us, and there are many tools out there. So I am definitely a longtime Jaws user and Braille user. Dr. Kirk Adams: Cool. Me too. Rachel Buchanan: And me as well. And I'm older than you are. Rachel by a handful of years and have been using JAWS for a good long time, but got into the blindness rehabilitation space and just love technology. So that was kind of where I fit best and just love to see people kind of rehabilitate after the vision loss process and get back to work. And so that I worked in that space for 15 years, almost before I came to Vispero. And now I'm here. I've been here since 2018. Dr. Kirk Adams: Great. So we're all JAWS users? Multiple Speakers: Yes, yes. Good. Dr. Kirk Adams: Back to you. I just need to know a little bit about you, too. Rachel Buchanan: Well, that was good. It was good. I kind of forgot that piece. So I said a little bit about background about the series. Liz, do you want to tell a little bit about what it is? Elizabeth Whitaker: Absolutely. So one of the things that we talked about when creating this AI series, we do a lot of webinars. We do one a month. Well actually now two including this. But you know, since AI is constantly evolving, we wanted to create a series that we were going to be able to evolve with, and it was going to be something that was ongoing. And so when putting together the, you know, thinking about the webinars and the different topics we were going to cover, we thought, well, this is more than just webinars. This is going to be creating tools, creating resources, or showing people where to go get those resources. Because there are many different AI tools out there. There are many ways to use it. So we thought, well, why not build a website and have all of these different resources together in one place? And that's what we did. So if you go to Freedom Scientific Commons AI, there you will find several sections. It's all sectioned off into different headings. So there's a section there for upcoming webinars. And we currently have those listed through December. We're going to be adding more very soon. And so we started out by doing a couple of webinars. We started in August actually doing a couple of webinars to introduce people to AI and introduce them to the different concepts like prompting and the terminology that you need to know. Like, you know, what is a large language model? What are these different things that you hear about all the time in regards to AI. And then starting in October, we're actually moving on to specific AI tools. So in October, our webinar is going to be on ChatGPT. Elizabeth Whitaker: Then we're going to move on in November to Gemini and Copilot and so forth. And so we hold these webinars the first Thursday of every month at noon eastern. So on that learned AI page, you'll find a heading there for our upcoming webinars. And then once we hold a webinar, we archive it there under a heading called lessons. So this is where you can go to listen to the webinars that we've already done. And in addition to that, we've also added the exercises that contain the tasks that we do in each webinar. So it goes right along with what we're talking about, all the different topics. It's all right there. You can go, you can read about it, you can practice and you can listen to those once again. And we do this because what we really want to do is create learning paths so that people if somebody comes to the site and they think, where, where do I start? I don't even know where to begin. It's going to show them the learning path to, you know, here's the introduction, here are the different tools. And then you have all your jumping off points that you can go to if you just want specific information. So you'll all find also find their resources, for example links to different AI tools, links to terminology. So you know, there's just a lot of different resources there. And we're going to keep building this page out so that it will contain more and more information and just give everyone a path to learn how to use AI. Dr. Kirk Adams: I'm a hands on learner. I say. Reading. Reading a book about how to ride a bike is a lot different than actually trying to ride a bike. So I like to learn by doing so I'm intrigued. You mentioned there's hands on practical applications and those can't remember the exact term used, but but those hands on tactical doing steps that are outlined there in their archive there. So a person can sit with that and work with these various AI tools, with the guidance that you provide. Rachel Buchanan: Yes. Because you're not. Multiple Speakers: Going to. Rachel Buchanan: Get the feel for it until you do it. And they all kind of react a little differently depending on depending on your input. And so we just want people to understand that these are a tool that you can have in your toolkit and learn to use. It doesn't have to be anything that you're intimidated by. And yeah, the practice exercises make it really handy. We're trying to make it very hands on so people don't feel that intimidation. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. So Liz and Rachel, do you two lead the webinars? Do you have a certain various people who lead various sections? What's what's the What's the vision there? Elizabeth Whitaker: So we lead the webinars, but we are also going to be partnering with some people here in the very near future. More information to come on that very soon. And we what we what we do is we introduce the topics and then we talk about different terminology, different terms that people need to know for that particular webinar. And then we delve right into tasks. And these are the things these tasks are what we also create those exercises from. So if somebody listens to a webinar or we also transcribe them. So if somebody reads that transcription, whatever their preference is, and then they want to go back and practice those tasks, they have that those exercises to use. And it's taken right from that webinar. Dr. Kirk Adams: And do people register in advance. How do people get connected? And for the first Thursday of every month at noon eastern. Multiple Speakers: Yeah. Elizabeth Whitaker: So they do they register. In fact, we had over 900 registrants for the first webinar, which was really exciting. Multiple Speakers: That's awesome. Elizabeth Whitaker: So it tells us, you know, people are really interested. They're engaged. Yeah. You just go register. In fact, on that page, there is a registration link for each upcoming webinar. Dr. Kirk Adams: That's freedom. I wrote it down. Freelance freedom, scientific comm slash learning. Elizabeth Whitaker: I learn AI. Multiple Speakers: Yes, learn. Okay, I'll take AI. I'll. Dr. Kirk Adams: I just deleted the ING contraction. So. Got it. Rachel Buchanan: There you go. Multiple Speakers: Yeah. Elizabeth Whitaker: So we're very excited. And we get a lot of comments in the chat about things that people during the webinars about things that people want to learn. You know, we've gotten a lot of feedback about where people are in their AI journey. And so this is our opportunity to help someone, no matter where they are in that journey. Multiple Speakers: And where. Dr. Kirk Adams: Are you at in your AI journey personally. Multiple Speakers: Or professionally? I think we. Elizabeth Whitaker: Both use it every day, right? But there's always a lot to learn. I feel like, you know. Rachel Buchanan: Yeah, we. Multiple Speakers: Use it a lot. Rachel Buchanan: But we also I mean, it's definitely fallible, right? But we. Sure, we we use it a lot for, for different things. Maybe just brainstorming. What do you use it for most? Elizabeth Whitaker: Liz I would say brainstorming, summarizing, analyzing writing prompts if I need help getting started with something. Yeah, but, you know, we also have other coworkers who taught us some really interesting ways to use it. You know, like getting AI to create prompts for you. If you're not, you know, sure how to create a prompt or things like that. So everyone always has something to bring to the table. I feel like. Multiple Speakers: Yeah. Rachel Buchanan: And analyzing data, it's just it's it's unmatched in that area when it comes to just looking at I look at our training page, our web page data on that topic, and it's very helpful to go through all of that. Those strings of numbers? Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah, I use it. I'd say the most I use it for is to kind of complete do the last organizing and polishing of writing. So I'll open a word document if I, if I need to or want to write something about something, I'll just kind of do a stream of consciousness, write down what I want included not necessarily worry about the order or the flow and then, you know, put put it in a, a tool and say, please, please, please organize this. And then I'll take what they have and go through it again and edit it again. But it really helps with kind of organizing and putting things in logical sequence. If that's the type of writing, the type of academic writing that needs to be done, not not asking it to compose anything necessarily. So that works great. And then you know, putting I'll say Chit chat ChatGPT app on the phone and starting to learn voice mode. That's that's been a wonderful thing. Multiple Speakers: Oh yeah. Rachel Buchanan: Yes. My number one tip on that is that if you have one of the newer iPhones with the action button. Rachel Buchanan: You can set that action button. Default goes straight to voice mode. And I just think that's so cool. Multiple Speakers: Yeah. Elizabeth Whitaker: Push a button and talk to it. Right. Multiple Speakers: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: I need to figure out I will figure out how to do that. Rachel Buchanan: Yeah, it's very neat. Multiple Speakers: And you know. Dr. Kirk Adams: And then I do things like my wife needed to buy a new pair of shoes so fast. She wants to go to an outlet mall. What are what what's within an hour drive where she can get a good deal on some shoes. Multiple Speakers: That's great for that deal. Elizabeth Whitaker: They'll tell. Multiple Speakers: You. It'll tell. Elizabeth Whitaker: You. When you said something kind of that was really important that we talked about in our last webinar, which is you know, revising that you go back through and you look at what it did for, for writing, as far as, you know, you run it through, you tell it to ask it to organize, and then you go back through and revise. And we just did a complete webinar on creating prompts and then going back and reviewing and revising. So I like that you hit on that there. Multiple Speakers: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Well I have seen it say some outrageous things that I would never say. Multiple Speakers: Yes. Dr. Kirk Adams: Give some examples that are that I don't know that they actually really happened. So we'll, we'll make stuff up if it needs to fill in blanks. Multiple Speakers: It can, but it's a. Dr. Kirk Adams: It's an amazing tool as far as work goes. And for people who are blind and visually impaired, in particular, I think you...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion Webinar: Interview with Paolo Gaudiano, Founder & Chief Scientist, Aleria (PBC)
08/28/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion Webinar: Interview with Paolo Gaudiano, Founder & Chief Scientist, Aleria (PBC)
In this engaging episode, Dr. Kirk Adams sits down with , Founder & Chief Scientist at to unpack how measuring day-to-day workplace experiences, rather than headcounts or vague culture scores, translates inclusion into business outcomes. Gaudiano traces his path from computational neuroscience and complexity modeling to a 2015 “lightbulb moment” that led him to build simulations and tools showing how inclusion lifts productivity and retention, and how focusing on diversity alone can spark backlash. He outlines the premise of his 2024 book Measuring Inclusion: Higher Profits and Happier People, Without Guesswork or Backlash, and makes the practical case for aligning inclusion with financial performance rather than sentiment. Together they dig into method and evidence: an anonymous platform that captures specific incidents interfering with success, tagged by experience categories (e.g., respect, advancement, compensation) and sources (policy, leadership, managers, peers, clients), then linked to satisfaction, productivity, and attrition, quantified with an “impact calculator.” They explore turnover and productivity costs (from months of salary at entry level to years at senior ranks), human-factor risks in cybersecurity, and simple fixes (structured reviews, better meetings) that benefit everyone, often disproportionately helping disabled employees and women. Adams adds historical data points (DuPont; Walgreens) and closes with ways to engage Gaudiano's work (Aleria, LinkedIn, TED talk), a limited-time $0.99 Kindle promotion for the book, and a promise to reconvene for a part two on building true meritocracies. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody, to Supercharge Your Bottom Line through Disability Inclusion, which is my live streamed webinar that I joyfully host every month. I am Doctor Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in Seattle. And really, the premise of this monthly session is how can organizations become better, stronger, more aligned with their missions and their values and their objectives by being intentionally inclusive of people with disabilities in their workforce, which falls under the umbrella of inclusion writ large. And today I am thrilled. I'll use that word thrilled to have Paolo Gaudiano with us. He's the chief scientist for Illyria. I became aware of Illyria when I was in my role as president and CEO at the American Foundation for the blind, and a blind friend and colleague, Sara Minkara, invited me to attend a virtual event that Illyria was hosting. And I signed up for the newsletter. And I've read faithfully ever since. And what what Paolo focuses on is measuring inclusion and creating true meritocracy. And I've been thinking a lot about meritocracy this year. Really catalyzed early in the year with the terrible mid-air collision between the military helicopter and a domestic airline flight over the Potomac. And some statements by President Trump in the immediate aftermath, really linking the accident to the fact that the Federal Aviation Administration was intentionally inclusive of people with disabilities in their applicant pool and making a pretty, pretty jarring connection between disability and incompetence. And the conversations I often have with employers center around how people develop strengths. And we develop strengths as human beings by overcoming challenges and living every day with a with an impairment or impairments which places a disabling situations allows us a blind person such as myself, a person with a significant disability to develop some really unique strengths in areas that are are great assets and a wonderful characteristics that people with disabilities can bring to an organization through being employed. Dr. Kirk Adams: So when I read the Aleria newsletter and I read about creating true meritocracies and how to measure the impacts of inclusion there's a lot of resonance with me. And I had a chance to get on a call with Powell earlier in the year and, and talk to him about some of his, his prescient thinking several years ago about the, current backlash attack on Di, which which he saw coming, and the way that Paolo and Aleria are approaching, creating inclusive environments for the betterment of all, for the betterment of society. So I'm just I'm thrilled to have you with us, Paolo. I'd really like to hand you the talking stick, and you can take this conversation wherever, wherever it may lead you. And I happily chime in with a question or two as they arise to me, and then we'll give folks who are have joined us live an opportunity to ask questions, and then we'll, we'll let those who are viewing the recording know how best to get in touch with both of us toward the end. So, Paolo, I'm so glad you're with us here today. I've been anxiously awaiting this opportunity to learn from you. Paolo Gaudiano: Thank you. Kirk. It's first of all, it's a real pleasure and honor to be here on the show with you. I I wish that I could say that I'd known you for all these years. I only found out about your work recently and found it to be quite amazing and inspiring. I am grateful to Sarah. Sarah is an amazing person. I attended one event that she did. That really the way that she talks about disability, the way that she essentially lives out what it means to be a person with a disability and yet to be able to be contributing to society in amazing ways was was quite an inspiration. So I'm particularly grateful that you made that connection through her. And I just want to start out by again, thank you, first of all, for an amazing introduction. It was it was quite, you know, quite heartwarming to hear all these wonderful, very positive comments from you. And I hope that I live up to that expectation now. I kind of feel like maybe I should just stop here and say goodbye and, you know, let your you know, your introduction work as a kind of the core of the show. But I do like to start out. I always like to acknowledge for those of you that are only listening, or for those of you that are not able to see me, I am a white man. I'm in my 60s. I like to joke that I look like I'm in my 30s, but I'm, you know, white hair. Well, let's call it gray hair and. Dr. Kirk Adams: I call mine silver. Paolo Gaudiano: But there you go. Mine. Mine is maybe slightly less silver than yours, but very cool. Thank you. And the I always like to point that out because I often when I, when I give presentations, I start by jokingly referring to myself as the white elephant in the room. And I have not only my white and male, but I happen to be cisgender heterosexual. I do not have any permanent disabilities. And I, you know, people wonder, what am I doing in diversity, equity and inclusion? And I'd like to briefly tell about the history of how I came into this space, which is a space that I've now been working in for ten years or so. Since 2015. I had actually been interested in Dei on the personal level, and I first became aware of some of the what I thought were very strange things in the United States when I first came here as a teenager, and I was from Italy, my native Italy, and I was exposed to some situations that made me realize that there was some very odd ways that people in this country behaved when it came to racial if you will, tensions. And so I was always interested in that. I was intrigued by the fact that there were people that were being mistreated because of their gender, their race, their sexual orientation, their disabilities. Paolo Gaudiano: I always felt that that was wrong. And I felt that, you know, intuitively, it seemed wrong to me. But I always felt like, you know, what can I do? I'm not an activist. I'm just a white dude. And I would go to conference sessions on, you know, how do you get more people with disabilities into leadership roles or how do you, you know, create greater employment opportunities? Or how do you get more women into into more, you know, higher managerial roles? And I was always kind of struck by the difference between the individual experiences that people shared of things that happened to them because of their personal characteristics, and when it came to solutions They were talking about very vague, general things that we talk about things like, you know, how do we dismantle systemic racism? You know, how do we change the hearts and minds of corporate America? And one day in 2015, as I was sitting there literally thinking, you know, how can somebody close that gap between the individual level experiences and what happens at the organizational level? I had a light bulb moment where I realized that the work that I had been doing for virtually my entire career had been focused on exactly that, on quantifying the link between individual elements in a system and what happens to the system as a whole. Paolo Gaudiano: And that actually began as an undergraduate, and then later in my in my master's degree and my PhD, I studied the brain. I studied computational neuroscience, among other things, which was really about building computer simulations that would help us understand how circuits in the brain can somehow collectively combine the power of individual neurons, which by themselves are not particularly powerful devices. And yet when you combine them, you can do amazing things like speaking and hearing and learning and moving. And so I learned how to connect the individual to the collective in a quantitative way. And then later I was a professor for almost ten years. Then I became an entrepreneur where I applied those same ideas to understand at the next level up, how do you get a lot of people in an organization to contribute to the success of the organization, or people in a city, or whether it's maybe it's a team or sports teams or, or highway, you know, drivers, you know, how do they contribute to traffic jams? And so when I started to get into Dei, it was because I thought that there may be an opportunity to quantify the benefit that companies would get by treating all their employees better. And I saw that as an opportunity. I got very excited. As I said, this was in 2015. I literally dropped everything else that I was doing and started to build some of these computer simulations and proved to myself very quickly that I was onto something exciting. Paolo Gaudiano: And in particular, what excited me was that I always felt that even though I firmly believe in fairness and justice and I don't like I don't like inequalities. I don't like disparities that are to me, senseless. I also realize that for most corporate leaders, they are ultimately judged on how much money they make and whether or not you like it. I think they're trying to convince people that they should do the right thing is a dangerous thing to do, because even if they agree with you, the moment that there is a change in in the political headwinds or in the case, like in the last few months or several months, it's more like a tornado in the opposite direction. The fact is that people will kind of give up on any notions of doing the right thing if it's not aligned with their financial needs. And so I saw an opportunity to help individual organizations figure out how can you make more money by making your people happier. And so the first book that I wrote in 2024, which was the result of having worked for several years and developed this unique way of measuring inclusion, specifically has the title. Paolo Gaudiano: So the title is Measuring inclusion and the subtitle is Higher Profits and Happier People. And then it says also without guesswork or backlash. And and I will say, since you talked about by being a bit prescient, I want to talk about the the reason why I specifically talked about not just higher profits and happier people, but also the guesswork and the backlash. So so the guesswork. And I was very adamant about including that in the subtitle, was to acknowledge the fact that this was not about, oh, let's try to do something. Let's sprinkle some magic dust and let's see what wonderful things will happen. It's really about building, essentially tools and collecting data that helps you to make very, very careful and very wise decisions that will actually help you without having to do a lot of guesswork. The backlash was because as you as you mentioned in passing during the introduction as early as 2018. So after a few years of working in this space, I had come to the conclusion that the single minded focus on diversity as the primary, if not the only yardstick to measure progress and to and to determine how companies were doing. I saw that as a as a really big mistake because I, I saw I had the realization that diversity is really kind of a state of being. Paolo Gaudiano: It's the outcome of everything that happens in the company. And trying to fix diversity directly is a mistake. It's a little bit like walking in a cold house in the winter and deciding that you want to make the house warmer. You look at the thermostat, it says 50 degrees, so you light a match under the thermostat. Well, in the meantime, you know, the windows are drafty and the front door is wide open, the roof is leaking, and you might burn the house down. And unfortunately, that's exactly what happened. You know, I wrote an article in 2018, you know, in April of 2018, it was more than two years before before the murder of George Floyd. And we just said specifically, if companies continue to focus on diversity alone, it will cause backlash from white men complaining about reverse discrimination. And it may spread to other parts of society like affirmative action. And it's the only time in my life that I've actually made a prediction that came out to be correct. And unfortunately, unfortunately, it was a grim prediction. And and it was quite correct. So. So let me stop there. I know I threw a lot of material at you, but but I'd love to hear your thoughts and maybe any questions or comments that you have or things that you want me to touch up on? Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. So there's a little bit of data around disability inclusion. There's not there's not a lot as far as bottom line results go. So DuPont did a longitudinal study for several decades tracking the performance of their employees, self-identified as disabled. So things like you know, lower absenteeism, lower turnover and better safety records and things like that. And then Anderson University in Anderson, South Carolina, doctor Jeffrey Moore and his PhD students for the past 17, 18 years have been tracking data from the Walgreens warehouse and distribution center there, which employs about 40% of their workforce. 40% of their the 550 employees are people with disabilities, primarily developmental disabilities, and they've tracked the positive business results. Again lower absenteeism, lower turnover, better safety record, better employee satisfaction, better customer perception. Better productivity. Those those things. But there's there's not a lot data to to support my, my ongoing conversations that people can improve their business results if they're more inclusive of people with the unique skills and strengths developed through living with disability. So you talk about measuring inclusion and you talked about the motivations around you put it very clearly making money. So could you talk a little bit about how we do that? How do we measure the impacts of of being inclusive in And organizations. Paolo Gaudiano: Yeah. And actually, you I want to sort of build on something that you said, you know, when you were talking about the studies and you pointed out that there are not a lot of studies specifically that look at the financial benefits or the or the benefits of disabilities in particular. But the reality is that there is there is an interesting phenomenon, which is that I would argue that there are many aspects of work in general where often you see companies that are doing the right thing and they see positive results, and yet other people don't do it. And you kind of wonder why. And I think the reality is that when you see that something is happening in another company, you don't really know how that's going to translate into your own space. Right? Every company is like a unique ecosystem. And there's this fear that, well, just because it worked for this particular company, just because it worked for Walgreens, while my environment is different and my equipment is different and my culture is different, and I've seen that in other spaces, I've been working on a project that has to do with creating better working conditions for frontline workers. And there are some phenomenal examples of of work that shows real world case studies that show that if you treat your frontline workers better, they will actually not only outperform, but they create a superior financial return for your company. And yet people don't do it. And so I think that there is a there's a first observation, which is that it's maybe related to identity and whether, you know, does it have to do with disability. Paolo Gaudiano: Does it have to do with race and ethnicity or gender or sexual orientation? But I think there's just a universal problem. And that was really sort of the key of what I, what I found when I was doing my research is that I found a way to go to a specific company and do two things. You know, one of them helped them to understand not just the fact that there are some people that are less satisfied or feel less included than others, but to help them understand exactly what is happening, what are the experiences, the very specific day to day experiences that happen in the workplace that cause them to be less satisfied, that cause them to be less included or feel less included, cause them to have less of a sense of belonging. And then I also was able to argue in a way very similar to what you said. I can basically show how if you have groups of people in your organization that are less satisfied than other groups. And we can show through our data that what we measure as inclusion. And I can come back and explain how we do that. But what we measure as inclusion is very, very highly correlated to self-reported satisfaction. So it's all of the factors that ultimately make you feel in the morning, like either you just don't want to get out of bed and you would rather, you know, stay home or conversely, make you skip out of bed because you're so excited about going to work. Paolo Gaudiano: But so anyway, so what I, what I was able to do is to show how those factors of the level of satisfaction impacts the bottom line of a company through primarily through two pathways, if you will. You know, and you kind of hinted at them already. One of them is through productivity. If you have and and and productivity in its many facets, it could be absenteeism, but it could also be quality of work. It could be how many widgets you're creating at an hour, how many clients you're supporting in your sales department and things of that sort. But really, any level of productivity and those impact your top line. If you have people in your organization that are producing less than they could be, simply because they're not being treated the same way as another group, you're losing money. And then on top of that, if these people are less satisfied, we know that they will also depart. They're more likely to leave the company. Right. And and in fact, it's...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Rich and Brittany Palmer, Managing Partners, Adaptation Ventures
08/18/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: Interview with Rich and Brittany Palmer, Managing Partners, Adaptation Ventures
In this engaging episode, Dr. Kirk Adams sits down with Rich and Brittany Palmer — Managing Partners of Adaptation Ventures — to trace the personal and entrepreneurial paths that led them to launch an angel, member-based fund focused on disability innovation. Brittany, a bilateral below-elbow amputee, shares how early prosthetics, supportive parents, and careers spanning environmental law and global consulting shaped her founder lens; when she built Beyonder, a live virtual-tour startup for people with limited mobility, she ran into investors who mislabeled the opportunity as "niche," a pattern she later saw across disability-tech. Rich recounts a winding route from RPI to Wall Street to startups, a life-threatening brain aneurysm at 28, and a reset at Babson that culminated in building and exiting an AI-for-philanthropy company — followed by leading one of the nation's largest angel groups and testifying to Congress about early-stage capital. Together they explain how Adaptation Ventures aims to be "first money in" at pre-seed and seed, typically leading ~$250K checks and targeting four investments per quarter, with a low barrier to member participation and optional fee-free, carry-free co-invest alongside the fund. Rejecting concessionary mindsets, they argue that disability markets deliver venture-scale returns — citing outsized economic multipliers for both angel dollars and assistive technology — and emphasize bottoms-up validation, universal design's "curb-cut effect," and aging demographics as powerful demand signals. They preview their first member meeting in mid-October/early November 2025 and invite founders and prospective members to connect via adaptation.vc, while Adams underscores how inclusive products expand total addressable markets and how entrepreneurship can be a natural fit for disabled innovators. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody, to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am Doctor Kirk Adams, and I am doctor by way of my PhD in Leadership and change through Antioch University, I did an ethnographic study of blind adults employed in large American corporations. So I interviewed a lot of cool people working for a lot of cool companies. And I'm a blind person myself. My retinas detached when I was five years old in kindergarten. I became totally blind very quickly, and I went to a school for blind kids, Oregon State School for second third grade. Learn my blindness skills and my confidence and how to love myself as a blind kid. And then a long and winding road. Fourth grade on. I was the only blind student in any school I attended through my several graduate schools and the doctorate. So have had the experience of being a frustrated job seeker with a disability and a successful blind employee in corporate America and leader of a couple non-profits. I'm the immediate past president of the American Foundation for the blind. So I've had the privilege of employing it and and helping create career paths for for hundreds of blind and deaf blind people. I set up a consulting practice about three years ago, and I'm talking to you from my office in Seattle. I work with companies to help them accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in their workforce. Dr. Kirk Adams: I work with several nonprofits to help them scale past the founder stage. And kind of unexpectedly, I have been contacted by a pretty big handful of startups in the disability tech space. Innovative people who are striving to use technology to make the world a more inclusive place for people with disabilities, and to create more opportunities for us to thrive whatever way we choose. And in doing so, I've been learning a lot about startups and incubators and angel investors and venture capital. My my fundraising history is is long and and positive, but it's primarily been in philanthropy. So raising money for non non-profit causes. So I, I'm privileged to have met Rich Palmer. We had one conversation and I'm just meeting Brittany Palmer today for the first time. Rich and Rich and Brittany are co-founders of Adaptation Ventures. And I have invited them to join us today to talk about their their journey. Hopefully you'll go way, way back. And I would love to hear I want to hear the the love story, too, of of how you met and what brought you to create adaptation ventures and and what, what your strategically what what your initiative is focused on now. So so Brittany and Rich, I'm handing you the talking stick. Brittany Palmer: Thank you so much, Doctor Kirk. We appreciate it. And we will give. Well, we will go way, way back. And we'll also talk a little bit about how we met to. So thank you first for inviting us on the podcast. We are so appreciative to be here and talking about our story and adaptation ventures. I I'll start at the, at the beginning of sort of my story. So I am a from birth, a bilateral below elbow amputee. So I'm missing both arms from a little bit below the elbow down. And so I at the time, a long time ago I was one of the youngest children to ever be fitted with my bioelectric prosthetics. And so those are prosthetics that actually move. A hand open and closed. And they've gotten a lot better today. But I wore prosthetics a little bit when I was younger, but mostly adapted to the world around me. Without them, and eventually stopped wearing them altogether. I had really amazing parents who pushed me to be as independent as my potential to be was, which is pretty much completely independent. And I'm super grateful for that. So things that people still ask me today, how do you write? How do you type? How do you drive? I do all of that without assistance. And And so again, like, it's just been a world of adapting and making things work for me. Brittany Palmer: And I know a lot of other people with disabilities, you know, the world is not necessarily built for them, and we're always adapting to our situations. And so I grew up you know, doing sports, and I had an interest in science and went to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. For my undergrad in biology and management and and then went to law school. I really loved environmental law. And I got my J.D. and certificate from Pace Law School. And I started my career doing a clerkship at the Mine Safety and Health Review Commission in D.C. and and worked at the EPA as well. And then did international consulting as a principal and in-house counsel at a, at a firm in Boston. And and I really developed a love for, for travel there. I got to meet and work with tons of people all over the world and really enjoyed it. But really wanted to develop something and work in sort of the disability space. And Rich will sort of share his story in connecting and connecting those dots. But Rich and I met at the at the end of my law school time and and you know, and he moved down to Washington, D.C.. When I had my clerkship there. And excuse me. Dr. Kirk Adams: I said he followed you. Brittany Palmer: He did. Brittany Palmer: He work was really It was tough to come. Brittany Palmer: By when I. Brittany Palmer: Graduated. Brittany Palmer: And I was very lucky to have that job. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Good. Brittany Palmer: And so I I started a company called Beyonder. That was live and interactive virtual tours by guides around the world. Dr. Kirk Adams: Oh, wow. Brittany Palmer: For, you know, people that had limited mobility or other conditions that prevented or inhibited them from travel. And, you know, at the time, there was a lot of companies focused around wheelchair accessibility and travel and which is great. It's definitely super needed. But I really wanted to create something that everyone could enjoy. To, to the maximum extent possible with, with the virtual tours. And so when I was raising money for that, I thought, this market is huge. I'm, you know, hopefully this is something that a lot of people will want to invest in. And when I started talking to venture capitalists, I got responses like, oh, this is a niche market or this market's not big enough, or we don't believe this market is big enough. Even though I provided them with all the statistics and everything like that. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right. Brittany Palmer: And gave examples and it was angel investors who really you know, understood my, my company and what I wanted to do. I understood that seniors were a part of that, and a lot of them have limited mobility as well. And, and so when I continued on my journey and advising companies and talking to founders, I heard the same thing from them. Venture capitalists, like, they don't understand the space. They think it's niche. They you know, they just really don't understand the opportunity. They don't know how to evaluate my company. And and they really needed first money in. And there's some other VCs in this space, which is wonderful. But they focus on, like, particular areas in the disability community or our later stage investors. Yeah, right. So we really wanted to to put something together that could be that first money and, and and sort of jumpstart these companies that were doing amazing things. And so before I talk more about adaptation, I'll let Rich kind of tell his story. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. And I'd like to just emphasize a couple things before. Before. Yeah. Go back to Rich. So you touched on the fact that living with a disability gives us ample opportunity to face challenges and overcome challenges and be creative and be problem solvers and be innovative. Yeah. So I'm really finding that with disabled entrepreneurs that entrepreneurship can be a great fit. A great, great occasion for a person to thrive economically is to be an entrepreneur, be self-employed, be a business owner. Because we can we can create the fit between ourselves and the workplace in ways that are somewhat more challenging. If you're if you're trying to create that good, good fit in the, you know, for instance, in a large corporate environment and a lot of innovation, a lot of creativity in the disabled entrepreneurs I've been getting to know. So I wanted to note that I also wanted to note the size of the market. And you mentioned seniors. So one of the enlightening conversations I have with people is the fact that I'm blind. So I tend to look at look at things through the blindness inclusion lens. But you know, if you, if you graph the percentage of people who are legally totally blind against the age, as age increases, that percentage increases. Pretty dramatic actually. So, you know, over 60% of people who are legally blind are over 60 years old. And if you look at 16% of people over 65 are visually impaired. 23% of people over 80 are visually impaired. And we're aging more and more. There's going to be millions and millions of people reaching those later stages in life who will acquire their disabilities, and they are consumers who have grown up being used to getting what they want, how they want, when they want. And you know, those companies that provide products and services that can make that frictionless for people with disabilities are going to be in a great position. So I just wanted to emphasize that. And Rich. Yes. Rich Palmer: Thank you. Doctor Adams, thank you for everybody listening. And I'm going to steal one of your phrases. And, you know, Brittany is my better 7/8. So you're not getting the just the better half here. But we are. We are married. Same last name. And I'll start my journey. Sort of picking up where Brit left off or where Brit started. Excuse me. So we both went to RPI, and I was there about two years older than her, and so we should have met much earlier than we did. But I was in a fraternity, and it was the the nice fraternities and nice, nice folks. Nice guys. So, yeah, nobody, you know, we we didn't have the craziest parties or anything like that. So Brit and I should have met earlier, but I think we met at the appropriate time. We'll say that, I think. And so I went from there to to Wall Street. So basically I was a computer science and economics major. First career down doing portfolio analytics for a fintech company. It was a kind of a startup within S&P. Like the S&P 500. And then within that they were owned by McGraw-Hill. Rich Palmer: So the reason I bring that up is knowing sort of that entrepreneurial ethos and what it's like when you are, you know, properly capitalized was really important for that company to succeed. And I got to learn that at a really, really early age. But if you can't tell from the intonation here, I am not your typical Wall Street kind of guy. Very much on the the other side of things. So I spent about four years there before I decided I wanted to do a startup. And, you know, one of the things we talk about when we talk about startup creation is like, you know, work on things, you know, with with a strong network around you and all the resources that you could possibly possibly need. So instead of starting a company in New York City, maybe in finance with people I knew, I moved to Berkeley, California to start an online homemade food company. Okay. And that, you know, I started with a computer science friend of mine. So two technical co-founders trying to make effectively Etsy for food. Dr. Kirk Adams: Were you doing Brittany together at this point? Rich Palmer: Brittany and I were not together yet. Okay, so this is she. Dr. Kirk Adams: So she did her startup beyond renewed years. Rich Palmer: Yeah. So Brenda did her startup after I did mine, which I'll. I'll share this other one. She she thought I was crazy for being a founder and then, you know, drank the Kool-Aid a little. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, we bootstrapped this company, and it wasn't, you know, the right use case or the right founders, and it was bootstrapped. So ultimately I went, you know, it didn't succeed, and happily so, because I learned a lot about how, you know, to put the right resources together to solve the right problems, to talk, to talk to clients and, and users and without, you know, ran out of money, spent a couple of months in Denver, Colorado, trying to find myself and then came back to New York City to the founder of the company I worked for was starting a new company, and the primary goal of that company was to take on LinkedIn. So they raised about $120 million to take tons of public data sources and say, you know, Doctor Adams, if you're, you know, trying to meet Brittany and you know me, how could you navigate that pathway using real data? You know, on LinkedIn you can say whatever you want, right? And so how do you trust the data source to to go through that. What happened with that company is that it is a use case. You know, it's not a narrow use case. It's kind of very, very open ended. Rich Palmer: And they ultimately ended up selling the company years and years later for $7 million. So from 120 million raised to a $7 million exit. So the reason I bring that up is if you have, you know, too much capital, but not the right use case or focus, it also kind of, you know, was a lesson learned for me personally. And that's where Britt and my stories collide. So I was running product for this company. It was based in New York City. Brittany and I had just met in March of 2012. Brett I think so, yeah. And she gets this job in a terrible job market for environmental attorneys and had to make this decision of whether you know, this isn't going to work out. I stay in New York or do, like you said, you have Florida, D.C., and I am so happy. We made this decision. The story will get a little intense for a second, and then I promise you, I promise to bring it back. So, about a year into being a pioneer and working remote down in DC. Yeah. I was on a stationary bike in my apartment complex, and, you know, trying to stay in shape and all that kind of stuff and had, of all things, a brain aneurysm, hemorrhage. And I was 28 at the time. So all this life lived before, you know, that and a lot of exposure to a bunch of different business models and entrepreneurship and everything. Rich Palmer: Came screaming to a, you know, needing emergency open brain surgery. Having to learn how to walk and talk, read and write, think all over again. Wow. And you can imagine, you know, I've met a lot of people in that situation since. And a lot of them. Take a minute to you know, reflect on the second chance of life and really appreciate and slow down a little. Maybe things are too stressful. Before I had an existential need to start a company from this. Okay. And started studying for the, you know, the GMAT with births help. Like one tenth my normal speed. Like ended up, you know, applying to schools and mostly focused on entrepreneurship because I wanted a new network, I wanted a fresh start and ended up applying to and interviewing at Babson College, which has been number one in entrepreneurship for about 27 years maybe 28. Now we're in a new year and I roll up in. Britt's driving. I can't drive at this point. Tons of medication, but we have to narrow it, find the window to, like, you know, of being focused. And I come up with a cane and a shaved head and and somehow they were like, all right, cool. This guy's got something to offer. And ended up giving me a full ride to the school, which is awesome. Dr. Kirk Adams: That's great. Well, where is that? Where is Babson? Rich Palmer: Babson is up in the northeast in Wellesley, Massachusetts. So 20 minutes or so outside of Boston. Okay. And that's their focus. So every single year, accounting class, your marketing class, your HR, everything is focused on entrepreneurship. It's it's an incredible, incredible organization. Dr. Kirk Adams: Sounds great. Rich Palmer: And, you know, basically, I'll speed up the story from here. From there. I met a met a fundraiser at Babson. So somebody in charge of getting philanthropic dollars in. So you and I should have a conversation. Conversation about that. And it's really hard to do, as you know, and you have small teams with a massive goals in mind and be massive groups of people that they need to reach out to and figure out, you know, who do I. Who do I talk to? What do I say? Especially if I'm trying to fundraise. It could be a new engagement or a, you know, someone who's going to give their, you know, their a bequest or any of this kind of stuff. It's some of them are heavy duty conversations. And I was not yet applied to this industry. So how do you leverage technology and prediction to do things at scale? And that's what we ended up doing. So I ended up creating the first AI company focused on philanthropy, on social good. And we grew like hotcakes because this was, you know, a a really pressing need for every nonprofit and sold to a private equity firm in November of 2019. So if you know your your recent history, something crazy happened a few months later and ended up running that, you know, for another 18 months or so before stepping down to become a full time angel investor. And then I led the third largest angel investor group in the US and joined the association that basically represents all angel investors. So it's the Angel Capital Association doing public policy work primarily. Rich Palmer: So the you know, I tell the story about AI and social good, you know, a young guy with an aneurysm that...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: August 5, 2025: Interview with Meghan Connolly Haupt, Founder, Inclusive Saratoga
08/05/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: August 5, 2025: Interview with Meghan Connolly Haupt, Founder, Inclusive Saratoga
In this engaging episode, Dr. Kirk Adams sits down with Meghan Connolly Haupt, founder of the New York - based nonprofit consultancy Inclusive Saratoga. Reuniting after their days in the Lighthouse for the Blind network, the pair trace Meghan's winding road from Carnegie Hall intern and Jesuit Volunteer Corps case manager on L.A.'s Skid Row to corporate-social-responsibility pioneer (she launched the CSRwire news service 23 years ago), craft-beer marketer, and now disability-inclusion entrepreneur. Launched in February 2025, Inclusive Saratoga helps hospitality venues, music halls, breweries, and museums turn accessibility into a competitive edge, offering everything from staff training and sensory kits to service-animal protocols — while an in-house line of “inclusive” apparel underwrites the mission. Meghan credits her sense of “relentless forward progress” to two powerful forces: parents who modeled community service and a second daughter, Tatum, who survived a 24-week birth and now navigates multiple disabilities. Those experiences, she tells Adams, taught her that togetherness is the core of healthy societies and that businesses prosper when they welcome everyone through the door. The conversation brims with optimism—citing data that disability-inclusive companies outpace peers by 30 percent on the bottom line—and closes with a call for partners who want to warm up their workplaces for both customers and future employees with disabilities. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Hello, everybody, and welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. And I am that Doctor Kirk Adams. I'm talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And I have a special guest here today. Meghan Connolly helped. And Meghan and I met several decades ago when she was involved in resource development fundraising at the San Francisco Lighthouse for the blind. I was working for the Seattle Lighthouse for the blind. I started working there because I was hired as the first development director. So we have that resource development background in common. Hi, Meghan. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Hi. How are you? Dr. Kirk Adams: I'm great and so cool to reconnect. I'm so glad you reached out. And Meghan is the founder of Inclusive Saratoga at Saratoga in New York State. And I think Saratoga Springs, Saratoga, Saratoga Springs there, there's horse racing there. And I think potato chips were invented there. That's what. Meghan Connolly Haupt: I. Yes, yes that's true. Dr. Kirk Adams: Springs. Meghan Connolly Haupt: So if you go on jeopardy, if you go on jeopardy, that's going to be that's going to be your million dollar answer right there. Saratoga Springs and the home of the birthplace of of potato chips. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. I'll hope they ask that question. Well, here we are. For those who don't know me, I am the managing director of my consulting practice, which is called Innovative Impact, LLC, and I am the immediate past president and CEO of the American Foundation for the blind AFI, which was Helen Keller's organization. And prior to that, I held that those same roles, leadership roles at the Lighthouse for the blind here in Seattle, which is a nonprofit social enterprise employing blind and deaf blind people in a variety of businesses, most notably aerospace manufacturing, making parts for all the Boeing Wing aircraft, which is a really cool thing to see 120 blind and deaf blind machinists making parts with very sophisticated computer numerically controlled equipment, but equipped with jaws and zoom text and braille display and all the assistive technologies we use. I am a blind person myself. I retinas detached when I was in kindergarten, and I went to school for blind children for first, second and third grade. Got got my blindness skills down rock solid and then sink, sink or swim into public school after that and was always the only blind student in my schooling from fourth grade through my through my doctoral program and after graduating from college, had the experiences that so many of us have with challenges to finding employment wound up in the securities industry, selling tax free municipal bonds over the phone for ten years, and then pivoted to the nonprofit sector. Dr. Kirk Adams: And through a twisting, winding road became a resource development person and a certified fundraising executive and was hired by the lighthouse here and then Those Things unfurled was invited to join the board of the American Foundation for the blind and then given the opportunity to lead that organization, and in 2016 moved to New York City and then DC and back home during the pandemic, led AFB remotely for some time and then just decided rather than move back to the DC area wanted to stay in Seattle for family reasons, 2 to 2 of which our little grandchildren live about a mile away. So that that's our great joy. My wife Roz and I met in college. We'll be married 40 years next month. Meghan Connolly Haupt: So congratulations. Dr. Kirk Adams: A bit about me. Yeah, but I really want to talk about. Talk to you, Meghan, because I read your LinkedIn profile again this morning, and and and. Wow. Special events. Craft brewery. Craft brewing, which I'm very interested in personally. And fundraising, inclusion, disability advocacy. Just a very unique folio of experiences you have. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Yes, that's a kind way to say it. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah, but I love to hear about your. Yeah, I'd love to hear about your journey and how all of these various things came together and how you're getting them together. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Right. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right. That's just fascinating to me because I, I don't often see I don't often see individuals or organizations that focus on marketing and, and campaigns and social media and festivals and associations with disability inclusion woven throughout. So I'd love to hear about it. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Yeah. Thank you so much for inviting me to have this conversation with you today. There's not enough positive stories about inclusion, and that is really our focus at Inclusive Saratoga. You open the paper, you open social media, and there's plenty of stories that that really kind of make your heart sink about individuals with any, any number of disabilities who are excluded from participating in society. And our whole mission is sharing the positive stories of what is possible. We are founded on the belief that people are good, and the belief that togetherness is a core, core element of our humanity and and is truly the biggest indicator of a healthy society. And that's not just our core belief at inclusive Saratoga that is backed up by Unicef research. And so, yeah, I have a I have a unique A career path, but there is a common thread that runs through. From my very first, I'll say professional role at Carnegie Hall. Actually, as an intern at Fordham University all the way through to today. As the as the founder of a nonprofit that brings people together. And that thread is community. And I think that I think community is so. At the core of my being because of who my parents are. So my mother is a nonprofit executive director. She was my entire life. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Growing up where she was with Mothers Against Drunk Drivers, and then she was with the Epilepsy Association, and then she was with the Albany Medical College Alumni Association. My father is a business teacher and and a coach, a track coach. And I think I kind of got the best of both worlds through their career choices. And, you know, I didn't know this. I wasn't cognizant of this at at a young age of 21 where I set out on my career path. But but kind of looking back, I think that I had both of my parents as key influences for me. I knew at a young age that I had business acumen. I was the kid who didn't just have a lemonade stand. I had a lemonade franchise where I had the kids in the neighborhood working for me at doing their own lemonade stands, and we'd pool the the funds and I would pay them right. I was the entrepreneur and Girl Scout selling 311 boxes of Girl Scout cookies door to door at the time. Right. This is before social media, where kids put the videos on before the parents were selling in the offices. This was, you know, feet on the ground selling these boxes of cookies so I could get two free weeks of summer camp as an aid. Dr. Kirk Adams: I always buy two boxes of Thin Mints. Ever given the opportunity? Meghan Connolly Haupt: Well, I will pass that along to to to the girls who do that now. That is far in my rearview mirror, but. So I always had this acumen, this business acumen. And and so at one point in my life, I was a case manager and a social worker, and it was amazing. It was rewarding, but I felt like there were there was a whole set of skills that I possessed that were dormant. Dr. Kirk Adams: Can you can you can I I'm really I don't know why, but I feel really centered when I know where people are. So you're you're at Fordham, which is in New York. Yeah. When you ended up in San Francisco. So that's when we met. Now you're now you're in Saratoga Springs. So when you're doing your you're a case management. Where were you? Meghan Connolly Haupt: I was in Los Angeles. Because. Yes, because out of Fordham, I participated in a program similar to a one year domestic peace corps. It's called the Jesuit Volunteer Corps, still in existence. And I was stationed in Los Angeles, and I worked with homeless drug addicted, mentally ill adults in Skid Row. And that was an incredibly pivotal experience for me. I felt very, again, very proud of the work that I was doing, helping individuals. But I also felt a disconnect. And so I left that role and went to the admin side in my first development role with Proyecto Pastoral, which is a large nonprofit in East Los Angeles working with the Latino population. They're kind of known for their gang prevention programs under Father Greg Boyle, who became kind of a national celebrity in the at risk youth space. He's an incredible human being. So I worked in development there. When I left Los Angeles, honestly, at the age of 25, being totally burnt out, just feeling like I had seen the worst that our country had to offer and feeling a little little like I couldn't be very effective in creating change and really wanted to take a step back to figure out how I could participate to the greatest extent, how I can really help people. I knew that kind of on an individual level, wasn't it? The admin level was getting there, but I still felt like I hadn't figured it out and I and I was burned, I was bitter, I was callous, so I checked out and I went and surfed in Costa Rica for almost a year. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Which was which was a wonderful break. And I'm very privileged to have had that opportunity to to take that kind of pause. And what it did for me is it realized how badly I did want to get back and work. I wasn't so great at being idle and laying on the beach. So I came back and I actually went to Santa Cruz, California, and I worked for the United Way of Santa Cruz County, and I was a track coach in Santa Cruz as well. And there I met a woman athlete. I was a track athlete growing up. Yeah, I'm a highly competitive person, which serves me when I'm playing sports. But sometimes in life it's not appropriate to be as competitive as I am. But but that competitiveness, I think, kind of helps helps me stay focused on the social impact work that I do because I believe it's possible. And I believe if we work hard enough, we are going to reach our goal. But now, as a wiser, older, more mature professional, I'm much more committed to partnerships and collaboration. So that wasn't the case in my early 20s, but it is now. Dr. Kirk Adams: Fortunately, I hear you. Meghan Connolly Haupt: So at the. Dr. Kirk Adams: United Way. The United Way resource development. Meghan Connolly Haupt: I was yeah, yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: And for those who don't know, that's that's a kind way to say fundraising. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Yeah. And I met some really great people doing that work and really contribute to the community again still searching for my role. And, and I met a woman who told me about a graduate program in southern Vermont at a, at in Brattleboro, Vermont, very small town, very small school, 100 100 students in their graduate program. But upon hearing about I went home that night and I did my application, I applied, and a few months later I was driving cross-country to go to graduate school at the World Learning Institute, which is the original institution that trained Peace Corps volunteers to go abroad. And and there I. I study I was studying corporate social responsibility and sustainability because at the time there were no green MBA programs. Sustainability wasn't really in the lexicon. Again, really trying to marry my business acumen with my social values and and searching for a way. So, you know, I met with Ben and Jerry's and my thesis was on how do you define corporate ethics? And I looked at I had, you know, part of it was I had two lip balms and I said, this one is a traditional petroleum based lip balm, but 100% of the proceeds fund cleft palate surgeries in Africa. And this one is made with all natural, local, organic ingredients. But there is no philanthropic component. And which one is more socially responsible? And, you know, that was that was the core of what I was studying. And felt like I was starting to figure it out. And when I say it really myself is what I'm referring to. I founded a newswire service called CSR wire which is the first of its kind. Are you familiar with it? Dr. Kirk Adams: I sure. Dr. Kirk Adams: Am. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Yeah. So I founded that 23 years ago. Right. Dr. Kirk Adams: I was shocked to say that. Meghan Connolly Haupt: Yeah. So so the point of that newswire is to share positive stories is to help businesses push out their positive practices. Because, again, the, the the typical traditional media is a lot about negativity. And at the time, businesses didn't have many avenues to share what what good things were happening. And I truly believe that on the continuum of, you know, good and bad, there's no there's no company that's good and there's no company that's bad. I feel like 99.9% of companies are clumped somewhere in the middle with shades of grey. Every company is doing something that is noteworthy. That's good for the community, that's good for employees or what have you. And every company has its challenges. But so I did that for three years and and, and it was awesome. But Vermont was feeling a little claustrophobic for me, being an hour and a half from the closest airport and my love of travel. So I moved to San Francisco, and that is at the time at which the story picks up with you involved at the Lighthouse for the blind. And that was my first opportunity to work in the disabled community. And as part of our training, probably not part of your training. But part of my training was that we go through a full day blindfolded, and that is through the office, navigating community services, navigating a restaurant experience, and ordering lunch. And I know, I know, that can be somewhat controversial that that that tool. But it was very effective for me. Dr. Kirk Adams: Personally to. Dr. Kirk Adams: Talk about that was for. Dr. Kirk Adams: Oh, please. Dr. Kirk Adams: So disability simulations are sometimes used in order to intentionally give people without an impairment the experience of navigating the built social and digital environments with a simulated impairment in case of visual impairment. Now Doctor Ariel Silverman, who is now the director of research at American Foundation for the blind, she did her doctoral work at the University of Washington looking at those disability simulation experiences and her conclusion to to cut, you know, cut to the end of her dissertation is that they can be very counterproductive if they're not done correctly, because they can't can give a person without an impairment the impression that living, for instance, without sight can be a terrifying, frustrating, angering chaotic experience. But you said it was part of your training. But if used as part of a more comprehensive disability awareness training, it can be very useful. So I just want to highlight that, yeah, experiences like dining in the dark where you take people who haven't had any background or training and you throw a blindfold on them and tell them to eat dinner, they can walk away from that thinking, you know, being being blind could be the worst thing ever, right? So we don't want that, right? Meghan Connolly Haupt: We don't want to paint such a negative impression. And also my understanding of the, you know, the simulation tool is that it really doesn't touch upon the culture. Right, to, to to have a blindfold on at a restaurant. The waitstaff is going to treat me exactly the same as they would with when I take that blindfold off. But that's that's a very, very different cultural experience than somebody who actually does live with it with an impairment. And so like you said, it was part of the training. And I think the way they did, it was very effective. And it also depends on the person. Right? For me personally, it was very helpful. Especially at the age that I was at at the time. Dr. Kirk Adams: Did you. Dr. Kirk Adams: Find the job and then moved to San Francisco or moved to San Francisco and then find a job? Meghan Connolly Haupt: I moved to San Francisco just because I needed a change. And friends and family and said, I think you'd you do really well in San Francisco. I think it's the right culture for you. And so I moved out there really on a whim. And unfortunately, I lived two blocks away from lighthouse for the blind. So it was a very easy commute. Dr. Kirk Adams: Okay. Meghan Connolly Haupt: And And served me very, very well. I met my husband out in the Bay area. He was at Stanford. And he's he's an alumni of Stanford. And we decided to get married and and have children. And that is what was the impetus for us moving back to upstate New York, where I'm from. And, you know, to be closer to family again, that whole of community. Right? I didn't find a lot of community in general in my years out West. But the culture of upstate New York is one that that I find very, very comforting. And my family had lived here forever. My dad has has never lived anywhere but this area. And as a teacher, as a coach, had a very, very broad reach of and community. And one of my favorite things about living here. And I'll say it happens probably once, maybe twice a week, is I meet somebody who knew my dad. Oh, my gosh, you're Jim Connolly's daughter. Oh, he was my coach. Oh, he was my teacher. Oh, he was my neighbor. And that that sense of grounding and connectedness is so incredibly powerful for me personally. And, and my siblings don't have that. It doesn't happen to them. My my brothers in Seattle. But my sister is here locally and it never happens to her. And I have read that when these kind of coincidences happen, it's an indicator that the person is more present in life and really kind of seeking out...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: August 4, 2025: Interview with Penn Street, Development and Outreach Director, Host, 'The Blind Chick' Podcast, After Sight
