We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Raymont Johnson. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Raymont below.

Alright, Raymont thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you talk to us about serving the underserved.

My business serves an underserved community in a number of ways. What makes my community underserved is that we serve a community which has a 73% poverty rate. A median income of $18000 per year. My city, Alliance Ohio, is about 90% white, so it’s not about color, it’s about poverty. I serve the community as an entrepreneur and a social entrepreneur

I serve the community as an entrepreneur, as a leadership coach, counselor, author, at my company So You Call Yourself A Leader LLC and my real estate company as the owner and landlord for RBJ Properties LLC. I sit on the Stark County Minority Business Association Board (SCMBA) where we assist over 300 veteran, women and minority owned business of all sizes with state certifications, access capital, business plans, negotiating contracts etc. I am the sole member of the board from Alliance. I recruit local minority owned businesses and assist them in whatever capacity they need, from starting their paperwork, to seeking capital. I provide space for them in our micro business center located in our 30,000 sq Ft Family Matters Resource Center (FMRC) with computer support or to meet clients. I am also a member of the local Rotary club.

From the social entrepreneur side, I am the President and founder of our 501c3 nonprofit Family Empowerment Ministries Inc (FEMI) which we started in 2008. We started in Maryland and relocated to Ohio a few years after I retired from the United States Air Force, when we felt the call to come back to our hometown and add value to the community by serving and filling gaps in service, along with launching the church in which I’m the founder and Senior Pastor now known as Faith City Alliance Ohio.

FEMI owns and operates the Family Matters Resource Center (FMRC). Our center is located in the highest poverty community in the city as I mentioned earlier. As the founder and president of FEMI I oversee the many services we provide of which many are unique to the city. We like to use a term Dr. Tony Evens coined, from the womb to the tomb. Our services include senior citizen computer training classes, free hot food meal, my wife Brenda, who is the owner of BJ’s Kitchen Scratch made comfort food at its best, a catering and mobile food business. She prepares called
Soul Food Sunday, Diaper Days Xtreme, a infant mortality education program geared toward reducing the infant mortality rate in our county and state. In addition, we have a community food pantry, youth and parent cooking classes, line dancing classes, access to Community Legal Aid. We help sponsor a monthly men’s program called the Toolbox geared to mentor fathers and men. We also have the only academic focused afterschool program geared toward helping 3rd grade students increase their reading aptitude in order to pass the Ohio reading aptitude test. We operated a in school mentoring program called Lunch with A Leader for eight years.

I serve and have served on numerous nonprofit boards to include, Alliance Habitat for Humanity, YMCA, Alliance Kiwanis Club of which I’m a member and the FEMI board of which I’m the President.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

As a social entrepreneur I got that from my late mother. She was always helping someone in the community.

As a leader I believe that is something that a Jewish gentlemen Robert Manheim, from Robert’s Men’s and Boys’ Shop. I started working there as part of the half day work program when I was a senior in high school. He saw something in me and kept giving me more responsibility. When his son in-law left the business, he made me the manager. I wasn’t aware of terms like mentoring but in hindsight I see that’s what he was doing for this young poor black kid. He gave me the confidence to be able to organize, manage and lead older men who had worked there for many years. They were not happy about that. lol

What’s interesting about me is I am the definition of you don’t have to be born a leader to become an effective leader. My personality is that of a person who likes to stay to myself. I’m naturally shy. With that being who I am my strength is the ability to maximize the capacity as a leader and manager out of anyone. My mantra in life is to inspire, empower and equip people to walk in their purpose! I’m proud of the fact that I can not only give people technical assistants but can inspire them to believe they can fulfill their dreams. I measure success by changed lives! Spirit, soul and body!
One of the things I felt was important as I went down the path of being a leader and manager in the military and corporate world was to expand my education to better understand business and people in general. To that end I began studying in the areas of management leadership and humanities. Raymont holds a Master of Science degree in Organizational Leadership (MSOL) from Nyack College, Nyack NY; a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Management from the University of Maryland University College (UMUC), College Park MD; Masters degree in Christian Counseling and Discipleship from Capital Bible Seminary, Washington DC. In addition, I’m a certified addiction coach and a certified Christian Coach focusing on the areas of business and the non-profit arena.

An area that I’m adept at helping business and organizations with is process improvement. Many small businesses struggle because their systems are not efficient to maximize production. I have a lot of experience in the nonprofit sector, not only operating my own nonprofit, but I’ve been on a number of nonprofit boards. I’m also a grant writer. I’ve been able to fund my own nonprofit by receiving grants from the state level in Ohio, county level and local level from organizations like United Way and others, while coaching and advising others on the process.

Any advice for managing a team?

In my book So you call yourself a leader a simple guide to identifying your leadership style revision, I talk about the importance of starting right, staying right and finishing right. Part of that starting right is to establish a healthy culture. Culture is king! If you start a new job as the leader manager, being able to shift culture, if it’s negative, isn’t easy but necessary. One of the best ways to accomplish that is by a principle I talk about in the book called Member Leader Exchange (MLX). MLX is the leader’s ability to establish a relationship with each team member that allows you to lead them in the most effective way to maximize their capacity. It’s ironic at the local YWCA they recently hired a new Executive Director. When I introduced myself to her, she said when I was hired everyone quiet. I said that’s great! The previous manager was fired, and these people were loyal to her and would have made your life pure hell. Now you get to hire and build your own team and culture. When she talked to my wife a week later, she said thank your husband for that insight, It really encouraged me.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

What I had to unlearn was to not be too hard on people and to give them grace. When I was a young leader, I would be quick to give up on people. I can remember firing a young man, don’t really remember why. But as I look back on my life I’ve been given grace when someone could have given up on me. Now when someone doesn’t perform at the level, I expect I don’t ask what’s wrong with them, I first assess am I giving them my best to make them their best. Those people can end up being your best employee and leader, because they are thankful for the trust you put in them.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.soyoucallyourselfaleader.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/raymont59?igsh=NzNxejE4ZmQzN3Nr
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/15jfNdU65D/?mibextid=wwXIfr
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/raymont-johnson-18969347?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app