It was the summer of 2020, and I was flying down the street on my Vespa 150cc, wind cutting through my T-shirt, flip-flops tapping the pedals, a small speed-racer helmet strapped to my head. I loved how powerful I felt riding that thing—unencumbered, fast, free.

As I passed a father and his two daughters playing in their front yard, one of the little girls pointed and said, “Look, Daddy! A girl on that motorcycle!” In that moment, I felt like a superhero. Like maybe I was showing them what was possible.

Minutes later, everything stopped.

The Vespa wiped out. My body slammed into the pavement. My tibia fractured—a sixth-degree tibia plateau break that would change far more than my mobility. The pain was unbearable, but I didn’t cry. I made jokes. I waited. I couldn’t stand. All I could do was lie there on the concrete, in shock, waiting for the ambulance.

I thought the Vespa would give me freedom. Instead, it confined me to a wheelchair for six months, followed by another eighteen months on crutches. Nearly five days a week, I was in physical therapy learning how to walk again.

And in that wheelchair, I learned something I never expected.

I wasn’t being seen.

People were polite. Kind, even. But they didn’t look at me. They looked over me. Around me. As if I were furniture—present, but invisible. For someone who had always prided herself on being capable, independent, and self-sufficient—the builder, the provider, the one who made things happen—this was devastating.

One moment still lingers. I was sitting outside a restaurant, staring at the front door, unable to open it. I had to wait until someone noticed me. I was humiliated. I hated asking for help.

One of my closest friends used to call me Supergirl because I had a knit beanie with “SG” stitched on it. I can still hear her voice saying, “You don’t have to be a superhero every day.”

At the time, I didn’t believe her.

That realization came later, in the quiet.

When I realized there was no one left to ask but God.

I was the main provider for my family, lying in bed with my leg elevated, answering emails between pain medication and moments of fear—not because I lacked time off, but because I didn’t trust the world to keep spinning without me. Control had always been my safety net. Letting go felt like losing everything.

But over time—nearly two years, in fact—something softened.

I began asking different questions.


What if this wasn’t just chaos?


What if there was meaning here?


What if this wasn’t the end—but a beginning?

That’s when I remembered something David Reiling, CEO of Sunrise Banks and a leader I deeply admire, once taught me: adopt an abundant mindset. Not scarcity. Ask, “What can I learn right now?” instead of “What am I losing?”

And that’s when I made a decision.

If I was going to build again, it would be different not from force or fear, but from trust, listening, and abundance. That decision became Morris Hoeft Group.

We build communities around brands by connecting head and heart. We create trust through human-centered design, Theory U practices, and deep listening. Our work is grounded in truly seeing people—because I know what it feels like to disappear in plain sight.

This isn’t just branding. It’s meaning-making. Brands grow when trust is present. And trust is built through repeated positive experiences—through being seen.

But this reckoning didn’t start with the Vespa.

When I was sixteen, my dad—a WWII veteran—asked what I wanted for high school graduation. “A SAAB? A new car?” he offered.

I chose college tuition.

He looked at me, confused. “Why would you pick that? You’re just going to get married and have babies.”

That moment stayed with me. I knew I wanted more. I didn’t want to be boxed into a role I hadn’t chosen. I wanted to learn, lead, and build.

And I did.

Throughout my career, I’ve mentored young people—formally and informally, through leadership programs, one-on-one conversations, and quiet coffees when someone needed guidance. I co-created a leadership initiative at Bethel University. I launched a podcast, Is That Cashmere?, to share the lessons I wish I’d known sooner.

I tell these stories because leadership isn’t linear. It’s fractured. It breaks. And sometimes, it heals stronger in the broken places.

My Vespa crash didn’t end my freedom. It redefined it.

To every leader reading this: there is strength in surrender. There is purpose in your pause. And there is power in being truly seen.

When I first met the women who would change my life, I was 19 on a gap year from university. They were mothers, daughters, entrepreneurs — women who made the most of every opportunity to support their families.

