Leadership, Leveraging Your Past, and Slasher Films with Toyin Ogunfolaju

Welcome back to Environmental Professionals Radio, Connecting the Environmental Professionals Community Through Conversation, with your hosts Laura Thorne and Nic Frederick! 

On today’s episode, we talk with Toyin Ogunfolaju, Director Social Value & Equity Americas at Jacobs about Leadership, Leveraging Your Past, and Slasher Films.   Read her full bio below.

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Showtimes:
3:53  Nic & Laura discuss being self-made
13:44  Interview with Toyin Ogunfolaju starts
18:03  Leveraging your past
37:13  Leadership
49:04  Slasher Films

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This podcast is produced by the National Association of Environmental Professions (NAEP). Check out all the NAEP has to offer at NAEP.org.

Connect with Toyin Ogunfolaju at https://www.linkedin.com/in/toyinogunfolaju/

Guest Bio:
Toyin Ogunfolaju has 20 years’ experience in the infrastructure and government relations industries. She leverages public/private partnership models as the foundation to identify opportunities and practices that promote regenerative social systems. She is the Director, Social Value & Equity Americas at Jacobs. Her role supports the delivery of social-economic & equitable solutions as Jacobs delivers its core services, which may manifest itself through prioritizing equity in capital planning/execution, workforce development, local supply chain sourcing, and community/stakeholder engagement. She has expertise in executive leadership, community engagement, and operations management. She is called upon to analyze critical requirements, identify areas of opportunity, generate solutions, and implement programs. She serves as a member of the Jacobs Global Social Value & Equity Advisory Community of Practice and as a Board Member of the Economy League of Greater Philadelphia, as well as chairing the Conference of Minority Transportation Officials Philadelphia Chapter Networking Committee. Recent industry recognition includes the 2021 Jacobs Harambee Black Employee Network Bridges Summit Certificate of Recognition for Contributing to Structural Change in the Broader Society, and the “Corporate Responsibility” Award for the 2023 Women of Color Magazine. 


Music Credits
Intro: Givin Me Eyes by Grace Mesa
Outro: Never Ending Soul Groove by Mattijs Muller

Transcript

Transcripts are auto-transcribed

[Intro]

Laura  
Hello and welcome to EPR with your favorite environmental nerds Nick and Laura. On today's episode Nick and I discuss being self made. We talked to Toyne a goon philosophy about leadership leveraging your past and slasher films. And finally breaking stereotypes. Here are some fun facts about my next favorite airplane. I have to do it okay. Yeah, my favorite airplane, the SR 71 blackbird. First of all, it's the fastest jet ever cruising at over Mach three or 228 miles per hour. It could operate. Oh

Nic  
my gosh, 2200 to 200 miles an hour. Unbelievable. Your favorite plane,

Laura  
my favorite plane could operate safely at a maximum speed. of Mach 3.3, which is over 2200 miles per hour at an altitude more than 60 miles or 85,000 feet above the Earth. Also, I swear I knew all of this before. And Nick did not write this I think everyone knows what you're up to here. That's insane, though. Yeah,

Nic  
it didn't work at all. I don't even my brain was

Laura  
like 200 Yeah, I couldn't even read that as 2000

Nic  
about didn't work at all and work perfectly. That's, that

Laura  
feels like going backwards. How can you physically go that fast?

Nic  
I don't know. It seems like it should fall to pieces, but apparently it didn't. So how about that? Awesome.

Laura  
Well, that may be my favorite. AirPlay. At that music, hip hop music

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Speaker 1  
All right, I know you know COVID the pandemic is overall can you get back to work I'm sure we're all tired of right your lawyer you're tired. You're so tired of commuting to work. You need to I definitely don't work from home that do ridiculous. But if you are tired of commuting, I have the perfect thing for you. We call it hyper launch and it's exactly what it sounds like we take you and put you out in front yard. We pull back a large, incredible slingshot and shoot you to your job. That's right. You'll get there in record time. We guarantee that will be the fastest thing you've ever had in your life. But you know, yeah, and we get lots of questions about this. Like,

Nic  
like, Will I die on impact and probably but that's you know, but you will get there way faster than you've ever done before. We promise we guarantee that that is our guarantee. If it doesn't you get your money back. How about that? How about that, Laura? How about that?

Laura  
I'll take it as it go 2284 miles?

Nic  
You know, it's funny, she said that it actually is the exact speed of the SR 71 blackbird Laura's favorite plane so

Laura  
sign up now for only $4 million.

Nic  
Yeah, it's actually a little higher than that. But yeah. $4 billion. I don't know. I don't know. It's been so let's

Laura  
get to our segment.

