 And welcome, thanks to all of you for joining us for the nonprofit show, Julie and I have been looking forward to having Tracy seals on with us, executive director with 100 black men in Houston. But before we do that, of course, we do like to start every episode by saying thank you to our presenting sponsors, and also thank you to Julia Patrick CEO of the American nonprofit Academy. I'm Jarrett ransom joined here with Julie again today the nonprofit nerd, also CEO of the Raven group. These are our presenting sponsors that we start off every episode and we close every episode by saying thank you from each of us and really for all of your continued support. We're modeling your investment here into the nonprofit show and our 360 plus episodes, but truly the sector at large we are so extremely grateful to have your partnership in the sector and really just want to extend our gratitude to all of you. And again, our guest for today's episode we have Tracy seals joining us from Houston. Welcome Tracy we're so glad to have you here. Thank you so much for having me on your show is an art is I'm so honored to be here and just to give your audience some nuggets and a little bit of background of me and my organization. Well, we are really excited to have you because you know we interview all different types of people. In the world, we have so many different interesting leaders that come on and share with us and our viewers what they're doing and what their challenges are and their successes. We've never had this organization represented and so we have so many questions for you. And I think we want to start off by plain and simple down and dirty. What's your mission of 100 black man. Absolutely so the mission 100 black man is to improve the quality of life and our communities and enhance educational and economic opportunities of all African Americans. And, and when you say I mean, what's that number what's that 100 mean are you, are you trying to get 100 numbers or have you figured that if you have 100 men you get 1000, you know 1000 lives involved what does that mean. So what the 100 black man signifies is basically, it was started in the civil rights era in 1964, and it was actually started with the composition of 100 black men. So with that being said, they saw the need and disparity of the African American community, doing that civil rights era in how the young men were the ones they're mobilizing, they were being more effective in the fight for civil rights. So that's how it started on the national level. And from there, it just trickle down to chapters being started all across the country, as well as in globally in Africa. So it started back in the civil rights movement. The 1960s and one of the things I had asked is, you know, so there's chapters does that mean that there's a national organization that governs or oversees, you know the various chapters and locations and then I'm fascinated by also knowing that there is a chapter in Africa. So the hundred black man of America is our national chapter. And that is actually hosted in Atlanta, and the hundred black man was actually started in New York with, and during the civil rights era at that time. In the chapter, our national chapter, they set the standards they set our bylaws. They also equip us with things that we need to have at the, at the local level of our chapter so if there's any type of funny opportunities that they have their team look into that is projected down to us locally. And as well as any funny opportunities that may come from the national level, we do receive those findings from them as well. Now interesting every year we have a conference for the national chapter. This year, of course, because it was held virtually next year, fingers crossed, we all get to go to Florida and have so what can meet where there's symposium and it's just like any conference that you would see any national organization have. And then was also amazing that at these particular conferences, the chapter of the year is announced. And the Houston chapter of 100 black men was started in 1994 by 11 founding members. And of all these particular years, we have never received chapter of the year. So drum roll, we actually see chapter of the year this year. So, when we have our gala we're going to present that and so it was the first time in 27 years that we received chapter of the year and Houston chapter has gone through a year first. Congratulations, that is a quite an accomplishment. Thank you. So how many members do you have and you're when you talk about Houston you really have like the Houston Metroplex right I mean it's it's a pretty large area right. Yeah, so Houston chapter, and it's kind of use because we have an awesome chapter we have a Dallas chapter of course, we're the largest. But within how our organization how many members we have, we have close to 300 plus members, but then we also have what we consider our active members. So we have members who have been members, they're nearing the time for, you know, retirement or the Emirates members, and then I'm sorry, marriage members, and then we have members who they're still considered a member, but because of their lifestyles they're not able to actually engage in our program structures, but there's they still carry the title of the 100. So how the Houston chapter is broken down if I can elaborate. Yeah please. We are for elements of our chapter. So if you can think of a hierarchy. So we are the hundred is at the top and our members come from various counties. So, from Galveston County, Harris County for Ben County, Waller County, Missouri County. So, our members stem from all those different areas. So, and then that's our 100 part. So when we say the Houston Metro 100. We have our next component, which is our emerging 100. Now interesting about the emerging 100 of all of our national chapters. We're one of three other art chapters that have an emerging 100. I know you're asking what