 

What began as a field project grew into a global social enterprise, partnering with more than 2,000 artisans across East Africa and Latin America. Together we leveraged their artistic heritage to create beaded bracelets that would eventually make their way to North America. Over time we produced more than six million bracelets, sold in stores like Nordstrom, Bloomingdale’s, Walgreens, and World Market. 

The most exciting part was the sales because they fueled transformation. When a woman earns her own income, everything changes. In development circles we often say that for every dollar a woman earns, 90 cents go back into her family and community. Investing in women isn’t just the right thing to do — it’s smart economics. Our entire project aimed to empower women to use their earnings to invest in microbusinesses or their children’s education.

Then came the pandemic. People weren’t panic-buying beaded bracelets, and the artisans we worked with were mandated to stay home. The project had achieved its goals, but this was a hard stop. Like many others, I was forced to pause and ask myself: What now? What next? 

In my next act, I wanted to be part of people’s daily habits — something that was a “need,” not a “want.” I wanted to build something that could scale quickly and create lasting impact. While a few people may argue this point, I know the first thing I think about every morning is my first cup of coffee — and I am not alone in that.

Coffee is one of the world’s most traded commodities, yet there are many women coffee farmers whose stories behind the bean remain untold. I saw an opportunity to bring the same model of empowerment and purpose to a new category, to bring more purpose and connection to something people do every day: drink coffee. This was the seed of &BACK COFFEE. 

It was always important to me to source our coffee responsibly from women coffee farmers, ensuring that every step of the journey, from bean to cup and back, creates value for those who grow it, those who drink it, and the planet we share.   

Our business model is intentionally B2B. We partner with companies seeking to infuse purpose into their everyday choices — helping them meet sustainability and employee engagement goals through something as simple and universal as serving coffee. Each cup tells a story of resilience, regeneration, and women whose work fuels more than caffeine — it fuels change.

After 25 years of building socially conscious ventures, I’ve learned that responsible commerce at scale can create profound, measurable, and lasting impact. It is possible to build businesses that deliver profit and purpose, and to do so in a way that uplifts rather than extracts. 

At &BACK, our model is “bean to cup and back,” a closed-loop, regenerative circle of impact. It’s about returning value to where it began, ensuring every business decision reflects not just profit, but people’s futures — because when impact is built into the way we do business, everyone rises.

Fabric scraps find new life as functional, aesthetic building material.

It started with a bold idea: Turn textile waste into renewable building material. French architect Clarisse Merlet realized his dream by founding FabBRICK in 2018. Today it continues to combine aesthetics, durability, and environmental consciousness while growing on an international level, proving that innovation and sustainability can go hand-in-hand. 

FabBRICK makes eco-friendly bricks from 80% recycled textiles and 20% ecological binders. This unique blend avoids the need for firing or harmful chemicals, resulting in a strong, insulating, and sustainable material. The recycled textile wall-cladding bricks are used for acoustic absorption, thermal insulation, and non-flammable lining and come in a variety of colors and patterns.

“The biggest challenge we’ve overcome at FabBRICK was turning an innovative idea into a sustainable, scalable business,” CEO Merlet shares with Real Leaders. “Our focus has always been on proving that sustainable materials can be both functional and desirable.”

The company also dabbles in customizing creations for furniture and decor. At its core, the functional and artistic innovator champions the circular economy. By collecting textiles from clients in France, FabBRICK ensures traceability and reduces waste. This strategy keeps materials out of landfills while addressing the construction industry’s ecological footprint.

FabBRICK’s milestones include securing patents, establishing a production line, investing in industrial equipment, opening a workshop, and earning the business of major brands like Google, L’Oreal, and Levi’s. The company entered the global stage with its international debut at Mexico Design Week in 2023 and its first U.S. sale in 2024. It continues to fundraise to further scale production.

As for Merlet’s advice to other impact-driven companies? “Stay resilient and adapt through failure,” Merlet says. “Focus on solving real problems, stay committed to your mission, and build a team that shares your vision.” 