Nic  
Actually, so ironically, we just were literally just talking about Arnold Schwarzenegger and I saw a clip of him talking about how he doesn't like it when people say he's a self made man. And he's like, Yes, I came from nothing. I lived in a place that had no electricity, no running water. That's where I started but self made it makes it seem like nobody helped me. Yeah, I just did it all by myself. And he's like, the concept is terrible. I had to he's I had coaches. I had teachers I had friends that got me to where I am so to say I'm a self made man makes me would make me very unbelievably appreciative of the people who actually helped me along the way. That's wonderful. It was like a really sweet I was like, oh my god, I really he's all my favorite people. Yeah, that was really great. It was like I was like, why that's so poignant. Yeah,

Laura  
I mean, that makes sense. But I think like, semantics, right? Yeah. Self Made. I get it. I think we all understand that you didn't like not literally. But I think you know, being self employed for seven years now. It is. There's still you have to believe in yourself. You have to you have to be able to have relationships and get help and be helped and all of that but there is a lot that just rides on you waking up every day and continuing to follow, chase those dreams and be dedicated to whatever it is you're trying to get. So you know, there's no you're not self made. You have to have other people in your court and you have to, you know, build partnerships and do things but at the end of the day, there's a lot of people who, who do not succeed on the entrepreneur route because they don't have that self made drive, you know, that they're going to do that because there are people helping you but there's no one in the morning who's saying it's 730 Time to get up and start rolling.

Nic  
So funny, I had no idea he would say that and that's why I brought it up. I think drives really important that's something that's really kind of what I want to wanted to get to. Because, you know, talked about that a lot this past week, too. It's being driven, you know, wanting to do more and learn more, be more be a better version of yourself, you know, trying to improve over time can be exhausting and not everybody's designed to just be that way. I certainly feel like my especially my younger years I have I know what the heck I was doing was rudderless. It's kind of like oh, okay, I guess I'll just do what everyone's telling me to do. And it took a long time for me to kind of pull myself out of that because and I found something that was really worth being hungry about. And that's it just took a long time for me. I don't know. Yeah. I don't know what your experience was with that site. But I feel like you've I mean, I've only known you for three years, but it feels like you've always been driven your whole life. I don't know if that's true.

Laura  
Yeah, it's interesting because I I've never when I grew up, entrepreneur wasn't a word that was thrown around the way that it is now. Obviously, we didn't have social media where there's like pages I can follow with motivational quotes and famous people that I can tap into at any second, Arnold Schwarzenegger talking about, you know, self made versus, you know, community made like those discussions weren't if they were happening, they were private, they were not, you know, something that you could just anyone could tap into. So I'm really interested to see like, coming up generations what they do with this, there's going to be the half that you know, the bell shaped curve, the half that does nothing. And then that half that's just like going after it has all of this tools and motivation and just knowledge you know, my my friends kids are saying things to them like, Well, okay, mom, but you know, having a kid is hard. You just have to be self aware around it. Like what nine year old knows what self aware means. Not in my generation. You know, it's, it's really interesting. So I think we're all getting this information at the same time. And so, you know, I'm trying I only started reading books like business books, growth books. You know, when I started working for myself, I didn't do that when I was in my career as much. And gosh, I wish I had been reading some of these books in exists, but some of them did you know how to win friends and influence. People have been around forever. Like, I didn't read that in my 20s. I read that in my late 30s. Like, I think that in the Four Agreements. I mean, I read that all the time now. And it's like you know, my personal, like, favorite book to stand on just to be stable and move forward. And I think that I forgot your question. I'm just rambling. So

Nic  
I'll circle back on two things. One, I want to say like officially, it's like not everybody needs to be driven. Everybody wants to do that. Yeah, that's absolutely super easily. Okay. And, you know, it's just funny because I kind of was always like, I'll just be like a middle of the road person. And then it just got more and more interested in learning more and more things about leadership and all those kinds of things. And you're talking about books, and that's one of those things that I asked a lot of people like that I consider good leaders. What are the qualities you have? What are the qualities of frigging team? All those things, and like, I read leadership books I have done that I haven't done as much but that's the thing people a lot of people really like. And for me, I'm like, Okay, well, maybe I'm missing something. Maybe I should be reading these and more of these books. I've read Psalm and been like, yeah, that's good advice. And I remember three of the 75 things that are in it, and you know, the rest will be that back in there somewhere, I guess. But I don't know. Like that's always seeing how do we

Laura  
well, I'm gonna shamelessly plug my book club because the world of these publishing high impact reading challenge for the last four years we've read a book every month and this year, we are coincidentally reading breaking ice and breaking glass leading unchartered waters by Vice Admiral Sandra stone is retired, who was a guest on our show before and she's going to come to our meeting. So super excited about that. So Nikki, Chicago November 30. Just come regardless, the book club is really like so is my business consulting friend Lisa Sears, and I started it because her and I were like, You need to read this. You need to read this. You need to read it. And then we had a long list of like book shares, and then we were just like binge reading, but no follow up. So just like exactly what you said, remembering three things from it. So we come and we all discuss what we learned what we did like what we didn't like, and then some people who didn't read it can go oh, I think I need to read this. Or someone else can say like, Oh, I'm glad I didn't read that one. But yeah, it's I think that's really elevated a lot. What you asked me before was if I've always been like this, because I only discovered like probably three years into my working for myself that lightbulb like oh my god, I always have been an entrepreneur. I've always when I was 18. I started, like I was building websites. I was starting this book. I wanted to put together a resource that would allow nonprofits that were wildlife refuges to have someplace where they can have a list people could go to and see like, what donations do they need? What's their cause I had this whole questionnaire and a lot of them wrote back to me, and then I was 18. I didn't finish it but like and then the internet also was born. So like my book idea became like what you would put on your website. So like, it never occurred to me like why am I unhappy in my nine to five job because I've always wanted to create, you know? Yeah,