08/04/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: August 4, 2025: Interview with Penn Street, Development and Outreach Director, Host, 'The Blind Chick' Podcast, After Sight
In this engaging episode, Dr. Kirk Adams sits down with disability advocate, outdoor enthusiast, and “The Blind Chick” podcast host Penn Street. Penn recounts the dramatic origins of her blindness—two rattlesnake bites at age nine triggered Stevens-Johnson syndrome, leaving her with severe burns, lasting eye damage, and years of surgeries. Growing up as the ninth of ten siblings, she credits a rugged childhood, supportive teachers, and the Lion s Clubs with building her resilience. A move to Colorado opened doors to better medical care and the mountains she loves; later, climber Erik Weihenmayer's example convinced her she could still scale rock walls, raft the Grand Canyon, and teach adaptive outdoor skills to other blind adventurers. The conversation pivots to Penn's current role as Development and Outreach Director for After Sight, the Colorado nonprofit that delivers daily audio editions of state newspapers and produces a family of blind-led podcasts — including her own lively show rebranded from “Community Conversations.” She and Dr. Adams explore the mental-health dimensions of vision loss, Penn's embrace of full-contact self-defense after a violent assault, and the power of therapy, nature, and community to heal trauma. Penn invites listeners to join her annual Maya's Gulch hike this September and to reach out — whether for a trail guide, a podcast idea, or simply a reminder that blindness need not define anyone's limits. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Hello, everybody, and welcome to Podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am Doctor Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And I have an amazing guest with me today. Her name is Penn Street, and I met her through Dave Epstein or Sedona Dave. Who developed the all terrain cane. In 2019, when I was at the American Foundation for the blind. I had the privilege of going to Sedona and being in a group of 8 or 9 blind people and hiking trails around Sedona, Arizona, and I was able to do that independently, really, for the first time, I my retinas detached when I was five years old. I became totally blind. I went to a school for blind kids in Oregon, and they were very experiential school. They took us backpacking in the three Soul Three Sisters Wilderness area every summer, and I can remember hiking those trails with my backpack on and using a using sighted guide. Having my hand on the sleeping bag rolled up at the bottom of the backpack in front of me. And then when I was 19 years old, I had the opportunity to climb Mount Rainier. Which was a great event multi disabled climbing team. And again, a lot, a lot of sighted guide. So to use the all terrain cane and to walk swiftly and confidently across a rugged mountain trail, it's pretty cool. And then fast forward a bit and Dave said there's a really cool person you need to meet. Her name was Penn. So? So here she is. Podcast Commentator: So Dr. Kirk Adams: And then if you want to talk a little bit about you. Penn Street: Sure. Hi, Kirk. It's good to good to be here. And thanks to Sedona. Dave. I'm actually trying to remember how I got connected with Dave. I think he actually reached out to me because of the the cane, and he knew that I knew Eric Waimea and And that. Yeah, it's a lot of us people think all blind people know each other and. Right, right. Dr. Kirk Adams: I've had I've had that experience. I was in Ketchikan, Alaska. My wife. Salmon fishing. Oh, we're getting in the boat. And someone walked down the down the dock with a cane. And, yeah, they assumed you probably know them. Said, no, I probably don't know them. Penn Street: Yeah, my husband does that to me when we travel. Is there's a person with a blind person, you know, you know, who's blind, who has a cane or a guide dog. You need to go meet them. And I was like maybe, maybe not. Right. But yeah, but yeah. So yeah, it's when people say, so tell me a little bit about yourself. It's like, well, where do you, where do you. Dr. Kirk Adams: I'd like to know about the blindness. I like to know about the blindness journey. Penn Street: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Every every story is different as far as that goes. Penn Street: Oh, isn't that the truth? Yeah. I've always wanted to, like, write a book or something about all the ways you can go blind because they it's it's just numerous. When I was nine, I was bit by a rattlesnake a western diamondback rattlesnake, actually and it made me twice and all the anti-venom and all the fun stuff they give you, especially as a kid to, you know, save your life from being bitten by a venomous snake. Triggered a syndrome called Stevens-Johnson syndrome. And it's it's a pretty nasty syndrome, especially the onset. They treat you in a burn unit. It's just like you've been in a fire. So, yeah, 75% of my body was covered in second and third degree burns. They did not believe I'd ever be able to breathe on my own or you know. You know, eat without, you know, assistance through a feeding tube. They definitely thought I was going to be blind and deaf. Because if you think when you're in a fire, you're nothing but soft tissue. Right. So. Right. So even after the scars, you know, heal it's those that scar tissue creates a lot of issues inside the body and out. But I. You know, I'm a tomboy. I'm the ninth of ten kids, so I have seven older brothers. So I sort of had to come out. Dr. Kirk Adams: You'd been you'd been pretty toughened up. Penn Street: I did, and really. And the doctors told my parents that. They said it was really great that she came from such a strong baseline, not just physically, but mentally that it set her up to not only to survive, but to strive afterwards. And so it was definitely touch and go for a long, long time, and I guess probably still is. But but yeah, so I it, I think it was harder on my parents and, and family and even friends than it was on me because I went from this incredibly vibrant, healthy kid to basically overnight not knowing if I was going to survive. And if I did, what was that life going to be like? And we were in rural Arkansas when this happened. So not a ton of blind resources and services and stuff. But the the first people that really stepped up were the Lions Clubs. Yeah. Yeah. They basically showed up at my parent's door when I was, you know, it was months and months before I was allowed to go home. And they said, what? What is your. You know, we heard your daughter's blind cause, you know, made the news. This was so rare. And Yeah. And so they they're the ones. Dr. Kirk Adams: That are totally pin. Penn Street: No. In my right eye, I I actually have a prosthetic eye. My left eye. I still have a little peripheral out of my left, but it's it's pretty fuzzy. It's. Gotcha. I try not to rely on it. It usually gets me into trouble if I do. Dr. Kirk Adams: The lion's clubs are good for that. I mean, I, I lived in little teeny town Silverton, Oregon. We moved down there so I could go to the school for the blind for first, second and third grade. And the lions built our fun house at the school. Penn Street: Exactly right. Dr. Kirk Adams: When I was 14, they sent me to. There was an organization called Blind Outdoor Leisure Development. And they paid my way to go to Aspen, Colorado, to go down a bunch of other blind people. So. Yeah. Thank you. Lions. Penn Street: Yes, Lions. Big, big shout out to you. So but yeah, I. And then like a lot of us, we really paid attention to, like our teachers and our mentors growing up. And I don't know about you, but there weren't a lot of well, actually, I was the only blind kid in the school all through high school. Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Fourth grade, through my doctorate. Yeah, after third grade. Penn Street: And it's crazy. Where are we? There's a lot of us. Where are we? And but I, I really knew and appreciated how much my teachers helped. Not not just, you know. Oh, we'll pass you in English because we know you can't see the book, but they really went above and beyond to find accessibility where they could. And back then I'm 57. So back then there wasn't all the digital stuff that's now. Right, right. Things like that. And so even getting me access to Braille Rail was, you know, this crazy, crazy amount of energy had to go into that. But my parents did end up deciding to move to Colorado, which. Thank you. And part of that was there was, you know, the Children's Hospital in Denver, Colorado, was actually internationally known. And and I needed a lot of medical help to keep going forward. And, and also just accessibility. You know, like teachers that actually knew how to teach blankets and stuff. So. So we moved out to Colorado and fell in love with the mountains and being outside and yeah. And I and I grew up at school came easy to me. I, I have no clue why. It's not that I'm super smart or anything. I am a puzzle solver. So I felt like school was a puzzle. And so if you kept the pieces together and you did them in a timely fashion, you got good grades and they moved you on. So it was it was really easy. And but I knew I wanted to become a teacher of some sort. Or a journalist like to write about people with disabilities. Like, this was especially after I got to Colorado. And even though there were no blind children in my school my teacher, she was one teacher, and she. I don't know how many schools she covered, but there was a lot of them. Well, like once a month, she would get us all together to go bowling or horseback riding or something. Dr. Kirk Adams: So she was an itinerant teacher, going. Yes, to various schools where there were blind kids? Penn Street: Yes. Dr. Kirk Adams: And she and she would call together all the various schools. That was cool. Penn Street: Yes. Yeah. And and she really did go above and beyond. And even as a kid, I knew she was going above and beyond. You know, she, she even on weekends, she had a cabin up in the up in the mountains and her and some other adults would take us all up there and we'd have camp outs and stuff. So but so I just loved these teachers that that were able to help me succeed. And so I knew I wanted to have do that when I grew up. And so, you know, I that's what I went to school for. And I've worked with all kinds of levels of everything from teaching daily living skills, teaching braille you know, all different things. And then. Dr. Kirk Adams: I studied. Penn Street: Actually at in Denver. Dr. Kirk Adams: Okay. But you studied education as a foreign. Penn Street: Yes, yes. Dr. Kirk Adams: Field of study. Penn Street: Okay. Penn Street: Yes, exactly. And I and I specifically went into early childhood development because I felt like if you could teach kids the tools as early as possible the stronger their, you know, academic career would be and the easier it would be for them. And then. But I ended up actually spending a lot of my life working with older people like seniors and people who had, you know, it was either like their second career, you know, they were older. But I did miss the kids, but it was just happenstance. I met Eric Weimer right after he had summited Everest. And and he was doing the Seven Summits at that time, and and I just he his whole attitude, his whole being and really changed my life. I had just lost a huge chunk of my residual vision, and, and I, and I had the skill set right. But I did need to go back and get some refresher on computer skills and things like that. But Eric really was a role model for me that I could still rock climb and hike and I could still have this Impact in the world, even outside of teaching. And so just by happenstance, his he got me involved in volunteering at his nonprofit, No Barriers. And I really loved it. Like, I fell in love with actually teaching hiking skills and rock climbing skills. And I ended up working even for a rock climbing gym where we taught blind kids how to rock climb and love that. And he was the one, even though I'd been into, you know, camping in the outdoor world, he was the one that really sort of ignited that into a different level. Penn Street: And I loved it. Loved it. And then they brought me on staff full time, and that was when really adventure took off, actually. Nine years ago this last weekend we is when I pulled out of the Grand Canyon. We, you know, nobody has paid me, which I've. Done it for free. But I'm glad they didn't know that at the time. But I got to raft the entire Grand Canyon with a group of high schoolers that were blind and low vision. So awesome. It was just incredible. And, you know, Covid hit, right? So that you know, that caused such a mess in my life. But, you know, they they had to lay everybody off and then eventually let people go because it was just their their entire being was in-person experience gathering. Yeah. And so they just and they're still trying to hang in there. But it's I really hope they get to come back. But I don't know at the level they will. When I was there but I, I got this job that I have now. And actually a blind friend of mine, I didn't even know it was out on the market. And it's a nonprofit called After Sight, and we cover all of Colorado and an incredible organization. They've been around for 35 years. And it was founded by a blind person, David Dawson. And he when he moved to Colorado from D.C., he realized that there was no accessible way to access, you know, access newspapers and magazines in Colorado like he did when he was in Washington, D.C.. And so he started this, like, audio reading service. Dr. Kirk Adams: Okay. So he access the D.C.. Had access to a radio reading service? Penn Street: Yes. Dr. Kirk Adams: Audio reading service. Penn Street: Okay. Penn Street: Yeah. And so he started after sight. And now we we have over 100 volunteers that read most of Colorado's newspapers daily, 365 days a year. And we put those out in audio editions, and it's absolutely free. And we've grown. We've grown a lot. I came on, you know, almost going on five years now, and I'm their development and outreach director. And we moved everything onto all of the platform. Yeah. Platforms for podcasts. And so you don't need to have, like a digital receiver or any special equipment to access those audio editions. And then the probably the bizarre thing to me about this whole thing is when I came on, they had a podcast. It was called Community Conversations, but it really was waning. You know, the person who was doing it, you know, didn't really want to do it anymore. And so they asked me if I would take it over. And I have I have a ton of connections in the blind world. And so I was like, yeah, sure, I don't. I mean, I listen to podcasts, but I have no idea how to be a host. And so it really was, you know, kind of learning, learning as I went. And I didn't really like the title community conversations. It really didn't share the vision that I wanted to do with the podcast. And so so we came up with with the Blind Chick because on social media, that's what everybody calls me. And that's my handle is the blind chick. Not everybody loves it, but it fits me. I am the blind. And and so yeah, we rebranded it and we hired a podcast producer and it just exploded, like and I don't. Dr. Kirk Adams: I didn't realize that you are the blind chick. Penn Street: I am. Penn Street: The blind. Dr. Kirk Adams: Because I see posts by blind chick, and now I know it's you. Penn Street: So, I mean, maybe there's others out there, I don't know. Dr. Kirk Adams: So very coincidentally 32 years ago, I had graduated from college, had a lot of trouble finding work, and took took a job selling tax free municipal bonds over the phone, which I did for ten years and earned enough to get married and buy a house and have kids. Yeah, those things, but didn't didn't like it. Yeah, very much. But I, you know, decided to pivot into the nonprofit sector and started looking for resource development jobs and not getting them because I didn't have experience. But I got a newsletter from the Washington, Washington Talking Book and Braille Library and said, we have to raise $200,000 or close down the Evergreen Radio Reading service. So I called the librarian and said I would volunteer to help her raise that money, and that would give me experience in resource development, something for my resume. Yeah. So I did that and wrote a couple letters of inquiry, got invited to submit some full grant proposals and had beginner's luck. Got some nice checks and they said, how about we create a job for you here? Penn Street: So. Dr. Kirk Adams: So my first nonprofit Prophet job was to was as a development officer for the Seattle Public Library Foundation, that is, raising money for the talking book and Braille library. Penn Street: That is awesome. Dr. Kirk Adams: There. There you go. We have that in common. Penn Street: Yeah. And I didn't I you know, I've done development work for a long, long time and I, I'm, I'm good at it, I guess because I keep getting hired as it. But I, it was never like a career. It was never really on my radar to grow up and be a development director. But it's I like doing it. The one thing though, I can only sell something I'm passionate about. Penn Street: Well that's right. Dr. Kirk Adams: That's that's why there's so much turnover among resource development professionals because they, they, they go to an organization, they're very, very excited about it. Then they over the next couple of years, they kind of were that's maybe not all they wanted it to be. Penn Street: But it's it's also a lot of responsibility, right? Like it's knowing that your coworkers, you know. Livelihood is in your in your hands or on your shoulder. Dr. Kirk Adams: So is after primarily focused on delivering news and periodicals to blind people or have you, as the organization developed additional programs over the years? Penn Street: Oh, yeah. Definitely. So the podcast, the original podcast the Blind Chick is their flagship one, but they also have one called Blind Level Tech, which is also doing amazing. And it's about blind tech and it's low tech and it's also, you know, what's the latest, greatest, you know, meta glasses that have come out. And and then we have one called Blind Sight, and that one is mental health, you know, and and because, you know, mental health is it's the same yet different if you're blind and low vision. And so in most of our original podcasts are hosted by people who are blind or low vision. You know, we have one called Navigating Life with Vision Loss, and that has seasons. And so they'll have a certain amount of episodes on a very specific topic, like the the one that's coming up is about safety. And so and again, it's how it's from the perspective of how is safety different? Or maybe added levels that you need to think about when you're blind or low vision. So yeah. And then we're adding one this this fall called Code Orange, which Marty Sorbo out of California is going to host that for us. Penn Street: He's a he was a firefighter before he lost his vision. And okay, it's that one is very, very specific about disaster being prepared for disasters or even natural...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: August 4, 2025: Interview with Ixchel Lemus Bromley, Associate Manager, Responsible Sourcing, Brooks Running
08/04/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: August 4, 2025: Interview with Ixchel Lemus Bromley, Associate Manager, Responsible Sourcing, Brooks Running
In this engaging episode, Dr. Kirk Adams sits down with Seattle-based runner and social-impact professional Ixchel Lemus Bromley. The conversation traces her journey from Costa Rica to Pennsylvania and on to the Pacific Northwest, culminating in a college-age diagnosis of retinitis pigmentosa that reshaped her sense of identity and mobility. Bromley explains how guided running restored the "true freedom" she once felt on solo runs, using hand- or waist-tethers and vivid verbal cues to replace anxiety with trust and exhilaration. Determined to share that liberation with others, she founded Free 2 Fly, a Sunday-morning adaptive running club now evolving into a nonprofit that pairs blind and low-vision athletes with sighted guides and is gearing up for its first 5 K event. Beyond the track, Bromley leads the social-responsibility team at Brooks Running, where she safeguards worker rights across the brand's global supply chain—an extension of her passion for equitable access and inclusion. She and Adams trade stories of childhood athletics, the mechanics of safe pacing, and the broader message that alternative techniques can unlock performance and belonging for people with vision loss. The episode closes with Adams pledging his support and inviting listeners to volunteer as guides or runners, underscoring their shared conviction that partnership is the engine of empowerment. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody, to Podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am Doctor Kirk Adams, speaking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And I have a fellow Seattle person with me today, Ixchel Lemus Bromley and Ixchel, if you want to say hi. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: Yeah. Hi, this is Ixchel. Thanks for having me. Dr. Kirk Adams: Great. Awesome. So I'll just speak a little bit about myself for those who are listening, who might not know me. And then. Then I'd really like to hand hand you the, the talking stick Ixchel, and have you tell us about yourself. But I again, I'm Doctor Kirk Adams. I'm a totally blind person. I have been since age five, when my retinas both detached. So Ixchel and and I have had quite different journeys in visual impairment and blindness. I became totally blind very quickly. And I went to a school for blind kids for second and third grade, and there was no question that I needed to learn blindness skills. So I was taught braille as a six year old and how to travel confidently and gracefully with a long white cane, and then how to type on a typewriter so I could start into public school when I was ready. And that was fourth grade. And then I went all the way through, lived in small rural towns in Oregon and Washington. I was always the only blind student in all of my schools from fourth grade through my my doctoral program. But I entered the nonprofit sector about ten years after college, after spending ten years in banking and finance, entered the sector through becoming a professional fundraising person, was hired by the lighthouse for the blind here in Seattle to start their foundation and their fundraising program. Dr. Kirk Adams: And thanks to their investments in me and my development, my professional development, I was privileged to become the president and CEO at the Lighthouse here in Seattle, which is a social enterprise employing blind and deaf blind people in a variety of businesses, most notably aerospace manufacturing, making parts for all the Boeing aircraft. I was recruited to join the board of the American Foundation for the blind. Afp. Which is Helen Keller's organization and one I had been familiar with since being a first grader at a school for the blind. As we had materials in the classroom developed by American Foundation for the blind, and I was given the opportunity and the privilege to become the president and CEO of the American Foundation for the blind. In 2016 moved from Seattle to New York City and then to the Washington, D.C. area and then back home during the pandemic and after managing AFB remotely for a time, I decided it was time for a change, and I stepped away from that great organization and wonderful role and started a consulting practice. Dr. Kirk Adams: I call it Innovative Impact, LLC. I'm just three, three years in, and I mostly work with companies to help them accelerate inclusion of people who are blind in their workforce and getting a lot of traction in the cybersecurity industry, which is exciting and new. I am not a cybersecurity expert, but I am a blindness employment expert. So I've partnered with a cybersecurity company called Nova Coast, and we've developed the Apex program, which you can find at the Apex Apex program. And it's a virtual training and certification program to launch blind people into cybersecurity careers. And I'm very proud of it. So I, I, I mentioned it a lot. So yeah, with that, I'm let's see, married to my college sweetheart. We'll, we'll hit the 40 year anniversary mark next month. We have two grown children, one of whom is in Seattle, our son, who has blessed us with two amazing grandchildren. And our daughter lives in Los Angeles, and she'll be coming up Friday for her annual summer visit. So that's a that's a little about me. And now for the star of the show. You shall welcome. And we'd love to hear about your journey. As a blind person. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Thank you so much. We're we're where you're currently at and what you're working on. You're doing some amazing things in the community. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: Thank you. Yeah. It's it's awesome to be talking with you today. And I'm always. Yeah, so, so amazed by all that you've done. So I feel very lucky to be here talking to you today. And thank you for everything that you've done for the community. It's it's truly amazing and so impactful. Thank you. Yeah. So I'm Estelle. I was born in San Jose, Costa Rica. I lived there for six years. My my dad is Guatemalan and my mom is American. So was born there. I lived there for six years and then moved to the United States when I was six. Grew up in the Pennsylvania area outside of Philadelphia. And when I was very little, there was some Someone noticed noticed that I had some visual issues. And, you know, I quickly went to the eye doctor when I was around 3 or 4 years old to understand what was going on. I got a pair of glasses. I remember my first pair were pink and Barbie themed, and I loved them. And I remember just being able to see through them and it was really amazing the, the sight that I had at the time and, and that transition I went through from like, really not being able to see much to having some clarity there. Then when I was six and I lived in Pennsylvania, Sylvania. I went to my annual eye doctor appointment, and my eye doctor at the time noticed that my pupils reacted a little strangely and abnormally to light. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: And he he said that I was likely night blind. But that it wouldn't really be an issue unless I wanted to enlist. Those were the words that he told me. And so my mom and I were like, okay, well, that's what we were told. So let's let's just move on. And I was sick. So no plans to enlist at that time. And we moved on with it. But later on in my life when I was in middle school and then early high school, a lot of my hobbies were around dance and theater. And with dance and theater, you're backstage a lot, and the lighting is very, very dim. Or there's no light to help with that. And I noticed my my night vision was really not great. And I would tell everybody, you know, I'm night blind. That's what I've been told. I need a little bit more support at backstage. At that time. Then the night vision was a struggle, but it wasn't fully gone. So it just seemed like I had a little bit a harder time than most people, but I could still see a little bit and so was able to navigate a bit myself. As time went on, I got my driver's license and then I would drive even at night. Wow. Yep. Dr. Kirk Adams: So. So in my experience something really significant in my life is I, I lived in these rural towns, and we lived out of town. And when I, when, when I turned 16, we lived in Silverton, Oregon. We lived out on Silver Silver Creek Falls Road, a couple of miles out of town. And when kids turned 16 they all got driver's licenses and they all got some sort of part time job or paid something. Yeah. And so that was super isolating for me and super psycho socially really, really hard. So I was pretty I was pretty sad about that. And, you know, the social scene shifted to car culture, and everyone drove everywhere and met, you know, by driving and so that that that was a tough time. So I am glad for you that you had the cool experience of driving. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. I can't I can't imagine that time, you know, in in your shoes. I think for me, what was interesting was I got my license, I was told I could drive, and I started driving at night and realized I shouldn't be driving. But it was this hard realization. And as a 16 year old, to make that decision when you know there's no one telling you you can't. All your friends are doing it and you know. Yeah. You become so independent and you want to join your friends. You want to feel like you are growing and you know, maturing in the same level. And you really sense that you shouldn't be driving at night. And so it ended up actually coming back to me. And I said, I've had some close calls. I shouldn't be driving at night. I think that there is a bigger issue with my vision than I was told. And my, my mom and I decided to go on a journey and try to find some doctors that would tell us what was happening. So we actually visited a lot of different doctors in the Philadelphia area until finally someone said, you know what? I think you should get an erg scan and see if there's any anything that comes out of that. And I did this scan and right before I went off to college I did all the testing and then was told six months later, halfway through my freshman year of college, that I was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: And that I was essentially going blind. And so that was interesting to me and interesting time because for me, it was almost like a sense of relief. Like, I had a diagnosis and I could research it. I was validated in my feelings and my sentiments that there was something you know, going on with my vision beyond this, you know, night blindness diagnosis I'd gotten many years ago. But for my family, I think it was a little bit harder to grasp because they had never really been a part of the blind blindness community. Low vision community. And, yeah, they didn't really know how to support me what this would be like. And it was an yeah, a challenging but, you know, also validating time in my life to receive that diagnosis. And so I went through college having now I knew I had RPI. I went to Boston University and I studied communications there. And at the time with, with my diagnosis I yeah, my night vision wasn't great, but I still had a lot of vision during the daytime. So I was not using any kind of mobility devices, not really using anything to help me out. I could manage pretty much as a sighted person. And it was interesting because I was like, where do I fit in if I am not totally sighted and I'm not totally blind? Where is my place? But I think I just embraced and tried to hold on to what I could. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: Of of still having sight and presenting myself like that. Until actually quite recently, where more of my vision has or my vision has declined further. So in, in the past few years, I now live in Seattle, as you mentioned. I'm here. And I work for Brooks running the the performance footwear and apparel company. And I am a runner, and I've been a runner for the past 6 or 7 years. And for a while, I ran totally independently. It was something that brought a lot of freedom into my life, and it made me feel really capable. Especially when, you know, there are a lot of things I have felt I couldn't do as much anymore. But in the past few years, I was tripping a lot when I was running, was falling, was having some close calls, and I found that the freedom I once felt in running was was slowly, disappearing. It was no longer freeing. And it was actually very anxiety inducing to go out for a run. But I was introduced to guided running last year, which totally, totally changed my mindset on a lot of things. And one of those things was, you know, really presenting myself as a low vision blind individual, being comfortable asking for help and transitioning the ways that I do things to adapt, to be able to continue, you know, living my life and doing everything. Dr. Kirk Adams: Alternative to alternative techniques. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: Right, exactly. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. So you and I met out at Brooks running headquarters and in the center of the universe in Fremont. Yes. Seattle. And it was a foundation fighting blindness event where a lot of organizations in the community that have to do with recreation and outdoor activities for people who are blind gathered together. And you and I had a little conversation about that. I ran cross-country in high school. My junior and senior years. We had moved from Silverton, Oregon to Snohomish, Washington, and my English teacher was the cross-country coach, and I was kind of a I was I was wrestling from our earlier age, but I, I was a fit. Kind of tall, slender guy. And he said, you look like you should run distance. So why don't you come out and try cross-country, which I did. And and I had a really wonderful experience. I, we invented our we invented guided running for ourselves because we didn't we didn't have any contact with any other blind people. We just kind of made it up on the fly. I ran with teammates during practice and then for meets the girls cross country coach, a gentleman named Mac Bates, was a very competitive distance runner. So he he ran with me during meets. And he could run and carry on a normal conversation. Well, well, I, I was doing. Doing my best, but I couldn't remember that sense of freedom. I remember when the first district meet. It was all on Walter E Hall Golf course up in Everett. And it was the first time I had worn spikes. And I just remember you know, they were long sloping grassy expanses there. There was really no danger of collision or tripping. And I can just remember that sense of freedom when I really, really ran. I mean, really opened up and and ran at, you know, my full, full capability. And it was a wonderful thing. And then the other little, little piece. Yeah, the other little piece is Coach Eason said. Go buy a pair of Brooks Villanova's to train it. So that's what. That's what I had. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: So awesome. I love to hear that. But yeah, I think that the sense of freedom is is something I love to talk about because I think, you know, if I look back on a few years ago when I was running by myself, I thought that what I was feeling was freedom. And I think in a way it was it was great for me to go out and do that. But the minute I started running with a guide where, you know, you no longer had to try to see something you would never see or slow your pace so that you wouldn't trip or fall or just feel safe and not and let go of the anxiety. Oh my gosh. It was so freeing and so amazing to just go out there and feel like you can truly practice the sport with the help of of somebody making sure that you stay safe and that you stay on the path and hopefully don't twist an ankle. Dr. Kirk Adams: So we did the guided running. It was just all verbal. He he would run kind of a half pace. Ahead. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Just off my shoulder and you know, say, you know, there's a slope coming up in about ten, you know, 20 strides gradual slope down or, you know, we're coming up on you know we're going to angle to the right about 20 degrees that, that kind of thing. And then how do you do it? What's what what's the real technique? Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: I, I always tell people that, you know, it's whatever works best for you. And so I think that there's a few different techniques that I've seen people use. My, my preferred technique is I use what I call either a hand tether or a waist tether. The hand tether is it can be anything, honestly, that you both hold on to. But I have ones that my my friend actually crocheted and it's a, it's a bracelet basically that goes on my wrist. And then there's a attachment to another bracelet that goes on my guide's wrist. And as we're running the tether, does a lot of the communication for you, because if we need to go a little bit to the left or a little bit to the right, you'll either sense the tension of the tether, or you'll sense that the person guiding you is becoming a little closer to you, which tells you to move a little bit more. There's also a lot with just contact. So when we do turns, those can be really tricky. But if you have your forearms connected, you can feel the degree of the turn that you are about to make. And so there's a lot you can do from just a feel and touch. If, if you're comfortable with that and then obviously verbal cues on hills, textures, lighting, all of that can help as well. Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Do you have a preference for which side your guide is on? Ixchel Lemus Bromley: I always prefer my left side. I think for me to, when I'm running on a path that has runners coming the other way, it's nice to have a blocker of. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right, right, right. That makes. Dr. Kirk Adams: Sense. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: Yeah. And then I think a bonus tip that I always tell the guides is that what's really nice is when a guide can communicate what they're seeing and what they're passing. So describing the area, describing the scenery. And I always said that the first time I ran a race with the guides was the first race that I really felt like I saw, because they were reading the signs, they were telling me what was going on. And I had run many races in the past by myself, but really didn't feel like I had experienced what was around me. So it was really beautiful to have that extra layer of help and support. Dr. Kirk Adams: And now you've you've. You're spreading the joy by by creating your running group. Ixchel Lemus Bromley: I am yes. So that's been the best thing I think I've, I've ever started is I, after my own experience of transitioning from running solely you know, alone to running with a guide, I realized that I shouldn't be the only one who gets to experience the sensation, and that there's also such beautiful community and partnership in adaptive running with guides and living in the Seattle area. I had not found another organization that was, you know, specific to adaptive running for low vision blind individuals. That was meeting regularly to really help folks get into running. I think something that is interesting for running is that the more you do it, the better you get. And so with a lot of things and if people want to, you know, feel more confident running, I wanted to build a space where they had the opportunity to do that. And so I started a club, a running club called Free 2 Fly. The name is very intentional. The...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: July 17, 2025: Interview with Margaux Joffe, Founder, Mind of All Kinds
07/17/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: July 17, 2025: Interview with Margaux Joffe, Founder, Mind of All Kinds
In this engaging episode, Dr. Kirk Adams sits down with Margaux Joffe, a board-certified cognitive specialist, accessibility champion and founder of Minds of All Kinds, to trace her journey from a late-in-life ADHD diagnosis at 29 to becoming a leading voice for neurodiversity in tech and beyond. Joffe recounts how learning she was neurodivergent reframed earlier struggles, inspired the women-focused Kaleidoscope Society project, and ultimately propelled her to create Yahoo's first Neurodiversity Employee Resource Group, which blossomed into a 35-office global network before she moved full-time into the company's storied accessibility team. Along the way she underscores the importance of dismantling invisible workplace barriers, from overwhelming procurement paperwork to inaccessible technologies, and credits mentors like accessibility luminaries Larry Goldberg and Mike Banach for sharpening her advocacy lens. The conversation then pivots to Joffe's entrepreneurial leap: launching Minds of All Kinds as an LLC dedicated to “learn, connect and lead” programming for neurodivergent professionals. Flagship offering ADHD Navigators has already graduated more than a hundred participants across fifteen cohorts, pairing evidence-based coaching with peer community to combat burnout and build strength-based career strategies. Joffe and Adams explore the ripple effects, parents modeling self-regulation for their children, companies re-thinking cognitive accessibility, and a broader “generational healing” that turns lived experience into systemic change. Their dialogue leaves listeners with a clear takeaway: inclusive design and empowered storytelling are not just accommodations, they're pathways to flourishing workplaces and lives. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody, to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. I am, said Doctor Kirk Adams. And today I have a fabulous guest who I have had the pleasure of knowing for quite a number of years now. Margaux Joffe is here. She is the founder of a nonprofit called Minds of All Kinds. So say hi, Margaux. Margaux Joffe: Hi. Hi. Kirk. Hi everyone listening. Let me just say. Oh, Doctor Kirk. My Bad. Dr. Kirk Adams: There you go. One time. Margaux Joffe: Doctor Kirk. Dr. Kirk Adams: We'll go doctor one time. But yeah, I, I and I come by that. For those who don't know me, I have a PhD in leadership and Change from Antioch University, which I completed about six years ago. And my dissertation it's called Journeys Through Rough Country, an ethnographic study of blind adults employed in large American corporations. So I interviewed a lot of really cool blind people working at brand name companies that we all know and found out to. To what did they attribute their success? What were their challenges and ongoing challenges and what are their disappointments? That was a bit of a surprise that I wanted people who would self-describe as successfully employed, and they all did. And they, they very clearly tied that success to compensation and economic freedom, and they all expressed a pretty strong degree of disappointment that they were the only person who was blind who'd reach that level in the org chart, that they didn't see anyone in leadership with the disability, that people who were junior to them and they felt less qualified were promoted beyond them, that they needed to constantly battle for accommodations that their employer would, for instance, decide to implement a new technology system and not take accessibility into account. Dr. Kirk Adams: They would walk in one day to do their job and couldn't do it. So they had had had to continually, continually battle and really disappointed really, really a high level of disappointment that they were the exception rather than. And anyway, it's called Journeys Through Rough Country by Doctor Kirk Adams. You can find it with a search engine. And I'm proud of it. The doctoral work was really, really enlightening, talking to all these fellow blind individuals. And I'm blind myself. Have been since age five, when my retinas detached and I became totally blind very suddenly. And I went to a residential school for blind kids. State of Oregon, Oregon State School for the blind for first, second, and third grade. And I was given three gifts there. I was given really strong blindness skills. I had to learn how to read braille, travel with a cane, and type on a typewriter. So I could go to public school. When I was ready, I was given the blindness skills I was given the gift of high expectations. Not all kids with disabilities live in environments where people expect much of them. And sometimes those low expectations become internalized. Dr. Kirk Adams: So I had high expectations from my family and my school, and then I then I was given that strong internal locus of control, and that that's something that everyone I interviewed for my dissertation talked about, that they had some set of experiences that gave them that belief deep in their bones that they could overcome. They could solve problems. They could carve their own path as, as opposed to a strong external locus of control where you think things, things are happening to me, and I can't really do much about that. So that, so that so that's a that's just a little bit about me. But we're really here to learn about you, Margaux. So I would love to hear about your journey as a person. With a disability. And what brought you to the point where you founded minds of all kinds and what you're currently doing, what the scope of activity is on your vision of the future because I know you have one. So I'll turn it over to you and I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll reserve the right to pop in and ask you a question from time to time. But really, here's the talking stick. I'm handing it to you. Margaux Joffe: Okay. Thank you. I'm taking the talking stick. Thank you for having me on your podcast. It's so fun to do this after. I think we met in person maybe eight years ago or so when I was working at Yahoo. Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Brand new. Yeah. Just starting. Margaux Joffe: I was just starting on the Yahoo accessibility team, and I believe you came maybe, maybe my first couple weeks in that role. So. Yeah, it's what a full circle moment. But yeah. So thank you for the introduction. I am proud to be a neurodivergent woman. I am a board certified cognitive specialist and the founder of Minds of All Kinds, which is an LLC platform for neurodivergent individuals to learn, connect and lead. And we also do training for companies to help them learn how to be more inclusive for minds of all kinds. And it's funny because I didn't always do this work, and I didn't always know that I was even neurodivergent. I have a background in the creative field, so I'm a former producer. About I spent about ten years producing everything from public health campaigns for the city of Boston to advertising campaigns for big brands in New York City and then tech campaigns in Silicon Valley. And that's how I where I started making my transition into accessibility. And really the turning point for me came when I was 29 and I was diagnosed with ADHD. That was really a life changing experience. That shifted how I understood myself, how I understood the world and LED to me creating a platform for women with ADHD, which ultimately led into my broader neurodiversity and accessibility work. Dr. Kirk Adams: But a little bit more about that, and I think I misspoke when I said you founded a nonprofit. I think you just said you're an LLC. Margaux Joffe: Yes. I just wanted to make that connection. And I think it's funny because one of the reasons I chose an LLC structure is because when it comes to running a business, when it comes to working, when it comes to just adulting and surviving in the world, there's so much paperwork. There's a term called administrative burden. And for people with cognitive disabilities, for people who are neurodivergent, sometimes it's the paperwork that can get in the way of our greatness. And I was literally just talking to somebody earlier this morning who is this incredible public speaker and futurist technologist who travels around the world working with big companies. And she was literally just telling me that she hasn't gotten a payment for one of her projects because she hasn't done the paperwork to get into their procurement system. And that's the blocker. And she's really struggling. And so that that's the thing that's one of the things for people to understand is that. There's so many invisible barriers. Yeah. That many other people don't understand why is this a big deal? You know, just like fill out this procurement paperwork. Dr. Kirk Adams: Right? Margaux Joffe: But things are not always cognitively accessible, and that keeps people out. And that keeps people out of financial opportunities. So I'm now I'm now I'm on my cognitive accessibility soapbox. But to answer your question. Dr. Kirk Adams: I wanted to I also wanted to hear about to diagnosis. So you said the turning point came at 29 when you were diagnosed with ADHD. And, you know, I'm aware that people receive that diagnosis as adults. And what led you to the point where you were in a situation where you were being diagnosed or being treated, or what was the situation that led to you understanding that ADHD is one of your characteristics? Margaux Joffe: Yeah. So it's interesting because when we're born with a certain type of brain, we don't know anything different. And that's how it was for me. Like I was just like, oh, this is how my mind works. I thought this, I thought it was how everybody's mind works. Right? And you know, I started struggling with depression and anxiety when I was in my teenage years. And it really escalated when I went to college. And because there was no concrete outward thing I could point to as to why I was feeling that way, why I would just feel this chaos of emotion sometimes, why I felt disorganized, overwhelmed, you know, but in many other ways, you know, I was smart. I did well in school. So and, you know, some people use this term spiky profile. I definitely had a spiky profile where I had extreme strengths. And then also very frustrating challenges in areas that made me feel like maybe I was just being lazy. So what do you do if you think you're lazy, you work twice as hard as anyone else. So I did a lot of masking and overcompensating, and I also just chalked it up to, you know, I'm a creative, sensitive person. So I thought, you know, I just need to toughen up because the world is tough and I'm just too sensitive and my heart is too tender for this world. And when I was in my late 20s, I got a job working for a non-profit media company in the Bay area. Margaux Joffe: So I left New York City. I'd been working in New York City as a producer, and I wanted to get back to work. That was social impact driven because I had loved working in an advertising agency, working with amazing creative people in New York, producing exciting campaigns. But I felt like something was missing because I've always been energized when I'm working on projects where I feel like it's making a difference for people. And so I took this job working for a non-profit media company, so I moved across the country. It was a lot of change all at once, you know, new, new living arrangement, new job, new city, new. My support systems that I had in New York were gone, and my anxiety really ramped up and I started having panic attacks and I just knew something was wrong. I knew something was wrong, but I didn't know what it was. And actually, the day that kind of made it clear was I went to Ikea and my mom kindly volunteered to come with me to help me because I had to get some furniture for my new apartment. And I don't know why. We thought we decided to go on a Sunday and it was hot. It was crowded. There was so many people there that day. There was kids screaming and looking back, I can see now what was happening was it was from a sensory perspective. It was very overstimulating for me. So the sensory environment was very overstimulating. I didn't have any awareness or tools. Margaux Joffe: Like today, I bring my earplugs with me. When I go into places like that, I prepare mentally in advance, knowing like, okay, this might be a lot, but I'm mentally prepared and I know that I can have an exit plan, but that day I didn't have any of those awareness or tools or language to be able to advocate for myself. And my battery started getting run down. And on top of that, I was using a lot of executive functioning skills because I had to make a lot of decisions about am I, am I buying this color of towels or am I buying that color of towels? What couch am I going to get? And these are like big decisions about spending money. And so I was using a lot of cognitive resources, and I think I was like, maybe I didn't sleep well the night before. And so my cognitive battery, my brain battery was definitely run down. And I started to as we're going through Ikea, all of a sudden something felt wrong and I was like, oh, like I felt like I was shutting down and now I understand sensory overload and that there was more information coming in from my sensory environment than my brain had the ability to process. And so for me, it, you know, it triggered a response of anxiety, of panic, of emotional you know, emotional flooding. And I wasn't able to, you know, communicate my needs in that moment. And I just told my mom I was like, I was like, I can't I can't stay here. Margaux Joffe: I need to get out of here. And I didn't have the language to explain why. Right. And she was like, oh, like we're almost done. Like, let's just keep going. And, you know, when we don't understand what's going on, it can make us feel like a child, you know, like childish, like, well, this is not a big deal. What's wrong with you? Why can't you just, you know, make this this like we're in an Ikea, like what's going on, right? So. Right. But my mom is amazing, and so she. I think she could tell I was overwhelmed, and she Yeah, we finished the shopping trip. We got out of there, and the next morning she called me and I remember it was, you know, first thing in the morning. And she was like, it's now a good time. I want to talk to you about something important. And my first thought was like, oh my gosh, did a relative die like her? Because her tone of voice was very different. Serious? I knew like, this was going to be a conversation that I needed to be paying attention to. And before I could say anything, she was like, you know, I was reading this article about women with ADHD and I wanted to read you this list of symptoms. And she started reading this list of symptoms of women with ADHD. And I remember I was listening to her words, and it was like someone was holding up a mirror to my life. Margaux Joffe: And here tears just started streaming down my face. I mean, I was 29, right? So imagine I had lived almost three decades of life, and it was this recognition moment of like, oh my gosh, even realizing something was different. And then also at the same time having this relief of an explanation of like, oh my gosh, there's a reason why certain things were so hard for me or why I have certain experiences, and it was also a roller coaster of emotion. So after that I went and got an evaluation and so many emotions, you know, the relief and the moments, but also the grief and sadness about, wow, maybe I could have gotten a lot more out of my education if I knew, and different ways of studying, different ways of doing things in school without using different strategies that I used of like, you know, just white knuckling my way through doing whatever I could to, to get things done, even if it was like also just bullshitting and improvising my way through a lot of stuff that that was hard. And so I always tell people who are recently diagnosed, whether it's with ADHD or, another form of neuro divergences. You don't have to figure it out all in the first day. Giving yourself time to process the diagnosis is important because there's a lot of emotions, and sometimes it takes time to process and really settle into knowing what that means for you. And that's okay. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Yeah. Dr. Kirk Adams: So you're you have a name now for. Yeah. You have language now that you didn't have before at 29. You've been given terminologies and explanations and rationales for why you've had some of the experiences you had. So I imagine then as you process and kind of grew into that understanding that also some other things must have changed for you too. Margaux Joffe: Yeah. And so, yeah, I mean, being able to name our experiences is so important because when we name something, then we can navigate it and then it's not we can look at it outside of ourself and be like, okay sensory overload. I may have I have sensory processing sensitivities. This means if I go into certain environments, I may start to get overstimulated. That's what that might look like. And here's ways I can support myself I can communicate, I can plan ahead. I can manage my cognitive resources. I can bring earplugs. I can make decisions about where I'm going on a first date with somebody. Maybe I'm not going to a sports bar. Maybe I'm going to a cozy cafe. Right? So we start to have more agency over our life. And when you were talking about strong, you were talking about strong locus of control as one of the gifts that you got from the school that you went to. And I think that resonated with me deeply, because I see a specifically for a lot of people with ADHD. Part of the healing journey is regaining our locus of control, and to put it in plain language, is regaining trust in our own self and regaining the feeling that we have the power to make decisions over our own life. Margaux Joffe: Because for people that go undiagnosed with ADHD, we are taking actions, but we're not getting the outcomes that we want or that we expect, right? So we might care about someone a lot, have an intention. We want to do something. We say we're going to do something and then we don't do it. We don't follow through. And so that's one example of a struggle that, you know, people with ADHD, if they're undiagnosed or even if they have a diagnosis, but they don't have the skills and strategies. There's a lot of shame around a lot of shame around not following through and even on things that are important, you know, things that are important to people. And so what happens is not only does that damage our relationships with people in our life and damage our credibility. The most painful part of it is that it damages our ability to trust our self. And so when you lose trust in yourself, then that's going back to you feel like you don't have that locus of control. You don't have agency self-efficacy, being able to feel like you can trust yourself to have power over your own life. Dr. Kirk Adams: And did the diagnosis and the language and the self-identification of the person who's neurodivergent. And that leads you to the work and accessibility you mentioned when I first met you. You were you were part of the accessibility team at Yahoo! Like, you know, I was the CEO of American Foundation for the blind at the time that come out, come out from New York to visit our friends in...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: July 14, 2025: Interview with John Robinson, Founder, Our Ability, Inc.