It was after midnight on the ramp — one C-17 in front of me, two C-130s idling nearby. We were receiving the remains of a fallen soldier while prepping for another mission before sunrise. The engines never stopped humming, and the mission clocks kept ticking, but for a moment, everything stood still. I remember the silence, the reverence, and the absolute clarity that something sacred had to be honored — and then, something important still had to be done.

In moments like that, there’s no time to compartmentalize. I deeply felt the weight of loss, but I also carried the responsibility to lead the next mission. That night galvanized my approach to leadership and eventually shaped my purpose: helping business owners leave a lasting legacy for themselves, their families, and the companies they built and led.

In the military we’re trained to lead through extremes — life, death, volatility, and uncertainty. But what surprised me most wasn’t the action; it was what leadership often demanded internally — the ability to let go of ego. I stopped thinking about myself and focused entirely on those around me — the families, the teams, and the mission. I learned to lead with empathy to help others stay resilient and focused on the outcomes that matter most. The unexpected part was when I made it about others, not myself, I actually became stronger. That shift left me more grounded, more resilient, and far better prepared for whatever comes next. Leadership isn’t about proving something; it’s about carrying something forward, especially when the stakes are high.

In that sense a successful mission wasn’t just about what I accomplished; it was about what remained after I stepped away. That principle never left me. I carried it from my military service into my own life and transition, and now I find deep purpose in helping others prepare for theirs, particularly the moment after the sale of their business.

Today I help entrepreneurs navigate one of the most defining moments of their careers: selling their business. At first glance the stakes seem different. No lives are on the line. There’s no enemy contact. But the emotional complexity, the identity shift, the weight of knowing that your next move defines your legacy — that part isn’t unfamiliar.

What many founders don’t expect is just how hard it is to let go. They’ve built a thriving enterprise from an idea, but it’s not just a company; it’s years of hard work, personal sacrifice, building relationships, and caring for all those who rely on you. Then one day it’s time to walk away from it all. To some that might sound like a retreat, retirement, an ending — but to me, it sounds like something else: mission complete.

The clarity I had back on that tarmac is the same clarity I try to bring to founders when they approach their exit. This isn’t just a financial transaction. It’s a transformational and emotional journey that few are prepared for, and if we do it right, it won’t feel like walking away. It will feel like the moment you know: You led well.

Employee-focused initiatives unlock value for a company.

Imagine over 20% of your manufacturing workforce were formerly incarcerated or had struggled with homelessness, you grow consistently year over year, and your goodwill adds to the value of your intellectual property — your brand. If you knew that this would work, would you still take the risk? Frontier Co-op’s inspiring journey shows how alternative hiring practices and other employee-focused initiatives can unlock value for a company.

Frontier Co-op is a cooperatively owned wholesale company based in Iowa that has grown to 50,000 member-owners since its founding in 1976. The co-op sells sustainably sourced herbs, spices, seasonings, aromatherapy, and other botanical products under its Frontier Co-op, Simply Organic, and Aura Cacia family of brands. Cooperatives operate similarly to other businesses as for-profit entities, where member-owners earn dividends from profits, have bylaws, and are governed by a board of directors. However, co-ops are unique in that they are owned and controlled by members who directly participate in the business. This cooperative structure has driven Frontier Co-op’s success by fostering responsible business practices, allowing it to reinvest in its sourcing partners, support causes globally, and break down employment barriers.

In 2018 Frontier Co-op formally established its Breaking Down Barriers to Employment initiative to address systemic barriers to employee success and economic mobility; it provides important support services including second-chance hiring practices, access to subsidized childcare options, transportation, and apprenticeship and skills training programs to ensure employees are successful not only within its co-op, but also in the wider community. “We have to look for our own solutions to these problems,” CEO Tony Bedard tells Real Leaders. “It’s not somebody else’s problem to solve.” 

Frontier Co-op partnered with the U.S. Agency for International Development in 2018 to empower smallholder farmers to bring ready-to-eat spices and teas into U.S. markets. As Bedard puts it, “The difference is that it works, that you can tie a straight line tangible benefit to the work that you do along with the intangible.” At the heart of this philosophy is the belief that real impact comes from action, not just words. He emphasizes, “The difference between what people say and what we say is that we actually do it, and we can show you that straight line.”