Nic  
so funny. Looking back for me too. It's small things like you know, there's TV shows like I met one of my favorites growing up as a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, right? Loved that loved it. And everybody has a favorite, right? Everybody has a favorite and I'm like one of seven total people who likes to do you know, and I do that just because you had swords but also because he was a leader. And Sam. But like, you know, people always assume I like the smart one because I was a smart person and like, No, I can't make these kind of stories and he's blue and he's I don't know, it's cool. He's leading he's in and you kind of don't think about that until you're like later in life. Like why did I like I like Cyclops and X Men again, because he's the leader guy. And nobody likes him. No. It's weird. So like, actually, ironically, like when the movies came out, I'm like, no, he's supposed to supposed to be a leader. Why do you think I'm such a wimp? And that was very disappointing to me. But yeah, you kind of start thinking about that as like, oh, yeah, I guess I've always wanted to be like that. It's just, yeah, I never never thought about it. That way, at all until I was in my 30s. Yeah, so I don't know. I guess that's kind of Yeah.

Laura  
And you can be driven at whatever you can be driven to be a great leader in your job. You can be driven to be a business owner of yourself like, but that that drive, I think is your mentor or whatever. Yeah, exactly. But I think some people lose the drive because they're not in the place they want to be, you know, they're either like, doing something that other people encourage them to do their parents or at whatever, just like x whatever those expectations are. And then I may think they're not a driven person, but maybe they're just not in the right space.

Nic  
I totally agree with that. I mean, TIFF is a great example of that, you know, having a couple of times perfect example. Yeah,

Laura  
it's extremely hard. Yeah, as far as like career coaching goes, like if you find yourself in that position, where you're like, how come I don't want to go to work? How come? I'm not working as hard as everyone else or if I have I don't have the drive that the Knicks has, you know, I'm I'm also a manager or leader but I'm not putting in the effort. Like maybe you're just not on the right the right right field or something.

Nic  
Unless you're saying she is in the right spot, right. That's right.

Laura  
She's pretty driven. I can't no complaints there.

Nic  
Alright, that's good. Before I get myself in more trouble.

Laura  
Awesome, let's get to the interview.

Nic  
Hello, and welcome back to EPR. Today, we have Tolian a boon for larger the director of social value and equity Americas at Jacobs on the show. Welcome, Tom. Thanks for having me. Okay. So you have a long distinguished career here. A lot of really interesting things. What was it like working with lobbyists who are advocating for law I want to start there. Oh,

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
my God, nothing easy. So that was very interesting. So I worked for an it was actually a law firm. So on top of the lobbies, it was an actual law firm and I even got kind of connected to that law firm because my mom worked for one of the partners, wives, because I really wanted to go to law school. I thought that like, this was going to be my jam. And so I was there for about six, seven years and kind of start off as almost kind of a like a paralegal kind of a role. Gopher some people might call it and but but really over those six years, I asked for more responsibilities and so got exposed to like, not only the legislative process, but then like the people, the personalities, the deals, the things that are the how the sausage gets made. So that was interesting. And then the the actual team that I work with, I was you know, I was the only woman on the team, the government relations team and that and that was in Annapolis. And the the undisbursed in like 20 years, and then and then the only woman of color right so that was an interesting experience. It was all dudes, you know, 40 something plus years old. And let's just say it was my first first professional job Wow. Wow, professional job. Yeah, so very scary. Because because you're like first of all these people know a lot more than me that I will ever know. Because I started I was 19. Right. So, so it was that fear. And I'm, you know, I was originally born in Nigeria. And so growing up and came to the US when I was three years old. And so in being from a Nigerian family growing up in the US in Maryland, where I grew up, there was always this fear of law and the law and right so I don't even know how I was even attracted to any of these things. Because I just felt like every every day I was like, Is this the day that they're gonna like, you know, say I can't come back or right so I don't know I got attracted to law but yeah, it was it was a great experience. I think it's kind of what has helped define, like my approach to the work I do today. And how to engage with people how to treat people in a fair and decent way. Yeah,

Nic  
I love that. You're bringing some of that up to that intimidation. Factor. I remember very specifically my first job, similar kinds of like, what I do, how does how do they know so much? And then, you know, we talked a little bit on the show about impostor syndrome, where it's like you think so Did did you kind of by the time you had finished there, do you do you feel like you had a better sense of yourself in that industry, or was it time to move on and but Cisco do something different? Yeah.

