I was deeply honored to travel to the Bay Area this week to acknowledge and thank an Operation HOPE Northwest Board Member by the name of Brian Tippens, an executive with Hewlett Packard (HP). Brian, who happens to be African-American and from the under-served community served today by the HOPE Financial Dignity Center, Oakland, cares deeply about community, and regularly gives back. But one of these acts involves his leadership around securing more than a dozen new HP first class computer systems to outfit the HOPE Inner-City Cyber Cafe at the HOPE Center, Oakland.
Brian claims that he was motivated by years ago when I gave a speech at a business conference in the Bay Area, but now it is he, and other caring executives like him, who go out of their way to stay connected to the under-served communities they grew up in and to give back, that inspire and motivate me.
Thank you Brian Tippens, for all that you do my friend. Your legacy is a living one.
John Hope Bryant is a thought leader, founder, chairman and CEO of Operation HOPE and Bryant Group Companies, Inc. Magazine/CEO READ bestselling business author of LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World (Jossey-Bass), the only African-American bestselling business author in America, and is chairman of the Subcommittee for the Under-Served and Community Empowerment for the U.S. President’s Advisory Council on Financial Capability, for President Barack Obama. Mr. Bryant is the co-founder of the Gallup-HOPE Index, the only national research poll on youth financial dignity and youth economic energy in the U.S. He is also a co-founder of Global Dignity with HRH Crown Prince Haakon of Norway and Professor Pekka Himanen of Finland. Global Dignity is affiliated with the Forum of Young Global Leaders and the World Economic Forum. Mr. Bryant serves on the board of directors of Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation, an NYSE Euronext publicly traded company, and a division of $54 billion Ares Capital.