is the emerging 100. So our emerging 100 is our millennial group of members. They're Mason entrepreneurs, other business professionals that range in the ages from 21 to 32. That's phenomenal talking about one of my things that I love I think this is one of the most missed opportunities in the nonprofit sector. You can call young professionals or 30 under 30 whatever but good for you. That's cool. Yeah, cool. And then we have our next level, which is our collegiate 100. Our collegiate 100, they're in three schools, two HBCUs and then a PIW. So they're in Texas Southern University, Preview A&M and the University of Houston. And now our collegiate 100 is co-ed. Yes. So, as you think about the 180 you think about that is, you know, 100 men, the collegiate 100 is our area where it's co-ed so it's open up to females as well. For instance, our University of Houston president is a female. Interesting. Okay, so I want to get into that a little bit more. I'm really interested in this and we, if you joined us for the chitty chat chat this morning. We kind of starting to talk about this a little bit but I'm really interested as a black woman, how you are telling the story of 100 black men to the membership. And then to the larger community, you know, at the outset, like how do you juggle all that when obviously you're a female and you're going out trying to rally these different constituencies? Absolutely. And what people never identify with my personality is I am very introverted. I don't think that about me. There's like, no, you're not. I'm like, yes, I am. It takes a moment for me to warm up to people. But I am extroverted because I'm a good subject matter expert. I know what I'm talking about. I can also sell and deliver what I'm talking about, right? But when I'm out in the community and I'm talking about the organization that I'm very new at, so I'm a very new individual organization, but I've been following the organization for quite some time. But I'm passionate about the work and I know what is representative of my community as being a black female. So when I'm going out and I'm sharing a story with the community for prospects, just a general community at large, I am letting them know that the services that we offer in our program programs are being delivered by professional black men that are the elitists of their profession and in the community because we have state representatives, the mayor of Houston is far the 100. All the way down to individuals that are teachers and in cost professors, just to let the individuals know that this is who encompasses our organization. But I always get the question. Do you let anyone else into membership? And that question is no because it's delivered to our black community and our mentees are black young men. And it'll be a little bit devices to let someone of a color train them on how they need to be brought up and mentor them. Not to say that it couldn't be done because, of course, you have other organizations, Rick Boter, Rick sister, they do the same thing. But our tagline or our mantra, if you will, is what they what they see is what they'll be. Oh, interesting, interesting. And really having that role model. I've heard this term before, and it's called that near peer. And I mean, I'm what I'm hearing is really this is peer to peer. There's the really, you know, discrepancy is is perhaps the age, maybe. Yes. And so really having that role model of an individual to seek guidance, seek advice, seek, you know, gosh, just, just anyone. We all need it, you know, I mean, I, I called Julia my sensei because there's so many times I'm just like, Julia, what would you do in this scenario, and having her support so I can imagine that that's a really strong program for for the community to be there. Exactly. And how we started with the hierarchy with the leadership is trickle down is trickle down from the leadership to from the 100 to the merging from the merging to our collegiate down to our mentors that we, you know, having our programming and my mentor was not a black female. You know, she was, you know, Caucasian lady, but I was brought up by black females and strong black females. So you have to have those balances, I think. And I think that's what our program structure brings to these young men's lives. You know, they, they make it mentorship and lesion from their instructional from their educators, right. But then when they're not at school, they're taught these values that education won't give them. So are you doing some training with your mentors. So because I would imagine I mean in its, it seems like we have a lot of mentor mentee type of people that we kind of contact. And a lot of times that older generation will be like these damn kids, they're not listening. Because there's kind of like that old white man, get off my lawn kind of mentality with the mentees and so how do you navigate that to kind of get them more in sync. So how we bridge those age gaps with our mentees is our mentors are phenomenal in the work that they do and we operate on four pillars, and those four pillars are mentoring, education, health and wellness and economic empowerment. And so with these four pillars, our mentors are able to keep these mentees so engaged in bringing real world scenarios to their, to their lens that they love it and every year they love coming back. A lot of times people are like how do you get them into the mentees to come. And a lot of this from word of mouth to hear about their churches, and they hear from their schools, you know, about our programming that we have here. So they're excited when they come, and they're eager to learn. And with the parent structure. We have the parents just involved in the mentoring of their children as we are involved in the mentor of their children. We let them know. This is not a babysitting junction for you Dr kids off on weekend. You know, you know, the lessons don't just stop you with engaging them, you