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
So a couple of things. Yes. And no. Let's start with the no part. I actually had decided to I didn't like I was in the process of starting community college or wasn't Community College and I started at the firm and then I just got very distracted and I didn't really I didn't really finish I started in some classes. I didn't really finish my undergraduate degree. And so because I got to a point in time where I kept raising my hand and hoping that they would treat me as like an equal and they didn't see me as a golfer, and that was like six years later, I decided in order for me to kind of be able to have options in the future. I needed to number one, get a degree and so I literally quit to focus on this school full time and so for like three or four semesters in a row, I took like five or six classes, or attended sir, whatnot. So I felt like no leaving that experience at like, I understood myself. I just knew that I felt like I was missing things. But it wasn't I wasn't gonna get it here. So in that regard, I guess I knew that much right that this wasn't going to be where I find myself but yeah, it was

Nic  
time to go. Yeah, I mean, that does take a good amount of self awareness, which I think when we're younger, sometimes we miss and so you go to school, you're attending, which sounds like all you're doing is being on you know, engaged. 24/7 How was that process for you? How did you manage to work your way through it?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Yeah, that was actually it was a lot of fun. Yeah. A lot of fun for me. Let me just say that from the job. And like you said, Very good observation. It was a lot of engagement. It was, you know, listening to people talking to people one on one, and I'd never barked at it before, right. So I also just learned like how to bartend and be a server so you know, getting dropped at a section that had like 50 people that having never served before. I think I just got fired the first serving job I had, because every none of the tables left me any tips at all, like that whole entire shift, and yeah, it was like the first it was like the first shift after the training and you're like, I got it. And it was like, none of the tables gave me any tips. So I got pulled to the side by the manager. It was basically like, look, we'll let you come back tomorrow, but like after tomorrow be and get it together. We're gonna have to let you go. So of course I had a cry session and against self doubt, right, just kind of like I can't even do a side gig. So So that was it was hard because I the number of class sprites within the school piece. Are you taking five classes? This is probably this is the most number of classes I've taken. It was a lot of pressure I put on myself because I had a timeline. You know, I don't come from money. So you know, literally the money I was earning was you know, the money I was been using to pay for school and living expenses. And I didn't want to be out of work too long like I had given myself like rough like a year to get it together and come out with a degree. So if I hadn't kind of like stuck to the timeline, it would have set me back and you know, who knows what. So that was the that was the bartending and the surveying, but also I had I created a network, right having worked at firm and doing lobbying, I created a network of friends and people professionals who worked in all sorts of sectors and markets. And then specifically one of my contacts, relative to transportation said, Hey, one of the agencies here is looking for someone to kind of be there like project manager, coordinator person for they're doing changes to their service, and they need someone who can do community engagement, and also kind of herd the cats would be, you know, the engineers and the technical folks. And so I was like, Sure, why not? I don't know what that is. I don't know. Yeah, let's let's give it a try. I'm starting to master the bartending thing. So I think I can throw on another another challenge. And then I have started working for Maryland Department of Transportation for several years thereafter.

Nic  
Yeah, so yeah. Okay. So walk us through a little bit about your career path after you get your degree. How did you go about getting a new job and how did you get to where you are now?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
So that role I had mentioned was actually, like, funded through a grant. So it wasn't it was kind of I didn't know a consultant. I had no idea what consulting was until I actually work for started workflow consulting firm but he would say it kind of was like a consulting gig, right. They were paying me through a grant. So yeah, I start working with this agency. And this particular part of the agency focused on providing transportation for people with disability. And so yeah, I guess I think I did a decent job because they hired a like a new director of that unit. And he decided that he wanted to employ me as an actual state employee. And so he named me as a manager and operations for the Maryland Transit Administration. And so I focused on managing the like dispatch of vehicles and operators. There's that was a whole kind of sub unit of the operations. There's a whole certification office, there's a call center. So yeah, that's kind of how I remember one got myself in the public sector, and then being in transportation. So I would say like transportation has had a significant role in kind of how my career has been shaped and the things I've been exposed to. So yeah, that's kind of this this the second category? Right? Yeah, the legislative piece, right, the law, the legislative executive branch, and then now I was, you know, in the public sector as a manager and operations and quite frankly, like, I think that's, I'm so grateful for that experience. Because what I saw was, you know, on the legislative side, on the policy side, there are all these policies that whether it'll you know, set elected official or whoever in charge, decided that this was kind of the way that our agency is going to kind of move forward. And I felt like what I was observing now that I was in the operations on the ground, that these policies were being developed without having talked to the people who actually like are there to implement, and so it was just kind of a rude awakening for me that like, this is my calling. Like, I spent those six, seven years kind of understanding, maybe what typically people don't understand as far as the laws, regulations and policies, the policy piece, which we have to have, right, of course, it all kind of go kind of crazy. left to our own devices. But then but then we were missing. We were missing them, like the real people on the ground, right, who who work the overtime or come in too early and deal with the customers or deal with the constituency on a regular basis. And so I just feel like what I do now is about trying to make those kind of parts of the house fit together.

Nic  
Yeah. It's such a great point. And I was like, I was gonna make a joke about it. But no, it's totally true. It's like yeah,

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
totally make a joke. You should totally make a joke. Tell me what's coming.