This sentiment aligns with Frontier Co-op’s approach to business growth. For example, it developed a strong internal talent pipeline. “I want to bring people in,” he notes. “I want them to see a career. I want them to end up being the plant manager … the CEO of the future.” In addition to breaking down barriers to employment with second-chance hiring practices, Frontier offers subsidized onsite childcare. This vision is underpinned by a focus on community locally and globally where it has dug wells, opened schools, and contributed over $1 million annually to causes around the world. 

Bedard believes effective leadership involves cultivating an environment where people are empowered to thrive. “A real leader is a person who breaks down the obstacles so that other people who work in the company can be successful,” he says. It’s this combination of action, vision, and empowerment that drives sustainable growth and meaningful change.

LISTEN UP

Hear our full conversation with Frontier Co-op’s Tony Bedard on Episode 488 of the Real Leaders Podcast.

When I joined BL Companies as CFO in 1999, no one expected I would become CEO. I was hired as CFO for a fairly well-established architecture and engineering firm. I came from the telecommunications industry with degrees in economics and business. In a field where technical credentials traditionally define leadership, I assumed I’d spend my career managing finances, not leading the company.

When I arrived the company appeared successful, but beneath the surface rapid expansion had outpaced internal systems. Financial reporting was inconsistent, decisions were made in silos, and accountability was weak. I spent my first months building structure by introducing financial controls, regular leadership meetings, and clear accountability. Progress was slow but steady.

Then in 2005 our founder and CEO announced his intent to retire. While his chosen successor had strong technical credentials, he had limited leadership experience. The remaining partners, including me, bought out his shares and believed the crisis was behind us.

It wasn’t. The founder accelerated his exit, leaving us months to complete the purchase or risk being sold. We had already been exploring an employee stock ownership plan to reward all employees — a structure that aligned with our values — so I led the effort to become employee owned in just three months.

Employee ownership gave us stability, but new challenges followed. When the Great Recession hit, another new CEO struggled to act decisively and ultimately resigned. The board appointed an interim three-person team — two technical leaders and me — to steady the firm, but as the impacts of the financial crisis grew, it became clear that crisis leadership required singular accountability.

I coordinated communications, developed our recession strategy, and with a heavy heart led a 17% workforce reduction that prevented a $1-million loss. The next day we met with all employees to outline our recovery plan.

By year’s end the board asked me to serve as CEO. I accepted and we finished that year with a $250,000 profit, which we shared with our employee-owners as bonuses.

Crisis taught me that effective leadership transcends technical expertise. Success comes from collaboration, clear communication, and the ability to make tough decisions. I learned that financial discipline and operational rigor are as vital to firm health as design and engineering excellence.

The architecture and engineering industry often assumes that great leaders must also be licensed professionals. My experience proves otherwise. Strong leadership grounded in empathy, transparency, and shared purpose can emerge from any background. What matters most is not what you studied but how you lead when it counts.

The master of knowing what’s next, Gary Vaynerchuk tells real leaders where their brands need to be — right now — if they want to stay competitive.

Gary Vaynerchuk — or GaryVee as many know him — has more than 44 million combined followers across social media. Vaynerchuk has built his personal and business brands by producing consistently compelling content across all the major platforms, hosts a top 100 business podcast with daily episodes, and is a bestselling author. Plus, he ranked in the top three on the Real Leaders 2025 Top Keynote Speakers list. He’s a storyteller on steroids, a no-holds-barred kind of guy who will tell you where and why you’re going to fail — and how to get ahead of it.

Real Leaders: You’re a master of personal branding, but how can leaders build their brands online when there’s so much noise? What important lessons have you learned about branding and brand equity?

Gary Vaynerchuk: One of the coolest things about business is it’s kind of like sports in that it’s very merit based. I often hear, “But there are so many other people trying to do it,” or to your point, noise. And I always remind them there’s really no option. If you’re crippled by competition, you probably shouldn’t be in business in the first place. That’s a really important mindset going into this.