know, we encourage them you know how the conversation with their children when they come home from our sessions. How does your, you know, just as you have when they go to school, how did it go, what did you learn, you know, how can you impact this into your everyday life. I'm curious, have you seen or has the organization really at large seen like consistent generational involvement. You know because it's been around as you said for so long and it's such such a core value, I think for so many individuals and in so many communities that I would foresee this where it's like, you know, a great grandfather and then, you know, a fought and just passed down the generation of oven of engagement and involvement. And we do have a legacy component where we may have a founder bringing his son and the sun brings in their son. So we do have that legacy component which we're very proud of. Oh that's beautiful. Yes, I would think that that would be such rich history. That's, that's great. When you talk about your mentor mentee piece and I loved your question Jared, and this kind of follows along with that but do you find that you have a problem recruiting the senior level men to find enough time to actually serve in the mentor role or what does that look like you know do you have more younger men trying to get into that pipeline to be matched up or what is that looking like. It looks like for us. The name alone is so synonymous with you know elite chip that a lot of mentors and older gentlemen they look to be into the organization. I have a colleague that went to school my mom and he heard that I work here and he wants to be a member and how they the organization does is membership we do it by class. So right now we're in a class of 2021. And what I love about the members of our organization, each class kind of has that class robbery, and you know, out with the other class so, but it's all good fun. So, but each class that is inducted in every year. So the opinion ceremony, they have a actual project that they have to do while they're going through the whole probationary here because the 100 we have to know that you're going to be dedicated to the work that we're doing in the community. Is community involvement a piece of the responsibility or that requirement, because I'm hearing so often especially now. So many individuals or organizations really looking to bring in diversity right, and I would imagine that 100 black men is such a great place to find such civically engaged men in the community to step up and really play a role and especially, you know be be more involved as so many organizations are really starting to do, you know, some strategic diversity. Is this something that your organization helps and works with as well Tracy. Absolutely, especially in our health and wellness committee, and that particular pillar in our economic empowerment pillar. We have so many community focused events. For instance, we have an event that's coming up in October, because we're addressing the disparity of sick of cell anemia which is a very high in the black community, and there's just not enough blood donors. So we're having an event that's going to be targeting the blood drive for sick of cell anemia, as well as an event that's going to be coming up that is focusing on vaccinations for our youth. And these are our public events in the communities that we're serving. There's, we have a partnership with md Anderson, where we talk about black vitamin, which is another one of our programs that we have where we talk about the different disparities. I can get my words out disparities and, and the black cancer origin of oncology. So these are things that we do within the community, and also in the black community especially lower social economic classes, financial literacy. You know, how do you balance your, your checkbook. My tip is, how do you stop getting your life in your child's name and destroying their credit. Right, right, you know, so these are community focused events that we, we publicize for the community to get involved. We have conferences that our collegiate 100 puts on that are community driven community focused. You know, it's been amazing talking with you we don't have that much time left but I'm really curious about asking you this question and it's really asking you to look into your crystal ball a little bit. How do you build more engagement. And where do you see the future of 100 black men. I mean, I would imagine that you've got this pipeline of young women, and they're not going to want to leave the structure just because they graduate from college. And there's nothing for them moving forward so how do you, how do you see all this. So how I see in my role in the trajectory that I like to take the organization to is, again, for our collegiate 100 female members to introduce them to the 100 black women organizations that they can potential partner with and be a part of. And to keep the momentum going within our community, but I also see us engaging more with corporate donors. Because, again, in 27 years, there has never been an individual in this space to go out and talk to people. I call myself, you know, the PP, the professional politician. I'm shaking hands and kissing babies for the organization to get them engaged in the work that we've been doing for 27 years and just also not get them engaged to get them invested into the work that we're doing because we're doing so much good work that and we have so much potential in the communities that we serve to get other people involved in it. There are so many corporations that are saying that they have funding for racial equity, but we want to be part of that funding. So I'm going out I'm having these meetings. And I know, hey, if you're looking for organization that has statute within the community, we have stability within the community, and we have other corporations involved with us because they see the good work that we're doing. We