As promised here are my thoughts from day two of the forum.
One panel I attended was about social entrepreneurship. Amazing insights. The reason for such a panel is because we’re running into a major problem with trafficking victims: they have no sustainable plan for the future. If you pull someone out of sex slavery for example, they need a vocational skill and a market to earn a living in. They have a life to live. The same thing goes for manual labor slaves. They have to have a marketable skill to sustain their lives going forward.
This same challenge applies to men and women coming out of homelessness and prison. Many times they can’t get hired because of things in their background so they need a market to work within that is sustainable. The takeaway from this thought is I’d like to begin gathering entrepreneurs together for brainstorming. Let’s get some creative innovation flowing towards creating a solution.
The next thought comes from the issue of bonded and slave labor. There were two former corporate executives that now work for non-profits fighting labor exploitation, that told our gathering that the complexity of supply chains for manufacturing and production are so deep that no corporation can know for sure if they have any slave labor involved. Because the raw supplies are coming from so many different sources, they can’t monitor everything. That was a sobering thought. There is progress being made in more standardized monitoring and certifications but we have a long way to go.
Finally, we got a charge to continue to be a part of this real movement to end modern day slavery in all forms. There is real momentum building and it will continue to build if we all do our parts.
Our part at North Avenue, is to support StreetGRACE. We are fighting the sex slavery and exploitation of children. Each of us has a role to play in that battle.
I could spare a few minutes on the phone this week to discuss job searches and employers’ openness. If you would like to meet, the first week in November would be better. I’d suggest you bring Prince into the loop and I could try to think of some other potential employers to invite.