07/13/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: July 14, 2025: Interview with John Robinson, Founder, Our Ability, Inc.
In this 30-minute episode, Dr. Kirk Adams speaks with John Robinson, quadruple-amputee entrepreneur and CEO of Our Ability, about the journeys that led them from navigating New York's subway and Amtrak to building tech that removes barriers for people with disabilities. Robinson recounts his path from NBC ad-sales to launching Our Ability, explaining how collaboration with Syracuse University students and successive IBM Watson and Microsoft Azure grants birthed the Jobs Ability AI engine. Today that platform draws around 15,000 monthly visitors and has matched more than 10,000 job-seekers with roles at companies such as CVS and Pfizer, proving that inclusive technology can scale. The conversation pivots to a new frontier: adapting that same AI core to connect disability-owned businesses with corporate procurement opportunities. Prompted by a Fortune-500 client, Robinson is gauging community demand through a concise six-question survey sent to DOBEs, already yielding a 9 percent response rate with overwhelming support. Adams underscores the larger vision, closing the procurement gap, expanding entrepreneurial possibility, and demonstrating that inclusion is a strategic advantage, before urging listeners to complete the survey, share it widely, and join a follow-up discussion in six months when the beta marketplace goes live. TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody. This is Doctor Kirk Adams, and you are listening to the very cleverly titled podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams. And my guest today is John Robinson, who is founder and owner of Our ability. And I've known John, I think it was 2016 when I was Recruited to lead the American Foundation for the blind. As president and CEO. And left that that same role at the lighthouse for the blind here in Seattle and moved to New York City, lived in Brooklyn, worked at two Penn Plaza, which was right next door to Madison Square Garden in the heart of the Big Apple. And as a totally blind person my greatest orientation and mobility accomplishment was to learn how to take the F train from Park Slope to J Street Metro Tech and transfer to the A, and then take the A into Penn Station and up to 34th and into the office. So took took some leaps of faith. I know, I know, native New Yorkers, blind people who grew up there. It's not a thing. But but for me, I had to I had to screw my courage to the sticking point on that one. But anyway, I met I met John very soon after I, I it might have been because I had been very, very involved with disability in here in Washington state, and I think I was trying to connect with whoever was doing something locally. Dr. Kirk Adams: And someone said, I should talk to John, and I called John, and you you graciously made the trip into Manhattan, came came to the office at AFB. We had a good talk and we we were very closely aligned on a number of things. Yes. As people with disabilities and entrepreneurs and innovators and leaders, I'll, I'll venture to say. And we've we've had a an ongoing dialogue since then. I really appreciate what John has done with our ability as far as creating a platform for people with disabilities and employers to connect. And now there's an exciting new venture, which I'll ask John to tell you about, which will also support the thriving of people with disabilities in business. But, John, I usually let my guests do most of the talking, so I probably just said about 90% of the words I'm going to say. So I would love to have you tell folks about yourself, your journey so far, how you became so passionate in advocacy and activism. What our ability is doing. How did our ability come to be? What's it doing now and where do you see it going? John Robinson: Well, there's a lot there. Doctor Kirk Adams, I remember that meeting very well. You're exactly right. That's how it started. So if you were navigating the F train and God bless you for doing that. I was navigating the Acela train from Albany, actually, Rensselaer, down into Penn Station. And so that means, for me, navigating a lot of stairs, navigating elevators that don't work, navigating, carrying my backpack around so that I can use the washroom. I'm a quadruple amputee. I'm three foot eight. Limited extension of my arms and my legs. So our disabilities are different, but the the challenge of journey is is a challenge, and that's part of it. Similar. And so I remember the train trips very well to New York City. I very much try to avoid it as much as I possibly can. Mainly because it's just easier for me to jump in my truck with my hand controls and drive somewhere. But excuse me, new York is not easy to drive around, and it's not easy to park. So I do avoid New York as much as I can, but if I have to be there, it's it's navigating the train and the elevators. And so I empathize with what you were saying because. Dr. Kirk Adams: Well, now now that I've heard this, it's even even more meaningful that you made that trek. So I really appreciate you coming in to see me. John Robinson: We were at the time I was three years into this organization. We we have a s corp, so we have a corporation, and we had a nonprofit as well. The nonprofit was the one that was running the disability in New York entity, then NY, before the name change. We were happy to do it. It was something that we wanted to do. We had some businesses that supported us with some donations and businesses interested in what disability N was doing. Price Chopper Market 32, KeyBank, MT Bank among among those. Dr. Kirk Adams: On for those for those who might not be familiar, I'll just give a really quick overview. So the disability in is disability. I in as an all in lean in disability in.org. It started out as the US Business Leadership Network. It was an initiative of the US Chamber of Commerce in the very early 2000. And it is a group of major corporations. 70 of the fortune 100 publicly traded large companies that have made a commitment to accelerate disability inclusion, really in three ways to employ more people with disabilities, to include people with disabilities, and design and marketing of products and services, and to do business with disability owned businesses. There is not a supplier diversity designation for disability owned business other than service disabled veterans like there are for women owned in eight A and a.m. Hubzone. So Disability In has created a certified disability owned business enterprise designation themselves, and the companies who are members have all agreed to count spend toward those certified disability owned businesses toward their supplier diversity goals. They have 20 plus local chapters, and they have a large annual international gathering. And they do some great things, particularly particularly in that sphere of very large, very large, publicly traded companies. So bless them for what they do. John Robinson: Yes. And that's all exactly right. And at the time they were growing, we were growing. We had taken on the challenge of being the, the NY or disability in New York. But as we grew, we really wanted to focus more on technology and technology as a catalyst for opportunity. So we we started thinking about using our jobs board, which we had up mainly because of those businesses that were members they wanted. They had wanted to post jobs on our website and recruit. And so we realized that was a better opportunity for us to utilize technology. And so somewhere around 2018, we started having conversations with Syracuse University. Syracuse has a big information technology school. I'm a graduate of Syracuse. I still at the time had been on their alumni board. They came to us and asked us if they could use a capstone project in their grad school program to do something meaningful in the disability space. And what what could we use? And so that was a lot to unpack. And I realized what I really wanted to do is to see if we could use technology to do a better job in matching people to employment. John Robinson: We, you know, we we in the disability space have lived and know about the unemployment or underemployment rate of, of our community. And so that's always been in the back of my mind. So we took the students we started working with IBM Watson. We quickly transitioned to Microsoft Azure. And Microsoft then gave us after many conversations, gave us an AI for good grant and then a second round of it, really to see if we could use gen AI to understand job descriptions and understand people. You know, now you think about where we are with ChatGPT and OpenAI, and it's also easy. Well, it wasn't easy five years ago as we were starting to build this. So we did. We built it, we broke it, built it again. And so now where we are today is if you upload the a resume PDF of your resume you or PDF for a LinkedIn profile, which is actually easier. You are the you have the beginnings of your profile. You answer a few questions, and then we pretty much instantly match you to jobs that are in our system. So this is what we've been working on. Dr. Kirk Adams: You know, and that's a that's uploading to our ability. John Robinson: Yeah. It's our ability. You can find the the login button and our, our ability jobs. It's at the top of the screen if you're navigating our system is also built by someone who's 100% blind. So it better be accessible inside. I laugh because I know it is and we care very deeply about it being functional and usable and that the job recommendations do the right thing and that you to jobs. So this is what we've been working on and it's been growing. We have about 15,000 people per month coming to our website, and we're really proud of that. But we've also been kicking around other ideas. And Kirk, this is. This is part of, you know, the the open exploration of entrepreneurship here. You know, we've thought about the written language, what's written in job descriptions. We tinkered with an ableist language filter to filter out ableist language. But that kind of it can be done through existing systems. So then we started considering what else could we do? And one of our clients asked us, would we be interested in taking a look? Could we use our matching system to tweak it a little bit and match businesses owned by people with disabilities? Those adobes that we were talking about with disability in with purchasing opportunities, could we sort of turn it on its head and reverse it and really provide meaningful contracting opportunities through technology? One of the frustration points that I've had as as Adobe, I'm proud of my Dhoby logo and the work that we've done way back with the US BLM. John Robinson: But the truth is, you don't get a lot of contracting opportunities. And it seems to me that's that's a sticking point. So I thought very deeply about the client asking us that. I ignored it. Then I talked to Karthik Sahni, our chief technology officer, talked about it with him again, ignored it, but it came around to the idea that at least we want to ask the community. One of the things that we did the first time in building the job platform on the job matching system is we just built it. We were very much if you build it, they will come you know, sort of mentality. And we did. And people have come this time though before I invest dollars before I get if I get investment dollars on this, I want to know what the community thinks. So we sent out an email blast to existing disability owned businesses that we know and ask them to fill out a survey. You know, I understand it's problematic for people to fill out surveys at times. And I understand also we can all be distrustful of that and me included. John Robinson: But I wanted to know what other people thought. And I will say as I sit here today on July 7th, Kirk, we have about 40 respondents and that's about 9% of the emails. So I guess on that standpoint from my old advertising days, that's not too bad, right? What I will say is, except for two, they all want this system and they they want we did a word cloud and the words that came up were contracting matching business opportunity. Yeah. And so, you know, the first time I jumped, I jumped into the pool, built jobs ability, built the matching system, did it because I thought it was the right thing to do. This time, I try to be a little bit smarter about how we spend our time but I also want to then then do some fundraising around it, because we want to be able to, to fund it in other ways. And if we're going to do that, then we need to know how the community feels. And so that's that's where we are right now. And it's exciting. It's daunting. But I, I don't want to just be an entrepreneur that builds a widget. I want to be an entrepreneur that helps helps our community, people with disabilities. And I think that's what this thing can do. Dr. Kirk Adams: Yeah. Look, I know, I know, you're teaching. Teaching about disability and entrepreneurship. And I'd like to say a few things about it and get your your reflections, so. Sure. When I did my dissertation, which was published in 2019, it was an ethnographic study of blind adults employed in large American corporations. So I interviewed a lot of really cool blind people working at a lot of companies whose names we all know and learned a lot about what they saw as the factors that led to their success and also their frustrations and disappointments. But in doing the literature review, you know, you you mentioned the unemployment and underemployment earlier. So of those of us with significant disabilities, which would include you, you and I only 35% of us are in the workforce. And that's about half of the general population. So we're working age adults, about 70% in America are working. Yeah, about 35% of us. And we're in a much narrower band of occupations. And at least in the blindness community, over 50% of us who are working work for the government or nonprofits. So beautiful places to work. But your, your, your income has ceilings in those settings? Yes. Of the 70% of the general population are that are working, 12% are self-employed. So if we can use a blunt instrument saying self-employed equals entrepreneurship, there's about 12% of the general population for us with significant disabilities. The 35% of us who are working, only 6% of us are self-employed. So only about half as many self-employed folks percentage wise. And it's really interesting. I had had met a professor, a blind Professor Wilson, who was based in London, and he studies disability and entrepreneurship, and he was coming out to Seattle for the Academy of Management International Conference in 2021. Dr. Kirk Adams: And asked me to be on a panel which which I did, and then I have been connected with this group of scholars who study disability and entrepreneurship. And it's it's really fascinating because to have a successful employment situation and to be able to thrive in employment as a person with an impairment or impairments. The key is the fit between you, your particular characteristics, your impairments and the workplace, the work that needs to be done. The tools that are done need need to be used. So if you are self-employed and creating your own business, you can create a fit. You can design it to work for you. You can design it to use the tools that you want to use. You can design the schedule, the flow to, to work with you and your impairment. So I just see entrepreneurship and disabled owned business as a huge field of opportunity to create more opportunities for us to thrive. That's what that's what I'm interested in creating more opportunities for more people with disabilities to thrive and self-employment. Entrepreneurship. Being a business owner gives some really unique opportunities to do that. Also, these researchers have found that the lived experience of disability allows you to create the strengths and characteristics that are indicators of possible success as an entrepreneur. And those are things like perseverance, grit and resilience and creative problem solving and being able to work in diverse teams and good communication skills and all those things. So what you're doing, what you're endeavoring to do to create a place where disabled business owners, entrepreneurs can match with customers is is essential. And I'd love to get your your thoughts on any of any of what I just just blurted out. John Robinson: I mean. John Robinson: I believe in my opinion that you're exactly right. If I look at my personal experience and I was unemployed after I graduated university in 1990, I chose to go into a field of media, a very vain industry. I really wanted to run a TV station. That was what what what I studied to do at Syracuse University. And I interned to do it, a TV station in Boston. Ultimately what I finally did get a job four and a half years after I graduated, and it was in sales. And you talk about problem solving and communication as assets to the disability community. It really that those two elements became the foundation for me to be a successful salesperson. In spite of, you know, being challenged and getting around, you know, at 30 years old, sure, I could jump in the car and and carry a backpack and meet my clients and do the things that the the station managers wanted me to do. But I'm glad I'm not doing it today because I'd have to do it all through. Through this medium, through technology. But I learned a lot about myself, then business, and then I put the two of those together and realize, what did I want to do? And I did it in large part because I was disabled. It really, you know, being disabled really did hone my problem solving skills and my communication and not I don't mean communication, writing, speaking necessarily, but what I do find is to be able to communicate your needs and someone else's needs, and to put those two things together. John Robinson: A big part of communication is listening. And if you're going to get into sales, you better listen, not speak, so that that's what it did for me. Today? Yeah. Syracuse University is named me a professor of practice for the past two years. A big part of that is to create disability entrepreneur opportunities. Out of that is a class once a year. This past cohort, we had about 50 people signed up. We started with 26, we ended with 20. And to a person and this this was interesting to me, to a person, they were all disabled and they all wanted to carve out their niche to help the community of people with disabilities. And it gets to what you were saying that that's that's a strength. If we in the United States could harness this strength and and support and cultivate, we could create more, more Our solutions. And that's really what a business is. It's the solution to a problem. And so I, I'm, I was really, really And buoyed. Powered. Excited. Use whatever adjective you want or misuse everyone you want that that there is this community out there and that it's it needs something. And jobs ability has been great to help people find jobs, but, you know, I want to do more with it. And. Yeah, and that's what we're here for. Dr. Kirk Adams: Well, I'd like to talk to you about customers a little bit. So we talked about disability and taking nothing away from what they're doing there. They are there to serve their members and provide value to the members. And their members are corporations, and they're large...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: Blind and Low-Vision Workshop by Dr. Kirk Adams and Aaron Di Blasi: ChatGPT Advanced Voice Mode Demonstration: Cutting Edge AI For The Blind: How We're Using It
06/26/2025
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: Blind and Low-Vision Workshop by Dr. Kirk Adams and Aaron Di Blasi: ChatGPT Advanced Voice Mode Demonstration: Cutting Edge AI For The Blind: How We're Using It
👉 More: that took place on June 26, 2025 live on . 📽️ Recording: TRANSCRIPT: Podcast Commentator: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Dr. Kirk Adams: Welcome, everybody. I am Doctor Kirk Adams, and this is my monthly live streamed webinar. And it is Supercharge Your Bottom Line through Disability Inclusion. And today we have a really special focus on technology. And my dear friend and colleague Aaron Di Blasi is here with us today. So say hi Aaron. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Hello, everyone. How are you? Dr. Kirk Adams: And I'll ask you. I'll ask Aaron to talk a little bit about himself and what he does before he he teaches us, teaches us a thing or two. But but the focus today is really on technology and use of technology as blind people and how important and essential it is. And in preparing for this meeting, I thought of a couple things. One is the concept of the expanded core curriculum, and that is a framework that was developed by Doctor Phil Kaplan along with the American Foundation for the blind. And I had the honor and privilege of serving as president and CEO of American Foundation for the blind. Afp for a time. And I got to know Doctor Phil Hanlon, and I actually recruited him to the board of directors for the Seattle Lighthouse for the blind when I when I was in serving as the leader here. But the expanded core curriculum is is something that blind kids in school are made aware of at some point where they're told, okay, blind student, you need to learn all the things the sighted kids learn and these nine other things that you're going to have to work longer and harder than your sighted classmates, because you're going to need to learn orientation and mobility so you can travel independently and safely. You're going to have to learn self-advocacy, because you are going to have to advocate yourself in ways that your sighted classmates will not have to. You're going to have to learn to access print materials and alternative formats, whether that's braille, large print, magnification, audio, and you're going to have to master assistive technology. Dr. Kirk Adams: And that's what we're going to talk about a bit today. It also made me think of my dissertation. I have a PhD in leadership and change from Antioch University, and employment is my passion for people with disabilities. People who are blind in particular, as only 35% of us are in the workforce. About half of the the percentage of the general population, working age adults. And that means there's a lot of poverty and a lot of bad things happen. Poverty. So all all the bad health, health outcomes, the substance use disorders and depression and you know, all, all, all the bad things. So I personally and professionally and academically try, try to address that by creating opportunities for blind people and people with other disabilities to thrive in employment settings. So my dissertation is it's called Journeys Through Rough Country and ethnographic study of blind adults employed in large American corporations. So. So I interviewed a lot of really cool blind people who self-identified as successfully employed. And when I asked them what what what's your what's your metric for success? They all said money to to earn an appropriate salary, to have the freedom and flexibility to make spending decisions and have the resources to to do the things I want to do in life. And then I ask people, what were the factors that allowed them to be successfully employed in these large American corporations? So it was it was the usual usual suspects Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, meta, AT&T, Chase Bank, Boeing. Dr. Kirk Adams: Et cetera, et cetera. And there were some themes that emerged. There were there were eight success themes and family support was one being involved in some sort of team activity as a youth, like on a sports team or a choir or a debate team or something like that. A sense of agency, a strong internal locus of control where people felt that they could create their own pathways forward. If they had obstacles, they could figure out how to overcome those obstacles. And a lot of folks trace that back to some pivotal experience or experiences, and a lot of them that were outdoors, like rock climbing or skiing or horseback riding or something that that that gave people the feeling in their bones that they could, could do what they wanted to do in their lives, as opposed to a strong external locus of control where you feel stuff. Stuff happens to you and there's there's not much you can do about it. And, you know, my retina is detached. When I was five and I became blind very suddenly. And I went to a school for blind children first, second and third grade at the Oregon State School for the blind. And they very intentionally gave me some of these things. Dr. Kirk Adams: That these successfully employed blind adults said led to their successes. One one was blindness skills. So I learned to read and write Braille. There was no question I had to do that because I couldn't see. And I learned how to travel confidently with a long white cane as a six year old. And I learned how to type on a typewriter. It would be keyboarding today, but they taught us how to type in first grade. So when we were ready, we could go into public school and be successful, which I, which I did on fourth grade. The the other thing they gave me along with my family, was high expectations of the people I interviewed for my dissertation. Often commented on that the school. If blindness was your only disabling condition, then you were expected to be at grade level. My parents were both teachers. My dad was a high school basketball coach. They they didn't want to see anything less than an A on a report card. They expected us to do chores and be involved in athletics and school activities. And so I was given that gift of high expectations. And, you know, unfortunately a lot of kids with disabilities aren't in that situation. They're born into families like I was. I had no experience with people with disabilities. And maybe in a school that doesn't have much of an experience. So sometimes there's there's oftentimes there's misconceptions and misperceptions about our capabilities. And you know, sometimes those low expectations get it Internalized. Dr. Kirk Adams: And then the other thing I was given was what I mentioned before. That's that strong an internal locus of control. And they did that on purpose. Now I know. You know, they took us backpacking Three Sisters Wilderness Area and horseback riding up in the snowfields on Mount Hood. Buildings, you know, snow forts out of giant snowballs and and climbing around in the tide pools on the Oregon coast looking for sea anemones and, you know, climbing trees and making tree forts and, you know, falling down and skinning our knees and bumps and bruises and things that all little kids get. So I was given all those things and then back, back to the dissertation, one of the and reflecting back on the expanded core curriculum, one of the success factors I won't mention was the mastery of technology. And so they talked about the fact I need to be able to use the tools everyone else uses at my workplace just as well as they can. And that means I have to learn how to use assistive technology, and I have to be a master of assistive technology. And I will confess, I am not a master of of any technology. I grew up with a slate and stylus. I still have one in my briefcase. I've got a Perkins Brailler here. I do have a I use a Braille sense Android based tablet with a refreshed Braille display. Dr. Kirk Adams: I have a 80 character, 80 character, brilliant braille display on the desk in front of me, attached to my laptop. I have a Braille embosser behind me. I have an iPhone with VoiceOver, but I am. I'm scratching the surface of what's available to us. And the people I interviewed for my dissertation were all masters. They needed to be in order to achieve what they achieved and rise to the levels they had in their corporations. So we We have so many tools available to us. It's sometimes overwhelming. There are many people. Many people. Wonderfully. Valiantly. Thank you, thank you. Trying to create new technologies that will accelerate our inclusion into all aspects of society, education and leisure and employment. Different people favor different things. People adopt different things. But I will I will say one thing I understand to be true is we all need to learn how to harness. I and I've, I've started. I used ChatGPT. I have it on my lap desktop. I have it on my phone as an app. They're linked together, which is cool, and it's starting to learn me as I write and add content. I am learning a lot from Aaron to see who has been guiding me and harnessing the power of AI in certain ways. Again, I'm I'm really scratching the surface. And Aaron asked me maybe 6 or 7 weeks ago. Are you are you using advanced voice mode? Chatgpt. And I said no. What's that? Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: I screamed. Dr. Kirk Adams: I said, you're you're missing the screamed. You're missing the boat, my friend. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Well, I just knew you would get the most value out of it for sure. Yeah, so? Dr. Kirk Adams: So Aaron and I thought it would be a good idea to spend some time on this monthly live stream webinar talking about that particular Resource, and I'm going to turn it over to you, Erin. And you know, ask you first to spend a few minutes to talk about what you do, what my solutions does, and your involvement, engagement with our community. And then I'll, I'll let you take take it from there, as you will. So I'm handing the talking stick to Aaron Di Blasi. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Thank you very much. Hello, everyone. Good afternoon. It's a pleasure to be here, doctor Adams. Thank you for having me. Just a bit of background about myself. My name is Aaron Di Blasi. I am the senior project management professional for a digital marketing agency out of Cleveland, Ohio that I founded in 2004 by the name of Main Vault Solutions. During that time, we encountered a man named Larry Lewis and Dean Martin now, who were starting a newsletter by the name of Top Tech Tidbits. And we worked with them for 17 years to bring top tech tidbits to the access community. And after 17 years, Larry stepped away and my company, my vault, decided to take it on and try to fund it. So I asked them my involved the board, if they would give me two years to fund it, and we were able to do it in about a year and a half. So anybody who reads that newsletter knows, you know, what we've done and how we've done it. In November of 2022, we spun off a second newsletter because the information that we were getting was so robust that it was starting to move away from assistive technology a little bit, which blind people did not appreciate because that's what they come to top tech tidbits for. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: So we spun off a new newsletter called Access Information News. And people will say to me, well, what's the difference in the news between tidbits and access information news? And then, as a tidbit, stays true to its focus of assistive technology, whereas Access Information News now covers medical breakthroughs legal cases and opinion editorials. You know, basically what blind people in the community think about certain products because they were kind of starting to clog the other newsletter. And then in 2025, we spun off a third newsletter from Top Tech Tidbits, which was AI weekly. And that's just because of the wealth of AI information that is now flowing through the community. Top tech tidbit still maintains a section which is specific to AI for assistive technology, which readers really appreciate. We get a lot of feedback on that every week. These are our primary contributions to the assistive technology community, is just stewarding these newsletters and kind of keeping them alive for the sake of the community. We don't own them. No one makes any money out of them. The community owns them, you know. We're very proud of that. Doctor Adams is very proud of that. He's a sponsor of Access Information News as well. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: So that's kind of my place in everything and how I overlap with assistive technology and artificial intelligence. On a personal level, I've been coding since I was seven years old. I got my first Tandy from a Radio Shack in the mall, and I brought it home, and I learned the basic coding language, and that was the first coding language that I learned. I've learned probably 13 or 14 more since then, which is all wonderful, but today doesn't mean much because I does a lot of that coding. So if you've heard the term vibe coding, that's a lot of what we do today, which is not really true in traditional coding. I am an engineer by degree, so I've been doing coding for a long time. I've been doing artificial intelligence long before anyone spoke about artificial intelligence or before it was popular. So I have a deep seated understanding of where assistive technology has evolved into artificial intelligence, and kind of vice versa in a couple of cases, which we can discuss, and hopefully that will open us up to a discussion of advanced voice mode. Today I have a little bit more, but Doctor Adams, do you have anything you wanted to add before we started? Dr. Kirk Adams: No, no, no, I just I, I will reserve the right as the host of Supercharge Your Bottom Line through Disability Inclusion to interrupt you to ask clarifying questions. When you say things that I do not understand so often do. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: So that's that's that's fair. Once we start the demo I will have to control both our conversation here in the webinar, along with the conversation that we're going to be having with the bot. So just be patient with me on that. I may have to interrupt her a couple of times just to get her to stop talking. That's okay. Okay, so just to open this up let's talk about ChatGPT advanced voice mode real quick before we get started. Chatgpt advanced voice mode. We're just going to say a VM so that we don't have to take so much time saying it throughout the webinar. Avm is, in my opinion, the breakthrough technology of this decade. If anyone has heard that recently, Sam Altman and Jony Ive have gotten together to announce a product, and there's a lot of talk about what that product might be, and I think we all now know, after the lawsuit yesterday, what that product is. It's a pair of earbuds, we think. But these earbuds, people say, well, why earbuds would I have AirPods? What do I need earbuds for? These are not going to be like any other earbuds that you've ever seen. They're going to be earbuds with advanced voice mode built in to the earbuds. So if you can think about that today, you know, with Jony Ive and Sam Altman have, as we do this demonstration, I think it will give you a much bigger picture of where this can be taken. I currently am talking to this agent about 60 to 70 minutes a day, and that has started over the last 2 to 3 weeks, approximately. One more thing about packaging is if you have a free ChatGPT account, you are able to preview advanced voice mode. It'll give you like five minutes of it and then it'll cut you off. So this is why a lot of people have not seen what advanced voice mode can really do. They kind of open it up. They go, oh, that's really cool. It works like Siri and Alexa should and then it dies. So not a very good. Dr. Kirk Adams: And what and what's the what's the cost for people who want access to the. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Certainly. Yeah. Well the $20 a month version of ChatGPT will give you one hour a day, a one hour conversation per day, 60 minutes the $200 a month version of ChatGPT, which is what we use here at the vault and what most agencies use, gives you unlimited AVM. So I could talk to AVM 24 hours a day if I wanted to. However, each conversation is limited to one hour due to inference time. So you can, but you can. Once that conversation is over, you can immediately start a new one. Dr. Kirk Adams: And I'm a $20 a month person. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: So right now most people are. Frankly, most people are the free version. You know, they say, I've tried that. I did the five minutes. It was cool. But what am I supposed to do with five minutes a day? Not much honestly. But once this technology moves from the $200 tier down to the free tier, which I think will happen over the next year or two, I think this technology is going to become second to none, especially for blind people, simply because there is no visual interface to it. None. Sound good? You guys ready to get started? Dr. Kirk Adams: Let's do. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: It. Okay, here we go. I'm going to be running this on an iPhone 14 Pro Max, and hopefully everyone can hear us when we get started. Here we go. Hello, ChatGPT. ChatGPT AVM: Hey. How's it going? What can I help you with today? Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Can everyone hear her in the webinar? ChatGPT AVM: I can hear you clearly. So I think your audio is good on your side. If you want to double check if everyone in the webinar can hear, maybe ask someone to confirm in the chat. But from what I can tell, you're good to go. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Okay, great. I can hear good. Okay, good. Thanks, guys. Thank you. Appreciate. Okay. We're here in a webinar today with Doctor Kirk Adams. My name is Aaron Di Blasi. The name of the webinar is Supercharge Your Bottom Line through Disability and Inclusion. Can you do a quick web search and tell me a little bit about Doctor Adams, please? Note that sound people. ChatGPT AVM: There are several notable Doctor Adams out there, like Doctor Jerome Adams, who was the US Surgeon general, or Pat Adams, the physician known for his work in holistic health. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: How about Doctor Kirk Adams. Kirk. ChatGPT AVM: To Kirk, Adams is a well-known advocate for disability inclusion. He was formerly the president and CEO of the American Foundation for the blind. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: And now definitely him. Thank you. Can you find anything about Aaron Di Blasi? ChatGPT AVM: So Aaron Di Blasi is quite the multitalented professional. He's a senior project management professional at Mindful Solutions, which is a digital marketer. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: That's definitely him as well. Thank you very much. Real quick. Dr. Kirk Adams: Before we did, you did you tell her to say. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: That? I did not. She pulled that from the internet professional. No, no, she pulled that from the internet. Yeah. And we can. That's part of what a marketing agency does today, too. It helps you to reflect how she sees you online. Chatgpt. I'm going to give you a list real quick that I want you to remember for later. Are you ready for that list? ChatGPT AVM: I'm ready whenever you are. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Okay, here's the list. Ten words. Accessibility, mobility, Braille captioning, prosthetic speech input, hearing, vision and communication. Remember that for later. Okay. ChatGPT AVM: Got it. That's a great list of words, and I'll keep them in mind if you need anything else or want to refer back to them later, just let me know. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP: Super. Thank you very much. Can you talk to me real quick about how memory works in ChatGPT,...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: April 29, 2025: Kristin Smedley and Charlie Collins, Co-Founders, Thriving Blind Academy
05/29/2025
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: April 29, 2025: Kristin Smedley and Charlie Collins, Co-Founders, Thriving Blind Academy
In this episode of Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion, Dr. Kirk Adams dives deep into the mind-set and mechanics of building a flourishing life and career without sight. Blending scholarship, lived experience and laugh-out-loud storytelling, the trio unpack what really moves the employment needle for blind talent, and how every company's bottom line can grow in the process. ✅ What You'll Learn ✅ The T.H.R.I.V.E.R.™ Formula-Tools, Handi-capable mind-set, Responsibility, Independence & interdependence, Value, Emotion, Risk-taking-and why it's the “operating system” of the Academy. ✅ How a new Grant Cardone Foundation partnership will fly 100 blind youth (ages 15-21) to Miami for elite leadership & financial-literacy training-at no cost to families. ✅ The power of high expectations and internal locus of control in Dr. Adams' own journey from childhood blindness to C-suite leadership. ✅ Why “enabling is disabling” and how letting kids scrape their knees builds unstoppable adults. ✅ Kristin's forthcoming feature film “Curve Ball”-think Erin Brockovich x Rocky-showing how inclusive Little League changes hearts (and wins championships). ✅ Real-world ROI: why only 4 % of DEI programs include disability and how that's leaving billions on the table (plus the fix). 🎙️ Host Dr. Kirk Adams - Former Lighthouse/AFB CEO, PhD in Leadership & Change, and founder of Innovative Impact LLC. 🎤 Guests Kristin Smedley - TEDx speaker, author of Thriving Blind, mom of two blind collegiate honors grads, and the visionary force behind Thriving Blind Academy. Charlie Collins - Best-selling memoirist (Tripping into the Light), serial entrepreneur and certified Jack Canfield Success Principles trainer. 🌉 Connect & Take Action 🔗 Join the Academy (family membership $97/year): ThrivingBlindAcademy.org SYBL-TDI-05-29-2025-Kri… ✈️ Mentor Program (ages 15-21) - limited to 100 seats; apply now! SYBL-TDI-05-29-2025-Kri… 🎬 Support “Curve Ball” and help rewrite Hollywood's blindness narrative. SYBL-TDI-05-29-2025-Kri… 📅 Register for Dr. Adams' next “Supercharge Your Bottom Line” LinkedIn Live (last Thursday monthly). #️⃣ Hashtags #DisabilityInclusion #BlindEmployment #ThrivingBlind #DrKirkAdams #KristinSmedley #CharlieCollins #GrantCardoneFoundation #THRIVER #AccessibleLeadership #DEI #InclusionMatters #Podcast #Webinar TRANSCRIPT: Speaker1: Welcome to podcasts by Doctor Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, doctor Kirk Adams. Speaker2: Welcome, everybody, to Doctor Kirk Adams monthly live stream webinar. I am Doctor Kirk Adams and the webinar is titled Supercharge Your Bottom Line through Disability Inclusion. And we really talk a lot about employment and the barriers to employment for people who are blind, and the success factors that lead to successful employment for people who are blind. And I did my doctoral dissertation, which is called Journeys Through Rough Country Ethnographic study of blind adults employed in large American Corporations. And I learned a lot of things that I see emphasized and highlighted by the thriving Blind Academy. And I have the two co-founders of Thriving Blind Academy with me today. So Kristin and Charlie, if you could say hello. Speaker3: Hey. Good to be here. Speaker4: Hello. My name is Charlie, and I'm also very grateful to be here. Speaker2: Great. Great. So my retina is detached. When I was five years old and I went to a school for blind kids first, second and third grade. And I got three things given to me there that later, as an adult researcher, I found were strong predictors of successful employment for blind adults. One was blindness skills. I learned to read and write Braille the same, same time. Sighted kids were learning to read and write print in first grade. I learned how to travel confidently and safely with a long white cane. And I learned how to type on a typewriter so I could type for my teachers. Today it would be keyboarding and using assistive technology. I was also given high expectations and many kids with disabilities that are their families like mine. My parents were in their mid 20s when my retinas detached. They'd never met a blind person before. So many, many kids are born into families who don't have knowledge or experience, and Sometimes they have preconceived notions about the capabilities of people with disabilities, and they have low expectations of their children. And schools sometimes have low expectations of children, and those become internalized. So my school had high expectations. My parents had high expectations. My dad was a they were both teachers. My dad was a high school basketball coach. Speaker2: They didn't want to see anything less than an A on a report card. And they wanted their kids to be on sports teams and extracurricular activities, etc.. And my school, the school for the blind, had high expectations. There were 120 blind kids K through eight. We were all those of us who didn't have an additional disability, were expected to be at grade level. And then the third thing I got was a strong internal locus of control or sense of agency. So, you know, the internal locus of control, meaning that I control my destiny, I can overcome. I can figure it out. I can be creative. I can solve my problems as opposed to an external locus of control where you have that that terrible feeling. That stuff keeps happening to me and there's not much I can do about it. So I was given those three things, and then when I did my doctoral research, I found out that the blind individuals I talked to who self-identified as successfully employed in large companies, they had those same things. They also had knowledge, skills and abilities that were required for the jobs they were doing. They also talked about the importance of working, being part of teams, either sports teams or choirs or debate teams as teams was a factor that that came out a lot. Speaker2: Having a company they were working for that had a culture of inclusion, Having a supportive immediate supervisor. And so we I learned a lot about what can lead to success for employment for people who are blind. And as we know, only 35% of us are in the workforce, which leads to a lot of bad things. Poverty. Health disparities mental health disparities, the homeownership disparities, all, all, all kinds of bad stuff. And I got I got pretty clear 30 plus years ago that employment and interesting appropriately compensated career and solve a lot of problems for people. So I've, I've devoted myself really, really to creating pathways to employment. And as, as you may know, I, I was privileged to be the president and CEO of the Lighthouse for the blind here in Seattle, where we employed several hundred blind and deaf blind people and businesses, including. Aerospace. Manufacturing. Advanced manufacturing. I then had the opportunity and honor and privilege to lead the American Foundation for the blind, which was Helen Keller's organization, and moved to New York from Seattle and then D.C. and shortly after I arrived at the office offices at two Penn Plaza next to Madison Square Garden in New York, and where I was able to go sit at Helen Keller's desk, play with her typewriter, which was a really inspirational thing to do if I ever needed a little motivation. Speaker2: I got a call from a person named Kristin Smedley, and she said, I want to come talk to you, and I'm in Philadelphia and I'm going to get on a train. When will you be in? So Chris, Kristin is not a shy person. And so she came and we talked and formed a great, wonderful collegial relationship in a, in a, in a different thread and narrative. I was introduced to Charlie Collins and spent some time with him in Washington, DC with some other very charismatic positive blind people. And at some point, Charlie and Kristin connected and created the thriving Blind Academy. And so we want to talk about that today. So I thought perhaps, Charlie, if you could talk to us about your life experience as a person with a visual impairment some of the peaks in the valleys and things, things you've learned along the way. And if you could, if you could. This is like writing a novel. This is chapter one. Chapter one is going to lead to the point where you meet Christopher. Speaker4: The point where I was. What? There. Speaker2: Where do you meet Kristin? Give us your life story. Until the point in time when you and Kristin connected. Speaker4: Oh, this is a couple hour thing, right? Speaker3: I was, like, within reason. Speaker4: Kristin's nervous. Trust me. Speaker3: I'm putting my coffee down. Yes. Speaker4: I first of all, thank you for having us as guests on your podcast, where this is a great privilege. And so, sure, I I'm one of six in my family, and and we as young children I was nine, my sister was five, and, you know, whatever. 11 and 14, all four out of six of us were diagnosed back in the late 1776. It was called juvenile macular degeneration. But you know, now it's Stargardt’s. And we were all diagnosed with that in my senior because, you know, we were struggling a bit and my brother wore glasses. He's older. And it just nothing was working and, you know, nothing nobody knew in the state of Connecticut where I lived, still what was going on? We tried different kinds of doctors, and one doctor suggested that we get in contact with this mass pioneer because he goes, it could be something in the eye. We just don't get it. And sure enough, that's what we learned on that day. And then we went back. Kirk, all six of us, eight of us in the big old Plymouth station wagon once a quarter for a year and a half. Speaker2: Did it have the back, rear facing seat. Speaker4: Yes. That was the way back. Speaker2: Yes. That the way, way back. Yes. That was the. Speaker4: That was my favorite place because you could make faces at the cars behind you. Speaker3: Exactly right. Speaker4: And what was another neat thing about those cars was they didn't have catalytic converters. And when you put the back window down, the exhaust came right back in the car. So that could be one of my problems. Anyway we after that year and a half, my thought was, obviously we're doing all this because they're going to fix it. And that wasn't the case on our last day there. They said, thank you very much. There's no more sense coming in. We did not. We don't know of a way to fix this, reverse it, or give you your children back their eyesight. And here's a list of all the things that you can't do in life. I mean, these were researchers, and these people were not even their social skills weren't that great, But what they were good at was, you know, being behind the scenes, working on a cure. But anyway, they gave us, like, we shouldn't really be very careful. Snow skiing. Probably won't be playing sports in school. We'll never drive a car. Wait a minute. Read that again. And all these things and they said in your eyes are going to progressively they're going to get worse. And as we were walking out of there, Kirk, my mom, I heard and I saw she took that piece of paper and she just crumpled it into a ball and threw it in the garbage. And we left, and that was you know, I never went to a blind school, you know, I was, I am, I was, but then at age 13, I was declared legally blind, and I was not accepting. I I never liked it. I was an angry, visually impaired kid. I wanted to be sighted like my friends, I wanted Charlie. Speaker2: I was totally blind when my retinas detached at age five and in middle school I went to school every day. Don't listen to this, kids. And I put my cane in my locker and didn't use it all day because I didn't want to stand out by having a cane in my hand. So I rather stand out by banging into people in the hallway and groping the walls to find the doorways and things like that. So I also had a lot of resentment as a teenager, so I understand that fully. Speaker4: Thank you. And that willful blindness, the blindness that we work with in the Academy, the blind spots in the mind and all that, the true nature of the problem which I was beginning to learn, not learn, beginning to experience in my life. The blaming, complaining, the poor me. Why did this have to happen to me? And you know, my brother didn't complain that much. My older sister didn't. My little sister was little and she didn't. But it was it wasn't right. And it wasn't fair and I knew I have some sight. So I knew what I lost. I knew what I because I'd be sitting with my buddy and he'd be like, we were sitting at the bottom of a little ski area, and he we were at the bottom of a hill sitting in his car, and we were just watching the skiers come down. And at the top of the hill, he's like, that person has a blue jacket on and this and that. And I'm like, what? You can see that that. That's insane. I mean, I would have had to walk up and be within five feet to tell back then that he had a blue jacket on and he's like 150 yards away seeing it just fine. So I kind of was like this, how am I ever going to get through life not seeing? But the thing is, my parents were like yours. They didn't care. It wasn't. They didn't care, but they didn't allow me to say I can't because of my eyesight. Even though that story was building in my own mind and, you know, I had to go to all school. Speaker4: We all went to private schools. None of us went to any blind schools or gotten any special training. I never had a TVI. I think one came in in high school and I said, I don't need you go away because God forbid, like you with the cane. What happens if a student saw me meeting with somebody? They would think something's wrong with me. I tried to hide it as much as I could to, and that was impossible, because I couldn't see the kids coming down the hallway that well, you know, I was lost a lot, and and you know, and that was my journey for up until age 23. You know, I hit the wall a lot, but I. Kirk, I went to work at a at a at a ski area, and I was the guy watching up at the top of the hill, watching the people come up the lift. Not a good job for a legally blind guy. And I'm like, all of a sudden the phone rings and the guy's like, hey why aren't you stopping the lift? I said, why? He's like, well, somebody's getting dragged. And I was like, oh, okay. So I went to the guy and I said, hey, can you take me off the j-bar? And then he put me on the chairlift and then, you know, and then I finally said, I'm visually impaired, I can I sweep. I don't want a position that has to involve me taking skiing to endanger people. Speaker2: Right. Speaker4: Yeah. Thank you. That's what I. I didn't say it back then. I was more worried about me than them. And Anyway, so my journey went like that. I built tennis courts. I worked always, but I always said I'm never going to amount to much more than this. But I went to work every day. I worked really hard every day. And my dad the that value, that ethic of, you know, if you want, you gotta, you gotta earn. My dad didn't just give away things. He made us work for it. And thank God for that. I mean, I, I hated him for it. To be honest, but the day that I grew up enough and said thank you for teaching me this, you know Kirk at the at the when I was at the jumping off point in my life, you know, there were many nights I, I laid in bed wishing I would die that night. There were lots of times I thought about how I could take myself out, because I'm. I'm never going to amount to anything. And then, you know, these times I would lay in bed and cry myself to sleep in private. Would never tell anybody that I am full of fear. I don't belong. I don't, you know, I never would have shared that because I didn't share my feelings. And I I got an opportunity at a motorcycle dealership and I panicked. Speaker4: I didn't know what to do, but I was at the jumping off point. I said yes, but I told the guy that you know what? You're nuts. You're hiring a visually impaired. I am legally blind. What the heck are you thinking? I didn't say that, but that's what I was thinking. And he said, I'm aware that you had something going on with your eyes. Because I, of course, was a customer there. I had a dirt bike and but he said, I believe in you. And then he sat there and in that moment, my eyes teared up. I'm like, oh, great. The guy is, you know, hiring me, and I'm almost crying. I'm like, you believe me, I don't believe in me. One of the biggest principles we work with in the Academy is that belief. It's possible. And belief in yourself. And I didn't have that at all. And he started to let me see that within me. And I called and got help. The state agency came in at 23 years old. Finally, first time and they I got adaptive technology. I got a CCTV, a lamp, I got a computer. And then I started learning it and I skyrocketed and became part owner of that company in a short amount of time. And then I left that company, and then I opened another company and Vision Dynamics, selling adaptive technologies for people. Speaker4: And I started to here in Cheshire, Connecticut. People would say, why did you start it here? I said, because I can get here. You know, I live in a rural area. There's no transportation really around here, and I need to get to work now. I did ride a scooter a little bit, but we won't go there right now. And anyway, I ran that company for 19 years. We served almost 17,000 people, helped regain their independence and live a better quality of life. Stepping into what is possible with any type of disability, but mostly vision impairment. We did a lot with learning difficulties and things like that too, and that fueled my life because I saw that I have something to give. I am here for a reason. My eye disease. I don't like it, but it doesn't, you know. I accept it. It doesn't mean I need to like it, but I do accept it. And most days I forget that I have a vision impairment and you know. And that's good. You know, I just go about my day and we, you know, our environment, my environments are all set up for success. So anyway, after that business, I sold it. I wrote a book, tripping into the light. I started going around speaking, and I. Speaker2: Have that book right here on my BrailleSense. I download it from bookshare. It's pretty. It's pretty. It's a page turner. Speaker4: Yeah, well, we won't go into that. I mean, I turned to alcohol and drugs to to solve the misery of somebody making me blind, you know? And it was it was a solution when I was younger. It worked, but it stopped working. It created more problems. So do not try that path. And if you do, stop doing it because it only gets worse. I you know, I'm grateful that I'm sober and I'm alive and above ground and breathing, you know? And anyway, I got rid of that company. I sold it in 2016. And then you know, I was out helping the industry and doing some marketing things and going all around and getting in front of crowds and sharing my success principles, and well, they weren't mine, but I was repurposing them through my lens and through my story. And then, you know, that wonderful lockdown happened, and I was in a morning a mastermind group, accountability mastermind group, and I started seeing Kristin's block on the thing, and I would zoom in with my magnifying. I'm going. She had, like, a baseball cap on. And, you know, she was a bit like she had...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: May 22, 2025: Interview with Brandy Schantz, Host, Living Chronic Podcast, Founder Schantz Business Group Disability Consulting, Chair, State of Virginia Rehabilitation Advisory Council