I take the other side of the pillow and see the absolute insanity of it in a positive way. Many of us remember a world when social media wasn’t the dominant force. What’s amazing about LinkedIn is I can post a video right now with great thoughts, and it can get 4 million views — if it wins on the merit of the creative. It’s not the social media that I grew up in when I invested in Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. Back in 2007 you had to build a community for a long period of time to get millions of followers so that a lot of people could see something you said. 

So I think the answer to your question is tough shit. Of course everyone is going to compete with you. But we are no longer in the era of social media but interest media — and this is the most substantial thing that has happened in communication in a very long time. With interest media, even if you haven’t started a personal brand for the last 15 years and it’s your fourth day posting on LinkedIn, Instagram, or TikTok and you have six followers — I have news for you. Don’t think you’ve missed the boat and envy GaryVee because he’s been doing it for 15 years. Because of the way the algorithms work, we are on an equal playing ground now. If your stuff is good — but today I just kind of mailed it in and did a mundane C-minus execution compared to typical GaryVee content — your video is going to get more views than mine. That’s a level of merit of thought and creative that has never existed.

RL: You’ve said that how you make money is more important than how much you make. Is that a nod to impact businesses, and what are your thoughts about the impact space in general?

Vaynerchuk: I believe in the brands that pioneered the impact space like Patagonia and Tom’s shoes. What really happens in your life between age 40 and 90 is that the dollars in your bank account don’t drive the level of happiness you thought they would, and a lot of people are confused by that. How you make money matters because you’ll have a happier life as a human being if you believe in what you’re doing. You’ll have more joy in your life, in your family and friendships, and how you feel about yourself as you round out your journey.

When I think back to 2005 through 2010 when the early seeds of the impact movement got going, it was remarkable. But when I think about 2015, I felt like every startup I looked at would walk in and be like, “Gary, you’re gonna love my startup. We sell umbrellas, but every time we sell an umbrella, we give an umbrella to somebody in a rainforest.” And then I would look under the hood and be like, “Yeah, but you’re selling an umbrella for twice the price.” That’s not being altruistic — that’s just using good as a facade for your selfishness.

Now in 2025 we’re in a beautiful place. We’re in this place where humans are thoughtful about this, and we’ve got a little bit of the muckery and snake-oil salesmen using it as a weapon out of the system. We’re almost in this mature space where it is a subconscious or conscious thought of every entrepreneur when they start a company that social responsibility is an option, and that’s a remarkable place for us to be. 

RL: What do you look for in a business before you put money or resources into it? Have your criteria changed since your days as an angel investor in Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), Uber, Snapchat, and Venmo?

Vaynerchuk: You know that I love to talk publicly about my big wins. There are many more losses that I don’t talk about. The beauty of being 49 now instead of my early 30s is that the last 15–20 years of investing have taught me that I’m looking for the jockey and the horse. In the earliest parts of my career, I would only invest if I thought the person behind the business could do it — so it was pure jockey. Then I got high on my own supply because I was so on fire that I lost my way a little bit and became only about the horse — if I liked the idea, I imagined myself in the role of helping it get big — so I almost overlooked the jockey. I am now firmly in a place where I have to adore the idea and the intuition, I have to believe that the human being in front of me is capable of seeing it through. So I look for that now, and because I do such early-stage investing, I don’t have the company’s results to rely on to prove that the person can do it. I have to go on my intuition. Can they do that? But I’m looking for what I call the jockey and the horse. 

RL: You’re one of the leading global minds on what’s next — and you’ve been talking about live shopping recently and how it will revolutionize business. Can you expand on that and how it will affect founders and leaders?

Vaynerchuk: This is the quote, and you can put it in a dark black box: Literally anyone reading this article, if you sell something, you must stop reading this article immediately. Go spend 25 hours researching the current state of life, social shopping, TikTok Shop, obviously, notwithstanding what happens here with a U.S. ban or not. Obviously this is global. A startup called Whatnot is the leader, but we’ve already seen Walmart, Amazon, and eBay have their own live platforms. It’s inconceivable to me that Facebook, X, and YouTube do not have aggressive announcements. M&A perhaps — I don’t know what they’re up to. I have no inside information, but it’s inconceivable to me that we won’t see things from Instagram, Facebook, X, YouTube, and YouTube Shorts this year.

