One of the most greatly anticipated weekly features of the The Urban Business Roundtable is the delivery of inspirational and motivational insights from award-winning entrepreneur, author and motivational speaker Farrah Gray.
By the time he was 16, Gray had launched nearly a dozen small businesses and social enterprises, already gaining national media attention. Today, Gray is a best-selling author and syndicated columnist, motivational speaker and CEO of Farrah Gray Publishing, which has a distribution deal with Health Communications Inc., publishers of the best-selling Chicken Soup for the Soul series. Gray’s first book, Reallionaire, is followed by his latest books Get Real, Get Rich and The Truth Shall Make You Rich. Gray has also earned dozens of awards and recognitions, including a Young Entrepreneur Trumpet Award, an honorary doctorate degree of humane letters from Allen University and being named to The Network Journal‘s “Forty Under Forty” Achievement Awards and The Urban Business Roundtable‘s Top 40 Game Changers of Chicago.
As a weekly motivational contributor to
UBR, Gray offers powerful, uplifting and actionable advice and insights to entrepreneurs and business leaders who eagerly anticipate the energizing dose of inspiration that is his trademark. As I’ve often said as host of the show: When the “Reallionaire” writes you a reality check, it does not bounce.Also, this week on The Urban Business Roundtable, UBR Contributor Renita Young speaks with KidFit LLC Founder and President Jamal Williams, inventor of the KIDFIT mobile device app. Williams, at 23, is also a member of the BE Next generation. His app is designed to help end childhood obesity. It works on the iPhone, iPod Touch and the iPad, and features more than 150 exercises for kids. Young speaks with Williams about his innovative application, his plans for the future and what he’s learned about his success. You can also learn more about Williams in the article “Shape Up!”, which was featured in the August 2010 issue of Black Enterprise.
For more important advice for inventors who
need help bringing their products, ideas and innovations to market, check out the November 2010 Black Enterprise cover story “Codename: Inventors.” You can also find more articles for inventors at BlackEnterprise.com.Also on this week’s edition of The Urban Business Roundtable, our Executive Producer TaQuoya Kennedy speaks with author Donna Satchell, president of Starr Consulting & Training, an organization focused on
improving the performance of clients ranging from Coca-Cola to the U.S. Small Business Administration, as well as individual professionals and small business owners. Satchell offers a few key lessons for entrepreneurs on how to stay focused on your goals and create the right mindset for success. Her mantra to her clients: “Just Get Serious.”
Of course, every week on UBR, you’ll get a weekly wrap-up of business news from USA Today Business Correspondent Charisse Jones, our Patient Investor Report from Khoa X. Ho of Ariel Investments and key economic intelligence for small business owners from our UBR Economists Derrick Collins and Rasheed Carter.
And, as always, you’ll get my take on issues, trends and opportunities of critical importance to your business growth and success. This week I focus on why black business owners need to move more aggressively to take advantage of the burgeoning green economy, representing literally hundreds of billion dollars in public and private sector investments over the next 25 years. Thirty years ago, black entrepreneurs were slow to recognize and exploit opportunities in the economic boom driven by technology. The result: As billions in wealth was created, black business was on the outside looking in, lamenting the “digital divide.” Now, according to Van Jones, Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, Jerome Ringo and other alternative energy and green economy advocates who spoke at our second Black Enterprise Conversation on Energy Forum in Washington, D.C., earlier this week, history is on the verge of repeating itself. We cannot allow that to happen. Black business owners must wake up and get engaged in the green economy. Follow our coverage of African American activism and engagement in the green space by checking the BEing Green section of BlackEnteprise.com, as well as the Black Enterprise/Shell Conversation on Energy web site. You can also follow the ongoing discussion by searching for #BEEnergyForum on Twitter.
If you have a question you want answered or a topic you want addressed on The Urban Business Roundtable, send me an e-mail at edmonda@blackenterprise.com or to me at Twitter or Facebook.
Alfred Edmond Jr. is the senior VP/editor-at-large of Black Enterprise and the host of the Urban Business Roundtable, a weekly radio show, sponsored by Ariel Investments, airing CST Wednesdays at 8:30 a.m., Thursdays at 6:30 p.m. and Saturdays at 9:30 a.m. on WVON-AM 1690, the Talk of Chicago. You can also listen live online at WVON.com. Check back each Wednesday for The UBR Morning Post, which features additional resources, advice and information from and about the topics, entrepreneurs and experts featured on the show.