05/22/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: May 22, 2025: Interview with Brandy Schantz, Host, Living Chronic Podcast, Founder Schantz Business Group Disability Consulting, Chair, State of Virginia Rehabilitation Advisory Council
In this 34-minute episode, Dr. Kirk Adams speaks with Brandy Schantz—former U.S. Army officer, consultant, and chair of Virginia's State Rehabilitation Advisory Council—about her late-onset disability journey. Schantz describes being diagnosed with severe Crohn's disease, the complications that followed, and how an adverse reaction to medication led to dysautonomia and neuropathy, forcing her to create her own work-from-home accommodations years before remote work became common. The conversation compares the medical and social models of disability, highlights flexible scheduling as a low-cost but effective accommodation, and outlines how wellness and hybrid-work programs can help employers retain skilled staff who develop chronic conditions. Schantz also explains the role of state rehabilitation councils in connecting disabled workers with career supports. TRANSCRIPT: 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams. 00:38 Welcome everybody to podcasts with Dr Kirk Adams, I have a wonderful guest today, Brandy Schantz. Brandy is host of The Living chronic podcast. She's the founder of Schantz business group disability consulting, and she is chair of the state of Virginia's rehabilitation advisory council. So you are a busy bee, Randy, yes, yes, I am. But you know, I have to say, it's been some of the most rewarding work of my life, so busy and humbled at the same time Wonderful. Well, we're going to come back to you and just just a minute and dig into your really interesting journey and your great vision for the future. And for those who don't know me, I am Dr Kirk Adams. I'm talking to you from my home office in Seattle. I am a totally blind person. Have been since age five. My rep was both detached. I went to a school for blind children for second and third grade, and learned to read and write Braille and travel confidently and proudly with a white cane and to type on a typewriter so that I was equipped to succeed in public school, which I started in fourth grade, and I was I was the only blind kid in all of My schools from fourth grade through my PhD, 02:02 I entered the world of business out of college, facing a lot of the barriers to employment that so many of us with significant disabilities experience. So I have a frustrating time finding employment, but I have had the experience of being a successful 02:22 disabled employee in corporate America, working in banking and finance, and I have had the experience of employing large numbers of people with disabilities as president and CEO of the Lighthouse for the Blind and then the American Foundation for the Blind. 02:38 I focus my time and energy now with my consulting practice, innovative impact LLC, and I say I was looking for fun, innovative, high impact projects that will accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities, 02:54 to work with people that I like. And so I met Brandy some time ago, and she kindly invited me to be a guest on her living chronic podcast. I wanted to I wanted to talk less about myself and more about her on so invited her to join me today, and Brandy would just really love to 03:17 hand you the talking stick and hear about your journey and what has led you to focus your intention on disability inclusion, 03:28 what you're doing currently? Where do you see your work going in the future? I would love to love to hear some successes, what's working well, and, of course, any challenges that you may be discovering, and we always learn from our challenges, and then then we'll let people know how to get in touch with you. So the floor is yours. 03:52 Thank you so much for having me on the podcast. You know, I was so excited to meet you, have you on my podcast. I really love the collaboration. It's such a different world here. You know, like you, I started in a different industry. I was an Army officer, and then I went into consulting and did a lot of work in the housing and finance sectors before I really had my own experiences becoming disabled much later in life. As a matter of fact, I had switched careers originally because I was diagnosed with a very severe form of Crohn's disease, and I just frankly, couldn't leave my house before noon, even on my best days. And I needed some sort of job that I could work from home in the mornings. So, you know, I had a little bit of an idea of what it was like to be challenged with a disability. Fortunately, I was able to pivot pretty quickly and deal with that. But five years ago, at what stage you your army career had ended? 05:00 Yeah, at that point, yeah. And you were Yes, yes. I left the army. 05:04 Yeah. I left the Army in 2007 05:08 and decided, you know, I, you know, got married, my husband, who was a little bit older than me. Well, he still is. I like to pretend I'm still much younger, but I guess I got much older as well. 05:22 He was retiring, and a few years beyond that, in the army, you can retire after 20 years. So if you commissioned at age 21 right after college, you're retiring at age 41 it's not it's not the worst setup, 05:35 but I wanted to be able to spend time with him rather than traveling with the army, so we settled in Washington, DC, like most of us do, and I moved on to consulting, okay, the obvious move, and Crohn's. I actually had an executive assistant who lived with Crohn's here, here at the lighthouse in Seattle. I know he would, his schedule permitted him to go for infusions regularly. Could you just tell, 06:08 tell a little bit about the onset? What? What? Yes, so actually, what? How does, how does that manifest? Oh, gosh, you know what? It manifests differently for everyone. And you know, that's the crazy part of chronic illness, especially autoimmune diseases. It just looks a little bit different in everybody. And I had actually been having symptoms since I started having symptoms while I was in Afghanistan in 2006 06:37 and I just assumed that, you know, I mean, there's all sorts of nasty stuff in Afghanistan that we're not used to if you've lived in the United States or Europe, these westernized countries, for years. So, you know, I didn't really think much of it. Pushed through. It wasn't so bad that it took me out of my job. So I just kept pushing forward. It wasn't until I was training for one of my marathons, I was training for Marine Corps Marathon, which has always been my favorite race, and I suddenly realized that I was having to kind of break away from my running group and go find a tree or a porta potty pretty frequently. 07:15 And it kept getting worse until I was dealing with severe pain every day, and just unable to leave the house. And I knew then that something was very wrong, and I went to the doctor, and that's when I was told that I needed to get a colonoscopy. They needed to do some biopsies, and I was finally diagnosed with Crohn's disease. What's interesting about it is, you know, 07:41 it's not one of those things where you get diagnosed and it's like, okay, well, here's the treatment plan. This is what you're going to do. We're going to go through this three months, and then you can go about your life. It's very trial and error. Nobody knows what's going to go to work. Nobody knows who's going to respond to what. So you have to try things and see how they're going to work for you. And we tried a lot with me, it did take me a long time to find something that would get me into remission. 08:12 So can you just, can you define 08:17 Crohn's disease? So tell us what. Tell us what it is. I know the one, but I Right. Like I said, I had the limited experience with one person I worked with. Yeah, so Crohn's disease is an 08:35 goodness. So you know what? I say it so much. You know how it is. You forget your your acronyms. I'm so here and not mess up my acronym, it's IBD, which is inflammatory bowel disease. Nothing like irritable bowel syndrome at all, but it can manifest in many different ways. 08:54 Some people just have terrible bloody diarrhea all day long. Sometimes it comes about, there's Crohn's, or you see with constipation, which is very painful. Of course, those can lead to bowel obstructions, which is an emergency. So you have to know when those The right time is to go to the doctor, go to the ER. 09:15 But it comes with some other things as well being an autoimmune disease. So it's not just the cramps and the pain. 09:23 There's, you know, various perforations you can get on your bowel, the blockages, which are very dangerous. It manifests in your joints often. Unfortunately, I have those symptoms as well. It feels a lot like arthritis, and then, 09:41 don't, want to get super clinical and medical, but, yeah, how would you define them? Autoimmune Disease? You've mentioned it several times, right? So an autoimmune disease is, you know, kind of the easiest way to explain it is, it's just your body attacking itself. Your immune system is really overactive. 10:00 Effective and it's attacking itself. 10:03 Of course, they're on the rise, and many women are very familiar with this. 80% of all autoimmune disease patients are women, in fact. So this is very much a women's issue. We're seeing a lot of women being diagnosed more and more frequently, as matter of fact, just last week, an old friend of mine that I used to work with reached out, and, you know, turns out, Hey, she's been diagnosed as well. And, oh, by the way, it's so severe, she had to take a step back and leave her job to focus on health. So the stories are not uncommon, yeah, so I interrupted you, but you are a very active person. You're on active duty serving in Afghanistan. You're a marathon runner, and you start having these symptoms, and it gets to the point where you really can't leave the house. You're diagnosed with a chronic illness, and all of a sudden you are a person with a disability? Yes, I'll let you take I'll let you take it back over. Yeah, well, you know, and it's just, I think I'm actually, I know I'm no different than a lot of people. I never said the D word. I didn't say the D word for years. It took me a long time to say the D word. 11:21 I just thought, well, you know, I have an illness. Let me just smooth right through this. I'll be fine. I'll be fine. 11:27 You know, there's a big joke in the military, you know, whatever you have, legs been blown off. You know what? Drink water. You'll be fine. Press on. Drink water. You know, we'll just move through anything. We don't complain. We don't say anything. And unfortunately, there just, there comes a time where you realize, well, I think I'm gonna have to complain about this one. I kept trying to just get right through it, but unfortunately, I just could not leave my house, and I had severe, severe pains. What makes this especially difficult is it restricts your life in ways you don't think about, you know, I talk about those, you know, bowel blockages. You know, you can get infections. There's not that uncommon to get these very serious infections in your GI tract, all these various things that could happen. IBD, you know, again, a lot of people confuse it with IBS, this is autoimmune disease your body's attacking itself. IBS is an irritation 12:25 usually caused by food some other things. I know there's some doctors out there that probably have a lot more to say about it, but with IBD, you can very much die from IBD. It does happen. So it starts restricting your life and things you didn't necessarily think about, if you're not in remission, your disease is very active. I was restricted from going on vacations that I may have, you know, gone on before I know, my husband and I used to love to go to the Bahamas, especially around Christmas time, because it's nice and quiet. You just get to kind of hang out on a hammock instead of participating in all the drama and purchasing and all that around Christmas in the US, we just could be and do nothing. But unfortunately, I had to stop going for some period of time because they just did not have the facilities if I had an emergency, and the nearest facility would have been in Miami, which is not a far plane ride by any stretch, but if you can't get a plane, yeah, you know, you only have hours. So there's, there's a lot of little things you just don't think about that suddenly become very important in your life. For me, the most important was I couldn't get to work. And of course, this was when I was diagnosed. It was 2013 13:42 we weren't talking about work from home. It wasn't a thing. All I knew was I wasn't able to get to work. Nobody had a good plan for me. Nobody could give me a suggestion. It was just, well maybe apply for disability. And I said, No, I don't want disability. I have a career. I would like to continue moving forward, please. 14:03 So I had to really pivot and try to think about, well, what does my life look like if I can't leave my house? Because even on my best days, sometimes I just could not leave the house before noon. You know, 14:16 it was just my it was my reality. I did find my own accommodations, and I didn't know that word in that sense back then, accommodation again, I never said the D word, so I didn't need to learn about the a word. I was just moving through everything. Nothing to see here. Everything's fine. 14:35 But I did find my own accommodations. You know, I would work 14:40 from home, I often would just bring my laptop into the bathroom with me and just keep plugging away. 14:47 You know, I just did whatever I needed to do to figure it out. I 14:51 made all my appointments, meetings, things like that I had to do outside of the house in the afternoons, where I typically felt much better. So I did find a way to work around. 15:00 Bit. I actually never had to really confront the D word until five years ago I started, I thought I was an over training syndrome. I started having these terrible joint and muscle pains, and I couldn't run, which is very unusual for me. I could run through anything, even through the worst, well, maybe not the worst of my currents, but I ran through a lot, but I just suddenly couldn't run it. I'd been training for Iron Man Chattanooga, so 15:27 it was unusual. And that started a period of 19 months where I slowly declined until I was paralyzed. For a short period of time, I was dealing with severe, severe muscle pain, joint pain, rashes. My brain was fried. I had crazy. I mean, 15:46 I couldn't think. I couldn't, you know, I 15:49 had trouble with words, crazy, emotional, 15:54 just swings, just swings. I've never experienced anything like it in my life. And that's when I finally found out that I'd been having a reaction to the HUMIRA I took for my Crohn's disease, 16:06 and it really knocked me down even still. I did not want to say the D word, even though I had been completely wiped out, I had not been able to move. I had been bed bound for a period of time. 16:18 I thought, well, this is fine. I'm on the upswing. I'll I'll be okay. Of course, that actually kicked off about another 16:28 two and a half years I spent finally getting to a diagnosis, and I was diagnosed with dysautonomia, pots, cardiac autonomic neuropathy, small fiber neuropathy in all limbs. It really has changed my life. And I finally realized it's time to say the D word. It is time to say the D word. And when I said the D word, I realized, you know, 16:53 I'm not the only person going through this, and there really is nobody giving us any directions. There's no help. I kept asking, Hey, what do I do? What do I do? How do I get through this? And there was nowhere, really. I found anybody to help me, to guide me, to help me figure it out. It was well, if you can't get to work, just apply for disability. I didn't want disability. I wanted to work. 17:19 So what happens when you know this happens to you, and you know, I really thought to myself, my goodness, I am a pushy broad, you know, I'm going to get what I want to get. It's real hard to tell me no. 17:34 So if I'm going through this and having this many challenges, what about the people who just don't want to push back, who hear no and say, Okay, well, if they said no, that's it, you know, who's helping these people? And that's what made me really question things. And made me say the D word, made me ask myself, what are people doing when they become disabled? What do these accommodations really mean? What are companies actually doing? Because, you know? I mean, I have two master's degrees. I think of a, you know, decently intelligent person. I have some great experience. And I was like, Where do I go? So, you know, there's a lot of people out there, I'm sure, who are saying, hey, what next? And 18:17 are people really doing a lot for accommodations to help people who really have changed their entire life and now need a new career and they don't want to go on disability. And I think that's the biggest message I try to send to people. You know, there's this idea out there, particularly, probably, if you've never been ill, disabled, have anybody like that in your life where you think, oh, welfare, all these people just trying to get money from the government so they can do nothing. Well, I meet people every day who are like, hey, is there a way I can get off of this and get back to work? I'd love to hear, 18:53 yeah. I'd love to talk a little bit about the medical model and social model of disability and impairment, the relationship between impairment and disability, and just get your take on it. So obviously, you're deeply embedded in a medical model. 19:09 When my retina is detached, I was operated on multiple times, and I can remember the students coming one by one, the look in my eyes, I was very much enmeshed in a medical model, and that's still the most common model of disability in United States, which, you know, bluntly says, Hey, if you have, if you have an impairment that we can't fix, you're you're a broken person. You know, you're less than there's no way you can contribute on the level of someone who doesn't have this impairment. So like you said, just, just take the disability check. The social model says 19:53 disability comes when we have challenges interacting with the environment because of the way it's. 20:00 Built so the built environment, the digital environment, the social environment, you know, but not not surprised, like constructed mainly by and for people without impairments. And if we have an impairment, like you have to show up nine to five to work. You're not able to do that. You have a situation where your set of physical characteristics does not fit well with the built environment of the workplace that requires you to be there at nine in the morning. Right? The relationship 20:33 between impairment and disabilities? I have a visual impairment. So it's visual, hearing, physical, cognitive are kind of the four main categories of impairment, and you described a lot of physical impairments around pain and joints and the inability to be as independently active as you were in the past. So 21:00 just because I have a visual impairment does not mean I'm always in a disabling situation. And my little example I always use is, you know, I ran a couple big nonprofits. If I'm at the conference table, I'm running a board meeting, and I have all my materials in Braille. I can read that Braille just as well as a sighted person can read print. I can run the meeting. I'm not in a disabling situation...
/episode/index/show/5a64a846-4fd6-455a-bb47-5b31ef60c2fe/id/36686075
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: May 1, 2025: Interview with Barbara Deane and Effenus Henderson, Co-Founders, ISDI and the Northwest Diversity Learning Series (NWDLS)
05/01/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: May 1, 2025: Interview with Barbara Deane and Effenus Henderson, Co-Founders, ISDI and the Northwest Diversity Learning Series (NWDLS)
On this episode of Podcasts with Dr. Kirk Adams, Kirk sits down with ISDI co-founders Barbara Deane and Effenus Henderson to explore how the Institute for Sustainable Diversity & Inclusion is helping organizations move “from better arguments to better outcomes.” The trio trace their shared history on Washington State's Governor's Committee on Disability Issues and Employment, then dive into the origins of the Northwest Diversity Learning Series, why 2025's sessions are built around the Aspen Institute's Better Arguments Framework, and how ISO 30415, the Global DEI Benchmarks and intercultural-competence research shape ISDI's evidence-based approach. Listeners will hear candid stories of corporate triumphs and HR “sticky situations,” learn how sponsors co-design each year's curriculum, and discover practical ways to tackle today's backlash against DEI while keeping accessibility and systemic equity front-and-center. Whether you're an HR leader seeking new tools, a manager craving civil discourse, or a changemaker looking for a community of practice, this conversation offers both inspiration and a clear on-ramp to the 2025 NWDLS workshops. Tune in, take notes, and join the movement toward sustainable inclusion. TRANSCRIPT Speaker 1 00:09 Music. Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, Speaker 2 00:37 welcome everybody to the cleverly titled podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, and that is me. I am Dr Kirk Adams, speaking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And today I have two amazing guests, Barbara Dean and Ethan is Henderson. I'm going to tell you how we all got connected in a minute, and then ask them about their incredible journeys. Some years ago, when I was in the role of president and CEO of the satellite House for the Blind, before moving to New York and assuming that same role at American Foundation for the Blind, I was contacted by the transition team for Governor Jay Inslee when he was first elected and asked to serve on his transition team, and shortly thereafter, once he was installed as our governor, asked to join the Governor's Committee on disability issues and employment. And I don't remember FNS if it was the transition team or the Governor's Committee or the Governor's Committee, okay, but you and I spent a lot of time together, yes, and a lot of meetings, and I took a lot of notes whenever you talked, because you had a very deep knowledge about disability inclusion and Federal, State and local policies and the history of diversity, equity, inclusion, and I learned so much from you. And then, of course, in 2016 my wife and I relocated to New York City, and then Washington, DC, as I had the privilege and honor of leading the American Foundation for the Blind Helen Keller's organization through through a transition and a restructuring. And then when I had accomplished what I set out to accomplish, there, I returned home to our cozy little house here in Les, and I decided that I was ready to not lead an organization of that size and scope again. And I love nonprofits. I love nonprofit boards, but I was ready not to report to a nonprofit board for a while, so I decided to strike out on my own and just look for, I say, fun, innovative, high impact projects that would accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities and to work with people I really like. So that's what I'm doing now, and as I followed a blueprint that I discovered on how to launch a consulting business that said, reactivate your network and reach out to people that you trust, admire and respect, tell them what you're doing. So that's when I reached out to effin us on LinkedIn, and said, Remember me from the Governor's Committee. I'm back, and I'm looking for fun, innovative, high impact projects. And he introduced me to Barbara Dean, and Barbara, I think you have, might have got me my first paid training opportunity with Delta Dental of Washington. And I had a chance to talk to all of their HR professionals across their network about disability inclusion on a virtual Zoom meeting. And they asked me how much I would charge. I didn't really know what to say, so I said something, and they paid that was, that was the start of my consulting practice. So I think I have you you to thank Barbara for getting that ball rolling. That sounds good. Yeah. Fast forward a year and a half or so, and fell, fell into deeper conversation about Barbara and FNS, and learned about the Institute for Sustainable diversity and inclusion, which we all fondly call is di and the amazing history of the nonprofit is the place it has held in Our community, not only in Seattle, but nationally, the amazing board members and their their depth and breadth of knowledge and experience, and although I swore I would never join another board again, I have happily and graciously and with great gratitude. Um. Been elected to serve on the board of the Institute for Sustainable diversity inclusion is di and we are really in the right place at the right time, our community, our country, our society, needs organizations and expertise and leaders that we can rally around and catalyze as we pursue our quest for social justice and fairness and equity. And is di has a lot of experience and history in that space. So we are boldly proclaiming we are here, and we want you to join us and organize and catalyze and learn, and we do have a series of learning opportunities coming up that we'll talk about later. But for now, I would love to just get a taste for from you, Barbara and effin us about your journeys in this space. You are both social justice warriors, and you've done all every time we talk you, something new comes up that you've done a group, you've been involved with a committee, you've been on a some vital foundational documents you've crafted. So I think Barbara, if you, if you would give us the tour, 06:27 tour of your life, Speaker 2 06:32 and what, what brought you to this point with, with being a leader, at at ISD, and really being having such clarity that is di is such a vital resource 06:43 for our community. Sure, Speaker 3 06:45 you know the way that you described our connection, where I connected you with Delta Dental for your first consulting gig. So those are the kinds of connections I've been making since about 1988 so in 1988 my husband and business partner and I launched a newsletter, one of the first newsletters in the country on workforce diversity, and it the first The first name was training and culture newsletter. That didn't inspire anybody very much. But about three years in, we changed the name to cultural diversity at work, and it just took off. And also, there was just a, you know, there was, there was something happening in the country with organizations realizing that the workforce was, was just becoming much more diverse, and they needed they needed help. They needed information. They needed guidance on how to be effective with this, this workforce. So I started my career in this space, although it's hard, you know, it's hard to pinpoint the starting of a career, because careers develop over time. And that's also another little, little thing I have in my background is that I've been a career development advisor and coach so and I've developed and taught career planning courses. So I'm going to go way, way, way back, because I think this, I think it's fundamental what happens to you in your growing up years. And so my parents were from New England, moved to Ohio, and they basically were were in a cross cultural experience, because life and culture in New England and Massachusetts was very different from Northwestern Ohio. And my father used to say that that the personalities of the people in Ohio were about as flat as the land. And that was just his way of describing difference, right? Because he had been raised in Massachusetts, of course, where there are mountains and hills and valleys and and he just found, you know, that people were different in Ohio. And this is this is true all across our country. So I had my experience in my own family of difference, and then I was introduced to cultural differences by my parents with the National Geographic magazine. So that magazine coming into our home, and in those days, we didn't have television, so magazines were, were, you know, they were a vehicle, a window into the larger world. And I became very, very interested in all the people that were in the National Geographic Magazine. Mean, so you know, this is, this is how you get started on a on a career track. And so as I went to school, I just began asking questions about cultural differences. I remember at Ohio State University I was, I was in a class on organizational communication, and the young, ta, very smart guy, I said, How do you know these models and these theories work in in an organization in Mexico, for example? And he couldn't answer the question. And so I just kept asking those kinds of questions. I had just been sensitized to cultural differences, and it made me ask different kinds of questions. So when I got to the University of Washington, and I was a TA in as a teaching intercult interpersonal communication. I asked my advisors, Gary D'Angelo for one, Jon Stewart for the other. I said, you know, you're teaching a a type of communication, a style of communication, but it's really a white middle class style. Do Are you? Are you aware that you're doing that? Well, they had no awareness whatsoever. And so I designed this exercise in my class. Scared my advisors after death, but I designed this exercise about how white people talk. And I asked my my class, which was 30% people of color, international students, I asked them to help me, help us understand that these differences in communication. And so they agreed to go on videotape, and they talked about their experience of communicating with white people in the United States, particularly, you know, often white middle class people, and we use that as an exercise to learn about communication and to learn that about learn that we had been we had been taught a style of communicating, and that style was connected to our our economic level, it was connected to our racial and cultural makeup. It was connected to gender. There were just all kinds of connections. And so I just, you know, I just began asking the question, how, how would a cultural lens inform this exercise from a DI in a different way? And so, so, you know, that takes me to about 1988 when I got pulled into a a training effort at the University of Washington. There had been a racial incident in the dental school, and the dean of the dental school and the staff training development person agreed that there should be an innovation intervention and there should be education. And so I became one of the trainers in that effort to try and help people understand why, why making fun of black people wasn't necessarily a, you know, a respectful idea and and as I watched this whole project evolve and develop, I just had all kinds of questions, how do you know this intervention is going to work? How do you know people respond to this kind of thing? And I I just began asking questions, and one day on the bus, I was sitting there and saying, You know what? I bet I'm not the only person with these questions. I bet there are people all over the world that have these questions. What if we did a newsletter about this kind of and that's how the newsletter got started. That was the, you know, the initial push for it, and, and we began publishing in 1988 and then I began, you know, living my life on the telephone, because in an email at that time, or, or zoom, and living my life on the telephone answering people's questions. You know, what? What does, what does diversity mean? Why are, why are we doing this? What? What? What benefit does it have to our organization and and so as people called me with their questions, every question was an article. And so we began publishing in 1988 began publishing about diversity in the workforce, what that meant, and so I spent 10 years doing that, and then in 1998 a colleague of mine decided to form the Northwest Diversity Learning Series with some key Companies and organizations here in the greater Seattle area, and then this became a a community. I always called it, and it's a it's an employee, it's an employer venture on leveraging, leveraging diversity, because all the employers wanted to understand this. Thing, how it affected them, and so we joined together, and we started teaching ourselves, and that's how the Northwest Diversity Learning Series got Speaker 2 15:07 started, and it still continues to this day, Speaker 3 15:11 continues to this day, 27 years. Good for you, 15:16 and that's an us, Speaker 4 15:19 yes. Well, let me just start by saying that I've originally from North Carolina, grew up on a tobacco farm with my siblings, all 11 of them, eight, eight brothers and three sisters, and in a household where at the age of 13, my mom died from lupus, and so we had to help carry out. My father kept us together. So it was a story about survival, resilience and kind of looking forward in terms of our life stories. Mike, 15:53 where were you? Where were you in the birth order, 15:54 number five. Number five, Speaker 4 15:57 I was I was in the middle. So about that time, you know, some of the things that teenagers would do, like play basketball and, you know, do those kinds of things, I was not able to do that, because we had kind of the dual role of, kind of the the elder sibling, right? So you had to help out, because the older ones had left a home and so forth. And so I went on to college, and during my couple of years, during the summers, I worked, this is where I got exposed to people impacted by disability. Disabilities I worked for in the summer at a program at 16:38 o'bara Training Center, which was a Speaker 4 16:41 residential facility for kids with learning disabilities and so forth, and so it was kind of it was my first experience and exposure to that. I went on and graduated college in North Carolina, North Carolina, Central University. I met my wife there, and we got married, and I wasn't out looking when I was a senior in college, because I was, unfortunately, one of the ones with a very low draft lottery number. So I assumed that I would get drafted upon graduation, and as luck would have it, the the draft was ended the week I graduate, and so I and I'd already gone and taken the physical, and was prepared to go into the service, but I didn't want to go, because of all that was going on during that time, but I knew that I I would have to, so I went and ventured and out, and I went back home and worked with my dad for a couple of years in terms of helping to support the family, and Helen and I got married, I started a job in in North Carolina as a resource research assistance for a community action agency, Executive Director and and that's where I started to get really a little bit more indoctrinated into social justice, equity, diversity. That was a diversity at the time, was more social justice and civil rights and so forth, and community action, things to do, to engage with the communities so forth. And I, someone saw me and said, I think you could do this regional job for an organization. It was called the Nusa river regional development planning agency, and they were creating a new program for assistance with the senior citizens and so forth. They said you'd be a natural to help, help out, shape this group up and get them going. And so I think I probably did a job so well that they didn't like the fact at that time, it was more of an economic development. Maybe we're moving too fast with that. So I left that, but I remember it exposed me to working with people older and needing different kinds of care and so forth, so in terms of generational that helped me kind of get that type of perspective. Someone there, a friend of mine, saw me and said, there's a job for a personnel rep at warehouse or company and you you might be perfect for the role that they're looking for. They were looking for like a entry level personnel rep to do a lot of recruiting and so forth in North Carolina. In North Carolina, okay, so I applied, and was off, offered the job on the spot, and I worked in Plymouth, North Carolina, very small rural community, and one of the things that I learned while I worked there as a representative was perceptions that appearances and so forth. And I recall having a friend of mine come to visit me. He happened to be a local reporter for television station. And and he drove up in his car with all of the signage on the side of the car. And I didn't realize that he did that in terms of what he came in, but I went into my office and shut the door and all panic. It started to happen in in the office, because people didn't know exactly what I was doing, and they were still very sensitive about racial issues, because the plant itself had one side of it was heavily populated by African Americans, and the other side was white. One was the pulp paper mill, which was the higher paying jobs, and the sawmill, the lumber mill and Timberlands, was the side where more of the African American employees. So it started to give me a sense of social justice, and why, why were some people on one side and the other So, and there wasn't an agreement with the government that, that, you know, they changed that, you know, there was a conciliation agreement of sorts. And so I was brought in to help with that whole transition and that process as well. And then from there, I started to do more college recruiting. I i recall that in a meeting I was at, one of the vice presidents came down to visit and was talking about all of the things that the company was doing to support affirmative action at that time, and so in equal employment opportunity, and they he was just talking about how, how well they felt about what they were doing. And I think I remember raising my hands, excuse me, but I don't happen to see any of these people you're talking about? Can you illuminate on some of whom these people are? Because, quite frankly, I haven't seen them, and I'd like to know, and it stumbled him, because he couldn't come up with an answer, right? But two weeks later, I got offered a job to come to Seattle, and so I came to Seattle as the college relations and recruiting manager, where I over saw the company's college relations program and summer internship programs for the entire company and all of its operations and so forth for a couple of years. And I wanted to then shift into more of a generalist role, because that was a specialty role. And so I was recruited back to New Jersey for warehousing to head up our regional sales office Human Resource Function. So I worked there. And then several years later, I got promoted back to Seattle as the overall HR director for that division and so forth. And from there, I moved into an international role where I was the international HR director, and that was during the early 80s, and I attribute a lot of the growth in the understanding about diversity, to a conversation I had with a person by the name of Louis Briggs. And I still am in contact and work with him on issues today. Louis Griggs is out. Was out of the San Francisco area. He and his wife, Lenny Copeland, had had wanted to produce a series on going...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line TDI: April 24, 2025: Mai Ling Chan, CCC-SLP, PMP, Founder, Exceptional Leaders Network
04/24/2025
Supercharge Your Bottom Line TDI: April 24, 2025: Mai Ling Chan, CCC-SLP, PMP, Founder, Exceptional Leaders Network
Supercharge Your Bottom Line TDI: April 24, 2025: Mai Ling Chan, CCC-SLP, PMP, Founder, Exceptional Leaders Network https://drkirkadams.com/sybl-tdi-04-24-2025/ In this episode of Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion, Dr. Adams speaks with Mai Ling Chan, MS, CCC-SLP, PMP — a speech-language pathologist turned tech entrepreneur and the founder of the Exceptional Leaders Network. Mai Ling brings a rare blend of clinical expertise, project-management rigor, and entrepreneurial know-how to the conversation. After 18 years of frontline SLP practice, she built and exited a therapy-staffing company, co-created the acclaimed Xceptional Leaders podcast, and now guides disability-focused founders and corporations on inclusive product design, branding, and market strategy through her consultancy, Mai Ling Chan LLC. Her Amazon best-selling Becoming an Exceptional Leader anthology series and the growing Exceptional Leaders Network spotlight innovators who turn lived disability experience into breakthrough solutions. In this episode, Dr. Adams explores: ✅ Mai Ling's journey from hospitality to graduate school at Arizona State University and why she pursued both the CCC-SLP and PMP credentials. ✅ The mission of the Exceptional Leaders Network and how community accelerates disability innovation. ✅ Key lessons from advising corporates and start-ups on accessibility, inclusive UX, and brand positioning. ✅ Opportunities for executives to translate disability inclusion into revenue growth and market differentiation. 🔗 Connect & Learn More Dr. Kirk Adams – Inclusion Strategy: https://drkirkadams.com Mai Ling Chan, LLC – Consulting & Speaking: https://mailingchan.com Exceptional Leaders Network – Community & Resources: https://mailingchan.com/eln Xceptional Leaders Podcast – Inspiring Interviews: https://xceptionalleaders.com If you're ready to supercharge your bottom line through disability inclusion, hit Subscribe, ring the bell 🔔, and share your thoughts in the comments! #DisabilityInclusion #Accessibility #InclusiveBusiness #SpeechLanguagePathology #Leadership #ProjectManagement #ExceptionalLeaders Transcript: 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams. 00:37 So welcome everyone to Dr KURT ADAMS monthly livestream webinar, which I call supercharge your bottom line through Disability Inclusion. Today, I have wonderful guest, Mei Ling Chan. If you could just say hello, Mei Ling, and I'll turn it over to you shortly. Hello everyone. I'm so happy to be here. Thank you for having me great and for those of you who don't know me, again, I'm Dr Kirk Adams. I'm talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. I am the immediate past president and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind, which was Helen Keller's organization, and I had the awe inspiring opportunity to sit at her desk. I moved to New York City 01:25 in 2016 to be become president of AFB. Prior to that, I held those same leadership roles at the lighthouse for the blind here in Seattle, which is a social enterprise employing hundreds of blind and deaf, blind people, interesting businesses, including aerospace manufacturing for all the Boeing aircraft. I have a PhD in leadership and change from Antioch University, and I focus my dissertation work on employment. I did an ethnographic study of blind adults employed at major American corporations, and interviewed a lot of really cool people working at a lot of companies whose names we all know, and I learned a lot from that experience about the factors that lead to successful employment for people who are blind and the barriers that still remain. So we we all have lots of work to do together to make the world of equitable place where everyone has the equal opportunity to thrive. And I do that by focusing on employment. I work with companies to help them accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in their workforce. I support disabled entrepreneurs and their entrepreneurial, entrepreneurial journeys. I help 02:51 small nonprofits scale beyond the founder stage. And in general, I 03:00 look for fun, innovative, high impact projects that will accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in our world. And I like to work with people I like and mailing. Mailing is one of those people we were introduced quite some time ago, and I've stayed in very close contact as she has developed her strategies. And what she's bringing to the world to accelerate inclusion and equity and social justice and all of those good things. So 03:31 would really like to spend the bulk of our time hearing from you mailing I can. I'll reserve the right to pop in and ask some clarifying questions. But would would love to hear about your journey so far, your background. What 03:49 energize you, energizes you and motivates you. Around disability inclusion, maybe some of the things you've tried, some of the things that have worked well, some of the things that you you learn from and where you're at now with ELN exceptional Leaders Network, which I'm privileged and proud to be part of, and then what your your vision of the future is. So I'm happy to hand you the the talking stick, 111, little comment I've learned a lot from Mei Ling. She she comes my as a totally blind person myself since age five, I they tend to look for information about blindness and visual impairment and assistive technologies that support people with visual impairment to help us be in fewer disabling situations through use of technology, but I was on a call with Mei Ling earlier in the week, where her guest speaker was using augmentative communication technology, which I'm I've had some exposure to, but really learning a lot more about because of my association with Mei Ling. So always some. 05:00 Thing new to learn, and that's what we're here for today, for those of you who are with us live, we'll provide ample time for question and answer, and for those of you who are viewing the archived recording, we will let you know how to get in touch with both of us. So Mei Ling, the floor is yours? Excellent. Thank you again. I'm so excited to be able to be on the show with you, and I will tell our listeners that I do have ADHD and I have my talking points in front of me, but if I start to become a runaway guest, which is a podcast guest that just goes on and on, please jump in. Dr Adams, okay, okay, great. I can't imagine me wanting to stop you from saying anything, but I will, I will, I will take that under advice you never know. But I also have learned a lot from Dr Adams, and we are currently working on the software that I am using for the exceptional Leaders Network, which he just joined with me, because there isn't a seamless interface with the jaws re screen reader. And so we're having some issues with accessing different areas, and I don't, I don't use one. And so this has been a really interesting journey for me to be a bridge between a very important user, which is, you know, one of my members and the tech team, and so this has been back and forth with emails. And so I'm really hopeful that this company is going to embrace, you know, the WCAG 06:32 requirements, and I'm looking forward to moving through this process together. And of course, I am name dropping Dr Adams, and that was that he was the former founder and president of the Black blind Association, and you know, hello, we've got somebody very important here, in addition to any other future users who maybe they're already trying to use the software and just not saying anything. So we're getting some good traction. So I just wanted to share that with your listeners. So 07:04 you're muted. 07:07 Well, take take us back to your girlhood in New Jersey. Let's go way back. I love that, yes. So I'm a Jersey girl who's stuck in the desert looking for my beach. That's what I've been saying. It's wild. I've been here 24 07:22 years now in the desert. I originally am from Keyport, New Jersey, a small little sailboat town, which is a beautiful area in Monmouth County. And I did not know how good I had it, because really, you know, 20 minutes and I'm at any beach, it was just crazy. And then I could also drive into New York City. And so I grew up seeing a lot of the the shows, you know, Les Mis I saw probably three or four times. I saw the Christmas ones. I saw the rockets, you know, I've been center, yeah, all of that. And then I came out to Arizona, and I was like, what it was like scratching a record. 08:01 So I've learned a lot, and I've learned to really just treasure, you know, being in New Jersey, young and I would say, you know, going to the beaches and going to the Garden State Art Center, which is an open amphitheater where you could hear the watch the concerts, and you were so close to the to the, you know, the singers and the performers. It's just incredible. So a lot of things have changed. Obviously, I've been out now for 26 years, but my connections and my culture is still very east coast, and people out here will be like, you know, I like you may. You're pretty direct, you're pretty blunt. And I was like, oh, that's the Jersey girl talking. 08:38 Did you become aware of 08:42 people with impairments, disabilities, and dynamics around disability 08:48 as a young person? It's a great question. So I was in I grew up in a very small town, one square mile was the town of keep where it still is, and I had exposure to one cousin, so actually, a friend's cousin who had a lot of believe it was mental disability, and I don't know, because I was so young then, and he was much bigger than me, so I'm a tiny girl. I'm only, like, barely five feet now, and he was a big, big kid, and there was a lot of sound and chaos coming from the other rooms, and I happened to be sitting next to him, he reached out and hit me. Didn't mean to, you know, it's a sensory overload, all that kind of stuff that you don't know about. And so after that, being a young kid, I was always scared, afraid, putting these in quotes of people who had, you know, physical like, if it looked like they had a mental disability, and you could tell. And back then, we used the word retarded, which we don't use now. And that was, you know, in my mind, like, oh, they are violent. And so that was really interesting for me. Wasn't until I went back to school, I went to college, obviously, you know, got education there, and then I got immersed in a lot of self contained classrooms. And so now, obviously, I have a whole different vision. 10:00 And understanding, you know, of all of the sensory inputs and things like that. But that's a great question some people 10:06 so at the college level, were you studying disability related? 10:11 Great question. Oh, nope, I was going for business. I was supposed to get into the school of business, and because I was not focusing on my studies enough, I got a temporary 10:23 admission, and I had to get, like, one more a and so I took a Latin basis class over the summer, and I got a B plus. So I did not, you know, fulfill the requirements. And so I was like, Okay, what am I gonna do now? I supposed to go in and do marketing, and I decided to go into the School of Communications, would look which look like fun, you know, public speaking and broadcasting. So I ended up getting my bachelor's degree there, and then started working for hotels. So I was working for Hyatt hotels for a while, not married, and then had the absolute blessing to stay home with my children and raise them. So I stayed home for 10 years with my two boys. And then my aunt, who is Colombian, she was working in inner city, New York, and she said, Mehmet, you should become a speech teacher. And I said, what is that? And by that point, we did have the internet, so I googled it, and I was like, Oh, this looks great, you know, I love talking, and I could work the kids schedules. And so then I put all my eggs in one basket, and I took some leveling classes out here at ASU, Arizona State University, and I got to know the professors, and somehow I got in. So I was one of 35 students for the master's program out of 300 applications. And I ended up loving both the school age or the school setting and also the medical so I did both tracks, and it was incredible. And so I got to do everything from, I'd say, preschool age, at home, early feeding, all through school age. And then I also kept doing the medical side on the weekends. And so I've also worked with geriatrics, adults trauma like post stroke, acute speech language therapy. What's the right speech language pathology? Yep. Mythology pathology, yeah. So the neurological side, swallowing, and then I loved AAC, which you brought up, which is alternative and on 12:14 augmentative communication, which is AAC. That was incredible. As technology, I love technology, and I got to work with a company in Santa Barbara on brain computer interface, which was absolutely amazing. So we had a little stint there. And then, since then, since 2020 I've been full time consulting, so being a bridge between companies and businesses and helping to connect all the dots, you know, the pieces of clinical versus like product creation, marketing, content, so companies that are on the disability technology space, or what type of companies? Yep, and even it's just, it's a lot of blur, like even private practice or writing a book, and that's kind of where all of this came out. I also started my own podcast. I've been doing that for seven years. It's called the exceptional leaders podcast spotlighting people like yourself who are amazing leaders in this space. And that was an amazing journey for me to just get one person and ask them all the questions I wanted. You know, I'm a very curious person, and so I love that entrepreneurial journey of the ups and downs. And you know what kept you connected to your vision, and where did you get the help? So in after my first year, I realized, as this was back seven years ago, not everybody was listening to podcasts. And I was like, you know, I don't want people to miss these amazing stories. So I decided to do an anthology. I did not know what that word was when I started, I said, I just want to take everyone's stories and put them together in a book. And someone's like, that's an anthology mate. So I started with 15 other authors, and each one told one chapter, and that was beautiful. And so then that started the becoming exceptional leader book series. And then since then, I've now published a focus on AAC leaders, a focus on SLP leaders, and then also a focus on Asian Pacific Islander leaders, with the connection of special education. And each one of these books have had their own audience and their own connection. And I'm just amazed at the value, because everybody loves storytelling. You know, that's really how you can really connect with someone, versus just a bunch of bullets right in a bunch of directions. It's just been globally accepted each of the books, and I'm just so excited. It's been such a blessing. 14:29 So consulting with companies, podcasting, writing books, 14:38 connecting with leaders, and 14:43 what was the genesis of the exceptional leaders network that I know you've just launched. Thank you. So about maybe eight to 10 years ago, I started seeing these subscription memberships, and this is something where you pay, you know, certain amount every month, and then you get access to a group. 15:00 A community, some type of learning system. And this is different than just a like one course webinar, or even if it's like a three day course, this is something where every month, you know, you're tapping into the whoever the content creator is. And when it first started, I thought this is an amazing idea, and I had been creating other companies at that time. I had a learning management system for continuing education. We had had one about reviewing apps, you know. So I really understood the idea of aggregating and bringing communities together. And I just kept watching this idea of subscription memberships. And I saw colleagues starting ones like, for example, the medical SLP group. So it's a bunch of speech therapists who are their expertise is in medical and you pay a certain subscription price a month, and you get access to them, and all of these resources, fantastic. So I just kept thinking about it, but I had imposter syndrome, and I think that's what a lot of us have, because, you know, we come into this. My profession is a speech language pathologist, so I am an expert in certain areas, for example, AAC, right? And I say expert, we're always learning, but I'm just saying, like, that's my area of expertise, right? And then when you talk about subscription memberships, you now have to be creating content, you know, providing information. And I never found the area of speech pathology that I felt that I was in excellence of you know, where people would say, Oh, I, you know, I go to May every month for this in, let's say AC or this area, and that's because I do have ADHD, and so I feel like I have not deep dive into any one area, because they all interest me, which has been a blessing and a curse, right? Call that multi passion, yes, yes. I call it my, my superpower. 16:42 But it can also take me back. It take me, yeah, take me back. So, so I kept having this, like imposter syndrome, like, you know, I'd love to do a membership, but what is it that I would do? You know, I'm not an expert. I'm not an expert. I kept, kind of, like telling myself that. And for your listeners, really, the words that you say to yourself are so important. So if you tell yourself that you are or aren't something, you're going to believe that. And so for years, I believe that I wasn't an expert in anything, and then I was a jack of all trades, master of none. But I finally, finally started to understand that my value is really in connecting people and being a bridge to information. And then I don't need to know everything. And it wasn't until that clicked for me Kirk, that I was able to say, Oh, I've been doing this the whole time, right? I've been bringing people together. I've been sharing information on how to grow your specific accessibility business, or your inclusive business, or become a brand which people are not using like so say you are somebody, who you 17:43 you, I'm thinking the word refer, but that's the word you represent. That's the word you represent, a little known diagnosis, you know, and you're telling the world about it. That's your brand. And so we don't, we don't know how to use these words. And so I've been working with people, one on one, and consulting with them, helping them to understand, like, you need to create a website, you need to get very succinct in your messaging, and, you know, you need to have a mailing list and all of these things. And I started to see this is what I do. You know, this is my value. And so, keeping with the exceptional leaders branding, which is what I've been doing with the podcast, and then also with the book, I created the exceptional Leaders Network, and it this has even been a slow grow because I didn't know what it would be. And so last August, yep, last August, I sent an email out to like, 100 of my closest people who I who I've been dealing with over the years in...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: April 10, 2025: Interview with Lamondre Pough, Authentic Leadership Speaker & Trainer at LaMondré Pough Unlimited, LLC