Nic  
It's like, oh, you're telling me that the the laws and policies we make are necessarily always reflect the real world? That's the crazy who Yeah, who knew? Right? No, but it's totally the world we live in. I know. It's absolutely kind of speaking my language. I love that because it's right in line with like, you know, we have a lot of environmental policy changes happening now. And some of the changes are happening for lots of different reasons. And some of them make sense and some of them don't. And it's kind of like a it's a really fun to have like that, that extra piece to hear like, Oh, I understand what happened. I can read it. Or I can meet legal documents like oh, the lawyer that wrote this was having a bad day. I can tell because of how

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
correct and or how quickly it got passed away. They were just like, yeah, it because there's so many areas that it got passed so quickly. And that was a priority, right? versus things that are maybe not priorities that take you know, years and years decades to work through.

Nic  
Yeah, so that means Yeah, after we will get a beer and tell stories, that's what that means. I've

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
got plenty. Right, right.

Nic  
But let's talk a little bit about your job now too. So what is your day to day job like as director of social value and equity?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
So I work for so Jacobs is at the heart of it and our marketing people will be upset with me when I say this, but I have to say this. We are a total solutions professional services consulting firm, but what that really means is that our company was founded in architecture, engineering. Construction Management type of professionals, and we've got contracts, federal, state local contracts on government contracts and private sector contracts. So so we provide a myriad of services for clients. So in terms of my role we've had for decades and decades, professionals, practitioners, who you know, whether they're in water, or they're in doing work in the transportation space or doing work in the what we call a built environment space, so buildings by who bring a certain aspect of social equity or environmental justice or workforce development, Equity, Diversity right to the table and again, these practitioners are not just community engagement, folks, I these are scientists, these are economists right. These are folks who are like super picky map GIS people. These are folks are really great at strategy, helping clients develop strategy, but we, we've had these different practitioners across what we call the Americas. For us, it's the US and Canada or the Americas. And so we didn't have within our organization, our company. We're a global firm in the Americas. We didn't have kind of a structure like we didn't have a department that focused on identifying and developing the folks who are practitioners, right and kind of creating a career path for folks to do this type of work. We have a direct understanding of if you are an engineer, a junior engineer, how you can eventually become like a senior engineer where we have kind of a direct direct correlation between someone who works in the water resource space. And so how eventually, right you can ascend. It's a different role, but we don't have that for those who are really interested in being the social economic inclusion or social equity practitioners. And so in the last year, working with our senior leadership development business case, provides smart for us to develop a basically a business unit that focuses on not only developing the talent, but then as we are delivering the engineering stuff, or the science stuff, the environmental stuff. That we're really thinking kind of big picture of how our projects and our programs impact the community and then trying to be as proactive about mitigating harms, trying to undo harms, and trying to create the most community benefits.

Nic  
That's really cool. That sounds super great. We're totally nerdy on the show freely. We'll admit this, but I want to know, okay, that's the broad picture. So specifically, how does that look for Jacobs? What do you guys worked on and what is the structure now?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Yeah, so I've got my so I'm the director for the Americas and we got two regions east and west. We we've named a director for our east and looking for a director for our West region and so what does this look like? So we, for example, I'm not going to name the client, but there is a particular pursuit, actually, that we're working on now. But they're looking at replacing a tunnel. And so we are pursuing work. With that a significant piece of the replacement of this tunnel is to be cognizant of the community that surrounds this tunnel go this is going to be a pretty big deal to replace a tunnel that quite frankly, is a thoroughfare, right early main artery for the service. And so how do you replace this do the technical stuff, right, make sure we ensure that safety is at the forefront making sure that you build a tunnel that's going to last but then for a community that may not even really use they use more about the local transit system. How do you how do you convince them that as you're doing this program, replacing this tunnel that you're going to be conscientious of potential environmental challenges, right. So you know, as construction goes on air quality, right, the length of construction, we know through many studies that you know long term exposure to the construction environment does things to us, from the standpoint we know, if something is actually mentally, Ill impact you physically, right? And then there's the circle of life. And so and so we, as we're pursuing this work, you know, our proposal and everything in the proposal because that help our better competitors. But ultimately, ultimately, what we as part as far as our proposal to the client, ultimately we were saying, Hey, we're really sound technically, we know how to do this replacement. Here's how we'll replace the tunnel over such and such theory yours, but also while we're doing
__________________________
Toyin Ogunfolaju  
We're saying hey, we're really sound technically, we know how to do this replacement. Here's how we'll replace the tunnel over such and such theory years. But also while we're doing that, we are also creating a workforce development program so that the local residents can also get hired and actually work on this program. We're not only just hiring those local residents for the jobs, whether those are in jobs for today into the future, especially energy transition type of skills, we're creating that capacity, but we're also you know, making sure that we are engaging the community in a way that we're exposing the next generation of future engineers or future scientists, we're really looking into making sure that the materials that we use are sustainable materials we're looking at, you know, because you think about Big Picture global things, right. The for example, the UN United Nations has done a pretty big undertaking in identifying 17 goals globally for sustainable development. And so we need to be cognizant of that as we're hopefully delivering this tunnel replacement, how those goals how the goals on the project roll up to that that they are global, that global view. So our work, the social value equity team would be really looking at from day one of this program, from the planning to the delivery piece, how the community needs to be part of this program. The jobs piece, the community engagement, that inclusive engagement piece, right? So really hearing from the community and taking the feedback and applying it to how we deliver the program is going to be very, very important here.