If you’re a businessman or woman who has lived in or executed in or paid attention to China, you’re completely bored by what I’m saying because this has been a decade of reality in China, but it’s finally hit the Western world. It’s significant. It could be incredibly detrimental to consumer packaged goods apparel or retailers if they dismiss it the way many dismissed Amazon and social media. This is big girl, big boy stuff. QVC and Home Shopping Network still do crazy amounts of revenue, and half of the people under 40 don’t even know they exist. Anybody over 40 is flabbergasted when they look under the hood. There is something inherently human that humans love to buy stuff when it’s in a live environment. It’s why live auctions do well. It’s why QVC does well. And when you take the conglomerate of the seven platforms that lead social media, the sheer attention, the hours spent by human beings in social media is profound and misunderstood in its dominance. And now you’re layering in shopping. This is a very big deal. I would argue, in a 15-year window, if Amazon stumbled and misplayed it, this could be the thing that knocks them off their perch.

Even if you’re a B2B company reading this right now, and you’re like, “Well, I sell SaaS. That doesn’t mean anything to me,” I implore you to figure out how to go do a collaboration with a fashion brand and make a cool hoodie for your B2B company and then sell it on live shopping  just for the awareness and brand building — not the revenue, which I know would seem far-fetched to a B2B person reading this — but I’m not saying it for my health. It’s a big media.

In 2009, 2010, 2011, I begged traditional media companies to understand how big social media is. It’s similar to what I’m doing right now with retailers and package goods companies regarding live shopping.

RL: How does a traditional media platform like a magazine — an American pastime — stay relevant?

Vaynerchuk: By conforming to the new distribution model through an awareness of what it does. If you fall in love with your form factor instead of your brand, you become vulnerable. Sports Illustrated is a great example. Sports Illustrated could have been House of Highlights and Overtime, but it became obsessed with its medium, not its brand.

My dad’s wine store in New Jersey is in an affluent area — Millburn, New Jersey — a nice green town, good money, upper-middle class to wealthy. There are plenty of small stores on Main Street in Millburn that are just dying. Of course, we know why — online shopping, right? However, if one of those store owners woke up this morning and decided to turn their store, even a piece of it, into a studio that did live shopping all day long, they would explode over time if they were good. That’s another way of answering your question. It’s about not becoming delusional or ideological about your medium. It’s about becoming obsessed with your brand and finding ways to convert it into new attention parallels.

RL: Your new book, Day Trading Attention — what does that term mean?

Vaynerchuk: It was a big moment for me when I came up with the term — one of those eureka moments. It captures everything I’ve been trying to say for 15 years.

Attention is the ultimate asset in the world. Nothing can happen unless someone’s listening to it. 

You can’t become president of the United States if you’re in a cave talking to yourself with no people around. As a parent, your child won’t become the human you want them to become if you don’t talk to them. Every single thing on earth is based on attention, what people give attention to. The quality of the content — the written word, the audio, the video, etc. — is the variable that determines if it lands or not. But without the attention, it’s that whole thing about if a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound if no one is there to hear it? So attention is my obsession.

I grew up building my dad’s business and then my personal brand — first on direct mail, print magazine ads, newspaper ads, radio, and local television. Then I did it on Google AdWords and email marketing, then I did it on YouTube, then I did it on social media. And I promise you, based on the history of my career, I will be at the forefront of when VR matters. I promise you when and if VR gets three hours of your day the way a phone does, you’ll go into your VR device, and you will be like, there he is — there’s Gary — because I don’t have any romance. And this is actually very important for every real leader to hear: I am not romantic about how I got here or how I currently make my money because if I do, I can get caught back to antiquated. I’ve got to always understand where it’s going, and I’ve got to get that timing right.