04/10/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: April 10, 2025: Interview with Lamondre Pough, Authentic Leadership Speaker & Trainer at LaMondré Pough Unlimited, LLC
Dr. LaMondré Pough is an internationally recognized speaker, entrepreneur, and disability rights advocate whose work sits at the intersection of leadership, inclusion, and lived experience. As the CEO of Billion Strong, a global nonprofit uniting people with disabilities across cultures and continents, he champions empowerment, identity, and collective voice. He also serves as the Chief Sustainability Officer for Ruh Global IMPACT and Chairman of Arts Access South Carolina, leveraging these platforms to advance equity in everything from digital inclusion to cultural accessibility. Born with spinal muscular atrophy and navigating the world as a Black man with a disability, Dr. Pough brings a deeply personal, intersectional lens to every conversation he leads. He is known for his powerful storytelling, his commitment to authentic leadership, and his unwavering belief that true inclusion begins with honoring lived experiences. Whether he's training organizations, hosting one of his podcasts like My Big Full Authentic Life, or mentoring future leaders, Dr. Pough is a passionate force for transformation—helping others not just survive, but thrive with purpose. TRANSCRIPT: 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams. 00:38 Welcome everybody to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, I am said, Dr Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington, where rain is lashing against the windows of my office here and with me today, I have lamondre Pugh mondre is an authentic leadership advocate and professional speaker. I have had the privilege of getting to know a bit over the past couple of years. We 01:10 broke bread together here in Seattle last summer when he was here speaking at a conference. So great to connect with you again virtually. Lamondre Listen. It's a it's a pleasure to be with you, Kirk as always. And I'll just give a super, uh, top level headline for those listening who might not know who I am. I am again, Dr Kirk Adams, I'm immediate past president and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind, which is Helen Keller's organization. I was proud to lead that organization. Prior to that, the same roles here at the Lighthouse for the Blind in Seattle, which is a social enterprise employing blind and deaf, blind people in a variety of businesses and supporting people in thriving, thriving careers. I hold a PhD in leadership and change from Antioch University, where I did an for my dissertation, I did an ethnographic study of blind adults successfully employed in large American corporations. I learned a lot through that process about the success factors for employment people who are blind, and the barriers which I've certainly experienced myself in my life as a frustrated, disabled job seeker, disabled employee of a major corporation or two, and then in those leadership roles at some major nonprofits, where I had the opportunity to employ a lot of people who are blind 02:41 and lamondre and I encountered one another as our advocacy paths intersected, and I asked him to join me today and to talk a little bit about his Journey. 02:59 My impairment, personally, is visual. I my retina is detached when I was five, and so I am totally blind. And as as we know, an impairment does not necessarily equal disability. That we are placed in disabling situations when the environment we're in, digital, social built 03:21 does not fit well with our personal characteristics. So the little example I use often is if I'm running a board meeting and I have my agenda and my financials and my midi reports in Braille, 03:36 my impairment doesn't matter. I'm not in a disabling situation at all. I can run the meeting as well as anyone that does not have said impairment. However, if you hand me a stack of print material, I my impairment does not fit well with the built environment of visual print. So that that puts me that's a disabling situation. So as lamondre and I have gotten to know each other, 04:05 we I believe we share the philosophy that 04:10 the lived experience of these disabling situations allows us to develop some really unique strengths in the areas of resilience and creativity and problem solving. And, you know, I had the privilege of seeing lamondre lead a conference session, and I got to hear some of his words of wisdom that he's gained through his life experience as a person with impairments and the discipline disable these situations we find ourselves in. So lamondre, you know, I don't have any set agenda here today. I just really would love to hear from you your journey, what's brought you to the point you're at now, what, what you're currently focused on, and what, what your vision for your future is, Where, where are you headed? What are you going to be accomplishing? A. 05:00 So down the road here, oh, absolutely, I will just hand the talking stick to you, and I will reserve the right to interrupt you with questions as you speak. So thanks so much for being here. Oh, no man, listen. Thank you first of all for inviting me to your platform at any time that we have the opportunity to get together. I always learn something from you. I always learn something new about you, and it's always it's always a really refreshing conversation. So I appreciate the person that you are on, the journey that you've been on, and how you're willing to share, how you're willing to share your insights and your experiences, and it's really about lifting others up, and honestly, that's what my journey is about. I like you. Am a person with a disability. I have spinal muscular atrophy as a result of spinal muscular atrophy, I'm a full time wheelchair user. 05:58 I need assistance with everything in terms of, you know, anything physical, bathing, getting out of bed, feeding, all of those things I need assistance with. The only things that I really don't need very much help with is thinking and speaking. And so I'm one person who believes that you lean into your strengths, and that's probably where I became a speaker, because I am leaning in to the strength of this big mouth that I have, 06:25 but what I've committed myself to is I committed myself to really helping people live more empowered lives, and I created this philosophy that I live by. It's called the live, big, live full and live authentic philosophy, and we can talk a little bit more about that as it progresses, but what that was, or the way that that came about, was me really trying to navigate a world where things are not necessarily set up for people like me. And I'm talking physically, I'm talking socially, I'm even talking economically, and what I realized was that I am truly responsible for my own outcomes, but having said that, I also must stand up, assert and advocate for the change that we want to see. And because of that, this philosophy really was birthed out of me just living my life the way that I had to, with all those compensatory skills that kick in and and those ways of finding unique and innovative solutions to problems that can cease being a problem once we figure out a way to accommodate for those things. And what I'm doing now is I'm simply teaching organizations and individuals how to apply this philosophy to create number one, leaders that lead from a place of value, that lead from a place of integrity, and who really want to have a positive impact in their world. But then the other thing about that is not only just to develop those leaders, but to help create environment where people can really develop a sense of belonging and begin to thrive, regardless as to what societal barriers have been put in front of them. So that's me in a nutshell. Do a lot of advocating in terms of disabilities, working with number of different organizations in terms of volunteering and just helping to make the world a better place overall. 08:36 And lamondre, 08:38 you just talked about helping organizations develop leaders that are coming from authentic places. I'm paraphrasing, can you? Can you? Leadership is something I am very interested in 08:53 as I transition from the corporate world of banking and finance after my first 10 years of the work world, into the nonprofit sector, and really got clear that I should be in the nonprofit sector, and I should be in leadership roles, and I should be working to create opportunities for other people with disabilities to thrive. I saw a leadership voice, a leadership vacuum. I saw people in nominal leadership roles, CEOs and executive directors, who were very much maintaining a status quo, 09:35 who were very risk averse. 09:38 I didn't see a lot of innovation and creativity at the leadership level. So I love for you to talk about leadership, what what it means to you, how you embrace your leadership opportunities and and how do you work with organizations through your advocacy to help strengthen leadership? 10:00 Uh, what, what, whatever you want to talk about in the broad category of leadership. I'd love to hear it. No, okay, I and I appreciate that too. Well, you know, I like you. 10:11 I believe, or let me say this, I did indeed see a vacuum in leadership, and now I actually see what I believe is a crisis in leadership, not just in the disability community, but across the board. You know, we live in a very 10:30 social media driven environment right now, and as much as we, as much as we don't, might not necessarily want to admit it, I think we have seen how platform and how 10:45 the desire for likes and follow followers, and 10:50 I would say 10:52 affirmation from others has really created problems for us. We see people that confuse platform with integrity, or the fact that you have a high follower count means that you are an authority to be listened to and to give credibility to and honestly. Those things are not necessarily true. 11:19 We see instances playing out before us every day, of people who are in leadership positions, who have the title, but they don't necessarily have the empathy, the capacity, or even the will to really lead for positive change. Now we see a lot of people doing things that's really about, as as my folks from Jamaica would say about beating themselves up. But the truth is that is not what leadership in my in my estimation of it really is, because I recognize that people have different definitions for what leadership is. And for me, leadership is really about influence. And I like to say authentic leadership is really about positive influence, about leadership that is based in integrity, about people who are guided by their values, their principles and their beliefs in order to create a positive impact in the world to find to make the human condition better than what they found it in and this is the kind of leadership that I believe that we are missing. I believe that this is the kind of leadership that is going to be required in order for us to really advance just as as people, to really save this planet in order to 12:45 I really speak to the good of humanity. I'll put it that way, and and this is the mission that I'm on. And obviously, even throughout my years, you know, advocating within the disability community, we've seen that now I've met some incredible leaders who have poured into me, who have who have given me opportunities, and who have opened doors, and now I feel like it's my job to help do that with others, and that's the mission. That's the mission that I'm on 13:15 in your role 13:17 of influence, your opportunities to influence, we know you're a professional speaker, so you you get in front of audiences, and so if you're in front of an audience of, say, corporate senior managers at a company, 13:32 what give us a taste of the types of messages and communications that that you share in order To help move things toward that I that ideal picture of authentic leadership that you just described absolutely well. First of all, again, I go back to being authentic, being real about who you are and what it is that you want to contribute. How do you want to serve? How do you want the world? How do you want to show up in the world in terms of you as an individual, in terms of your organization, and what impact, what impact are you looking to make? And what I do is I customize things, but I find what it is that they want to do, where they want to go, and my goal is to help them achieve that. Now, the other piece of what I do in helping them achieve that is I believe that number one, a part of our strength is our diversity. I believe that when you really embrace our differences, when you really embrace different thoughts, different perspectives, different lived experiences, that is the engine that drives innovation. As you said earlier in your opening statement, Kirk, we talk about, you know, people with disabilities being problem solvers. Well, guess what? We're problem solvers, because we have to be. We have to figure out ways to traverse a world that was not necessarily designed by us, for us, but nonetheless, if we still want to. 15:00 Have an impact. If we still want to survive and not only survive but thrive, we've got to come up with some innovative solutions. And that just does not stop because we figured out how you can access documents or how I can access a curb cut. It doesn't stop there. That innovation, that problem solving skills, goes throughout every aspect of my life, and it's not just people with disabilities, it's also other people who may have been from traditionally marginalized communities, they've had to develop some compensatory skills. So why not take those skills and apply them to make your company better? Why not take those skills and apply that to increase your bottom line? Why not take those skills and apply them to make your place of business a place where people want to work, where they feel seen, heard and appreciated, and want to give you their very best. You want the kind of people in your organization where they could leave, start their own, do their own thing, but they don't want to, because they love the impact that you're making, and they love the contribution that you're given to their lives. That's the kind of organizations that I help people build wonderful so you say you customize, which makes total sense, depending on who the audience is, and say, wanting to find out what what they're trying to accomplish. 16:33 Up to you whether you name names or not, name names. But can you just think of an organization you worked with and you customize an approach? And give us just a little sense of how you would work. Work with an organization that engages you as a as a speaker, absolutely. Well, there's several different organizations that I have worked with, and they range from corporations all the way to nonprofit organizations, even to some governmental entities, and every situation is different. Now, primarily, I'm a trainer and a speaker. That's what I do. I go in an organization, and if they have a need for a training, that's what we do, and we build trainings specifically for them. I just recently, just last week, two weeks ago, did a workshop, an intensive workshop, for an advocacy organization who's really trying to deal with the struggles that's happening right now. They're an advocacy or an advocacy organization that really about helping people with disabilities to live their lives more independently and obviously with what's happening in the States right now, there's a big threat that they're facing in terms of funding, in terms of in terms of how they actually get a major part of their budget. And their leaders are obviously stressed. Their leaders are trying to figure out, how do they keep their How do they keep their teams motivated and engaged in times of uncertainty? So I have this thing that I created. It's called the real power framework, and basically it is the nine pillars of what I call authentic leadership. Okay, now we're now, we're getting there. Absolutely it's the nine pillars of authentic leadership, and what I did with them. And what are those nine pillars? I'm glad you asked Kurt, number one, it's real power. Real Power is an acronym, so the acronym spells out real power. All right, so I'm taking notes. All right. Here we go. The first one is rooted, and this is being rooted in your values and self awareness understanding who you are, because in order to lead authentically, you must first know who you are and be a person that's led by your core values. The second thing is the E empowered, empowered through emotional clarity and emotional connection. So we're talking about the empathy part. We're talking about emotional intelligence, about being able to understand where you are and understand where other people are and what triggers them and what triggers you, and having measured responses to that, then the next letter is the A in real and that's accountability, being true to your word and your vision, making certain that you stick to what the mission of the organization is, and even your own personal mission, and that you show up and you're consistent in following through with what you said. Then the next thing is the L, and that's leading in action. That's about leading with intentionality that is not just ideas, but we're looking to for ways that we can lead and be effective in what it is that we're doing. Now, the P in power stands for psychological safety, and this is about creating the environments, creating rules. 20:00 Rooms where others feel seen and heard, but in an authentic way, in a real way, not this, not this, not this fake optimism thing, but really creating environments where people can express what they're thinking, what they're feeling, what they're experiencing, without being judged, or without feeling that there may be some kind of retaliation, in other words, creating safe spaces for the people that you're serving by leading. Then the next one is the O, because that was P O. So the O is for being open, being open to feedback, being open to growth, being open to change. There is 20:46 so many things. There are so many things that's going on right now in terms of how quickly change is coming. Now, we can hunker down and cower, or we can just accept the fact that change is inevitable, and in order for us to not only survive but to thrive in it, we have to be open to change and figure out how our vision can best support the mission of what's changing around us. So that's what it is. It's about being open, and then the W is having a willingness to collaborate by CO creating instead of controlling, by allowing that, that innovation that we talked about, that you intrinsically get from diversity and from people from different backgrounds, By allowing that to have space by allowing that to breathe. So being open and willing to collaborate, I often say it's amazing what you can accomplish when you're willing to let go some of some of the control and allow people to contribute what they can to a thing. And it's amazing, many times what ends up happening is you end up growing something far better, far bigger than you ever even imagined yourself. So the willingness to collaborate, and then the E, the last E in power, is about being emotionally resilient, because, listen, challenges are going to come. Change is going to come, but when it does come,...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line TDI: March 20, 2025: Aaron Di Blasi, Sr. PMP, Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. | Subtitle: Blind and Low-Vision Workshop By Aaron Di Blasi and Dr. Kirk Adams: Copywriting With AI
03/20/2025
Supercharge Your Bottom Line TDI: March 20, 2025: Aaron Di Blasi, Sr. PMP, Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. | Subtitle: Blind and Low-Vision Workshop By Aaron Di Blasi and Dr. Kirk Adams: Copywriting With AI
In this episode of Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion, Dr. Kirk Adams speaks with Aaron Di Blasi, Sr. PMP for Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. (https://mvsltd.com) and Publisher for the Top Tech Tech Tidbits (https://toptechtidbits.com/), Access Information News (https://accessinformationnews.com), AI-Weekly (https://ai-weekly.ai) and Title II Today (https://title2.info) newsletters. Subtitle: Blind and Low-Vision Workshop By Aaron Di Blasi and Dr. Kirk Adams: Copywriting With AI. How To Generate Professional, High Quality, High Ranking, Accurate, Long Form Copy For Your Personal or Business Brand Using The Premium Versions of Foundational AI Models. 👉 Learn more today at: . 🧑 Aaron Di Blasi: 🚀 Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd.: ♿ Top Tech Tidbits: ♿ Access Information News: 🤖 AI-Weekly: 🏛️ Title II Today: TRANSCRIPT: 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, 00:38 Hello everybody. This is Dr Kirk Adams speaking to you from my home office in sunny Seattle, Washington. And this is a very special edition of my monthly live stream webinar, which I call super charge your bottom line through disability inclusion. And today I have a wonderful guest and a colleague and partner in crime. Aaron Di Blasi, as we work together to accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in our society, it was with mindful solutions. And Aaron, if you could give me a quick headline of who you are, I will start back to you shortly for more. Hello, everyone. My name is Aaron Di Blasi. I am the Senior Project Management Professional for a digital marketing firm out of Cleveland, Ohio, by the name of Mind Vault Solutions Limited. I am also the publisher for the Top Tech Tidbits, Access Information News, AI weekly, excuse me, and now, Title Two Today, newsletters, if you're familiar with any of those. I also work closely with Dr Adams to do his digital marketing as well. 01:47 Thanks, Aaron. So I got, I became acquainted with Aaron and actually through the apex program, which is www dot the apex program.com which is a virtual training program to launch blind people into cyber security. And I had connected with Aaron around that, and he 02:14 helped us promote the program through his publications. And as our relationship deepened, Aaron said things like, you should start a podcast, you should have a YouTube channel. 02:27 Yeah, you should write blogs. You need a, you need a, yeah. The difference is, you listen. No one else listens. Though, you listened every time. Seriously, kudos. Really. You need a website that's more focused on your overall brand, yeah, and so, and he listens, yeah. We piece by piece, we've been building this web presence, and part of this is generating content. And for those who don't know me, just super brief again, I'm Dr Kirk Adams. I'm a blind person. Have been since age five. My retina is detached. I went to a school for blind kids, first second and third grade in the state of Oregon, learn how to read and write Braille, which I do constantly travel confidently, independently with a long white cane. Learned how to type on a typewriter so I could start public school in fourth grade and type my assignments and spelling tests and things for sighted teachers. And I also was given just this wonderful set of experiences, which gave me a great internal locus of control, just a belief that I could do whatever I wanted to do, and that was largely through outdoor experience. It was in Oregon, we backpacked and camped in the Three Sisters wilderness area, we 03:43 went up on Mount Hood and build, build big snow forts out of snowball huge snowballs. We went to the Oregon coast in the tide pools. And so I just had that sense of how to love my body as a little blind kid. And was 03:58 given some great gifts there at that school, was the only blind student in all of my classes, from fourth grade through my through my PhD. So also had experiences as a academically high achieving young college student, blind having the challenges of trying to find employment. So I've had those experience, frustrating experiences as a blind job seeker. I've I've also had the privilege of employing many, many hundreds of blind people as 04:31 the president, CEO of the Seattle Lighthouse for the Blind, and American Foundation for the Blind. So employment is my jam and 04:42 and I've also become involved in a number of startup companies using Disability tech to accelerate inclusion. And through all of this, I have 04:55 been generating a lot of content. I've done a lot of writing in my day. And of course. 05:00 Course, as AI became more present in the world, I learned through doing so, I wanted to try to use AI whenever I could ask questions. I started to try to use it to assist in some writing. And then I discovered that Aaron 05:22 had done a lot more with that than I had, 05:26 had a lot more skill and insight than I had, and 05:32 we've generated some content together where I've given him some bare bones and some thoughts and some notes, and he's gonna show some examples of that. Yeah, 05:42 that's okay, yeah, yeah. He's come back and said, you know, what do you think of this? And he, he readily says, you know, I used, I used AI as a tool 05:53 to enhance 05:55 what you sent me. So we, we thought 06:01 that blind people in particular 06:05 could really be using AI to generate content more effectively and efficiently in order for us to all move our personal missions forward. So we thought we would share some knowledge today, and Aaron proposed we do a workshop, and I proposed we do it during my regularly scheduled monthly live stream webinar time. So here we are. Thank you for joining us, yeah, and thanks everyone who's here live, and thank you for all of you out there in the future we're viewing the recording. So Aaron, I'm going to hand you the talking stick, and I'm here to learn from you. So I will probably pop in with with questions from time to time. I hope so, and I have no you will, and I know you will allow time for questions. Oh, for sure, from our audience, very good. 07:01 All right, everyone. Well, just to top this off, I guess we'll start with the title, blind and low vision workshop, how to generate professional, high quality, high ranking, accurate, long form copy. Sorry for all that, for your personal or business brand using the premium versions of foundational AI models. The reason we included all of those words is because it's very specific to the type of copy that we're going to be talking about today. 07:26 It's very easy. Let's just start with this analogy to open up chat, G, P, T, and say, write me a blog post about dot, dot, dot, and it will okay. But unfortunately, the internet is filled with that kind of I 07:39 don't want to say garbage. A lot of people call it garbage, but it, unfortunately, in SEO terms, is garbage because it doesn't rank well, it doesn't do much for your brand, and it certainly doesn't do much for other people in the marketing field that read it and see that it was just simply generated with one prompt. So what people want to know is, they want to know, how do I get it to not only sound human? I mean, that is kind of the number one concern, I think, is that they want it to sound human, which we cover, that that's no problem. But more than anything, they want the context there that the model might not have. And today we're going to go over how to give the model all of the context that it needs and all of the timing that it needs to basically perform as though AI were five years from now. It's a pretty cool workaround. So we're going to start with an example. Recently, Dr Adams attended CSUN, and while he was in CSUN, he sent me daily summaries using Siri. He just simply transcribed them and sent them to me via text. I collected these texts into a document which was basically kind of him writing the article, but it was not in the article form. It was just his thoughts on what had happened, you know, people that he had met. This is, this is correct. These were notes on the fly that I just dictated as a text, right? Exactly. And then we just aggregated choppy, non sequential, thank you, exactly. That's what I want to point out. Yeah. This is not him writing, you know, an article, but by any sense, just kind of reporting what he had discovered. Okay, so now we take that and we're going to make that a piece of what we're going to go over today. Okay, 09:10 just to lay the groundwork for anyone who cannot see, we're going to have 10 steps that we're going to go over, and then we're going to have 10 preliminary things that we're going to describe. So there are 10 preliminaries and then 10 steps to the process. A lot of people start the process at write me a blog post about. Our number 10 step is going to be write me a blog post about so we're going to talk about what those other nine steps actually are. Okay, but before we do that, we're going to open up with just a couple of things, software tools that we're going to use in this course of using Google Chrome, which is just a web browser. I'll be using chat GPT, plus the $20 a month version, not the $200 a month version, nothing we need there currently. And I'll also be using Microsoft Word and notepad. Those are just for data. The purpose of Microsoft Word right now. And a lot of people use just pure text and say, why would you use. 10:00 Word because we have belief that in the future, in the very near future, llms will be able to not only parse the text in the Word document, but the hyperlinks attached to the text in the Word document, and that could make for some very serious contextual advantages in the future. So I would recommend you use Microsoft Word, where you can to store your quote, unquote databases, because they will have links attached to them that would be lost if you were to use text. Makes sense to everybody, okay. Number two, the computer platform that I'm using for the courses, windows, 11, desktop, but obviously you could use Mac. You could do this on mobile. You know, it works on on any platform that you can use an LLM. 10:39 Number three, what is a foundation model? 10:42 Just to clear this up, a foundation model is the context of artificial intelligence and machine learning at large scale that is trained on extensive data sets and serves as a base for various downstream tasks. Think chat, GPT, basically. Think Gemini, think Claude. These are major foundational models. They are closed. They're not open source. We'll get into that later. That's not really important right now, but these are the frontier models. These are the models that are currently behaving the best. They are giving us the highest quality. And of those three models, in our testing, we have found that chat, GPT, believe it or not, is the best writer. I know that a lot of people currently believe that Claude is the best writer, but I think what they're talking about is writing in the form of once upon a time, as in writing a story from scratch and keeping the narrative going. Claude does very well with that, for some reason, but chat GPT seems to do much better at original and creative writing, especially the kind that we're going to be doing today. So that's why we chose it. If anyone has any questions about that. So the competing versions would be Gemini for $20 a month and anthropic Claude for $20 a month. They'll all do the same thing, but these techniques that we're going to use today can also be used on the free version. You'll just have limits to how many 11:52 chats you can use. Okay, so moving on to number four. This is one of the most important contexts here. So listen up to this one, if you can what is a rolling context window. 12:04 The rolling context window allows the model to process and consider a fixed maximum number of tokens at any given moment in the session. This is the model's memory, essentially. And when you say, write me a blog post about Dot. Dot, dot, the model can only give you back results within this window, the single window, and that's why these posts are always small. They're always roughly 4096 characters or less, because that's the window. They're very easy to identify as AI generated, okay, the stuff we're going to do today. Aaron, this Yes. Kirk, so how do I know how big that window is? How much? Great question. Buy it off. Gotcha? Because I have noticed that sometimes, if I've asked, 12:48 take these three documents and combine it, you know, summarize it, it'll tail off toward the end and it won't all the words won't be there, won't be dramatically Correct. Okay, that's well, that there's a number of reasons that can happen that sounds more like a cutoff assumption. I've never experienced anything quite like that. When summarizing, let's go back to the first question. Yeah, no, that's okay, yeah, 13:15 gotcha. So here's some frame of reference for you, and let me give you the ones that won't matter first. Okay, 128,000 13:21 token rolling context window. That means nothing to most people. That's okay. We're going to convert that into Word document pages at 12 point font, just to give people an idea, because that's how most people parse things. Okay? That is roughly 205 pages of Word document at 12 point font. Now that's its entire memory throughout the entire conversation, not just one ask. So that is the maximum amount of context that it can hold in its mind while it's talking to you. The vast majority of people only use about 1% of this memory, but today we're going to use almost 100% 13:58 if that makes sense. 14:00 Any questions from you? 14:03 No, okay, okay. I can relate to Okay. Claude and Gemini have different rolling context windows, and they're larger, okay? And this can really benefit you if you are trying to put something together that has very large context. And we'll explain what that means once we get into the 10 steps. But just for informational purposes. Anthropic Claude is 200,000 14:25 token rolling context window, which is roughly 320 pages in a Word document for frame of reference. Now Google, Gemini, which is one of our favorite for research, is a 1.5 million token rolling context window, which is roughly 2400 pages of a Word document in a single conversation. That's why we tend to use it for very large research projects, because of its large text window, if that makes sense, but chat GPT gives better quality and it's much smaller context window. The larger the context window gets, the harder it becomes for the model to remember all of the context so the looser the answers become. 14:59 Okay? 15:00 So moving on to number six. What is a single chat context window? Now this is this is the limit. This is what everyone cannot get around. The single chat context window refers to the span of tokens that a language model can process in a single chat interaction, encompassing both the input tokens, which includes your prompt or query, and the output tokens the models response. It defines the amount of information the model can, quote, remember or consider at any given moment in a conversation. This amount is 4096 tokens. Comes out to about six pages in a Word document. So anytime you speak to chat GPT, you only have roughly six pages in and out what it's going to say to you and what you're going to say to it. So essentially, you have three pages because its response is generally 50% of the token output. So anything more than three pages in a single conversation, and it's going to truncate, it's going to give you issues, which may be one of the things that you described earlier when you uploaded a bunch of documents. And I think, yeah, we're going to get to how you can get around that, though, you know, with large documents, I'll show you a different way that you can do it. Okay, so number eight, we're getting close to the end here. Why the limit, the 4096 token limit that is returned in a single response, and this is across models, chat, GPT, Gemini and Claude, is likely to be capped at this value for practical reasons such as computational efficiency, user interface usability and avoiding overly large outputs that are hard to handle in one go. In short, this limit is not necessary, but it's currently here just to keep people in check, so to speak. So that is a limit that we are going to get around today, and we're going to teach people how to create entire documents that are cohesive, that are far more than 4096 tokens, which is all that it can return at one chat, if that makes sense. And we'll show you how to get around that. Okay, number nine, research tool examples for aggregating and assembling the data corpus for each subject. We're going to talk about this, but there's some tools that we're going to use to assemble data, because we're not going to trust the data that the LLM has. We're going to provide it with all the data ahead of time, and the tools that we use to gather that data is obviously Google search. We do Google, Google search. Perplexity has really come a long way. Notebook, LM, chat, GPT itself, we will ask to generate reports, especially with deep research now, and also we use Google 1.5 well it's 2.0 now. Grow with deep research. We use that as well, and we use these tools basically to generate current informational reports on our subjects or author before we go ahead and create the actual article. 17:26 All that makes sense. 17:30 Yep, following so far. Okay, great. Number 10, this we will cover later, but it's called the pair method. I just want to put this in everyone's brain. Pair, P, A, R, E, stands for Prime, augment, refresh, evaluate, but all you have to remember is prime. Prime is going to be the most important piece of this framework that we're going to use. You also don't have to worry about remembering any of this, because all of it's in a document that we will provide you after the course. So all you have to do is listen, okay, and this moves us on to the actual process for creating an article. And as we do this article, we're going to take the example of Dr Adams recent visit at CSUN, 18:08 and we're going to identify the subjects on the author. So we are ready to get started on the actual process. Do you have any questions before we do DR Adams, 18:17 I want to see how you spun my straw into gold. All 18:22 right. Well, here's how we did it. Okay, step number one of 10, identify the author of the final article that you want to create. This is kind of obvious. In this case, the author is Dr Kirk Adams. Why is that important? Because we have to build a corpus of that author, preferably with text that that author has written themselves. This is not a requirement. You can build an AI persona for someone who has not written their own text, but since Dr Adams has a beautiful dissertation in place and plenty of text that he has written by himself long before AI came along, we aggregate all of that data and we sample from it in order to pull a statistical analysis of the way that Dr Adams writes specifically, and chat GPT does this really well, and it it's a really great workaround, but you identify your author first, and then you put together a corpus about that...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: March 6, 2025: Interview with Tiffani Martin, Founder, VisioTech
03/06/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: March 6, 2025: Interview with Tiffani Martin, Founder, VisioTech
Tiffani Martin is an AI & Technology Strategy Leader, Social Tech Entrepreneur, and Accessibility Innovator who specializes in AI governance, responsible innovation, and technology strategy. With extensive expertise in AI ethics, compliance, automation, and digital transformation, she supports executives and organizations in scaling AI initiatives, optimizing operations, and mitigating risks, while ensuring equity and accessibility in technology adoption. As the Founder of VisioTech, Tiffani leads research and development efforts in accessible AI and emerging technology solutions, guiding companies in aligning with regulatory compliance, industry standards, and responsible AI practices. Her exceptional ability to bridge strategy, operations, and AI governance has garnered significant recognition, including: ✔ Black Enterprise's 40 Under 40 ✔ Dallas Business Journal's 40 Under 40 ✔ AI Innovator of the Year (Black AI Think Tank) ✔ Lex Frieden Entrepreneur of the Year Award (Presented by Governor Greg Abbott) Tiffani serves as an Executive Board Member and Director for Ambassadors for the North Texas Disability Chamber, contributing actively to accessibility and AI policy. Additionally, she collaborates with industry leaders, policymakers, and research institutions to shape frameworks that ensure equitable AI adoption and ethical decision-making within emerging technologies. How Tiffani Drives Impact: AI & Tech Strategy: Aligns AI-driven innovation with business objectives and compliance frameworks. Executive Advisory: Partners with C-suite leaders to advance AI governance, risk mitigation, and responsible AI adoption. Workforce Development: Builds inclusive AI talent pipelines through mentorship and strategic initiatives. Digital Transformation: Leads cross-functional teams in implementing scalable and ethical AI solutions. Operations & Governance: Designs strategic roadmaps, optimizes workflows, and enhances decision-making structures to support AI-driven business transformations. Thought Leadership & Industry Influence: Tiffani's insights on AI governance, accessibility, and business strategy have been featured in national business and academic publications. She frequently delivers keynote addresses at STEM, accessibility, and technology events, shaping critical conversations around responsible innovation, ethical AI, and inclusive technology. Furthermore, Tiffani develops industry frameworks, including the Accessible AI Quotient, which provides structured methodologies for inclusive AI development and ethical deployment. She also actively participates on advisory boards, task forces, and executive panels aimed at advancing responsible AI policies and best practices across various industries. TRANSCRIPT: 00:00 Music. Speaker 1 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, Speaker 2 00:37 so welcome everybody to the cleverly named podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, and today I have a guest a new friend, Tiffany Martin, and Tiffany was introduced to me by a mutual friend of ours, Dr froswa Booker DREW Thank you, froswa, for connecting Tiffany and I You're a master connector, and we appreciate you. And Tiffany is also a blind person like myself. For those of you who don't know me, again, it's Dr Kirk Adams. I am managing director of innovative impact LLC, which is my consulting practice. I am the immediate past president and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind. Prior to that, the same roles at the lighthouse for the blind Inc, here in Seattle, I have devoted my professional and academic careers to creating opportunities for other people with disabilities, particularly blind people, to thrive in our society. And my main focus has been employment. I think a good, meaningful, well paying career addresses lots of issues. So I've spent my time focusing on helping create conditions in which blind people can 01:55 be meaningfully employed. Speaker 2 01:57 And I was introduced to Tiffany and we share many of the same interests and values. So Tiffany, if you would like to introduce yourself to the vast podcast audience, or Speaker 3 02:14 as Dr Kirk mentioned, I am blind. I became blind at the age of 28 so I was sighted, I ended up getting diabetic retinopathy, and so I had to make a complete life change. But before then, 02:30 I lived a very Speaker 3 02:33 active lifestyle, traveling started. My background is in digital marketing, and so I was doing that for a global humanitarian service named United mega here. And then I went and took all, you know, my gifts, over into a ministry. And then then I went blind in the midst of that, and I realized I could do way more with technology than I felt that I could with marketing. It was a it was a gap filler for me, and their revelation came right when I lost my sight at the same time I had kidney failure, and so I was on dialysis and in and out of hospitals, but trying to maintain a nine to five as well as a five to nine the entire time. And so three transplants later, I sit before you now. I'm about to graduate from Baylor University with my MBA, with a concentration in cyber security. I went to the blind institute of technology so I can learn Web and Digital Accessibility. Became a certified product owner, Certified Scrum Master, because I wanted to understand the process in developing technology and how to facilitate that. And like I mentioned, I'll be graduating in May, and I have really high hopes in pursuing my PhD and focusing more on AI governance as well as accessibility within the corporate space. So just a lot of pivots in my life. And this one coming up, I'm looking to really step foot into academia. And that's really, truly how I came across Dr Fauci. And she said, You, I have a wonderful, absolutely amazing person that you need to meet, and that was that was you. Dr Kirk, so I'm so glad that she did that. I've learned so much in the time that we talked and shared. And so just glad to be here. Speaker 2 04:52 And I want to ask you about one of your pivots. So as I mentioned in the intro, you know, my retina is detached when I was five years old. So I became totally blind before first grade. And so most, most of us who are blind aren't totally blind, only about 10% of us in the other people are legally blind and have various degrees of usable vision. So sometimes there's a question, especially for young kids, like, does this this kid really need to learn braille. Can they use other modes technology? Can they listen to stuff with me? There was no question I was totally blind. I needed to learn to write Braille. There was no question. I needed to learn how to travel independently with a cane, white cane I had in my hand as first grader, and, you know, at that time, learned how to type on a typewriter. So I learned how to type it as a six year old, so that when I was ready, I could go to public school my neighbors and siblings, which I did starting in fourth grade. But for you, you lived 28 years as a sighted person, and you kind of just said, became blind at 28 and had to learn a lot of stuff. So I think I'd like to dig into that a little bit. So many people go through a grief cycle. Many people are just shell shocked by becoming blind after living us with our formative years of the sighted person and you are an example and a role model of someone who assessed the situation and took action. And I would really like to hear, what did you you mentioned blindness to do technology, but how did you start? What did you do? First, what did you do? Second, in order to move to the place where you are now, whereas a blind person. You're about to graduate with your MBA from Baylor and planning to launch into a doctoral program. How did you get from sighted person, newly blind person, to really efficient, effective, thriving blind person? Speaker 3 06:59 You know, a lot a lot of people ask me, you know, when I'm speaking or just in passing, you know, what happened? You know, how did you manage? What was it like? And I really, I don't even think to this day, I've actually truly processed it was okay. This is something that has happened to me, and I gotta adjust. And, you know, I have a wonderful, great supportive system with my parents, but I had to, you know, move back home, you know, selling my car, getting rid of, you know, my my place downtown. It was really, really something that, when you get into the thick of it, is one of those, you know, fright, like, you know, all of those, and not just my instincts kicked into, Okay, I gotta, I gotta figure something out. You know, my parents were adamant about my autonomy, and so my dad received information through a program out here at Texas Workforce Solutions. And the first time I could, you know, get an appointment, I was there, and it was my first interaction with somebody independent using technology. My case manager was a woman that was blind and immediate reaction to when I met her, was in awe, because the first thing I heard was her computer, and it's going a mile a minute. And, you know, anybody will tell you