Nic  
Oh, it's so great to hear that too. And I think one of the things you hit on that I wanted to kind of follow up on to so you're talking about a community who's engaged in a project and has an incentive to be supportive, because you are educating the community that's so cool to see because it gives them a sense of ownership. Is that kind of where that's kind of the ideas came from. All right, and

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
the idea of co creation, the idea called write code design, one of my mentors heard the quote, or the thing she'd always say to me that just sticks with me. People will support that which they helped create. Right and so, in order for this program, to be successful for this tell replacement to be not just a total replacement. We need the community to understand why it's going to be a benefit to them, even if they aren't quite literally, Amtrak users. Right, that this is a community development program. This is a way that they might be able to get some of that infrastructure that that doesn't necessarily exist today. This is a way in which individual residents of the community can be trained or upskilled or rescaled for jobs in the future and not just jobs for the sake of having a job but actually like careers. So our job is to number one message that effectively right? And then actually do it. Right.

Nic  
So okay, that's there's two parts there. Right. So to message effectively, I mean, what have you found to be the best way to reach communities about big projects like this?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Yeah. So first thing is first, make no assumptions, right? So make no assumptions that everyone's got a smartphone, and that you know, sending out email blasts are gonna get to anyone. make no assumptions that even if you printed the thing, or you sent the QR code or whatever kind of means of kind of letting people know, you're going to be doing a town hall or something like that, understanding that there's history, that there are traumas, right? And so, being ready for listening to that feedback period like this is even before we even get to the part about the program of the project that we're delivering, that there is history here. You know, folks have probably come before and said, Oh, we're going to build this and we're going to do that and you're going to be that much more better. We're going to create this many jobs and then that never happened. So understanding that like and being humble and then having those tough conversations, and then really building into the process and some level of accountability. Right? So not just scheduling town halls and saying we want to hear from you and then we do nothing with that feedback. Making sure that with our even just contracts that we have with the client, there's milestones, there's reporting. There's ways in which we're basically checked on the promises that we made and making sure that we live up to that.

Nic  
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think that's great. That's an absolutely wonderful approach to this and I think in my career too, I've seen so many examples of community practice going well and going poorly, and almost always it starts at the very, very beginning, making poor assumptions and not following through. So now second half of what you said, right, so it's not just talking to talk but walking the walk. So how do you follow through with what you promise?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Yeah, so it's like you think about making like a cake or something. You have to bake it into the batter, right? You don't sprinkle it on top, like, Oh, well. We're done building the thing. And so we just add sprinkles and everybody should be good, right? So it's about it's about identifying like, early on in that kickoff meeting, that first meeting, let's talk about how we're all going to get along and do stuff and how we're going to move in case one another identifying metrics, key performance metrics, right. So a key performance metric might be that in the design phase, you are going to go above and beyond what the regulations say about how to engage the community, right. So the regulation might say that you only have to do three outreach events right and then three is like the bare minimum, you actually need to do X number and this is how and then the scale and or the versatility of those engagements like virtual options versus in person options that we're going to actually so for example, that are the small diverse businesses who we could bring onto our team right, who, themselves who are residents of the community who have skill sets that we need on this program, hiring them onto our team, right? That's another kind of way to keep this very community focused. And then at the end of the day, making sure that we are spending time in the community and saying, Well, I'll be on even this programming project, right? Yes, genuine to the process, which is why it's important that our teams be local. We're not flying folks in for him to kind of, you know, have the expertise and then fly out that they're actually people who live and like myself group have grown up in the community. All right,

