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John Hope Bryant knows a thing or two about pulling oneself up by the bootstraps.
From his own humble beginnings in Los Angeles, he’s become a thought leader on the issues of education, financial literacy, and strong family structure. His work has been recognized by five U.S. presidents, and he’s served as advisor for three.
Bryant is founder, chairman and CEO of Operation HOPE, America’s largest not-for-profit and best-in-class provider of economic empowerment tools and services. He’s the author of three bestselling books.
His latest is Up from Nothing: The Untold Story of How We (All) Succeed. The book is especially relevant at a time of political in-fighting and racial and class divisions.
Rodger Dean Duncan: When faced with tough circumstances, some people fall into the “woe is me” victimization trap. What’s your advice to them?
John Hope Bryant: Whether you believe that you can, or whether you believe that you can’t, you’re right. So, as I like saying, it’s all about mindset.
Having a defeatist perspective like the one you mention defeats you before you ever even get started in life. It only hurts you. I can’t guarantee you that having a positive state of mind will make you a success, but I absolutely guarantee you that having a negative one will guarantee you failure.
Duncan: There’s no doubt that the Covid-19 pandemic has brought heartache to a lot of people. But it’s also given people the chance to learn some important life lessons. What positives do you see coming out of the pandemic?
John Hope Bryant
Bryant: When have you ever had six to eight weeks, let alone six to eight months, to step off the grid of life and to reflect, to brainstorm, to reconnect with those you love, and to reset yourself? To reimagine your dreams that you have for your life? This is the hidden benefit of the Covid-19 period. With all of its devastating challenges, it’s also symbolic. You cannot have a rainbow without a storm first.
Duncan: What have you discovered to be the best path to adopting an “I can do it!” mind set?
Bryant: Practice is how you get anything in life. It’s about building personal habits and culture.
What is the culture in your family, on your block, in your community, and in our country? It is here, and I guarantee you that if you hang around nine broken people, you will be the tenth. This is also cultural currency. If you want to be an eagle, learn to hang around some.
Duncan: Employee engagement has been a challenge in many American businesses for decades. What are some best practices you’ve seen that really influence people to “own” their jobs and take full accountability for their performance?
Bryant: Employee engagement in the workplace speaks to culture, and as I firmly believe that culture is everything. The highest performing companies are those with the broadest and strongest employee engagement.
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As KKR and Delta Airlines have done, I believe that a future model, and possibly even a partial upgrade on the “union model,” is the stakeholder model. No one attacks themselves, and few people wash rental cars. People protect and grow and are excited about things in which they have a stake. All of us have to be in this to win this. And we must understand that adversaries, especially China and Russia, benefit from Americans fighting each other. The stakeholder model, combined with the financial coaching model for America that HOPE Inside the Workplace model provides, is a model for the future that will work, and help to lift all boats.
Duncan: By many measures, there seems to be more divisiveness in American than most of us have seen in our lifetimes. What’s it going to take for us to get our act together and collaborate for the common good?
Bryant: The Bible says that “a house divided will not stand.” This is also common sense.
We need something that we can all agree on, and I believe that this “thing” is not the focus on red versus blue or the focus on white versus black or the urban versus rural agenda, but the unifying green—the color of U.S. currency, and likewise the color of our sustainability.
We need to focus together, on growing GDP and economic opportunity for all. I even believe that the best route to social justice (for Black America as one immediate example) is through financial inclusion and economic empowerment for all. Conversely, we can take no pleasure, that there is a hole in our boat. We are all in this thing called American progress together.