want you to be involved because this name again is so synonymous globally. I love it. And you know, I think that I love what you just said because Jared and I talked about this a lot with our guests and that is, you know, in some ways you're only as good as your best champion. There are 1.8 million nonprofits in this country and there are a lot of choices, a lot of people doing really amazing things. But if you're not out there communicating and talking about your vision and building those relationships, that money in that relationship, I believe is going to go somewhere else. So you've got to develop a campaign with the right people that are fearless and proud about what their organization is doing to create that synergy. And what you said synergy is very important because I tell a lot of people, you know, it'll start that initial phone call. And then with, you know, we're still living in the world of COVID. How are you comfortable with meeting I need to have you put a face to this voice. And let's let's arrange something let's let's cultivate. Not this relationship, but let's cultivate this family dynamic. Because we want them to be part of your family. Yeah, I love it. I'm really inspired and I think this was a great way to start the week because so many of the things you've talked about really can help, you know, so many different types of organizations. So, I don't know, Jared, what do you think about the mentoring relationship it seems to me that we are seeing more and more organizations that are offering the mentor relationship. And that's not maybe how they started but it seems like it's a component that they're that more and more nonprofits are adding. I think it's really important. I think we talk a lot about those hard skills when it comes to life of, you know, getting a job interviewing things like that but we don't necessarily talk about those soft skills. Do you show up do you show up on time are you clean and neat and everything put together. Some of us might have taken those kind of, you know, opportunities of life lessons for granted because it was so innate in our childhood, but that isn't the case for everyone and regardless of, you know, of ethnicity and so I have seen honestly on time, really this, this breakdown in those soft skills, you know, like, how can we build up the entire person holistically, including these soft skills including the hard skills that I feel, you know, many are taught in that kind of classroom setting and this mentorship is such a wonderful component I think for so many individuals and so many organizations right now. So I love hearing that it exists for this organization Tracy and, and I just know that it's doing so so much great work. And there is so much to do out there in our communities and so to have, you know, civically engaged black men and invested in the community and invested in the future of the community by this mentorship is really critical. Yes, because I mean, I had a mentor, I always tell my little brother, you know, you got you, he was a child of divorce I'm like you got the short end of the stick. Right. Right. Like, you know, because you know my sisters and I we had the opportunities to be in different clubs have those mentors because our parents work, but by the time you know he was coming up. It was just, you know, him going to school and doing those particular things. So he missed out on having certain opportunities I think that would help him have helped him in his adult life. Like you stated those those soft skills, having someone to you know to talk you through things and process things with because again in the black community. There are certain things that we don't seek help for like mental health. You know, when you talk about oh I'm going through something you're told to go pray about it. But I'm a firm believer that no you have to work on your mental health, you have to work on your self care, and you have to process things through with individuals. And that's where our organization does we help our mentees process things, you know, we take a holistic approach to their health and wellness. And we take that leadership approach to letting them know that you can be honest you can be no matter what obstacle may come into your way. And we're here to support you through it. Wow, elements. Tracy, I love this and I think that even though you're female, I think you're a rockstar. I love this organization. Really exciting and I love the voice that you bring to this movement because it's, it's something that you know we need to be doing throughout our communities in this country and thank you. It's really been an amazing thing here. Please, information and check out 100 black men I mean they are across this country and moving globally. An organization that has an August foundational story and so really really a cool thing that we could get you on our show and to talk about this. Thank you so much for having me for your viewers to learn more about the organization and what we do here and what I can contribute what I have contributed to the organization, I cannot thank you enough. Oh my gosh, it's been our pleasure. Again, I'm Julia Patrick CEO of the American nonprofit Academy. I've been joined today by the nonprofit nerd herself. Jared Ransom CEO of the Raven group. Again, we want to thank all of our sponsors for having the confidence in us. And I would say Jared, you know they mentor us. Thank you so much so yeah it's a great community. Yeah, it's been really really impactful for so many of us so we want to say, again, thank you very very much. Hey, another great way, we way to start the week. We have some really challenging days ahead for our nation this week on so many levels. We've had so many things occur, and the nonprofit sector has been there and will be there to pick up the pieces. So we want to remind everyone to stay well, so you can do well. We'll see you back here tomorrow. Thanks Tracy. Thanks to you.