Nic  
and I think that's a great point. It's like our native Hawaiian company. I used to live in DC, but if I flew from DC to Honolulu, and I wore a three piece suit, they would tell me to turn around and go right that you know, it's it's something you have to understand your community. It's a before, during and after. And I love that you said that it's so great. So I'm glad to hear that that's a that's a really great work. I'm really impressed with all the work that we're talking about today. One of the things I want to dive in on you specifically, is about your leadership. I think, you know, we're talking a little bit about like what you do, but you are, you've taken many leadership roles in your careers. It sounds like you've had lots of different unique acts. So what advice would you have for people who are trying to become good leaders? What do you see as a you know, you mentioned your mentors. What do you look for him? Yeah, and leaders?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Yeah, I see. So I'll say one thing, and then I'll talk about the one thing I learned not to do. So I say, and I'm just thinking about right now in my company, there's just we're doing kind of a reorganization. And so a lot of people feel, feel and things are happening. And there's a lot of side messages and big picture messages. People are kind of coming up with their own narrative. There's like a moment of uncertainty. And when I what I noticed, though, in moments of uncertainty is that it's harder in moments of chaos and certainty. It's harder to pretend like you're something that you're you're not so. So it's like, this is where you kind of find out kind of how people who people really are. Right? And so what I've learned is that you got to be genuine you got to be authentic, whatever that is. So you gotta go find yourself to figure out kind of what you are who you are. Go do it however you got to do it, you know, do a weekend getaway or you know, do your daily meditation whatever you that whatever works for you. You do you do you boo. But yeah, the day you should be who you are. Because if you pretend to be someone in order to either get a role or to give people the impression that you are that leader that you're not like they're just going to that's that facade, you know, over time or very instantaneously will just crumble and they'll just be hard like with a lot of stuff to keep and keep up inside to me like it's like not telling the truth or being that right. You got to figure out or remember who you lie to and just be you. So that's one and one thing I learned early on from someone I thought was a mentor and so you got to kind of be careful like who you call a mentor was what not to do. This particular woman mentor. She was ahead of set team or group and she was notorious for having meetings in which you know, she'd be counting her fist on the table dropping dropping F bombs, and instill fear in people performed, I guess, but they performed out of fear as opposed to performing for her in order to because they stood behind. Right kind of like a leader. It was more about fear of getting fired or fear. They don't get yelled at. And so I learned a couple of things. One, if that was what I needed to be, or how I needed to behave in order to be a woman later, as like this isn't meant for me like I should probably figure out something else. It's not gonna go down like that. But then also that I quickly understood that, hey, I don't mean to critique this particular leader because hey, she's coming from a generation in which if you didn't sound like this because it was all male dominated, if you sounded quote, unquote, kinda like how a woman sounds right? To handle that you were gonna get swallowed up, right? You were gonna get taken seriously. They wouldn't. They wouldn't view you as a leader and they certainly weren't gonna, you know, ask you to be to take on a leadership role. And so she was really kind of just mimicking behaviors that were more developed for survival than they were about right the creating a certain sort of a legacy, a more positive legacy. So I kind of need that kind of humble by observation a bit from that standpoint, but it also taught me just you know, sometimes you can learn things from people from what you shouldn't do. standpoint. So xi knew very quickly that I needed to make sure that whatever spaces I was in, they weren't fostering that type of behavior, right? That That wasn't the way that I was gonna survive and could quickly kind of evaluate if I needed to be like that in order to survive and this isn't a place for me.

Nic  
Right? And I want to say like, I think you also in your answer, understanding where someone's coming from, even when they're angry is really that's a that's a great skill to have. And not everybody else can have that perspective. And I think that's a really great observation on your part is it's easy to say, oh, that person's a jerk. They're just mean.

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Yeah, I just Yeah, I just think that I'm always I'm curious to kind of a to a fault sometimes. Because it's like, everything's like a lie, though. And like, my theory or a lie. Why? I just it wasn't enough for me to test kind of go goof like, I saw that that person is terrible. It was kind of like there's a reason for this, right? Like, I don't think people just genuinely wake up out of bed and kind of go like, and here's how I'm gonna be terrible. I think there's a there's a there's an explanation for it. Right. And so, so yeah, curiosity, I would say is probably one of my stronger suits or whatever, but

Nic  
it's so cool. I love it. That's that's something I say, too. I, I always tell people to be curious. Just be curious. We find a lot more answers being curious than them without answers

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
and understanding. Right? So, so we don't have to be resigned to what it is that you understood the situation to be, but like, at least, at least you understand

Nic  
it doesn't. It doesn't like it, you know, like as you understand it, that's very cool. So as somebody coming up like a junior, a young professional in the career, is there any advice that you would give younger folks on ways to where you take we talked about you know, trying to understand who you are as a person but like, you know, that next step for you go from that junior level to you're starting to get some experience. Do you have any advice for folks kind of transitioning from just starting out to kind of becoming that full leader? Yeah.

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
This just yeah, for those who are seeking to be in those like management leadership type of roles, and that's not for everyone. So that's also a thing to write, understanding to write. If you're happy with learning a particular craft, and just being the like the smartest person in the whole world about that craft. And you're happy with that and don't need to be kind of, you know, ascending into other roles. You do, right, like, Yeah, that's great, wonderful. The sooner you figure that out, the more but for those who are looking to, you know, lead those who are looking to manage those who are looking to kind of inexperienced organizations, I would say invest in ways in which you can be a more rounded professional. I talked about, you know, knowing your particular craft and being the best at it, but that's one thing, right? Like, definitely buying skills on your skills. I value those who actually have skills versus folks who just kind of walk around because they're they have nothing shaking hands. So, so have skills it's important to have skill there should be good at yes. Great, wonderful master that, but then also things like I knew when I started my career, I just would raise my hand for things and they were things that weren't necessarily like about a particular craft or skill they were about being in front of people and being in new groups of people. I mean, think about when I worked in the lobbying part of my career, where you know, we would host events pretty regularly for different types of organizations, different parts of our different stakeholder groups, and I would be walking into rooms in which like, I knew no one. But through that process, I learned how to talk and engage my learned how to listen, even if every conversation wasn't the most interesting conversation ever happened, right? I did. I volunteered in like professional organizations. In the back of your mind. You're like, Oh, no one's paying me to do this. Well, it's a good idea for you to kind of pick and choose specific organizations that you want to kind of spend some time growing so they'll help you grow your network. And then you start to hopefully develop relationships outside of your organization. For that vantage point, it's always good to have different perspectives right and kind of be able to hear from other people in different walks of life. So I would say go outside your comfort zone, raise your hand for things that don't necessarily like exactly aligned to your job today. Right. Stay curious. Make sure that you are also along the way identifying mentors, champions, sponsors. It's also very important mentors are great, for sure. But your mentors are not always the folks who are going to have that power or that that influence in an organization to get you that next interview or that for someone to consider for that next up on the list of people from you know succession planning standpoint. So it's important to also familiarize yourself with those within your organization who have power and influence and get to know them a little bit. So again, as you're ascending, you need those types of folks to be talking about you when you're not in the room. And, and depending on their level of power influence. They could be the person who picked you for our job that you didn't think that, you know, you are capable and qualified for it. Right. So so just being mindful of the mentor sponsorship and champion, and those three are definitely important to have in your network.