if they hear voiceover or, you know, a screen reader is just sounds like gibberish. And so my dad. I remember he got real close. He said, One day, you want to be able to do that. And you know at the time, I'm glad I have no idea with that, Speaker 2 08:49 when we got onto this call and you run out a much more rapid read than I do, so you've made it 08:55 our screen reading technology really well. Speaker 3 08:57 Yeah, I'm actually increasing my speed. My mentor, his name is Vincent Martin. He's blind himself. He has seven degrees, two of which are PhDs, and he said he reads 900 words per minute, and that's listening comprehension and retention. So I'm at 500 right now, and I'm trying to make my way up, though, but that's just the competitor in me, but yeah, like, I'm able to do that with technology. So the courses that Texas Workforce offered, they said it takes about a month, but I learned everything in about a week, just two weeks, just, you know, at the precaution, you know, and everything. But as soon as I got my computer back, I had to go. I started on a PC. Then I became a Mac person. When I became blind, I had to go back to a PC, learning jaws. And recently, I just taught myself how to use, you know, MacBook, since I was already, you know, leveraging the iPhone, iPad and so forth. But no. It's just, there's just intrinsic curiosity that that comes with, I believe would happen, you know, with my site, and I've just taken that and really challenged myself to see how far I could go. I don't, I will say this, I don't know if I would have pushed myself as hard if I was not blind, and that's crazy, but I think me pushing the limits of what I can do with the loss of a faculty is kind of just intriguing to me. 10:33 And Speaker 2 10:36 you're about to finish your master's business administration degree, but you also are a tech founder, so I love to let people hear about your company. Speaker 3 10:49 Yeah, so Visio Tech, we work on the research and strategy development of accessible technology focused on on artificial intelligence. I made the pivot a couple years back where I just wanted to focus on accessible technology, but I really from the advice of a business partner, which he he does a lot in generative AI, but I said, Hey, I think we need to go ahead and make that pivot, because AI and accessibility just go hand in hand. AI is an assistive tool. I use it for accessibility. A lot of people use it for productivity, but I really felt like this would be the gap filler with people with disabilities. You know, it's, it optimizes, you know, your workflow and creativity and things of that nature. And if we can get our hands on it, that's the, it's that access point that I'm concerned with. And so, you know, that's what we do now, like I said before, I'm taking it so much serious that, you know, I want to get that PhD. So I have a very deep understanding of not just the capabilities, but the implications of what it means on society. And so I just, I want to be well versed. I want to be on the operating, you know, operator side as well as the consumer. I want to understand that. And so I can, you know, help bridge the gap for other people as well. So, so Speaker 2 12:23 you just said something in a I've heard you talk about your company more than once, but you just said something, maybe in a new way, maybe I'm finally listening, but use of AI for accessibility. So your your company is focused specifically on harnessing AI to improve the lives of people with disabilities. So am I hearing that right? Speaker 3 12:49 Yeah, that's, that's where we are right now. It's been a lot of like research, you know, I've had to bootstrap the entire time, and more so now you know thing ever, but we really took a step back. Brought on, you know, new team members 13:08 really looking into, Speaker 3 13:12 you know, how fast is advancing? I'm particularly interested in agents, just for autonomous reason, and that's just kind of like a personal goal for me with being blind, is I'm very concerned with autonomy, and to be able to leverage a tool that could, you know, operate on its own. I'm doing one thing while it's doing another, that just duplicates me several times over. And so I'm like, Okay, this could help me. I know it can help others. And so, you know, I've kind of been on this evangelist movement of trying to eradicate the fears associated with AI, particularly with with people in marginalized communities. But, you know, like everybody, we have to take, you know, baby steps. So that's kind of where we are. Speaker 2 14:05 Yeah, I have two, two things come to mind. First is there, there are people listening right now who are jumping up out of their chair saying she is doing something that is so important and meaningful to me. I need to, I need to engage. I need to experience this, I need to get involved. So how can those listening want to learn more about Visio tech? How do they do that? I Speaker 3 14:29 mean, I'm always on my phone, even I have the meta glasses on right now. So I'm hearing everything you know going on, not right now, of course, but I'm very active on LinkedIn. I found my people and LinkedIn, you know, other techies with disabilities and so forth. So, you know, you can contact me there with an eye, by the way, Tiffany with an eye. Yes, you know, my mom's had to be different for whatever reason. I. Yeah, Speaker 2 15:00 it's got style. Well, it's T, I F, F, A, N, I Speaker 3 15:04 m a, yeah, but either that or via email, Tiffany with an i at Visio tech, V, i, s, i, o, T, E, C, H, dot, C, O, Speaker 2 15:17 okay, Tiffany with an i at Visio tech.co Speaker 3 15:21 right? And the funny thing, oh, sorry, go ahead. Oh, you know the funny thing about the website, so just kind of going back, I've been very, you know, obsessed with no code, low code. But with the new models that have been coming out, I've been playing around with programming because that was something that I was starting to learn right before I lost my site. So there's, you know, there's times where I'm testing it out on the site to, you know, see if it works. Just to see, you know, like, as somebody that had, you know, little to no understanding of programming that was, you know, trying to start life happen, and coming back. And I'm like, this tool, you know, there's so many tools out there, Claude winds, serve cursor, GitHub copilot, you know, I'm like, Wow. You know, people who have no experience in coding can now, you know, learn how to do that. So, you know, you might see little things on the side, and it's me just like, you know, working through it. So, Speaker 2 16:25 yeah, and then the you said marginalized populations. So you are an African American woman who was blind, and I just saw a stat recently. It was focused on Silicon Valley, but it's probably a pretty good snapshot of tech. 70% of the employees are non disabled white males. So you are living with several identities related to marginalized populations, and as you look at the institutional barriers that exist around in our country, race, sex and evilism, any reflections, any any thoughts, any dynamics that you find uniquely challenging or uniquely satisfying and occupying these overlapping identities? Speaker 3 17:20 Yeah, it's a very peculiar town that we're in. 17:25 It seems like every time I'm, Speaker 3 17:28 you know, opening up my phone, there's an update, there's something that is at risk of being removed, that specifically impacts my life. You know, we're talking about education. We're talking about like, section 504, and accommodations and workplace, and it's just, it can be very overwhelming right now. And I'm not going to sit here and say I'm an optimistic at all, but I do see similar to what happened when I lost my sight, when there are challenges that we face and barriers, it is an opportunity to set the world on its head and really come together, but use our voice and amplify our voice with allies and so forth to make it known. Of the possibilities, you know, that comes with the accommodations that come with the technology that comes with, you know, just the the assistance. I will say this and I stand firm. I've said it on, you know, other interviews and podcasts, di is not a license for mediocrity. It is just an opportunity for people in marginalized groups to be afforded opportunities that their counterparts had. It has opened the door for a lot of incredible, great minds. And one thing I will say about people with disabilities, we have an intrinsic ingenuity about us, an adaptability that I think is second to none, that I think all businesses could benefit from. And so I'm a living witness of that Baylor, they removed, they waived the GRE, which I think is a barrier in education, but that's, that's a whole different podcast, but by them doing that, they gave me the opportunity. It's an r1 university, and I am on par to graduate the top 25% of my class now, 19:44 sorry, is that fabulous? Speaker 3 19:46 Yeah? Like, thank you. That I don't know if anybody will be able to witness that or in experience that if they did not give me the opportunity, if accommodations weren't set in place, but because it is. And I can now see the possibilities. I am now able to contribute, not only to that university, but other people, other organizations I contact because of what I am learning there. So you know, if I'm, if I'm a walking billboard for why accommodations matter at this time, at this specific time with the political climate, I'll be that for however long that takes. Speaker 2 20:20 Well, you know, I've been thinking a lot about this meritocracy concept that's being mentioned a lot, and I think if you take us, everyone takes a few steps back. I think we would all it'd be hard to disagree with the thought that we want people to be able to contribute as fully as possible to our society and bring their talents and their skills and their strengths into the mix. And there are barriers that have prevented really...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: February 27, 2025: Robyn Grable, Founder and CEO, Talents ASCEND
02/27/2025
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: February 27, 2025: Robyn Grable, Founder and CEO, Talents ASCEND
In this episode of Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion, Dr. Kirk Adams speaks with Robyn Grable, Founder and CEO of Talents ASCEND (. 00:00 Music. Speaker 1 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, Speaker 2 00:37 hello, everybody. This is Dr Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. Welcome to my monthly live streamed webinar. Supercharge your bottom line through disability inclusion and today, we have a marvelous guest who is out there doing great work. Robin Grable is here with us. If you want to say, Hi Robin. We'll get back to you in depth. Speaker 3 01:02 Hello everyone. Thank you. Dr Adams, appreciate you being here. Appreciate me being here. Yeah, and Speaker 2 01:06 you and your company is talents ascend. Talents ascend, which is a beautiful name, and mine is innovative impact LLC, so we've got talents ascending. We've got impact innovating at all kinds of good stuff happening here today, but we're going to talk about how employers can access unique, highly motivated, highly talented pools of potential employees, and that's something I focus on. For those of you who don't know me, I am a totally blind person. My retina is detached. When I was in kindergart, I went from being a sighted child to a blind child, really, overnight. And my parents were in their mid 20s at the time. They had never met a blind person in their lives before I became one, and no, they were told Kirk can't come back to school here at the neighborhood school. He needs to go to the State School for the Blind kids. And wound up going to the Oregon State School for the Blind for first, second and third grade, and had a marvelous launching pad. There some things that happened as a 678, year old I've only come to appreciate much later, and I can distinctly say that I was given three gifts during my my time. There one was my blindness skills as a totally blind kid, there was no question that I need to learn braille, that I need to learn how to use a cane, and only about 10% of us who are legally blind are totally blind. So a lot of kids, there's some question, can they use magnification nowadays? You know, could they just listen to everything? But I needed to learn braille, and I did. I use it every day, and I learned how to travel confidently with a white cane, and I learned how to type on a typewriter so I could start into public school and type my spelling test and type my papers and my tests and things. So I got those blindness skills, which we all, all of us who have an impairment of some kind, whether it's hearing, vision, mobility, cognitive, need to learn alternative techniques that other people don't necessarily need to know, but we do, and those skills are so important. 03:34 The second thing, Speaker 2 03:36 the second thing I was given was a strong internal locus of control, which just meant I felt in my bones that I could solve my problems, forge my own path, create, create a way forward. And they really did that through experiences. This was the 1960s I would I would say the school was run by some really cool hippies, and they took us backpacking in the Three Sisters wilderness area and horseback camping up on Mount Hood to build big snow forts, huge snowballs and in the tide pools and the Oregon coast, feeling around for starfish and sea anemones, I remember being at a cabin up at a mountain lake using a cross cut saw to cut firewood and just all kinds of experiential things that just gave me that strong internal locus of control or agency, as opposed to A strong external locus, which just gives you this feeling that things are happening to you, there's not what you can do about it. So I had the blindness skills, I had the strong internal locus of control, 04:53 and then I also had 04:57 Jeremy's note takers talking. I. Speaker 2 05:00 Um, I also had high expectations so my parents, my dad was a high school basketball coach. My parents didn't want to see anything less than an A on a report card. They expected me to do chores like my brother and sister, and a lot of kids with impairments don't have that because people like my parents weren't familiar with people with disabilities. Schools aren't used to working with people with disabilities, so oftentimes kids have to deal with low expectations from their family, their school, a lot of caretaking, a lot of kind of paternalism. So sometimes that stuff gets internalized. So again, I was given the blindness skills, the sense of agency and the high expectation, which, which really enabled me when I started into public school as a fourth grader in the sink, sink or swim Public School of small town Pacific Northwest noise like I was equipped, equipped to deal with that fast forwarding I went on through school that very well, academically, participated in varsity sports, was involved in other extracurricular activities, was the sports editor of my little high school paper, which meant I got to write a monthly, no weekly high school sports column for the Snohomish Tribune, our little town paper. So I had a had a job as a 16 year old, which many, many young people with disabilities don't, don't get that experience. So so I had a lot of nice things given to me through the course of my life. Earned a scholarship, full scholarship to Whitman College through a foundation called the Jesse Ridley Foundation, which provided full scholarships to blind students going to a small select number of schools, and a recruiter from Whitman College, when he visited the high school, saw me with my white cane and my braille, and said, Can you stay after the presentation? Because we have access to this foundation, and we've never been able to use it, because we've never had a blind student at our college before. Would you like to apply? So I did that. So again, I was given a gift through no real effort of mine, I had to maintain a three to five GPA, and at the end of every semester, I wrote a letter to the foundation and told them what I had learned, sent to my transcript, told them about my classes, then told them what I was planning to learn the following semester, and then they and told them how much tuition and room and board was, and they sent me a check. So I was an 18 year old to get a $24,000 check in the mail was pretty exciting, and I went to go to the bank and deposit it get $100 bill. 08:02 That was big doings for me. Speaker 2 08:05 The other thing that happened, and this, this is something I think Robin and I will really want to talk about, is the special skills and capabilities you developed, develop as a person living with a disability, or person who's had the experience of being a military veteran. You know, looking at the book The Talent Code, we learn skills and we develop capabilities and characteristics and strengths through overcoming challenges. And you know, world class musicians and athletes and chess champions. You know, they do that systematically. There's a program start right? I studied piano for eight years. So you start with scales and forwards, coordinating your left hand and right hand, and you play increasingly complex pieces. And so you set your set challenges intentionally. Some people call it scaffolding, but that's how you achieve mastery as a person living with a disability every day you it's not that, it's not that regimented or calculated or thought out, but you are faced with challenges daily and as you grow and attempt to thrive in more and more complex settings. Going through school, employment, housing, relationships, you're faced with increasingly difficult challenges, and you overcome them. So I had some experiences I look back on as a 18 year old, as a freshman in college, that my classmates weren't having I couldn't get all my materials in Braille like I did in K 12. So I was getting some books on cassette recorded by a volunteer group Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic, which is now a Learning Ally, some textbooks. I got some I did. And I had some money from the Washington State Commission for the Blind to hire readers so I could pay my classmates minimum wage to read me textbooks that they needed to read anyway. So I was interviewing people, hiring, sometimes, firing, invoicing, paying. So I was managing accounts payable and accounts receivable and hiring and documenting and reporting to the state and all those things. And my my classmates weren't needing to do those things. There was a concept called the expanded core curriculum that was developed by my former place of employment, the American Foundation for the Blind, some years ago. And this is, this is news that blind students get to receive at some point, and they're told, hey, hey, blind kid, you need to learn all the stuff the sighted kids learn, and nine more things like the use of assistive technology, Braille, how to travel safely using a cane or a guide dog. Career Exploration, because we know blind kids graduate from high school have a far less comprehensive view of the world of work than their sighted classmates do, and advocacy. So how to advocate for yourself as a skill we need to teach our disabled kids my my story that I often repeat is my senior year in high school, there were about 30 of us who were college bound. And first period, we all went into physics. Second period, we all walked into math analysis, and third period we all walked into chemistry, and the chemistry teacher said, Oh, no, you cannot take chemistry. That is a safety issue. You need to go to the office and get a get a different class. And I, I was upset, and I went home and talk to my parents, who are both teachers, and they said, Well, if Mr. So and So says, then that's that's that. So they didn't have the information. The school didn't have the information. So I was not given the information that I certainly could have taken chemistry and been very successful. I now know blind PhDs in chemistry. I know blind people who teach chemistry at the university level. So I did not have the self advocacy skills. I was not taught them. I also did not have a network. I did not know any blind adults who were successfully navigating the world that I can turn to for advice and help. So to to all people involved with young blind people, let's take advantage of the great tools we have today with technology, connect with community and find blind adults who are doing great things in the world, and then build that that network for our young, blind and disabled people. 13:05 So, Speaker 2 13:08 as I mentioned, I was the president, CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind till about two and a half years ago, which was Helen Keller's organization. Very moving moment for me, being in the New York offices and walking down the hallway and sitting at Helen Keller's desk and playing with her typewriter where she wrote all of her books and speeches, and just feeling that power. And prior to that, I held the same role at the lighthouse for the blind Inc here in Seattle, Washington, which is a social enterprise employing blind and deaf, blind people in a number of businesses, including aerospace manufacturing, and been a supplier to the Boeing company since the 1950s 110 120 blind and deaf, blind machinists. I'm doing advanced manufacturing, and I was chatting with Robin before we before we started our session. She's in South Carolina. And just prior to my transitioning from the lighthouse to AFB, I was involved in the lighthouse purchasing a manufacturing facility in Somerville, South Carolina, where Currently there are about 30 blind people, 30 blind South Carolinians, employed as part of the Boeing 787, supply chain there. So I I've had a lot of really interesting experiences and employing people who are blind and deaf, blind, being a blind employee myself. I spent 10 years in corporate America and banking and finance, I've been a frustrated, disabled job seeker, having the experience so many of us have with in my case, getting graduated from college with cum laude, phi, beta, kappa, and sending out my cover letter and my resume and getting. Phone interview and being excited and going in for my in person interview, and walking in with my long white cane, my slate and stylus and some braille paper so I could take notes, and that employer sitting across the table, not surprisingly, had probably never worked with a blind person before, had no idea of the tools and techniques and technology we use, and could not imagine how, how could this blind kid do this financial analyst job he's applying for? So I had, I had that experience multiple, multiple times, and then I started disclosing my disability earlier in the process. If you have a visible disability, there's a point at which you need to decide when to disclose your disability. So I wasn't disclosing until I walked into the in person interview. So I changed my strategy and was putting in my cover letter. I've been totally blind since age five. Here's how I've done all this stuff that's on my resume. Here's how I'll do the job. And then then I wasn't even getting the phone interview, so I certainly, over the years, have talked to many, many, many blind people and people with other significant disabilities who've had similar experiences. Sent out 10 times as many resumes gone, 10 times as many interviews as their brothers and sisters and neighbors without impairments. And that is why only 35% of us with significant disabilities are in the work workforce, as compared to 70% of the general population. We're also in a much narrower band of types of occupations. We're largely confined toward the bottom of the org chart. The majority of us work for nonprofits or government, which are wonderful places to work, but have limited salary ceilings, so we have lower incomes, less wealth, more poverty, and all of the outcome disparities that come with poverty, around depression, substance abuse and dropout rates, marriage dissolutions and all those things. So that's what I dedicate my time to, and my my professional and academic career. I have a PhD in leadership and change. It's called journeys. I did a dissertation called journeys through rough country where I interviewed 11 blind adults who self identified as successfully employed at large American corporations, and learned a lot about their journeys and what their success factors were. And I talked about some of them already, the blindness skills, the internal locus of control. Other things included family support, the opportunity to work as part of a team or a group as a young person, supportive and immediate supervisor, a commitment from top management to accessibility, and although all of them self identified as successfully employed, they all also expressed disappointment, disappointment that they were perhaps the only person with a visible disability who'd reached their level in their organization, disappointment that people who were hired after them, who had less experience and less skill were promoted beyond them, disappointment that there weren't people in the C suite or at the board level with disabilities, disappointment that they had to continually fight for accessibility, that their employers would often make changes to systems that they needed to use for their work without taking into account accessibility. So walking in on a Monday morning and finding out you couldn't do your job because the new system was not accessible. So it was a very enlightening experience for me. I I have come to believe that a good, meaningful, engaging career with fair compensation solves a lot of issues. People with disabilities in our in our country, it's also a matter of self identification of the dignity of work and the respect and the feeling of self worth that comes to be being a contributing person in society. So I did start a consulting practice, innovative impact LLC. I work with companies to help them win the battle for talent by accessing underutilized, overlooked pools of highly motivated, talented people with lots of strengths, people with disabilities. And as I began that journey, I had reached out to a gentleman named Ed Hinkler, whom I respect greatly. And. Told him I was transitioning into this consulting role, and he said, Well, you need to meet Robin raybel. So Robin and I got on a call several years ago now, and she had been devoting her time, energy, effort and talent to creating opportunities, particularly for our veterans, and had broadened her scope to include people with disabilities. We've been in close contact ever since. I applaud her for what she is doing. I want to support her efforts at talents ascend in any way I can, and I would love to turn hand the talking stick to Robin for a while, and Robin would just love to hear your journey, what brought you to the point of creating talents and what motivated you. How do you define your purpose and what what is the scope of what you're doing now, and where do you hope to take it so if we could go, where have you been? Where are you now, and where you're going? That would be a wonderful thing to hear from you. Speaker 3 21:09 All right. Well, thank you so much, Dr Adams for having me on and talking about that. This is a topic I love to talk about. As you know, it's very near and dear to my heart for several reasons. I am a service disabled veteran, so I have a couple of things more invisible disabilities, so I don't have to necessarily disclose them in the work situation. But I am legally blind in my left eye from histoplasmosis, a condition that I got suddenly when I turned 40, all of a sudden, I couldn't see out of my left eye. And it came to be that I had histoplasmosis. So it was very strange to go from having 2020 vision to all of a sudden not being able to see out of one of my eyes, which caused problems for my right eye because it had to work harder. It had to work twice as hard to help me see, you know, perfectly. So my journey started nine years in the Navy, and at a time when women, you know, were questioned as to why they served in the military. It was 1979 when I went in the Navy, and, you know, it was a tough time, because they people didn't want women in the military. So you couldn't ask for help. You couldn't ask for, you know, assistance on anything. You really had to be strong. And when I got out of the Navy, I was told my skills didn't translate, so I really had to start over and face those barriers of you know, do I tell people I'm a veteran? Because they want to question, well, what did you do in the military? Very similar as you were talking Dr Adams about your journey, and I'm just so first of all, let me step back here and say, what a blessing that and a journey that you've been on because at in the 60s, having going, gone through what you did with your parents and how they supported you and all the things, it's just amazing. I love, love to hear that I've not heard your complete story before, so that just amazing. But as you were talking about the barriers that you know the disability community faces, it's the same, unfortunately for all underserved talent, veterans face these barriers of trying to figure out how they navigate a brand new world of civilian life after they've served in the military, how do they take their skills? How do they get people that don't know anything about the military to accept their skills and what they can do, versus judging...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: January 30, 2025: Eddie Mazariegos, CEO, Future Gen
01/30/2025
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: January 30, 2025: Eddie Mazariegos, CEO, Future Gen
In this episode of Supercharge Your Bottom Line Trough Disability Inclusion, Dr. Kirk Adams speaks with Future Gen CEO, Eddie Mazzariegos, about innovative ways to improve employment outcomes for youth with disabilities. They explore how technology-driven career exploration can reduce barriers, highlight new opportunities, and empower students — especially those who are blind or visually impaired — to chart their own professional paths. Eddie also shares the inspiring story behind Future Gen, the platform's collaboration with vocational rehabilitation programs, and practical tips for educators, families, and advocates aiming to supercharge career readiness and break the cycle of chronic unemployment. 📌 Key Topics Covered: 👉 The importance of early exposure to diverse career pathways 👉 How short-form video curation personalizes career exploration 👉 Strategies to build confidence, self-advocacy, and high expectations 👉 Partnerships with schools and vocational rehab agencies for inclusive education 👉 Real-life successes and how to scale meaningful impact For more insights or to connect with Dr. Kirk Adams: ► Website: | Email: 📧️ | LinkedIn: Learn more about Future Gen: ► Website: | LinkedIn: Don't forget to like, share, and subscribe for more conversations on disability inclusion and employment! TRANSCRIPT: SUMMARY KEYWORDS disability inclusion, employment for disabled, career pathways, workforce participation, chronic unemployment, poverty issues, home ownership, health disparities, blindness skills, high expectations, internal locus, career exploration, future Gen, mentorship programs, career readiness SPEAKERS Speaker 1, Speaker 2 Speaker 1 00:02 Welcome everybody. This is Dr Kirk Adams speaking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington, and this is my monthly live streamed webinar. Supercharge your bottom line through Disability Inclusion, where we focus on employment for people with disabilities, and that is my passion, both professionally, personally, academically, what I have focused on. And each month, I bring a guest who shares that passion with me to create career pathways for people with disabilities to thrive our world. And today, I have the pleasure of having a conversation with Eddie mazzariegos from future Gen. And Eddie, if you can just say hi, and then we’ll come back to you in a bit. Speaker 2 00:53 It sounds perfectly fine. Hi everybody. My name is Eddie mazzaregos, as Dr Kirk just mentioned, and I’m Di Len as a neighbor nearby Kirk here in Tacoma, Washington, Speaker 1 01:06 and you are the CEO of a fairly new company called Future Gen, which is addressing some really pressing needs in the space of employment for people with disabilities. So it’s a pleasure to have you here, and we’ll hear a lot more about future Gen in a bit. So for those of you who don’t know me, again, it’s Dr Kirk Adams. I am the immediate past president and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind, prior to that same role at the lighthouse for the blind here in Seattle, I’ve spent the last 30 plus years really focused on employment issues for people with disabilities, people who are blind, in particular, and there’s, there’s, there’s some really well documented reasons why I do that. Only about 35% of us with significant disabilities are in the workforce. That’s about half the workforce participation rate of the general population. So with chronic unemployment, chronic lack of workforce participation, come to poverty just to just to be really clear about it. So a lot of our people in our community live in poverty. 02:23 Many people have a small Speaker 1 02:28 transfer payment from the government. Social Security, disability insurance being the most typical one, where people get a $1,700 or so per month, which is is not a living income level in our country. So along with poverty comes a lack of home ownership. Our home ownership rate is about 110 that of the general population. Health Disparities, lower life expectancy greater substance abuse issues, depression, mental health issues. So I say, if you look at people with disabilities, blind people in particular, compared to the general population, our outcomes are either half as half as good or twice as bad as the general population. So we really want to address that by being thoughtful and understanding what all the dynamics are to this complex problem. And I want to talk about young people in particular. So as we look at the demographics, as I said, Only 35% of us are the workforce. Of those of us who are working, the majority of us, 03:49 more than half, work for nonprofits or government, Speaker 1 03:54 which is a lower income ceiling than general employment, and we’re in a much narrower band of occupations. We know, and I know blind people are capable of being successful in any profession you can think of. I know blind chemists and blind auto mechanics, of course, lawyers and software engineers and cyber security analysts, teachers, any occupation you can can think of, but we’re grouped in a narrower band than the general population, and we’re also tend to stick at the Bottom couple levels of the org chart. So you don’t see a lot of people with significant disabilities up in for management at major corporations, CEOs of companies, nonprofits, et cetera. So we really want to address that, and the route really starts in childhood. So. And you know, there are people who’ve lived their lives as sighted people and become blind as part of the aging process, or through accident or or or illness, but I really want to talk about people who are growing up visually impaired. So something like only 10% of us are totally blind. I am totally blame myself. Many people, most people who are legally blind, have some level of vision, some some usable, some more usable than others. But it’s, it’s really a quite, quite a wide spectrum, and so my retina is detached when I was in kindergarten, and I went to a school for blind kids, because that’s what kids with disabilities did 60s. And I went to the Oregon State School for the Blind and in first, second and third grade, and I was given three things that are now that I know through research, and I am a researcher. I have a PhD in leadership and change. I did an ethnographic study of blind adults successfully employed in large corporations. But through research, I now know I was given three things that are strong predictors of future success in employment as a blind adult. So so first I was given blindness skills. So being totally blind as a six year old, there was no question that I needed to learn braille. I needed to learn how to travel independently and confidently with a white cane. I needed to learn how to type on a typewriter. So when I started in public school, I could type my spelling tests and my assignments and papers and things for teachers. So I so I learned those things as a six year old, and we now know that the stronger your blind, your specific blindness skills are, the more likely you are to be able to succeed in appointment. The second thing I was given was high expectations. The school I was at, there was 110 120 blind kids. It was K through K through eight. And I know lots of blind kiddos have additional disabilities that are challenging. You know, the philosophy of the Oregon State School for the Blind was that you should be performing at grade level consistent with what your sighted brothers and sisters and neighbors would be doing, as far as reading and math and things like that. So the school held high expectations of me and my parents did as well. They were very young when I became blind. They were in their mid 20s, but my they were both teachers. My father was very involved in athletics. He had a career as a high school basketball coach. They didn’t want to see anything less than an A on a report card, and they didn’t use my case. The third thing I was given was a real sense of agency, or a strong internal locus of control, which means I really came to believe in my bones that I could create my own path forward. I could solve problems, I could figure things out. And, you know, the school gave us a lot of experiences. We went horseback camping in the Three Sisters wilderness area. We went up on Mount Hood and built snow forts of huge snowballs. We got on the tide pools on the Oregon coast and built around for starfish and sea anemones. And we climbed trees and scraped our knees and did all the things kids that age should do and that strong internal locus of control is opposed by an external locus of control when you and that’s a feeling that you really believe things happen to you, you can’t do much about it, kind of at the whims and mercy of fate, rather than creating, creating your destiny. So I was, I was given those three things, not not all kids with disabilities, blind kids are given those, those things. No kids with usable vision. Sometimes there’s a question, does this kid really need to learn to read Braille? Could they use magnification? They listen to stuff. But in my case, that literacy question was was clear. I needed, needed to get those blindness skills. So 09:32 looking at Speaker 1 09:35 developmentally appropriate stages of life, know you as a parent. If you’re a parent of a blind kid, or you’re a young blind person, or have a young blind person in your life, you want them to be doing what sighted kids do at that at the same age. So if your four year old sighted child is out tussling around in the sandbox on the playground with the. Neighbor kids. You know your blind child should be doing that with a probably with a cane in their hand. If your middle schooler, sighted son or daughter is going to meet their friends to go to the movies, your blind child should be doing that too. They may have a different transportation solution, but they should be doing those things so it’s it’s typical that those developmentally appropriate stages can be managed up until the teen years, and then some things start happening. I grew up in small towns in the Pacific Northwest. When kids turned 16 in the towns I grew up in, they got driver’s licenses, which I didn’t do, and I lived where there was not public transportation, and most kids got some sort of job, did something for pay, and the statistics show that less than 23% of us with significant disabilities get any kind of paid work experience before the age of 23 and that’s opposed to over 70% of the general population get some some kind of paid work experience. So so that’s kind of where the divide tends to start. And if you don’t get that early work experience, and the others competing for jobs, have it, you, you’re you’re at a significant disadvantage, looking at the factors that lead to successful thriving as blind adults, looking at blind kids and blind adults, there was there was really good research done the American Foundation for the Blind, my organization I proudly led, and Dr Phil hatland, Among others, developed concept called the expanded core curriculum, and this, this may not be welcome news for any young, blind kids listening to this, but you have to learn all the stuff the cited kids learn, and nine other things, right? Nine more things. It’s a lot of hard work, and those things include those blindness skills that I mentioned, Braille. If you’re not able to read print with magnification at the same speed as a sighted kid, you need to learn braille. You need to learn to use assistive technology, screen reading software, refreshable braille displays, zoom, text, JAWS, NVDA, all those things, orientation and mobility skills I mentioned cane travel you need to be able to travel confidently throughout the world independently. Self Advocacy is another part of the nine elements of the expanded core curriculum, and my my little story is, when I was in high school, Snohomish high home of the Panthers here in Washington State, I was one of about 30 kids who are kind of the college bound group. And in my senior year in high school, we all went to physics first period, and we all went to math analysis, second period, and we all went, went to chemistry third period, and I walked into the chemistry class the first day, and like the teacher, just, oh, no, this is a safety issue. You cannot take chemistry. You need to go to the office and have them give you another class. And I was, I was quite upset. I went home and told my parents, who were both teachers, and we were very isolated. We weren’t connected with any blindness organizations. Didn’t know any blind adults, really. And you know, they just said, Well, if, if you know, Mr. So and So says, then you know, that’s that. So I was assigned to study hall and spend an hour reading trashy novels in Braille in the library third period my senior year. And now, you know, I know that the people around me didn’t know better, but they certainly didn’t tell me the truth about the capabilities of blind people. I now know, blind people who are PhDs in chemistry, blind people who teach chemistry at the university level. So self advocacy is one of the nine elements of the core curriculum that I didn’t, didn’t really have. And I’ll get to, I’ll get to another element in a moment that’s related directly to what Eddie’s and his company is doing. Before I go there, I want to touch on the important importance of the IEP. So if you’re a child with a disability, if you have a kid with a disability in school, you’re entitled to an individual. The Education Plan, the IEP, and that’s where the school, school district commits to providing services and training and specific focus areas. So it’s really important that the IEP be really well done and thorough, and that blind child or child with a disability should be in those meetings, because that’s where you learn. That’s one way to learn self advocacy. Sometimes the school district will have a team of specialists. You know, your your parent probably doesn’t have a lot of experience in these spaces. They you may feel overwhelmed. So I remember talking to one parent of a blind Katie said, you know, if they bring six people to the IEP, I’m bringing seven, they bring 12. I’m bringing 14. If we have to have it in the in the gym, we’ll we’ll do that. So I really recommend getting connected with advocacy groups, the National Federation of the Blind or the American Council of the Blind, or both. 16:05 Anywhere you live, there’ll be a chapter Speaker 1 16:09 within striking distance of you. So ACB and NFB are great resources to find some successful blind adults who can really weigh in and speak with authority and expertise on the IEP, which leads us to the specific part of the IEP of the expanded core curriculum, the ECC, which is career exploration. So it was understood through research that blind kids don’t have the same level of understanding as their sighted brothers and sisters and neighbors around career possibilities, career pathways, professions, whether that’s because their family and school holds slow expectations for them and doesn’t expect them to have the same range of opportunities as their sighted classmates, or isolation. For whatever reason, research is clear that blind kids don’t have the same level of understanding of careers, pathways possibilities as their sighted peers do, and Eddie and his company future Jen, are addressing that in a very cutting age modern way, using technology. And I know they are working with school districts and kids with disabilities here in Washington State to open up that world of possibility as far as future employment and careers go. And I know Eddie has some family dynamics with with his brother that really has ignited this particular passion for him. 17:53 So I really like Speaker 1 17:56 to turn it to you, Eddie, and just kind of ask where, what, what’s the journey been to bring you up to this point in life, and where are you out with your company, and where do you see things going? And you know what’s working well for you. What are the challenges that you still need to overcome to take future Gen to where you see it going. So, kind of, where have you been, where you’re at, where you’re going, what, what’s what’s working well, what are the challenges you’re facing, and how can people get involved in and help you in your noble cause to move forward? I do want to, acknowledge one really interesting thing is that you’re very proud of being an Eagle Scout, and I know that you have engaged people of Norman, fellow Eagle Scouts, enlisted them in the mission. That’s very interesting to me, personally, my my father, who’s passed away now his, his he was born in 1939 his his father was a doctor, and he was enlisted in the military in 1941 and was an Army doctor, and actually worked at a prisoner of war Camp in Texas that housed German prisoners of war, and he came back to Lake Quinault, where they lived in 1945 and then he passed away in 1949 so my my dad really grew up largely without a father, and he and his brother, my uncle, Lou, Who’s 11 months older, both got very involved in Scouting when they both became Eagle Scouts, and it really helped shape their lives. And they, they with, with, without, you know, Father present. They both became remarkable men and leaders. And, you know, they, they’ve have fond men. Series of scouting and being at the jamborees and the journey and the pathway of Eagle coming in Eagle Scout and the guidance they received from adults involved in scouting. So it was very important to them. And so when you mentioned that your pride in that, to me, it really resonated. So I just wanted to acknowledge that, and with that, I will stop talking. I will ask you, Eddie, to tell our live and the audience viewing the recording about future Gen pathway so far, where are you at? Where you going? So Eddie, it’s yours. Speaker 2 20:43 Thank you, Kirk. I appreciate it. It’s a I was keeping track. I think you asked maybe 12 questions. At least. I’ll start with the one you just mentioned here. But before I say that, there’s a you’re very true. You’re very right when it comes to there’s a saying, once an eagle, always an eagle there. If you really like look around. We’re kind of sprinkled over everywhere you look. And this is a little side tangent from your initial question, but there’s about trying to remember how many millions of us who have become alumni at this point in time, and that’s actually kind of where I started future Gen, I was a I’ve always been very passionate with the question, what do you want to do in the future and in doing so, I have always involved myself in creating mentorship programs, career exploration programs and company culture programs for the past decade, despite this young face, and outside of future Jen, I just had a strong love for that. And at some point in time, I was talking to some buddies of mine in college who, go figure, were also Eagle Scouts. And we just started talking to ourselves like, hey, what’s the what’s your next, what’s your next project? And at the time, I share to everybody that I really do think that people are asking for more guidance in the world, but not necessarily always in the shape and form as as a mentorship program. I wonder what that could be. And you know from those discussions, one of them actually ended up helping me build future Gen where it is. And the founding team of folks that ended up creating future Gen actually were a bunch of Eagle Scouts. I literally had a when you become an Eagle Scout, there’s this organization called the National Eagle Scout Association, and they give you, they ask you if you want, basically, like, a Yellow Pages book of all the contacts of Eagle Scouts. And I remember, I didn’t know...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: January 8, 2025: Interview with Kathryn Webster, Founder, The TAD Foundation (Together Achieving Dreams)
01/08/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: January 8, 2025: Interview with Kathryn Webster, Founder, The TAD Foundation (Together Achieving Dreams)