Day trading is a term on Wall Street, and it is very different than the way people used to invest in stocks. Our grandparents and our parents, they would buy a stock and they would go to sleep, or a mutual fund and they would be like see you later, I’ll look at it in a couple of years. Then when the internet came along, we had these kids buying stocks and selling them every second — day trading. If I buy an ad in a magazine, I’ve got to make the ad, buy it, and then there’s a long period of time before it shows up in an issue. Magazines are great and important, but the way social works now, the sheer tension, the speed in which you have to make content and be on top of this, is more like day trading than buying mutual funds — so day trading attention captured the essence of what I want to say about marketing. From Nike to Real Leaders, to GaryVee the personal brand, to a store on Madison Avenue, to a law firm — if you are doing marketing, if you are trying to get attention, if you want to succeed and build anything, a personal brand or a business, the more you understand that you’re day trading attention now, the better you will succeed.

Once you understand that, you start to realize how much science and art and strategy and complexity there is to be good at it. If I told every kid who was an athletic freak 20 years ago when they were 6 years old, “Hey, you should all become basketball players — not football players — because I see the future, and basketball is going to grow, and because there are only 15 players on a basketball team and not 53 like there are on a football team, you make a lot more money if you’re a good basketball player,” that would have been the right strategy that wasn’t obvious 20 years ago. And yes, being great is hard, and that’s what this is: I’m telling you that basketball is coming, but the reason I wrote the book is to show you how to train and actually be great at it.

RL: If I’m a direct-to-consumer, socially conscious, or certified B Corp company, where should I be playing online today?      

Vaynerchuk: I mean required — not even optional — Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts. I couldn’t comprehend if you’re trying to sell something direct to consumer not being on those channels. The next tier would be X, LinkedIn, and Snapchat Spotlight, which is the TikTok/Instagram part of Snapchat. But the first four are utterly required to have any prayer of success.

RL: If I’m a small B2B service provider looking to target socially conscious business owners, what kind of strategy would cater to them best?

Vaynerchuk: This is going to blow people’s minds. The AI algorithms that run the For You Pages and the feeds of the social networks are getting better and better by the hour in understanding content and then putting that content in front of the people they’re trying to reach. Can you imagine what’s going to be in place in a year or two? It’s already happening — but I’ll go with a year or two — where this individual who’s saying words like “socially conscious” or “for good,” literally algos are picking that up, and then the feed will send it to people who’ve shown a propensity for being interested in that subject matter.

So my answer for that B2B service provider you describe would be very heavy in YouTube Shorts and LinkedIn to reach that socially conscious business person — LinkedIn because it just finds the B2B environment and YouTube Shorts because YouTube is the second-biggest search engine in the world, and so when you put a social piece in there, a YouTube Short will show up for the people looking for that kind of content, and that would be stronger than you doing it on Facebook and Instagram right now.

RL: If you are a founder growing a business on social media, should you grow it on your personal platform profile or on the company’s?

Vaynerchuk: Great question. The answer is both. Every business brand I have has its own pages, and then I have my pages. Humans tend to over index brands and companies. It’s just the nature of the medium, but by doing both you’re able to take the human audience and push them to your business, and you can work with them back and forth. Collab posts are now a thing, and so I genuinely believe it’s both. But if somebody’s crippled by that and thinks that’s so hard, or they can’t, the reality is either will work.

RL: Should a company have brand guidelines, or is that giving away the ultimate creativity?

Vaynerchuk: Should brands have guidelines? Sure. It’s good to know what you’re up to for new employees. But for the leaders reading this, this is a marketing terminology issue more than a business and operations one. In Marketing Land, how to build a brand, brand guidelines — a lot of this stuff is hurting people in the new world. It was good for television — it’s not good for social media. I would rather brands focus on being relevant to as many different consumer segmentations as possible versus coming up with a tagline or color scheme that restricts their creativity in this new world.

RL: Real Leaders is all about the holistic leader — developing not just the professional side, but the personal side. We have a lot of family businesses in the Real Leaders community. Are you thinking about bringing your kids into your business?

