Audio Source: Aaron R. Plush
Musical Bed: AfroPlush (produced by Ted White)
Additional Audio Source: Monopoly Online Game, Bongo Brothers of the Marching 101, South Carolina State University

Born for Supplier Diversity

A Black man, An African-American man, from Orangeburg, SC, who comes from the most loving family, families who absolutely love the Lord and attending Church, who is ambitious enough to be unafraid and says to the world, I will not accept no, unapologetically and non-negotiable.

It is interesting how over time you begin to realize that your life (and that is each and every one of us, the approximately 8 billion of us who are living now and whatever the number is that have ever lived 😇) is God’s perfect masterpiece. Every component of my life now makes sense to me.

Growing up in small town USA, Orangeburg, SC located geographically right between Columbia, SC and Charleston, SC on I-26; yet also being the center point between New York City and Miami, FL on I-95. All 5 cities have significant meaning in my life and interestingly enough, I have lived in all of these cities except Charleston.

Being from a city, well town 😊 that has 2 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) ~ Claflin University and SC State University, a technical college, Orangeburg-Calhoun Technical College, a seminary, Southern Methodist College… for a small town with a population of roughly 13 thousand folks… there are certainly a lot of options to be educated and hence it showed in the public school system that created my core solid educational prowess. Educated teachers who loved me is certainly a part of the recipe that makes me who I am today; and with certainty and make no mistake about it, I am truly from small town USA; not a transport, but was born there without an accent (go figure right?!) God knew what He was doing… as always; I cannot see myself being born, groomed or reared any other place.

In sharing this, I am making it crystal clear that I have an affinity in my DNA for Diversity. Once I learned of the concept of Supplier Diversity, I was sold. At the time, I said to myself, “you mean to tell me that you have a subset of professionals in the world who have a specific focus on ensuring businesses owned by an under-represented group/person are all gaining opportunity to provide their products and services to companies and in arenas they typically would not. Do not pass go, do not collect $100 dollars on the monopoly board, simply sign me up. I am totally in.”

After becoming totally in, I was able to use my core transferable management consulting skills of effectively implementing in greenfield spaces before (Contingent Labor), to build a robust Supplier Diversity Program at Citrix Systems, Inc. I am Godly proud that both programs (Contingent Labor and Supplier Diversity) were built on a solid foundation led
by me and are still in existence today.

Supplier Diversity website @ Citrix: https://www.citrix.com/about/diversity-inclusion/supplier-diversity-program.html

Supplier Diversity Case Study with Sievo:
https://hub.sievo.com/hubfs/Customers/Citrix/Citrix_CaseStudy.pdf?hsLang=en

Supplier Diversity Presentation for Sievo Friends Conference:
https://vimeo.com/sievo/review/460461920/dfa8d06e40sort=lastUserActionEventDate&direction=desc

Now as a Consultant, I am equipped and prepared to help diverse owned Businesses, Corporations and/or anyone with their consulting needs in relation to Supplier Diversity.

Call me today to learn more:
954.864.0434

With each entry we will take a deeper dive into the how of this process; how the implementations really work, and how we make The Spectacular happen together.

Until next time, that’s all folks…

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