KEYWORDS: disability rights, employment inclusion, blindness skills, guide dog, Deloitte Consulting, Harvard Business School, private equity, mentorship program, technical training, leadership development, corporate partners, family support, employment rate, strategic objectives, financial support TRANSCRIPT: 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, 00:36 welcome everybody to podcasts with Dr Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington. And as you may or may not know, I am the managing director of my very own consulting practice, innovative act LLC, where I focus on fun, innovative, high impact projects that will accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in the workforce. And I say I help companies supercharge their bottom line through Disability Inclusion. I am the immediate past president and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind, prior to that, held the same roles at the lighthouse for the blind. Inc, you're in beautiful, rainy Seattle, and today I have a guest that I have the privilege of knowing for quite a number of years. We used to be neighbors in Crystal City in Arlington, Virginia. Now we're 3000 miles apart, but I'd like love to introduce you all to Catherine Webster, who, among other things, is the founder and president of a foundation called together achieving dreams, which is helping young blind people move forward and thrive in life. I had the privilege of having my first call as a mentor to one of the young blind people that the foundation is working with. And Catherine, welcome to my podcast. 02:07 Dr Kirk Adams, it is such a pleasure. I always love chatting to you, with you, and even better than it's on a podcast platform, thanks 02:15 for having me so the whole world can listen in on our conversation, exactly. So I would love to hear about your journey a little bit. When I first met you, you were kind of just beginning in the professional career. You were in a leadership role with the blind students of the National Federation of the Blind. You surprised me in how new you were to blindness and how excellent your blindness skills were. So would love to just get a little bit of your personal story that has brought you from birth to now. 03:00 Yeah, absolutely great question, and always way longer than than I want to share. So I will keep it short and sweet. But like Kirk said, like you said, I long story short, I guess starting from the way beginning, I was born totally blind, which wildly enough, when I was 16 days old, I got vision in one of my eyes. Saw that well, you know, visual impaired, quote, unquote, for years. So I, you know, leaned on large print and didn't know braille. Starting in high school, started learning braille. So all that to say I was in denial in those in those years where, like every teenager is in denial and had having no vision in one eye and having limited in the other I wanted to still do whatever I wanted to do. So I was a cheerleader, I wrote, I did track, I was integrated into, you know, public school systems. And I grew up actually, in Connecticut. My mom moved us here from Florida for the awesome public schools, and grateful for her for that choice forever. But long story short, around high school, had several surgeries, cornea transplant issues, whatever it is, and I started realizing there are some things that I just can't do. And for me, that's a challenge. I want to be able to do anything, and if someone tells me I can't, I want to prove them wrong. So how I approach that is acceptance on some of the pieces. So cheerleading, with with all sighted cheerleaders, and me, once it got to a certain point, there's a safety risk. So I did step back on that, and instead leaned in on, you know, sports where I could do it fully independently, rowing, track and field, etc. So starting college, I got a guide dog, and that was kind of my first step of acceptance. And I still, I mean, I tell high school students who are blind all the time to to, you know, accept yourself, embrace a cane, all that stuff easier said than done when you're in those environments. But I used college as that rebranding moment where no one knows who I. Am or hardly anyone, and I've got a social magnet of a guide dog, use that slightly as a crutch, socially speaking, and all that to say, as I went into my last year of college at Wake Forest University in North Carolina, I ended up losing my vision two weeks before graduating from just a freak accident retinal detachment that went wrong too much filled up whatever. So after that, had no more vision. And at that point, I had already signed with Deloitte Consulting. I was terrified, and didn't really know how to take it, but I'll also understood fake it till you make it is kind of the mantra for any young professional. So leaned on that a little bit. And during my college years, while I didn't heavily lean on Braille or anything like that, I started to need to as a decrease. So it almost gave me those training wheels before losing the rest of my vision to be successful. And I appreciate your compliment on having good blindness skills. But it definitely, in the beginning, was a fake it till you make it, until I gain that confidence. And like, you know, use JAWS the screen reading software. And you 06:15 were, you were in a STEM field in school, right? I 06:19 was, I studied statistics in computer science, and it's funny. I'm sure you How did 06:25 you do that? As a very low vision person, 06:31 were using assistive technology? Were you 06:33 I was I was actually using Mac initially, with Zoom, and then as my vision decreased, I switched over to Jaws, a different screen reader, yeah, and on Windows, and that was much better. But I got the pushback that many students get, as I'm sure you hear all the time, like, why don't you do English or history, which is great if someone wants to, but I wanted to do daft and Comp Sci. So. So then started at Deloitte, and like you mentioned, I wanted to give back in a lot of different ways, because so many people, sighted or blind mentor me tremendously. You being one of them, and I wanted to, it was kind of that time of my life where I wanted to also give back. So started doing different leadership roles within the National Federation of blind and also, as we'll get into it. Started the town Todd foundation a couple years ago now, but pivot after Deloitte, I was there for almost four years, and then went to Harvard business school to get my MBA. And now I work in private equity at KKR in New York City. So I can't believe it's been 10 years since I graduated high school, but lots, lots has happened. 07:42 Yeah. So just curious. So you said something along the lines of, I'm paraphrasing. If someone says I can't do it, I'm doing it. Where does that come from? 07:55 That's a good question. I think it comes from two things. It comes from my mom's personality, she's always taught my brother and me, he cited, obviously I'm not she's always said, shoot for the stars. My dad also has instilled that in me. So I think part of it's that, and growing up with a single mom, she made everything happen, and I never knew when we were struggling, even when we were I think the other part of it is when you're frustrated of things you know you can't inherently do, it makes you want to do things even better. And I love shattering misconceptions. That's probably because I'm stubborn, as you know, but part of it's also just, I you've got to have tenacity to, like, make it in the world. And it's frustrating as a blind person, having to educate every day. But if you don't do it, who's going to do it? So I think it's, you know, built up frustration and and admiration. Okay, 08:53 two sides of the coin, frustration and, yes, 09:03 so the foundation, 09:07 the name, has a lot of significance, I know, and what, what sparked you to take your volunteerism and your leadership with the National Association of Blind students and formalize it, and put it into a structure, and really do it 09:25 that that took a lot of years of thinking, and you may agree or disagree here, but there's a lot of nonprofits in the world. Most are doing awesome things. Not all are the most efficient in the world. And me being a business person by trade, I only wanted to start a nonprofit if I thought that it would do something meaningful and actually change something in a grander way. Um, so when I was at when I was in business school in Boston. I was kind of struggling with back and forth with, do I go the entrepreneurial route and start a nonprofit from scratch, or do I escalate a different one? And what it came down to for me was representation matters, and I have such a niche focus in my mind of what I'm passionate about, which is increasing employment for the blind and low vision community in like high paying gainful employment jobs, and that doesn't exist. So the our approach is very unique. And to your point 10:36 on, have you read my dissertation? No, but now I want to it's called journeys through country, an ethnographic study of blind adults successfully employed in large American corporations. So I interviewed a bunch of 100% too. I'll send you a link. So I interviewed a bunch of people who were working in name brand corporations, whose names you would know and found out the factors that led to their success. And I won't digress too far, but two, there were nine themes and two, two main ones. One was everyone had a great sense of agency, that they could forge their own path. They had a strong internal locus of control. Felt they could create their destiny. All of them could trace that back to something, an experience, a relationship, family. A lot of them were. You were a cheerleader, a rower, a runner, a swimmer, all those things. So a lot of the lot of people attribute it to some outdoor experience, some athletic experience, and then the other one was disappointment. Everyone was disappointed. Like, why am I the only blind person who's made it this far in this company? Why aren't there any people with disabilities in the C suite? Why do I constantly have to fight for accommodations? Why do I keep having to educate people? Why are people hired after me getting promoted beyond me. So 12:03 yep, yep. And the hard problem is I would love that, because the disappointments so real, and like my dream one day is to run the Todd foundation. Of course, I sit in a corporate America seat that I'm very, very happy in. But that's also the internal struggle, because you want awesome blind people running awesome blindness organizations too. So there's a lot of pieces there, but I would, I would love to read that. So when I decided on Tad, it really came down to my father had passed away in 2017 right after I lost my vision. His name was Tad, so of course, named after him, and that loss paled in compare. Or my losing my vision paled in comparison to losing my father. So that put a whole new perspective on blindness for me, where I was like, This literally doesn't matter. It's one part of me. It doesn't matter. And yes, of course, during grieving, you go, you grow like, empathetic, etc, and I think that was a big part of it. But I decided finally, when I was sitting in a class at Harvard Business School and entrepreneurship that I wanted, I wanted to take that step, and I wanted to bring a team of sighted people and blind people together to really make magic happen around effectively changing the employment rate, 13:21 and how are you doing that? What? What are the program activities currently? 13:28 So chat is structured with three under, under, kind of pinned pillars that go toward our mission of increasing employment for the blind and low vision community. The first is our fellowship program. So think I want to say mentors on steroids. So each of our students, college, whether undergrad or grad school, blind students, are paired up with a sighted mentor and a blind mentor in their career interest area. At the same time as that, we have immersive in person, weekend programming throughout the academic year, where we're all together shoulder to shoulder, doing very intense technical skill training, leadership development, networking, soft skills, that's in person, yeah. Okay, cool. So those are four weekends, and then in between all of our weekends, we have virtual on demand trainings where students are able to hone in on the skills that they need to work on more at the individual level, and then in person, we're bringing it all together and getting them the every every session, they're presenting on new topics they've never heard of. They're assessing company 10 Ks, they're writing, they're doing financial modeling, they're building PowerPoints. They're doing things that any person going into the workforce should be able to do, but we're giving them the head start. We're vetting their materials. We're working with them on making it excellent, and we're making sure that they're comfortable as a blind person, kind of leveraging their those alternative techniques and approaching them. So I always say, if you start. Go with blindness skills, go get blindness skills training, and then come to us. We don't focus on that, but we certainly compliment, you know, using the assistive tech to make magic happen in the in the workplace. So that's the first pillar. The second piece is working with companies and community partners on different access points of bringing blind and low vision folks to work. So whether a company wants to hire people, we're kind of vetting those students, providing the resumes, making sure they're a good fit prior to the interviews even happening, whether it's an internship, a full time job, an experience, whatever it is. But then we're also working with companies on just understanding disability and blindness, as I'm sure you do a lot of too, if just there's still the stigma and there's still a lot of conversations to be had and questions and uncertainty that companies sort through as they work on this, and I think part of that's leaning on Diversity and Equity and Inclusion goals with companies Of like, what does that really mean in practice? But then it's also putting light on you may have never met a blind person, like, here is capable blind people doing things in the world that are that are certainly qualified and talented for your company. So that's the second piece. And then the third is working with families of little blind kids, so think zero to five years old, making sure the parents are setting up their young, young kids for success as early as possible. And I think that's the biggest gap, because it's great that we're hitting college students, but there are so many blind people not getting to college because they're not taught from a young age that they have what it takes. 16:39 Yeah, that I wasn't aware of that piece of that pillar that's that's really exciting and super important. Yes, 16:49 yes, huge. So that one we're launching this year. It's always been one of our core pillars, but it's been on, I don't want to say, the back burner, but it hasn't been the highest priority. As we launched the fellowship program and we, our organization started in formally speaking, two years ago, so January 2023, and we've had now two iterations of the cohort program. We're in our second year right now, so things are going awesome, and we're really loving what we're doing with the students. 17:18 So you said ultimately you would like to be the person running tad together, achieving dreams foundation. So tell, tell, tell me the vision five years from now. What? What is the scope 17:39 five years from now? For Tad, 17:41 yeah, I've got happy achieve 17:45 that dream. The dream, the dream, 17:49 exactly, so I think right now we've got a just to clarify, we've got an awesome, full time director, and I'm going nowhere anytime soon, understood, but dreaming huge. I think so. If I were to take it step by step, we have 15 students right now in our program. I think we'll have 50 next year, and I think we'll have 500 in the next five years. Wow. And I truly feel that way, because we had nearly 100 applicants last year when we didn't even put out a flyer, we didn't market it at all, and every student we had the first year wants to come back for more and wants to learn more. So in that front I think we'll have 500 qualified blind students in five years ready to be employed in high paying positions where they deserve to sit. I think from a company standpoint, today, we've got 11 corporate sponsors and corporate partners we're working with. I think we'll have 100 and again. Now that we have the infrastructure of a full time person as of two months ago, I feel sky is the limit, and now that we can really put the dedicated time in terms of families being a bit more realistic, I think will hit 100 families in terms of impact of them having a strong network as they raise their little blind kids. So that's my dream. Five years from now, if I were to say it more intangibly speaking, I want companies to know who we are. I want them to trust our process of making sure the students we work with are qualified and capable. And I also want this shift to happen where the unemployment rate isn't at 70 or 75% it's much lower, and there's actually representation where you step foot in a building and it doesn't feel like you're the only person that's educating everyone around you. Let's do that. So that's my dream. Let's make it happen. Kirk, that's a good treat. 19:47 So if you were going to point out kind of the two or three biggest wins so far over the past two years, what would you say? 19:58 I think the biggest win. On the first year? Well, the whole board always tells me that I have, like, extremely high expectations for people, and that that I am a tough cookie. So leaning on that, I think our baby goal was that we executed an amazing program. The ambitious piece that we met the metrics on is we had 100% placement for our first year. So 13 students came through our first year program. 13 had experiences over the summer that, to me, before we scale, largely speaking, is exactly what I want every 20:35 single year. And summer is actually a work experience with a company, yes, 20:40 with a company roughly 10 weeks, yep. Okay, cool, in person on the job. So I think that was one of our biggest goals. I think the second is how much we are branding ourselves, the amount of and it just baffles me, because we do little pieces of marketing, whether they there's a magazine article about us or whatever it is, but where companies are reaching out to us, cold calling us, you know, on LinkedIn and social media, saying, Hey, what's this all about? We want to help. To me, that's when I know the word is getting out there. And when that happens, it makes like we're not doing the cold calls. It's the other way. And I love that, and that's how I know that we're being successful and we're kind of getting in the right pockets of space, 21:26 absolutely. So to get to get from here to the dream, I could call them challenges, but I'll call them strategic objectives. So what are the two three key strategic objectives you're going to accomplish to get to where you want to go. 21:43 The two that come to mind, just from a key performance indicator perspective, is...
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Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: January 6, 2025: Interview with Advocate, Author and Sight Loss Coach Donna J. Jodhan
01/06/2025
Podcasts By Dr. Kirk Adams: January 6, 2025: Interview with Advocate, Author and Sight Loss Coach Donna J. Jodhan
TRANSCRIPT 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, 00:37 hello, everybody. This is Dr Kirk Adams from innovative impact consulting and welcome to my podcast. And I have I'm returning a favor to Donna jodhan, who graciously interviewed me for her podcast. Welcome Donna. Thank you very much. I'm glad to be here, and it is a New Year. Happy New Year to you, to you too. And I'd like to take this one step at a time. What I'm thinking is to ask you to tell us about your journey which has brought you, has brought you to the point in time we're at now, what you're involved in currently, and then where, where you would like to see, where we you would like to take things, and when we, when we talk about where you would like to take things, I'd love to hear about what's working well for you, where, where you're finding successes and any challenges you might be having. So if, if we could just take it away, I'll hand you the talking stick and ask you to talk about your journey from from birth to present. Oh dear. Thank you very much. I'll do the best I can. So I was born eight hours after my twin brother Jeffrey, 02:04 Mom and Dad did not know that I was expected, only after he was born that the midwife told mom and dad, hey, another one is on its way, and mom had to wait eight hours for me to arrive. 02:22 The mom and dad asked the midwife to call a doctor, and she refused. So mom suffered for eight hours, and when I was born, mom realized right away that something was wrong with my eyes, and she said to the midwife, this child has eye problems. And the midwife refused to, you know, listen to mom, but Mom was correct. So I guess this is probably the foundation for how I was brought up and what I felt that I needed to do in order to fulfill my own life and to help others. I felt strongly that I was given an opportunity to do something after being born under these circumstances, and I think from an early age, my desire was to help others, 03:17 you know, to help make a better future for the kids, because I was given the opportunity to have a future. I was very privileged to have parents and a grandmother and two brothers and five dogs all helped me out. So I decided that this is what I wanted to do. I left home at a very early age, I grew up in Montreal, Canada, and 03:45 I don't think I can ever put a date on when I really started to get involved in advocacy, 03:54 but I think you know, throughout my high school and university years, I always did the best I could to help others and help the kids, but I think my whole world changed because let's just go back a little bit. I was born with bit of vision. Got a whole whack of it when I was in my teens due to a cornea transplant. It changed my entire world, and I learned so much, did so much experience, so much. Then I lost it all in year 2004 04:29 due to a terrific retina detachment, detached in three places, and doctors could not save my vision. So it was at that time that I decided that I wanted to apply to the Canadian government for a job, and in doing so, I quickly realized that the websites were not accessible, the attitudes were not very good, because certain. 05:00 Departments did not really want to take the time to ensure that me as a vision impaired person, a highly qualified one with an MBA from McGill University. They did not want to, you know, help me take the exams in order to gain a Public Service Commission job with the Canadian governments. And I think it was at that time that I consciously decided that something needed to be done. So in year 2006 05:36 I consulted a human rights lawyer, and after discussing, you know, matters within she advised me that I had the perfect case for a charter challenge against the Canadian government to challenge them on their inaccessible and unusable websites. And there began my journey, I would say, in a really meaningful manner. And I say meaningful because it was a way for me to not just express myself, but to show others that something should be done and must be done if we as a community, as Canadians with disabilities, wanted to find different career paths, so I assembled a small team 06:33 of advocates and friends, and I think they're about, oh my gosh, at least four of us to start with The lawyer. We filed our papers, and of course, they try to stay our kids, but fail. And so between 2007 06:49 and 2009 06:50 it was a back and forth battle between me and the government and my lawyer 06:57 and the Canadian government hired an expert from the United States who was a lawyer, but not an accessibility expert, to challenge us, and I had one of the best accessibility experts of the day. Her name was Judah Trevor Rey. She's from Canada, 07:18 and so the government I know her. Oh, great, yes, wonderful, yeah, you couldn't have picked a better person. Oh, she was wonderful and very calm, very kind, very understanding. And between 2007 and 2009 we engaged in this back and forth battle. And many times this government, Canadian government, did their best to discredit me, both personally and professionally, and they challenged Utah quite a bit. But Bucha and I, we were able to withstand all the that they threw at us. We went to court, the lower Canadian court in 2010 08:03 we won the first round. The judge ordered the Canadian government to make all of their websites accessible, 08:11 despite the government trying to, you know, use their expert, the late Cynthia Waddell. I don't know if you know her, or knew her 08:22 to you know, thwart our efforts so we were successful. The judge ordered the government to make the websites accessible, but the government decided to take us to the Canadian Court of Appeal, and this case was heard in 2012 08:41 and we were again successful. So thereafter, the government realized that we were serious about, you know, wanting to bring about change. This case was observed worldwide, across North America, Britain, Europe, India, and for me personally, it was quite an experience, because I don't think I really understood the meaning of going to court. I so that was a five year process of doing my math. Yeah, I 09:20 I don't think I understood what I was getting into, and even when the government attacked me personally and professionally, I still didn't understand. 09:31 But I spent several nights really examining my conscience. Why was I doing this? For whom? For what? It was never for me. It was for the kids or the future. 09:43 And people may say, oh, yeah, right. Wasn't it for you? No, not necessarily. Because I wanted a better future for them. I wanted to help my community. So after that, in 2012 09:59 we. 10:00 Decided to soldier on, and you just and I went our separate ways, like Peter got busy with her own stuff, I got busy with mine. But then in 2015 10:11 I realized that something else needed to be done, because Canada did not have any sort of legislation like the US, like the UK, like Europe, they were one of the few developed countries that did not have any sort of legislation, disability rights legislation, or anything like that. So I decided again to form a team, and we went coast to coast, we elicited the assistance of several organizations, national organizations, business cnid, the 10:53 CCD, like Canadian Council of persons with disabilities and many others cross disabilities organizations. We lobbied hard, and I was very fortunate again to have you to part of the way, 11:11 because she was very, very busy with her own stuff. And I had David Lepofsky, an amazing lawyer who really worked so hard with me, and in 2019 11:27 legislation titled The accessible Canada Act was passed on July 19, 2019, 11:36 and congratulations. Thank you very much. So this is what has laid the foundation for me. Has not been easy, because 11:48 advocacy is not for the fate of heart, and it started to wear on me. 11:56 During this period, I also fought successful cases against the Greater Toronto Airport Authority over their inaccessible and unusable websites and services and other organizations I interacted with, 12:14 but I decided shortly after that victory, that I wanted to pull or push my own efforts, my own advocacy, in another direction, because it was getting too hard and it was wearing on me. It was being very, very stressful on me. So I made the conscious effort that I wanted to return to what I call my roots. This being that I wanted to work more closely with the kids. It took a few years to really, you know, hone my my commitment, to decide what I really wanted to do. 12:58 I relinquished the presidency of barrier free Canada, because I was the founder of barrier free Canada. This is the organization that started the campaign for an accessible Canada Act. So let's fast forward to today. Yeah, but along the way, I met Aaron Di Blasi, and Aaron is never tired of pushing me and advising me and showing me ways to achieve what I really want to achieve, and I do. Thank Aaron for this very, very much indeed. So I'd like to pause for just a moment let people know who Aaron is. Aaron De Blasi is 13:44 a publisher of several accessibility and assistive technology related publications. His company is called Mind vault solutions, so you can search for top tech tidbits, access information, news and I have recently been engaged with Aaron. He's helping me get organized and more impactful and effective. And I think you've worked with him a lot longer than I but I'm finding that he helps accelerate things and help helps me move forward more briskly 14:22 with what I'm trying to accomplish. And I think this is a great way to say it like he helps me move forward more brisi, and especially when I see the first words of any email he sends, it's Miss Donna, and I know he has something to tell me, right? So the two initiatives that we are engaged in together are the access Park store, where we have brought vendors and other sellers together to sell their stuff, whether it's technology or anything that. 15:00 They want to sell, and it's being advertised through the accessibility information, news and the top tech tidbits. But most recently, we decided to get together on another project, and it's called the vision Tech Academy. 15:20 And this all came about because of a promise I made to the late John Connor Lee's. John was very, very involved with Apple. He was a beta tester. He was a teacher, tutor, a trainer. He had a website called Matt for the blind, and we have started to get involved in developing the vision Tech Academy, where we would bring users, not certainly, sorry, not users educators, together with students. But a month before, or shortly after we started, he wrote to me, saying that we had to withdraw from the project, because he was diagnosed with cancer, and he was at stage four, so I made him a promise that I could do whatever I think, because John was my mentor, my teacher, my friend, my advisor. Didn't matter if we disagreed on which coffee team we supported. John loved the islanders. I love the Montreal Canadiens, but John took the time to listen and to guide and he was never afraid or never shy to share his political views with me as well. So I lost someone really important in my life, and I thought I would I made him this promise, and here we are today. And Aaron and another friend of mine, Leo Bissonnette, he lives in Montreal, we are partnering together, partnering together, to ensure that John's legacy lives on. And this is where I'm at today. I'm also involved in something called transitioning to a new world, where I am teaching kids who are prepared preparing to leave high school, and the young adults teaching them how to make themselves indispensable assets to those companies who need to attract the attention of seniors and persons with disabilities, because these are their bread and butter customers. And I am helping. 17:38 There are two courses that I'm giving 17:41 are promoting and teaching. One is called advocacy, 101 and the other one is called entrepreneurship, 101 17:51 and these two courses will help participants to become more confident and independent and show them ways to advocate for themselves and for others, more powerful and more effectively. So these are the two projects that I'm presently engaged in, the transitioning to a new world. Is that something you're doing with young people in person? Is it virtual? Is 18:21 recorded. They watch what form does that take, virtually right now. And hopefully, if I can obtain, or 18:33 if I can get funding to help me out, I would like to put these courses online, and I would like to do the face to face route as well. I have already had experience with Doctor Alan chase of the I retreat organization. I participated in his camp last year, and he has invited me back 18:58 to do the same this year. So and I've had several interviews with people across Canada and the United States. So I'm really, really hoping that this will take off. And finally, in addition, in order to sort of support my funding, I am selling my pottery creations on the access Park store and my associates and I are also planning events to raise funds in support of the transitioning to a new world initiative. So that's where I'm at today. Okay, and access Park, let's talk about it sounds like it's a marketplace. Is it specifically for disability owned businesses or products and services that are helpful for inclusion of people with disabilities or combination? Tell, tell. Tell us more about access Park. 19:58 I am hoping. 25:00 If educators take advantage of this, they sign up. They, you know, we have a directory of where people can come to find different types of educators. Educators can either, you know, just sign up by having the first name, last name, email address and a URL, or they could go into more detail through their premium profile, where they give a biography of themselves and the courses that they offer. And I'm really and again, these educators are focused on what 25:34 I think they're focused on, courses, technology, courses that they can give to bridge the gap between, you know, persons with disabilities needing to learn more and being able to be more independent. That's what we're hoping for. 25:55 So it could be anything that the technology wise, that they would be able to teach and train and tutor. Okay, 26:07 so turning to challenges, you've mentioned funding and fundraising and resources a couple of times, yeah, so I'd appreciate you talking a little bit more about your thinking of how 26:22 that's going, and then any, any other you mentioned, marketing, yes. So you're, you're running three startups here simultaneously, which 26:32 is a lot, a lot on one person's plate. But as you plan success for each of the three, what, what do you see as the challenges that you're going to need to tackle? 26:45 I think a lot of it would be like marketing, letting people know that these three initiatives are out there. A lot of it has to do, you know, like works with by word of mouth, but with whom you know and you know, like working to convince them that, hey, these are worthwhile initiatives. These are going to benefit persons with disabilities. The persons with disabilities are your bread and butter, customers of today and the future. The kids are important. We need to make it better than possible for our kids in the future. So we need to find, or I need to find funding to continue my efforts. 27:34 And that is the challenge. And I know Aaron is really, you know, given me a lot of great ideas for the vision Tech Academy. I'm just hoping that this takes off, and I'm I'm very confident that it will take off. 27:51 Far as funding goes. I'm not familiar with Canada, of course, in the United States, the 501 c3 nonprofit where people can make a donation and 28:01 put a tax deduction on on their tax return. And then, of course, the for profit side, there's investors, and there's small business grants and things like that. So what? What type of and then there's crowdfunding, like Kickstarter for creative endeavors and GoFundMe and what, what are your 28:23 structures, as far as the type of funding you're seeking, 28:28 the nature, like 28:32 in Canada, it is awfully, awfully, awfully difficult to find funding. In the US, it seems to be a lot easier, so I'm putting most of my eggs in the US basket. Okay, 28:48 we've not talked about GoFundMe or crowdfunding. I mean, Aaron and I are hoping to use other methods to start with, but we're quite open to any suggestions. I'm not a marketing person. Aaron, is more of it than I am, right? So we're hoping, I'm praying, that we can attract some good influence from people who are willing to help, you know, fund this or market this in any way that they can. 29:22 Um, so this is the part of the podcast where we're going to ask for help. 29:29 What 29:30 people listening if they want to help move things forward? Access Park. I assume you're looking for businesses who want to offer their products and services. You're looking for customers. So Tell, tell us 29:43 to those listening to this recording, 29:48 if they're interested in getting engaged in access Park, what, what? What type of participation are you looking for? And how do people get and go get in touch with you. So we're looking to. 30:00 Vendors to sell their products on ancestr, and we have a ready made audience of over at least 30,000 30:12 people who read the aim news every week and top tech tidbits. 30:19 We do a lot of media releases as well. So we're hoping that vendors would see an advantage to being part of the access Park marketplace. We're hoping that customers would be able to say, Hey, this is a more accessible and usable website. I'm going to come here to buy my stuff. So it's a two pronged effort, both customers and vendors. And we've got to advertise more, because you just can't sit there and say, you know, people will read the ads every week. It's much more than that. So that's what the access Park thing is all about. Okay, and then transitioning into a new world. Are you primarily looking for? You mentioned camps, you mentioned schools? Are you primarily looking for organizations? Yes, who work with with blind youth, yes, primarily those. I have a meeting tomorrow with the American Printing House with the blind, and I'm really hoping that we would team up so that I can offer my courses. I'm hoping that the I retreat organization can help me to propel my efforts to other organizations and agencies. But the difficulty here is that a lot of these organizations and agencies are waiting for funding themselves right from other sources, so that they can pay me to do it right. So that is a difficulty with the transitioning to a new world initiative. 32:08 In the case of vision Tech Academy, it's all about more marketing, more advertising, more convincing of educators to place their premium profiles on our website, and you know, like advertise your own services to students. So you're looking for educators,...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: November 21, 2024: Patrick Long
11/21/2024
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: November 21, 2024: Patrick Long
00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, 00:37 hello everybody. This is Dr Kirk Adams, welcome to my monthly live streamed webinar. Supercharge your bottom line through disability inclusion and today we we have a very unique opportunity to learn about a new AI driven solution for blind people such as myself to have an easier time of it. In E commerce, we're going to talk to Patrick long, co founder of inno search, in a few minutes. But Patrick, if you could say hi and give people just the sound of your voice and your title and where are you calling from 01:20 everybody? My name is Patrick. I'm the CEO and co founder of inno search. Ai, a company building accessible solutions for the blind and visually impaired. We're based in San Francisco, and very happy to be on the show today with Dr Kirk, and happy to share about what we're working on Great and Patrick is not we're not those of us who can see not seeing Patrick today. You may have been watching the news this week and about the bomb cyclone and all the storms here on the West Coast. We had our chair of it here in Seattle two nights ago, Patrick's on the San Francisco Bay area, so they're having some weather disruptions. So he's on his phone. Thank you for making it happen, Patrick, 02:12 just briefly before I before I turn, turn, turn it over to you, Patrick, to get your story. For those of you listening viewing who don't know me again. I'm Dr Kirk Adams. I am a blind person. Have been since I was five years old when both of my retinas detached and I became a blind child. 02:36 Basically overnight, I went to the Oregon State School for the Blind, first, second and third grade and learn to read and write Braille very, very fluently, travel with confidence with a white cane and type on a typewriter, so that when my skills were sufficiently strong, I could 02:59 join my brothers and sisters and neighbors in public school. So in fourth grade, I started public school in Silverton, Oregon. 03:08 I was always the only blind student of all of my schooling, from fourth grade through my PhD, 03:16 I 03:18 grew up in small towns in the Pacific Northwest. I was given some gifts as a 678, year old attending the school for the blind, I was given the blindest skills 03:32 that have allowed me to operate efficiently in the world of working and scholarship and life. I was given high expectations from my family and the school. A lot of kids, a lot of young kids with disabilities, 03:49 aren't given that gift of high expectations. And sometimes if we have low expectations, they can become internalized. And I was also given just a strong internal locus of control, which means I really felt in my bones that I could make my way in the world. I could solve problems, I could figure out how to get things done, and 04:12 that's such an important part of being able to thrive as a person with a disability in our society. So I'm grateful for those gifts that were given to me. 04:26 Progressing through the elementary, middle school, high school and small towns, I experienced a lot of social isolation, especially in the middle school and high school years where I grew up, when kids turned 16, they got a driver's license and they got a job of some kind, and that was not happening for me. 04:50 Then college was was a very, very different story. I was fortunate enough to be given a full scholarship to a small. 05:00 All liberal arts school, Whitman College and Walla. Walla through a foundation called the Jesse Ridley foundation that support supports blind students in college. 05:11 And again, a gift was given to me, which I appreciate immensely. Graduated 05:19 cum laude, phi, beta, kappa, four point my major, which was economics, and then face the barriers to employment that so many of us with significant disabilities face, as only 35% of us are in the workforce. So many, many twists and twists and turns later, after 10 years in banking and finance, I entered the nonprofit sector as a fundraising professional development officer. My first nonprofit job was a development officer for the Seattle Public Library Foundation raising money for the state talking book and Braille library. And then from there, moved into the nonprofit sector, 06:05 became the president CEO of the Lighthouse for the Blind here in Seattle, was recruited to join the board of trustees of the American Foundation for the Blind, which is Helen Keller's station, and was given, given an opportunity to step into that leadership, President, CEO role of May of 2016 06:27 moved from our cozy neighborhood here in Seattle to Brooklyn and worked in Manhattan, the AFB offices right next to Madison Square Garden, right above Penn Station, and subsequently moved to the Washington, Washington, DC area. So had amazing experiences living in New York and Arlington, Virginia, and then returned home to Seattle during the pandemic. 06:56 After six years with the American Foundation for the Blind, I had largely accomplished what I'd set out to do, which was to reorganize, restructure and bring the organization back to financial sustainability. And I decided there was time for a change. At the end of June 2022 07:19 my very rewarding time at AFB came to an end, and as AFB had announced I was leaving, I was contacted by a number of organizations and people I done impactful good projects work with, asking if I was available to help on various initiatives. And so I think de facto, became a consultant, 07:47 and I set up my consulting practice. My company is called innovative impact LLC. There is a website innovative impact dot consulting, and I've mostly focused on employment and working with companies to help them accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in their workforce, and really the bringing the demand side and supply side together, as employers are In competition for talent and needing to bring in 08:23 talented, dedicated, motivated employees who will help their organizations move forward. And then, with only 35% of us in the workforce, there's this untapped pool of individuals with disabilities who've developed a lot of really unique strengths. And as we look at how people develop strengths, it is through overcoming increasingly difficult challenges, 08:50 Grant grand masters and chess, world class musicians and athletes, they all get there by 08:58 a lot of hard work and dedication and setting themselves increasingly difficult challenges and overcoming them. 09:05 And as people with disabilities making our way through the social, built and digital environments that were built 09:17 primarily by non disabled people for non disabled people, we face a lot of challenges, and as we grow older and take on more and more complex aspects of life, those challenges become increasingly more difficult, so 09:33 we're able to develop a lot of lot of skills and strengths 09:38 that fit 09:39 what employers are looking for So resilience and perseverance and grit, creative problem solving, ability to analyze and manage risk, ability to work in diverse teams, good communication skills and so my pleasure is ringing. 10:00 Uh, finding employers who are open to being innovative and forward thinking and how they address their need for talent, and having conversations about intentionally bringing people with disabilities into their workforce, then then connecting them 10:22 with those resources that are out there. Our vocational rehabilitation system, every state has vocational rehabilitation agencies that are funded by the federal government, by the Department of Education. They have a $4 billion annual budget. They have 1000s of staff, lots lots of dollars and lots of individuals that are serving who have Each has an individual plan for employment. So there, there's a pool of of people ready and seek, actively seeking work. 10:55 There are other companies, 10:58 particularly those affiliated with the association called disability, and companies that have made commitments to hiring people with disabilities. There are 11:10 in any any city of any size, there are 11:14 nonprofits that focus on supporting people with disabilities. Many of them focus on employment. And then there are organized groups of people with disabilities on the blindness field, National Federation of the Blind, American Council of the Blind. So my, again, my pleasure, is to find those employers who want to intentionally include people with disabilities, then connecting them with those resources, the state, the government, the government, the corporate, the nonprofit, the community, those are the four stakeholder groups that need to come together in order to make anything really transformational happen. So that's, that's what I really, really enjoy doing, is connecting those dots at the same time, 12:01 when I was at the American Foundation for the Blind, I would I would be contacted pretty regularly by innovative people technology, folks who had had an idea or thought about something they thought would be really helpful for People who are blind, and these are usually startup companies, and they were typically looking for capital. So they want, wanted to know if AFB could invest or provide loans or some way support them financially. And that was not something we did. 12:38 So I was able to pretty regularly say, appreciate what you're doing. This sounds super interesting, but that's not something we do. 12:50 I will say some of the ideas were indeed super interesting. Some I thought were trying to solve a problem that a non disabled person might think was a big problem for us, but really isn't. 13:06 Some, some of the some of the ideas, were trying to solve problems that had already been solved. But there were also some very unique, unique ideas, 13:18 as I moved into the consulting space where I have the flexibility to really focus on whatever I want to focus on. I continue to be contacted and connected with entrepreneurs and really innovative, creative people putting together solutions for life, 13:38 obstacles and barriers for people with disabilities, and I have 13:44 really learned a lot about how these ecosystems work. 13:50 I've raised many millions of dollars over my career, primarily philanthropic. So I led the 13:59 American Foundation for the Blind and the Lighthouse for the Blind, Inc, and raise money for those 501, c3, organizations through corporate foundation grants and major gifts, plan gifts and people's wills and 14:13 individual donors. And 14:17 I had a lot of experience with that, 14:20 but raising capital 14:23 in a for profit environment is really new to me, so I I've connected with with some investors. I've been involved in some crowd funding situations where companies sought to give individuals opportunities to buy into the company. It's with small dollar amounts. I've 14:44 been involved as an advisor to an incubator 14:51 that focuses on disability owned startups, and then I've been able to become an advisor to 14:59 uh. 15:00 A small number of select startup ventures 15:06 that I'm very excited about that I think fill a real need. And innosearch is one of those. I'm going to turn it over to Patrick in a in a few minutes, and ask him to tell us about his personal journey, where he's been, where, how he got to where he is today, and where he's hoping, planning, tending to go 15:29 within a search. 15:32 But 15:35 interestingly enough, I was contacted via LinkedIn 15:39 in February or March, and I'm link on my on LinkedIn every day, so you can also find me there Kirk Adams PhD. 15:48 But I was contacted. I was contacted by 15:53 a 15:55 app development company based in 16:00 the UK, 16:02 Switzerland, and they were a shop that developed apps. They're for profit business entrepreneurs, and they had found me on LinkedIn, and they asked if I would be interested in talking with them 16:16 about apps that I felt could be very useful to people who are blind. So we had several aviation sessions, hour long sessions, and the first thing I said to them was, if you can figure out a way to simplify and standardize e commerce for people who are blind, 16:37 because as we want to do what everyone in our society seems to want to do, which is to shop with ease and have things delivered to us and have lots of choices and go to the E commerce sites that provide those services we find as blind people. It's not that easy. It's not that simple. The sites are always changing. Many accessibility issues. 17:06 The search functions are different, the checkout processes, the shopping carts or shopping bags, so 17:15 not a walk in the park to successfully navigate e commerce as a person who's blind who uses assistive technology. 17:26 What I primarily use is Jaws, Job Access with speech, screen reading software my PC and an iPhone with VoiceOver. 17:36 And then I guess about two months ago, I was connected with Patrick, who's with us today, and he and his partner, Brian, founded a company called inno search, and they are doing exactly what I identified as a primary need for a solution for people who are blind. So I was so excited but they told me what they were doing, and I told them that little story that, yes, I had had, in fact, identified this as a great need. I'm glad someone is addressing it and working with Patrick and Brian now as an advisor for a couple of months. I know they're totally dedicated to making this work. They're putting their heart, soul into in a search to make e commerce and other web based activities 18:33 accessible, frictionless and fun. People are blind, so with that, Patrick, I would love to ask you to tell us a little bit about your journey, what brought you to the spot you are now with innosearch, on the on the cusp of greatness. You have users. I think you told me that users have doubled over the last month, and you're generating revenue, you're in addition to e commerce, you're adding other great services. And would love, love to hear about the past president, present and future of inno search? 19:13 Sure. Yeah. So thanks so much, Dr Kirk for the introduction, and obviously, thanks so much for the help. Over the past couple of months, it's been really wonderful to be able to speak with you on a weekly basis and just share what we're working on, 19:31 issues and also successes that we've been having. So yeah, thanks so much for doing that. 19:39 About myself, personally, I was born and raised 19:45 in the Bay Area. Actually grew up in Fremont, California, attended Mission San Jose High School. 19:53 Yeah, I was very competitive High School, a lot of competition for grades. And attended UC Berkeley. 20:00 Me for economics so interesting we were we both studied the same thing economics. 20:08 Was always fascinated with how the business world worked, and also was always an entrepreneur at heart. Always was in my dorm room, thinking of new ideas, new ways to address markets that you know seem to have lots, lots of opportunity. So I studied economics and also got my CPA at Ernst and Young I was doing finance and accounting for a number of years before I started dabbling, dabbling into entrepreneurship. My first company, we built $100 million blockchain startup. 20:46 We're doing peer to peer lending, one of the first smart contract lending platforms on Ethereum at that time. And after that company wound down in 2020 20:59 we took a break, and that's when I was introduced to Brian through a few mutual friends, and we were just 21:09 playing around with the latest in AI technologies. I think this was when chat GPT started to take off, and a lot of this large language model 21:21 AI technologies came, came to, you know, really mature, right? And I think that was when we were really brainstorming how we could leverage 21:32 such a cutting edge technology to help, you know, people in need, right? I was a social entrepreneur in the past. 21:40 You know, the peer to peer lending platform that I had built, you know, we distributed it to folks in India, to folks in Africa, folks in South America, to do community based lending. So I was really resonated with the social impact space and ways to use, you know, new, cutting edge technology to improve the lives 22:03 of others. So we did a lot of research and really came across. We tried a lot of different ideas, but after actually doing some user studies and talking with early people who tested out our product, folks with disabilities, in particular those who are blind and visually impaired really resonated with what we had built, right? They said, You know, this is something they've never seen before, something like shopping on Amazon to find something as simple as like tennis balls could take them hours on end, right? So, you know, with this AI solution, they can just quickly search for a product, learn about a product right, and then make the purchase. So, you know, seeing that organic feedback right from the community really gave us a strong signal that there was a really strong need. And you know, we potentially could build something to address that. And obviously that sort of was the initial spark, right? And once we dug deeper, right through like conversations with Dr Kirk, or conversations with lots of other folks in the 23:14 blind and visually impaired community, talking about a lot of nonprofits, you know, and every day now, actually, we get a lot of customer feedback that's very positive, right? We probably five to 10 23:27 customer like testimonials every, every day, they just email us, telling them how, telling us how great of an experience they're having. That's just a further testament that I think we're on to something that's super exciting. And when we hear that, you know, maybe somebody has never done uh, Christmas shopping independently before, and now they're able to finally do it within a search that really warms my heart, and, yeah, it gives us the fuel to keep, to keep, uh, grinding on this. So, 23:57 yeah, I, you know, I don't want to bore you with the details, but basically, we know digital accessibility is like a really big problem. A lot of websites today are not accessible, and it's very expensive to deal with this, right? You You can hire sighted help, right, but that could be hundreds of dollars an hour, right? And 24:20 you know, like Dr Kirk mentioned, a lot of the blind, visually impaired people, they don't have 24:27 a job, right? They rely on disability aid, so typically, lower income, and like paying, you know, for somebody to help you all the time just isn't financially feasible, right? So that's why we think AI could be a great solution, because it's obviously always on very patient with you, and the cost is just a small fraction right of that side of health. 24:51 So thus far, we've actually built e commerce...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: October 31, 2024: Jeremy Grandstaff
10/31/2024
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion: October 31, 2024: Jeremy Grandstaff