Vaynerchuk: I have no ambition for my children to be businessmen or women. If my daughter and son end up not being an entrepreneur or not even interested in business — let’s say they want to go nonprofit, or they want to be a politician, or they want to be an artist — I’m great with that because I’m obsessed with my children being as passionate about what they do as I am about what I do. If they decide they want to be in the game, the first thing that comes to mind is the fear of nepotism. I’m incredibly scared to create a fake environment that will ultimately be financially lucrative for my children but will be emotionally detrimental. I wouldn’t even do it to my own employees because I view them as family. I wouldn’t put my children in a position that lets them leapfrog over someone who’s earned it.

My kids are 15 and 12 right now, so I’m still a few minutes away from the red zone, but I’m at the point where it’s worth thinking about. I’m very fortunate that I’m growing up in an era where we’ve got 100 years of data and anecdotal examples of what can go wrong when you don’t play this right. The good news is, I don’t have my own self-esteem wrapped up in my children’s financial and professional success. What really hurts parents is when their self-esteem is wrapped up in their kid’s school, in their sports, and how much money they make. I don’t have that. I’m obsessed with being their father — not their friend or cheerleader — and as a father, I need to be a counterpuncher to the truth of who they are in their soul and try to help them into a place of joy and fulfillment and passion, and hopefully that will be how it plays out. 

I was 9 when the doctor told me I had bone cancer. I didn’t understand everything, but I understood one sentence: “You have a 50% chance to live.” My early years began with a question: If I survive, what will I do with it? My survival — that fragile miracle — became my compass. I realized early that life is not measured by its length but by its impact. My body healed, but my purpose had only begun. 

At 14 I founded my first nongovernmental organization: Bee The Change — a small, direct-aid organization that supported children in African communities. We packed boxes, raised funds, and connected directly with kids who needed food, medicine, and education. That was my first taste of leadership with purpose. I discovered that real leadership doesn’t start when people follow you; it starts when you decide to move, even if you’re the only one walking.

Then came a phone call that broke me. A young boy in Africa, whom I had come to see as my godchild, died. The cause? Cholera — from contaminated water. I was devastated. We had helped him with school supplies and food, but not with the one thing he needed most: clean water. That moment tore through my soul. I realized charity wasn’t enough. If we wanted real change, we needed to fix — not just treat — the systems.

From that pain was born the Umuntu Movement — inspired by the African philosophy “Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu,” meaning, “I am because we are.” Today the movement has provided clean, safe water to over 50,000 people, cultivated several hectares of regenerative farmland, planted 40,000 to 50,000 trees every year, and supported education centers and schools that empower new generations of changemakers.

Driven by this conviction, I earned my bachelor’s and master’s in engineering, followed by an honorary doctorate (PhD h.c.) recognizing my work in sustainable technology and water innovation. To me, science is not separate from empathy — it’s a tool to serve it. 

That journey led to the creation of Evodrop, a Swiss-based multinational water innovation company to redefine what clean water means. We developed patented purification technologies that remove nearly all harmful contaminants while preserving the natural vitality of water. Evodrop has grown into a global impact company with over a dozen international awards. I’ve learned that business, at its best, is a form of service. When companies anchor themselves in purpose, profit becomes a natural outcome — not the destination. At Evodrop part of our revenues flow directly back into Umuntu’s social and environmental projects, creating a self-sustaining cycle of change.

We don’t see our success as isolated. Every drop of clean water we deliver, every tree we plant, every child we educate — it’s all part of a shared ecosystem of impact. I’ve realized leadership isn’t about building empires; it’s about building legacies that outlive you.

When I was 9, I had a 50% chance of survival. Today I wake up every day knowing that I have a 100% chance to make a difference. That’s what drives me — not fear, not ambition, but gratitude that I got to turn pain into purpose, and purpose into progress.

Defining moments don’t always come from victory; sometimes they’re born from your deepest wounds. When the odds are stacked against you, your true mission reveals itself — because survival is not the goal; significance is.