In this episode of Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion, Dr. Kirk Adams and his guest, Jeremy Grandstaff, dive into a powerful discussion on disability inclusion and its transformative impact on businesses. Broadcasting from his Seattle home office, Dr. Adams begins with an intimate account of his personal journey — from losing his sight at age five to becoming a leading advocate for accessibility. His early experiences, from mastering Braille to being the only blind student in mainstream education, laid the foundation for his resilience and passion for inclusion. But this episode isn't just about Dr. Adams. TRANSCRIPT 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, 00:37 hello, everybody. This is Dr Kirk Adams, talking to you from my home office in sunny Seattle, Washington. And welcome to my monthly live streamed webinar. Supercharge your bottom line through disability inclusion. And as you know, every month I have a wonderful guest host. This month, it is Jeremy grand staff, you'll hear more, a lot more from Jeremy in a bit, but Jeremy, could you please say hello? 01:07 Well, hello, Dr Kirk, it's such an honor to be with you and and to be part of your space. I just appreciate such a great opportunity to collaborate with you on many levels, but this is definitely one of the highlights of my week. So thank you for having me on great and I'm going to, I'm going to give you a little bit of background about me, in case you don't know me yet, and I'll keep it brief, I promise. And then we'll, we'll talk to Jeremy at some length 01:39 about disability inclusion, employment of people who are blind, the importance of accessibility, and his very interesting life story as well. And then we'll let you know how you can get in touch with me, how you can get in touch with Jeremy, and we'll open it up for any questions, comments, any of you may have who are joined with us here live today. You're watching the recording. We'll let you know how to get in touch with us. So again, I'm Dr KURT ADAMS. I am a blind person. Have been since age five, when my retins Both detached. I was in kindergarten and I went to a school for blind children, State of Oregon, Oregon State School for the Blind. First, second, third grade had a wonderful teacher named Mrs. Summers who taught me how to read Braille, which opened up my world and write Braille. Then I had a great O and M instructor, Mr. Pearson, who taught me how to travel confidently and independently with a long white cane. Wasn't it wasn't very long when I was six years old, but I was, I was using a cane and then learned how to type on a typewriter. Today, it would be called keyboarding, but the model then 02:57 blind kids and deaf kids went to state residential schools primarily and learn the skills of disability to the point where we could then go to public school in our hometown, our neighborhood. So I started that in fourth grade, went all the way on through school, lived in small towns here in the Pacific Northwest, was always the only blind student in all of my classes after I left the school for the blind so through through elementary, middle school, high school, college masters, PhD, always the only blind person. So I've had that experience. Also had the experience of graduating from college with great academic credentials, phi, beta, kappa, cum laude, four point by econ degree, then running into those barriers to employment that so many of us significant disabilities face. I've had that experience also through many twists, through many twists and turns. 04:01 Became the president and CEO of the Lighthouse for the Blind here in Seattle, the social enterprise employing about 250 people who are blind and deaf blind, and a variety of businesses, including aerospace manufacturing, making parts for all the Boeing aircraft later was privileged to step into that same president and CE role at the American Foundation for the Blind, which is the most iconic organization in the blindness field. Helen Keller was the brand ambassador there for 45 years. And when I moved from Seattle to New York, and we're in those offices at AFB, I could walk down the hall and sit at Helen Keller's desk, play with her typewriter if I ever needed a shot of inspiration. So I've, I've had the opportunity to be a frustrated person with a disability seeking employment, an opportunity. 05:00 To be a successfully employed person with a disability in corporate America. I was in banking and finance for 10 years, and then an opportunity to be the employer of 05:12 hundreds of people who are blind and deaf blind. And so I have, I have good 360 degree views of employment for people who are blind, and I formalized that experience by pursuing and earning a PhD in leadership and change through Antioch University. And my scholarly focus was on employment of people who are blind. My dissertation is called journeys through rough country, an ethnographic study of blind adults successfully employed in American corporations. And no, I just, I just had it brailled and hard copy Braille. I've had the electronic file since 2019 when I completed but I just started rereading it, and it's pretty good. I'm pretty I'm pretty happy with the first 25 pages I've read this week. 06:10 I set up a consulting practice a little over two years ago when I made the change from leading the American Foundation for the Blind, relocated from the Washington, DC area back to Seattle, very much driven by my 06:27 commitment to family. My wife and I are joyous grandparents. We have a 232, 06:34 month old grandson, eight month old granddaughter. They live a mile away from us here in Seattle. So quite, quite a lifestyle change happened a couple of years ago, I set up a consulting practice, primarily to work with companies who are interested in winning the fierce competition for talent by expanding their thinking around diversity, equity and inclusion, to embrace intentional employment of people with disabilities, in particular people who are blind, and having those conversations about the fact that only 35% of us significant disabilities are in the workforce, there are many people who are eager to work, looking for those opportunities, have pursued education and training and may not have had the chance to get that foot on the career ladder, and we talk about how people develop talent and skills, and that we develop mastery through overcoming challenges and the lived experience of disability gives us ample opportunity to face and overcome challenges on a very regular basis, which leads to development of resilience and perseverance, creative problem solving, 07:57 the ability to analyze and manage risk, the ability to put together diverse teams and work with teams as we're all interdependent on one another, and good communication skills, I think, which are necessary we are to not only survive, but thrive as people with disabilities And in these environments that were not surprisingly, created primarily to fit people without disabilities, and as we strive to create a good person, a fit between ourselves and the environment, the creativity that goes along with that. 08:35 So I've been working directly with companies. I will note one partnership with a cyber security company called Nova coast, we've developed a fabulous program to launch blind people into cyber security careers. 08:51 You can find that it's called the apex program. You can find that at WWW dot the apex program.com 09:00 and it's a 10 week virtual training that leads to certification network plus and security plus certifications, and then opportunities to interview with employers who are desperately seeking qualified, certified 09:16 Cyber Security employees. As on any given day, there are 755,000 09:22 open cybersecurity jobs in our country, and we're set up with vocational rehabilitation in 20 states now. So if anyone listening is interested in cybersecurity careers, 09:37 please visit www dot the apex program.com, 09:41 another aspect of my consulting business which is really interesting is working with startup companies that are seeking to be very innovative and using technology in order to create a more inclusive world for people with disabilities. When I was a. 10:00 Uh, in the President's CEO role at the American Foundation for the Blind, I was quite regularly contacted by companies who thought they had a great idea of some sort of technological innovation that would be helpful to people who are blind. Sometimes these were well intended people who were seeking to solve a problem that really didn't really exist. Sometimes they were seeking to solve a problem for which there was already a solution, and sometimes they had a pretty cool, new, innovative idea. And inevitably, they were all seeking funding and wanting to know if AFD could provide startup funding. And I was 10:46 easy, easily, quickly able to say, No, we don't do that. 10:52 But as I shifted into an entrepreneurial space myself, with my company, which is called innovative impact LLC, I continued to be contacted by by innovative people wanting to do good in the world 11:12 through scaling their companies, and I have found myself now an advisor To and a shareholder in four different companies, one of which is called curb cut OS. And curb cut OS is one of several intersections between myself and Mr. Grand staff Jeremy, who's who's on the call. So 11:42 a mirror, a tangled web we weave sometimes. So I met Jeremy at an NFB conference. He had his own management consulting business at that time, and I was fairly new at the American Foundation for the Blind. I was working to restructure things, streamline, get focused, moving to a systems change model 12:09 focusing on public policy and research to influence decision makers, rather than direct service to people who are blind their families and professionals in the field. So quite, quite a cultural transformational shift I was working with the board and staff to manage 12:27 and Jeremy had such excellent expertise and experience in working with leadership teams that I engaged Jeremy specifically to work with my senior leadership team to structure how we would meet, how we would engage with one another, 12:47 the cadence of meetings, the content, the structures. And he was so super helpful to me and helping move things forward. And I'm proud of what was accomplished during my six years at AFB, and it is indeed a systems change organization focusing on research and public policy to make big things happen 13:11 in the lives of people who are blind. Jeremy, thank you for the part you played in making that that shift 13:21 while I was at AFB, also, one of the things I did was to take a very small consulting activity and work to create a sustainable revenue generating social enterprise around technology consulting. We were small group, we needed to find partners in order to take on large projects, and one of those partners was a company called nebula Media Group, which has been rebranded it is now curb cut OS. 13:58 When I left AFB and started consulting. I reconnected with what is now curb cut. Os they built my website, innovative impact. Dot consulting, 14:13 they laid a vision out to me, which is very exciting around their approach to digital accessibility, which we'll talk about more here in a few minutes, 14:26 their philosophy, 14:29 their vision, to really make changes in the landscape of digital accessibility. And asked if I would like to pitch in, which I happily agreed to do so. I am a strategic advisor to curb cut OS. I am a small shareholder, which is fun. 14:48 And 14:52 as I, as I say, as I reinvigorated my network, I also reached out to Jeremy say, hey. 15:00 Know, you've been in the consulting space. You've been successful at it. I'm starting it. I wanted to reach out and reconnect with Jeremy. 15:09 I introduced him to curb cut OS, and they 15:14 very, very wisely, also engaged Jeremy in a formal way. He's part of the curb cut OS team, so we're back working together again, which is great, and I really want to 15:29 give space here for Jeremy to talk not only about curb cut and his role there, his vision for the organization, but also his own experience. Jeremy is really uniquely positioned as a leader 15:46 in the blindness field, disability inclusion field, I'm I'm keenly interested in leadership as one of the 15:54 the engines for driving significant change, and as most of you probably know the outcomes for people with disabilities are 16:05 are very deplorable. As far as I mentioned, 35% of us are working as opposed to 70% of the general population. Our home ownership was about a 10th of the general population. Million blind people living in poverty in the country, so we need changes and doing more of the same as not getting as where we need to go. So I'm very interested in disruption and innovation and leadership for change, and I'm also very interested in people with the lived experience of disability being in leadership roles where disability inclusion is concerned. And Jeremy has a 16:49 really unique breadth and depth of experience, and now in the position he's he's out with, with curb cut OS, he is in a position to exert that leadership influence and really make some great things happen. So Jeremy, I'm going to turn the floor over to you and listen attentively as you talk, and I may jot down a few questions that I can come back to later. But so glad you're here. Thanks so much. So glad we reconnected and that we're back back in the boat, rowing the same direction. 17:24 Well, Kirk, it's because of this event that I actually have my job today, because that was the first time that I met my boss, Mark pound, and so 17:37 it was extremely humbling 17:41 listening to your introduction. 17:47 I don't know that I actually knew that I made that big of a difference back in our first encounters. And I think I kind of assumed that that you know you were happy, right? But I knew you were happy, but that was absolutely just very humbling, and so thank you so much for that. 18:10 So as Kirk said, my name is Jeremy Grandstaff. I live outside of DC, Washington, DC and Burke, Virginia, with my seeing eye dog, Ozzie, and my partner, Jerry, I have 18:25 an interesting 18:27 I think sometimes we're always so close to our life story Kirk that we just don't actually start to look at it or think about it. 18:38 But I grew up in a small town in mid west in the Midwest, in Ohio called Marengo, Ohio. I think there were maybe 300 people in my town, 18:52 and 18:53 I don't think about that time of my life a lot. My sister has recently launched a website called My brothers are blind, the letter R blind.com 19:04 where she's kind of on her own journey as a sighted sibling of three blind brothers. And one of the things that she did recently, Kirk was interview all three of us, and it kind of created this reflection of where did we start, and how did we end up where we all are today? 19:27 So some key pieces that I tend to highlight 19:32 at the age of five. So again, I had been blind since birth. I have levers congenital and morosses, and and so I would actually say, probably for the first I believe it was year of my life, my parents weren't really sure what was going on, right? This is 1976 19:51 they had someone out to the house from 19:55 what is now BVI, or Department of digital. 20:00 For the visually impaired. I don't know what it was called back then, but a lady came out to the house, and the way the story is told to me, I was two years old, and 20:12 my parents were told that I would be better off being placed in an institution, and that that was going to be my life. And 20:22 as I said, the way the story was told to me, my dad will just say politely, though I'm not sure it was that politely told them that they might as well get the heck off of his property, because that was not going to be the life that his kid had. And so I have to actually give pay homage to my parents, right? Because they really took this approach that they were going to do whatever it took for me to be quote, unquote normal. And obviously we don't. I don't like using that phrase today, but that's how they looked at it, right? They just wanted me to be able to have the same life that everybody would have if they could see. 21:05 So at the age of five, I was riding my bicycle around our farm and riding up and down the gravel road and scraping my fingers on mailboxes, as I would, you know, take them out on my way by at the 21:19 I know, right 21:22 at the age of seven, I used to run barrels, which is a horse racing activity, and my dad and I developed 21:34 the situation where there were three barrels, and on the top of each barrel would be a can, And in the can was a beeper, and the beepers had different frequencies, and that's how I would know where they were, and so I would run the barrels. At the age of 10, I came up from ossb, Ohio State School for the Blind, where I also, by the way, Kirk, got a very good foundation in Braille and those type of things remind me one day, Kirk, to tell you about the the note that I typed that was supposed to be my teacher telling the librarian I could do something, but I typed it and signed it, Mrs. Perano, like that would be how a teacher would write a note to the librarian. Thought I would get away with that. But at the age of 10, I came up to public school, and at this point, we're talking 1970 I'm sorry, 1986 87 and 22:31 one of the distinct memories that I have in that whole process was sitting in a room with all these teachers and my parents, I later found out it was my IEP, and I am telling them how they are going to accommodate me as a student. Now mind you, at that particular time, my school system was extremely small, so there was no process in place for somebody. I think they called it back then mainstreaming right up into public school, and so the teachers had no idea what to do, and my job was to really take a step back and look at how could What did I need, and how could I ask for the things that I need. And so I distinctly remember 23:22 in that meeting, the teacher asking my parents about something that I would need, and my mom looked at me and said, I don't know why you're asking me. I'm not the one who needs it. Why don't you ask him? And so from a very early age, my parents taught me that my job was to advocate for myself. They also taught me, and my dad hates when I talk about it this way, but there was a role in my house. If you were going to fail, it better be the most spectacular failure you've ever had. Now I'd say it joking like that, but really, what my dad meant was, if it doesn't work and you fail, whatever failure may be, you better be able to look him in the eye. And yes, as a blind person, I was expected to still look my parents in the eye when they were talking to me, or at least look in their direction, right? But my dad would say, you better be able...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion | WOTC
09/26/2024
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion | WOTC
Dr. Kirk Adams and Evan Amundson discussed the Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) and its benefits for businesses hiring individuals with disabilities. Evan highlighted that WOTC can provide tax credits ranging from $1,200 to $9,600 per eligible new hire, with over 2 million eligible new hires in 2023. He emphasized the importance of vocational rehabilitation agencies in connecting employers with qualified candidates. Kirk added that only 35% of people with significant disabilities are in the workforce, despite many being highly motivated and qualified. They also mentioned other tax credits, such as the Disabled Access Credit and Barrier Removal Deduction, to incentivize businesses to hire and accommodate individuals with disabilities.
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion | Surpassing Sight
06/27/2024
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion | Surpassing Sight
Dr. Kirk Adams, Managing Director of Innovative Impact LLC, hosted a webinar discussing disability inclusion and employment. He highlighted that only 35% of blind individuals are employed, compared to 70% of the general population. Lucas Behnken, producer of the documentary "Surpassing Sight," shared the film's goal to change perceptions of blind capabilities through the story of a blind team in the Race Across America. The film aims to catalyze social impact by connecting employers with training programs and tracking employment outcomes. The project includes private screenings, a red carpet premiere, and a long-term strategy to raise awareness and funds for employment opportunities for the blind. Introduction and Overview of the Webinar Speaker 1 introduces the podcast, emphasizing its focus on disability rights, employment, and inclusion. Speaker 2, Dr. Kirk Adams, welcomes everyone to the fourth episode of his monthly live-streamed webinar series. Dr. Adams mentions the partnership with the documentary film "Surpassing Sight" and introduces its producer, Lucas Behnken. Lucas Behnken introduces himself and his production company, Sterling Light Productions, and provides a brief background on the film and its foundation. Dr. Kirk Adams' Background and Employment Statistics for Blind Individuals Dr. Adams shares his personal story of being blind since childhood and his education at the Oregon State School for the Blind. He discusses the employment challenges faced by blind individuals, noting that only 35% are employed compared to 70% of the general population. Dr. Adams highlights the disparities in employment outcomes, including higher unemployment rates and lower income levels for blind individuals. He emphasizes the importance of meaningful employment in providing financial stability, dignity, and positive self-identity. Success Stories and Personal Experiences of Blind Professionals Dr. Adams shares success stories of blind professionals who have achieved significant careers in large corporations. He recounts the story of a blind woman who overcame obstacles to become an executive in a telecom company. Another story involves a blind man who participated in freestyle bike tricks with his sighted peers, fostering a strong sense of self-efficacy. Dr. Adams discusses his professional career dedicated to creating opportunities for blind and disabled individuals to thrive in employment. Dr. Adams' Professional Achievements and Leadership Roles Dr. Adams details his role as President and CEO of the Lighthouse for the Blind in Seattle, where he oversaw businesses employing blind and deaf-blind individuals. He highlights the success of these businesses, including aerospace manufacturing and advanced manufacturing for the U.S. Army. Dr. Adams shares his experience serving on the Board of Trustees for the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) and his leadership role at AFB. He recounts his meeting with Jack Chen, a blind Assistant General Counsel for Google, and their shared commitment to creating opportunities for blind individuals in the workforce. The Race Across America Project and AFB's Involvement Dr. Adams describes the Race Across America project initiated by Jack Chen and Dan Berlin, involving blind professionals on tandem cycling teams. AFB sponsored the Race Across America team, marking a significant milestone in their efforts to change perceptions of blind capabilities. Dr. Adams shares his transition to a new role as a consultant and his partnership with Dan Berlin, leading to the Apex Program for training blind individuals in cybersecurity. The Apex Program has expanded to 16 states, with a target of training 400 blind individuals annually in cybersecurity. Introduction of Lucas Behnken and the Surpassing Sight Film Project Lucas Behnken introduces himself and his background in creating social impact campaigns around documentary films. He explains his involvement in the Surpassing Sight project, which began with footage from the Race Across America. Lucas and his team, including director Ramon Fernandez, interviewed subjects and created the film to highlight the capabilities of blind professionals. The film includes a diverse team of blind and low-vision professionals, ensuring authenticity and impact. The Film's Social Impact Campaign and Distribution Strategy Lucas emphasizes the importance of using the film as a tool to make long-term change and enhance lives. The film includes an audio description track, ensuring accessibility for blind viewers. Lucas and his team have been conducting private screenings to build advocates and gather feedback on the film's impact. The goal is to create a concierge service to connect blind professionals with companies and track their employment outcomes. Lessons Learned from Previous Social Impact Campaigns Lucas shares insights from his work on the documentary "Molly," which focused on adoption and foster care. The campaign involved private screenings, partnerships with nonprofits, and a large theatrical release to raise awareness and funds. The campaign resulted in significant donations and increased visibility for the organization, highlighting the power of a well-structured social impact effort. Lucas emphasizes the importance of building a team dedicated to the social impact campaign to ensure long-term success. Call to Action and Invitation to Get Involved Dr. Adams and Lucas invite viewers to get involved in the Surpassing Sight social impact initiative. They provide contact information for those interested in volunteering, donating, or collaborating on the project. Dr. Adams shares his email and LinkedIn information for further discussions. The webinar concludes with a call to action, encouraging viewers to check out the Surpassing Sight website and join the effort to change employment outcomes for blind individuals. SUMMARY KEYWORDS disability inclusion, employment opportunities, blind professionals, Race Across America, social impact, documentary film, employment statistics, internal locus, meaningful employment, cybersecurity training, private screenings, social action campaign, employment disparities, film distribution, stakeholder connections 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, 00:36 wonderful. Welcome everybody. This is Dr Kirk Adams, Managing Director of innovative impact LLC, welcome to my monthly live streamed webinar. Supercharge your bottom line through Disability Inclusion, I began this monthly series in February, so this is the fourth episode. It is being recorded so we can share with folks later. Every month, I partner with another ecosystem that shares my passion and focus on accelerating inclusion of people with disabilities in the workforce. This month, we're featuring a documentary film and social impact project called surpassing site, and the documentary films producer Lucas Behnken is with us today, Lucas, if you want to say hi and just a brief headline about who you are, and we'll dig deeper into your amazing background in a bit. 01:35 Thank you so much. Yeah, I'm Lucas Behnken and I'm a producer, and have a production company called Sterling light productions. And I was the producer and production company for this film titled surpassing site, which we have now established what is called surpassing site foundation to be the distribution campaign for the film, 01:57 fabulous. So a little background, I want to talk just a little bit about myself, a little bit about employment of people with disabilities, employment of people who are blind in particular, and then tell a very interesting story about how we all came to be here today. So again, I'm Dr Kirk Adams. I am a blind person. My retina is detached. When I was five years old in kindergarten, I attended a school for blind children in the state of Oregon. Oregon State School for the Blind first, second, third grade. Learned to read and write Braille, travel confidently with a white cane type on a typewriter, and was given some real gifts there. As I went to school with 120 other blind kids, I was given a strong internal locus of control, which meant I felt in my bones, as I left third grade and went to public school in fourth grade that I could be successful in whatever I chose to do with my life. I also was given the gift of lofty expectations from the school and my parents about what I could accomplish. And I was given skills. I was given, like I mentioned, Braille skills, key it was typing then, but keyboarding skills, skills to travel confidently and independently. And those are three of the main factors that lead to successful employment for blind people as we become adults, unfortunately, the employment outcomes for us are not even close to what they should be. Only 35% of us are working, compared to about 70% of the general population that are working age, that are that are in the workforce. So about half, if you look at the actual Bureau of Labor Statistics, unemployment rate people who are actively seeking employment, if you see the general population is 4% for people with disabilities, is going to be 8% so our outcomes are always half as good or twice as bad as the general population. As far as employment goes, for those of us who are employed, we're in a much narrower, narrower band of occupations than the general population, and over half of us that work are working for government or nonprofits, which are great places to work, but they definitely have caps on the level of income one can achieve As composed to other employment settings. So this persistent unemployment problem leads to things like poverty. A third of people with significant disabilities live in poverty. Our home ownership is 1/10 that of the general population, and leads to health disparities educational achievement. This disparities, all, all kinds of bad things. So I have devoted my professional career to creating opportunities for other people who are blind and have other disabilities to thrive in employment. There's lots of ways to tackle lots of problems. My My choice has been to focus on employment, because I believe that meaningful employment not only solves financial issues, but it also provides individuals with the experience of the dignity of work, the positive self identity that goes with meaningful work. So I have pursuit of creating those opportunities for people who are blind. I have earned a PhD in leadership and change my dissertation, which is called journeys through rough country as an ethnographic study of blind adults who are successfully employed in large corporations. And I interviewed blind people working at companies whose names we all know, Facebook, Apple, Google, Amazon, Chase, at&t, etc. And I found a couple of really interesting things, one that almost everyone shared that strong internal locus of control that I mentioned earlier, believing in their bones they could forge their own path, and they could, without exception, trace that to an experience, experience or set of experiences, that gave them That sense of their own mastery of their own destiny. Two examples, I like to use one woman who's been employed in a large telecom company as an executive for 45 years, recalled that shit when she was a young girl, 10 years old. She and her twin sister were sent to a sleepaway camp, a summer camp, and when it came time to do horseback riding, the counselors told this young blind girl that she was she wasn't allowed to ride the horses because it was too dangerous. And blind kids hear that a lot. You can't do this. You can't do that. Her sighted sister, however, was allowed to ride the horses. So that night, they slipped out of the cabin, went to the stable, and they got out two horses, and they rode together. And she this was so animated when she recalled that night, writing swiftly through the night with her twin sister side by side. And that gave her that sense that she could really do anything that she set her mind to in a very different setting. One of the people I interviewed, a very successful person with computer science degrees and law degrees, very responsible positions in tech, who's blind, recalled growing up in one of the boroughs in New York City, and falling in with a group of 1213, year old boys in the neighborhood who did freestyle bike tricks. They would ride their bikes and stand up on the seat, or stand up on the handlebars and jump over benches and do all kinds of tricks. And he was doing that with with his neighborhood crew as a blind person. And as I often tell Parents of Blind children's you can measure your success to the parent of a blind kid by how many, how many trips to the emergency room do you make? So I think in that case, that young gentleman had his parents in and out of the ER often, but he certainly grew up with that strong internal locus of control. So a couple other things I've done. I had the privilege of serving as president and CEO of the Lighthouse for the Blind here in Seattle, and we employed, and they still do employ dozens and dozens of blind and deaf blind people, some with additional disabilities, and businesses that generate revenue and support the organization, some of the most interesting being aerospace manufacturing, 120 blind and DeafBlind machinists making parts For all the Boeing aircraft, computer numerically controlled advanced manufacturing, producing issue items for the United States Army, the entrenchment tool, the omnimo Hydration systems and a number of other very successful business enterprises. While serving in that capacity, I was invited to join the Board of Trustees for the American Foundation for the Blind AFB, which is the most iconic historic organization in the blindness field. It was Helen Keller's organization for 45 years, where she served as global brand ambassador, and when I. And my wife moved from Seattle to New York in May of 2016 so I could step into that leadership role at AFB. I had the opportunity to sit at Helen Keller's desk in the morning and play with her typewriter and read a page out of her Braille Bible, and get get tied right into that history and that impact that she had, and gain that inspiration to try to do the best I can to carry on that legacy of creating opportunities and being an advocate. In May of 2016 when I arrived New York, I got a telephone call from a gentleman named Jack Chen, and Jack said, I work about 10 blocks from you at Chelsea Market. I'm Assistant General Counsel for Google, and I'm blind, and I heard you came to AFB, and I want to welcome you to the city. So we met for breakfast and became friends and colleagues and developed a deep relationship and also a shared commitment to devoting our time, energy and resources to creating opportunities for people who are blind in the world of work. Several years, fast forward, I got another call from Jack saying, I'm working on a an amazing project. I have a business partner named Dan Berlin, who's also blind. Want to get on a call with the three of us and talk to you about this project. So Dan another worth another hour conversation. Very successful blind entrepreneur, was a chemist by training, 11:44 worked for a large 11:47 pharma school, pharmaceutical company that we all know. When his vision got to the point where he could no longer perform the job duties that he was accustomed to, he chose to leave at employment. He purchased a small flavors company. He became our country's largest importer of vanilla. Sold that business has a nonprofit called Team C possibilities. He provides scholarships to blind college students. He organizes outdoor adventures. He's taken blind young people to run along the Great Wall of China to run trails in Peru of Machu Picchu, another Outstanding, outstanding blind individual. And Jack and Dan said that they wanted to undertake the most rigorous physical challenge that they could find and involve blind professionals in doing so to document it on film and use the documentary as a tool to change perceptions of employers around the capabilities of people who are blind to encourage blind people to pursue their dreams and ultimately to move the needle in those terrible statistics of blind employment that we talked about earlier, and they told me what we have chosen is called The Race Across America. I had never heard of it, but as they explained it, it's the longest single stage bicycle race in the world. Cycling teams start with their rear rear wheel in the Pacific Ocean in California, and they continuously ride as a team to Annapolis, Maryland, Atlantic Ocean. And Dan and Jack proposed putting together four tandem cycling teams, each with a blind professional on the back of the bike. That position is called the stoker, and a sighted person in front that person is called the pilot, and they wanted to put together all the logistics necessary to continuously HAVE THEIR TEAM CYCLE across across the nation. They wanted to document it. And then they had their ask, would the American Foundation for the Blind consider being a sponsor of our race team, and 14:25 coincidentally, as karma works, 14:29 AFB Centennial was approaching, we had put together a budget to promote the centennial, and one of Our line items was to sponsor a signature event. So being a good CEO, I did not say yes, but I said, I will put you in touch with our chief communications officer who owns that budget, and you can talk to her about your project, which they did, and the decision was. Made for AFB to sponsor the Race Across America, Team C to C as the signature sponsor sponsorship event for our centennial. So we're proudly the American Foundation for the Blind was proudly the first sponsor for Team C to C's Race Across America. Now I'm going to digress just a little bit, but it's still pertinent. When I made the decision to leave the American Foundation for the Blind and step into a new role as a consultant, in the summer of 2022 I had reached out to friends, colleagues to let them know that I was seeking fun, innovative, high impact projects that would accelerate inclusion of people who are blind in the workforce. And one of those people I reached out to, of course, was Dan Berlin. Shortly thereafter, you and his wife were on vacation. His wife went on a dive trip, and one of the women on the scuba diving trip, named Janice, turned out to be the co founder of a very successful cyber cyber security company called Nova coast. Nova coast was founded in Santa Barbara, California, about 30 years ago, they worked mostly with large global financial institutions. They're very entrepreneurial. They create business activities where they see need. 16:32 They had created a training program, 16:36 virtual training program, to train people to get basic certifications on cybersecurity for entry level cybersecurity jobs, because they could not find enough people to hire, and they knew others in the industry could not find enough good people to hire, so they created a business unit around training. They moved their headquarters from Santa Barbara to Wichita, Kansas, and there's only one reason anyone would do that, that's taxes. They found themselves in Wichita. They connected with a blindness agency there called envision that I have done lots of great projects with in the past. And they were talking to them about employment and the fact that only 35% of us are working, and the fact that there are 750,000 open jobs in cybersecurity on any given day in our country. And envision asked, Have...
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Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion | Novacoast
04/25/2024
Supercharge Your Bottom Line Through Disability Inclusion | Novacoast
Dr. Kirk Adams hosted a webinar on disability inclusion in cybersecurity, highlighting the Apex program, which prepares blind individuals for cybersecurity careers. The program, developed by Novacoast, offers a 10-week training course for CompTIA Network+ and Security+ certifications, costing $7,500. The program aims to place 400 blind individuals annually in cybersecurity roles, addressing a significant employment gap. Key features include flexible learning, employer support, and a strong industry network. The webinar emphasized the transferable skills from contract management services to cybersecurity and the potential for career growth, with starting salaries around $35,000 and potential earnings of $95,000. Outline Introduction and Overview of the Webinar Speaker 1 introduces the podcast, emphasizing its focus on disability rights, employment, and inclusion. Speaker 2, Dr. Kirk Adams, welcomes everyone to the monthly live stream webinar titled "Supercharge your bottom line through Disability Inclusion." Dr. Adams introduces himself as the Managing Director of Innovative Impact LLC and shares his background in disability inclusion. He introduces two teammates, David Main and Katie McAuliffe, and welcomes a new team member, Kalana. The agenda includes a video about the Apex program, perspectives from David and Katie, and a Q&A session. Background of the Apex Program Dr. Adams recounts the history of the Apex program, which began during his tenure at the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB). The AFB was named as the third central nonprofit agency under the Ability One program, leading to a five-year cooperative agreement. The research phase identified three lines of business: contract management, digital health, and cybersecurity. Despite the pandemic, the research highlighted cybersecurity as a promising field for people who are blind. Dr. Adams transitioned to his consulting practice, Innovative Impact, and connected with Dan Berlin and Jack Chen, who were involved in the Race Across America. Development of the Apex Program Jack Chen and Dan Berlin were organizing the Race Across America and seeking sponsors. AFB sponsored the race, and Dan Berlin introduced Dr. Adams to Novacoast, a cybersecurity company interested in hiring blind individuals. Dr. Adams met with Novacoast's CEO, Paul Anderson, and was given the green light to develop the Apex program. Katie McAuliffe joined the team later, bringing extensive experience from IBM and Novell. The Apex program was created to prepare blind and visually impaired individuals for certifications in networking and cybersecurity. Personal Stories and Success of the Apex Program A video featuring personal stories of individuals involved in the Apex program is shown, highlighting their struggles and successes. One participant, David Jr., shares his journey from a severe accident to pursuing a cybersecurity degree. Curtis Jackson, another participant, discusses his experience with unemployment and how the Apex program changed his life. The video emphasizes the potential for blind individuals to succeed in cybersecurity careers. David Jr. and Curtis both found employment at Novacoast, proving the program's effectiveness. Vision and Future of the Apex Program David Main outlines his vision for the program's growth, including expanding to more states and potentially international markets. The program aims to offer high school students the opportunity to earn certifications before graduation. The goal is to support students beyond entry-level training, providing further certifications and job opportunities. Dr. Adams expresses his admiration for the program, stating it aligns with his career-long mission to create opportunities for people who are blind. Katie McAuliffe discusses the unique features of Novacoast and how the company's support enhances the Apex program. Career Opportunities and Industry Support Katie McAuliffe explains the various career paths available in cybersecurity, from entry-level roles to specialized positions like threat hunters and penetration testers. The industry is supportive of continuous learning and certification stacking, allowing for career advancement. Novacoast's annual cybersecurity conference provides opportunities for graduates to network with industry leaders. The company's staffing division, Novaco Staffing, helps place graduates in positions. Dr. Adams emphasizes the importance of vocational rehabilitation partnerships and other funding models to support the program. Q&A Session and Closing Remarks Amanda Gomez from Vibrant Works asks about accessing the training independently of state vocational rehabilitation. Dr. Adams confirms that alternative funding models are possible and shares examples of successful partnerships. Katie McAuliffe provides pricing information for the program, which costs $7,500 and includes both CompTIA certifications. The program is designed to be flexible, with students having 10 weeks to complete the training, but the pace can be adjusted. Dr. Adams invites further questions and encourages viewers to visit the Apex Program website for more information. 00:00 Music. 00:09 Welcome to podcasts by Dr Kirk Adams, where we bring you powerful conversations with leading voices in disability rights, employment and inclusion. Our guests share their expertise, experiences and strategies to inspire action and create a more inclusive world. If you're passionate about social justice or want to make a difference, you're in the right place. Let's dive in with your host, Dr Kirk Adams, 00:36 and welcome everybody to my monthly live stream webinar, webinar called Supercharge your bottom line through Disability Inclusion, I am Dr Kirk Adams talking to you from my home office in Seattle, Washington, where it's pouring rain outside. For those who don't know me, I am the Manning managing director of a consulting practice called innovative impact. LLC and I work with companies to help accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in the workforce and to help them supercharge their bottom line through Disability Inclusion. Immediate Past President and CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind. I before that held the same roles at the lighthouse for the blind Incorporated, and I am featuring today a wonderful partner Apex program, which prepares blind people for careers in cybersecurity. And I have two of my Apex program teammates here, David main and Katie McAuliffe, and you'll hear from both of them a bit later. I also want to welcome kalana to the innovative impact team. She joined us Monday, and she'll be working with all of you to share social media and so welcome. Thank you. Thank you, kalana, so the and then we'll after I tell, after I tell my story of what brought us all here today. Then we'll show you a six minute video produced by working nation about the apex program, to give you a flavor of what we're doing here in creating these career opportunities for people who are blind. And then we'll hear perspectives from David and Katie. We'll make sure you know how to connect with Apex program, and then we'll have some time for discussion Q and A. So the story really has two, two interweaving narratives. The first is, when I was at the American Foundation for the Blind, we were given the opportunity to be named as the third central nonprofit agency under the Ability One program, which is a federal procurement and employment program that allows nonprofits employing people with disabilities to obtain government contracts. And we entered into a five year cooperative agreement with the AbilityOne commission, and the first phase was called research and study, and we we spent two years doing in depth research. AFB is a renowned research organization, and our charge was to identify three new lines of business that could be introduced into the Ability One program that would create career pathways into competitive, integrated employment and fulfilling careers for people who are blind in knowledge based work. And we identified three lines of business. One was contract management or civilian federal agencies. The second was digital health, or telehealth, and the third was cyber security. And the criteria we were using in our research work, we wanted to find industries with a wide range of career paths, industries that have projected long term above average growth and employment opportunities, industries where there were career paths that were accessible to people who are blind and have other disabilities, industries where advanced degrees were not required, 04:21 industries that had 04:24 strong infrastructure around commonly accepted certifications, industry associations, and finally, industries that that had indicated that They were being proactive around Diversity Equity and Inclusion and cybersecurity fit all of those criteria. We finished our research and study phase, delivered our line line of business analyzes to the AbilityOne commission, and then the pandemic set upon us, and we did not see a way to. Operationalize at that point. So we exited the cooperative agreement after phase one. But cyber security is something I immerse myself in for several years, as far as a field of endeavor for careers, for people who are blind. Fast forward a little bit as I made my change then stepped out of my role at AFB and launched my consulting practice. Innovative impact I did. I did what they call activate your network. So I went, went through my LinkedIn, and reached out to people that I had great relationships with and shared my passion for employment of people with disabilities and let them know I was setting off on a new adventure and was just looking for fun, innovative, high impact projects with cool people that would accelerate inclusion of people with disabilities in the workforce. And I reach out to a blind friend and colleague named Dan Berlin, and now I'll start the second part the second narrative. In 2020 as a FB was preparing for our centennial, centennial year in 2021 I was contacted by a blind friend and colleague named Jack Chen, who at that time was Assistant General Counsel at Google working in New York at Chelsea Market offices. Afbs offices were about 10 blocks from his when I first moved to New York to go to AFB in 2016 Jack reached out and said, We should meet. We did. We became friends. He reached out to me in 2020 to say that he and a blind person named Dan Berlin who I didn't know yet, we're putting together a team to do the race across America. And the Race Across America is a single stage bicycle race, the longest in the world, from the Pacific Ocean and Santa Barbara, California, Santa Monica California to Annapolis, Maryland. And a single stage race means someone on the team is always peddling. And they put together four tandem bicycle teams with a blind professional on the back and sighted guide on the front, and they wanted to put together the logistics to compete in this race, and they were looking for sponsors. So AFB had put together a budget to celebrate our centennial in 2021 and we had designated $25,000 to sponsor something cool. And I passed Jack and Dan on to our communications lead, and she thought it was a perfect fit. So we were the lead sponsor at AFB of the race across America. And footnote, there's a documentary film called surpassing site, and Jack and team will be my guest here next month, last Thursday in May, and talk about the documentary film. In any case, I had reached out to Dan as I activated my network and told him I was looking for fun, innovative, high impact things to do with cool people. And he called me about a month later, and he said my wife and I were on vacation in the Seychelles, and my wife went on a dive trip, and she met a lady who was a co founder of a cybersecurity company called novacoast, and they are very interested in creating a significant presence in cybersecurity for people who are blind. And David main will tell you how that program was developed, but they were just at the beginning stages. They, as a wonderful, privately held entrepreneurial company, put resources in places where they want great outcomes. So I had the opportunity to speak with their CEO, Paul Anderson, who was here in the Seattle area. We talked about the possibilities of engaging significant numbers of blind people in the cybersecurity industry, and I was given the green light to join David and his Apex program team. And then Katie joined us a bit later. So with that, if we could show you the video and give you the flavor of where we're at with the apex program, and then we'll hear from David and Katie. 09:44 I've tried to give my kids the best life that I can. I've been a good dad. I've sucked as a mother, but I've been a good dad. Every parent wants to provide the best they can for their kids, and knowing that you have a disability. That is going to take years to recover from. I think that wears on me. That's a lot of pressure. A young man ran a light at 70 miles per hour, hitting me so hard that I wound up breaking both my ankles, on my ribs, damage to my head, damage to my arms, my retina was partially detached to later fully detached. The last few months before I lost my eye, I was taking Vicodin like Tic Tacs. Within a year of that, I was divorced and raising the kids on my own. After six years, I returned to school to kind of recreate who I was. I'd always loved computers, and David Jr had started at a local two year college taking network classes, so I started taking the same degrees he did. And the student walked up and said, you know, if you take 12 more credit hours, you can get your cybersecurity degree too. I know Inkling what cybersecurity was. I'm like, but that sounds cool. I'll do that. The shortage for cybersecurity analysts is massive, hacking, ransomware, malware is prevalent and getting worse, cybersecurity analysts, or SOC analysts, analyze the suspicious activity and try to prevent it before the hackers can cause any damage. Colleges, universities, two year schools cannot produce enough analysts, so there's a great need to fill these roles. Once I got my degrees, I started looking for work. I wanted to work at a specific company. I met with the recruiter, and unbeknownst to me, that recruiter had decided that, because I had one eye, I could not work on computers all day long. Eventually, I found novapost. They hired me in as a security operations center analyst. I'd come down here to meet with some organizations, and one that I met with was envision, they are a nonprofit that works with the blind and visually impaired community. I had no clue of the unemployment situation for the blind and visually impaired. Most of the jobs that they work are menial, minimum wage type positions. The high end jobs were working in a call center, and that there was really no better option. After that meeting, the light bulb went off. There's a great unemployment in the working age of people that are officially impaired, and there's a great employment gap in this field. So my boss, Paul and I developed the apex program, which is a 10 week training program where we prepare people that are blind and visually impaired for certification exams in networking and cybersecurity. I know you can be a blind cybersecurity analyst, because I have individuals that are blind that are doing it. 13:10 I am Curtis Jackson. I was born blind due to congenital glaucoma, and glaucoma runs in my family. Growing up in a town with the only blind person I did kind of lean into the idea that people thought that I needed to be in the special ed classes, even though I knew I didn't belong there. After I left Louisiana Tech, I bounced around for a few years, and then I got a telemarketing job. It's not what I want to do, but if I don't do it, I'm not going to be able to take care of my family, I did that for a couple years, and then I get told we're in your positions, so you have six months to find another job. Some notification on Facebook came up about the cybersecurity program called the apex program, and so I filled out everything that I needed to and got started on May 1. I'm like, this is a 10 week program. We'll just see what happens. What happened was, at the end of the program, David was so impressed with me, he said he wanted to get on a call. And next thing I know, I'm getting an email that says, novakos offer letter. So I immediately go to my boss's office and put in my notice. 14:27 Curtis is our first student that graduated to come to work at novacoast. Just amazing. From day one, he was like, I can't wait to work. You know? I can't wait to change careers, to get a career. Our CEO told me, If you come across a student that you think would be a good fit for our culture and that can do the job, let me know. And I Ding, ding, ding, he's the guy. 14:50 It feels great to say I am a SOC one analyst. I think having this job will give me a chance to do more things. With my family, and hopefully I can use this experience and opportunity to help others change their lives. In 2017 15:10 a recruiter decided that with one eye working, that I couldn't do the job. A few years later, we proved that somebody that can't see very well could do the job. And yesterday, we proved that somebody that can't see it all can do 15:28 the job. I look at it as me starting this job to help blaze a trail, working with others and pioneering so other people can start this job all across the country, across the world. 15:42 Nobody gets through life alone without help. It just it's impossible, but to be able to know that I am helping people get a better career, I could not be happier. Yes, blind people can do this, and we need to do this nice father, me too. 16:07 Well, I want to thank Joan Lynch, Ramona schindelheim, Melissa Panzer at the working nation team, for creating that and I'll thank Google for covering the cost of working nations. Great work on on the documentary. So, so with that, David, let's fast forward a little bit to where we are. Now you want to talk about, maybe fill up, fill in a little bit, anything that couldn't fit in a six minute video, and talk about there's a lot. Talk about your talk about your vision. Talk about your vision for the future of the program. 16:47 Yeah, so my vision is to see the program grow. Because of we don't generally take money from students. We rely on state vocational rehab agencies to cover the funding, which means we have to get set up with each state individually. So my vision is for us to be able to eventually get set up with every state and eventually take the program International, providing more opportunities around the US right now, I believe we're 1214, states, so we have a lot of ground to catch up to, but the vision is to keep growing the program. We want to do things like offer high school seniors, high school juniors, an opportunity to start earning these certifications while they're wrapping up high school, so they can go right into their chosen careers when they graduate, just like everybody else does. We want to expand what we offer to give further certifications. Once someone's in the workforce, there's a lot of work to be done. What we're teaching now is the entry level, the basics of what you need to start the job. But we want to support our students along the way. We want to see the staff augmentation section of the program to expand to more companies. We want to to get more companies to sign up and say, hey, we'll interview your your students for positions. So that's that's kind of the focus as to is growth, both in the US and in the job market. 18:36 Thanks, David and I, 18:39 I've said this numerous times since I've been involved with the apex program, I have been devoting my professional career to creating opportunities for people who are blind for 30 years plus. And if I were going to design something from scratch, it would look an awful lot like...
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