Nic  
Yeah, I mean, that's great, great advice and so I have to brag about you just a little bit here before we close out. The I think we had to give you the brass on your definition from the women of color magazine. Yes, got to do that. So thank you. Give us a quick overview like you tell us about the Magazine Award and what like Yeah,

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
yeah. So women of color magazine, specifically focus on women of color and stem as a whole. And every year they do a conference, and they've been doing this for 12, almost 28 years, I think this one or the 29th year and so every year, there's like a slew of different awards from the technologists awards to diversity, equity, inclusion leaders, kind of you name it, community involvement, like kind of you name it, they have different awards. And so the award that I was given was relative to corporate responsibility, so they gave out two of those awards this year, to myself and another awardee. And so it was really a reflection of the work I think I've been doing for most of my career, right, which is how do you how do you take the business side of things and then connect that to the civic engagement side of things, and then connect that also to things that are, I would say, government regulatory, right? And try to make those bring those together in a way that they're better outcomes for our community. So that conference happened in Detroit a few weeks ago. That was awesome. I brought my sister with me they they call it a digital twin conference, because that because that meant that their conference was happening in person, but that folks could also stream it online so I was able to I was able to go up and get my my acceptance speech and give a shout out to my family. As they were actually watching me and whatnot. So this is so cool. I have a super cool, cool experience. Yeah,

Nic  
that's incredible. Okay, that's that's really awesome experience. I'm glad again, congratulations for that. Well deserved, I would say so. Yeah, of course, and naturally we have to close out the interview. Talking about maybe it was a horror movies maybe Oh my goodness. Yeah. The week of Halloween, why not? I know why not? Right. I mean, it's so funny, but Lauren, I love horror movies. We like movies. What are some of your favorites? What do you like?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Yeah, so I'm not gonna Yeah, it's just like you're putting me in a corner here. So there's just a couple of staple ones for me. Michael Myers. So that's Halloween for anyone who doesn't know about Michael Myers. Halloween series Nightmare on Elm Street. So pretty cool. Yeah. And then Friday, the 13th Jason. So those are those are kind of like the three staple ones. And then there's a lot of other pampy ones, which you know, I want to call them one hit wonders. But you know what? That wasn't a series but you're if you brought it up I wouldn't know what everything would tell you about that one seat so there's a whole lot more but those three are the ones that

Nic  
kind of jumped off at me that's so fun. Yeah, those slashes you like that a good slash flashers

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
exorcist exorcist Oh yeah, brothers with my brothers would be so mad at me if I hadn't mentioned exorcist exorcise. Yeah, that's so funny. Yep. Okay, so

Speaker 2  
we did this thing. Once we're like, we just decided to watch like every Halloween movie there was, you know, like all the Michael Myers in a row. And so you're watching them, you're not really paying attention, because after the second one, you're kind of like, well, these are all kinds of silly. It's all the background. And they used to use it right to

Nic  
Oh, yes. In the fourth one. And the fourth one, they literally go and they take you out the music. So

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
you're right. Oh my gosh, you're so Oh, you're okay. You're good. Yeah, I know. Exactly. Exactly. What you're talking about. You kind of pause you're like, Wait, what just happened? What are they doing? They're doing something different. It's switching it up.

Nic  
Right? And it was so funny because like our entire party just like totally stop and everyone's like, Wait, like they just lie to us. And that's why I love them. Those are so fun. So yeah, I just I haven't made

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
I haven't really kept up with the newer kind of horror films because I just I just haven't, I mean, some good ones out there. But I just have like this very discrete 80s early 90s timeframe that I'm just very, I'm captured in that time. timeframe. That's

Nic  
it. Yeah. That's too funny. I was wondering if you'd know. Wow, okay. Yeah, that yeah, you're legit. That is like legit. 80s 90s Like, you can't not know that. So yeah, tell you the real deal. 100%. So we are our thing of, we'll do two more questions. Before you gotta serve it. Is there anything that we didn't cover that you'd like to say before we sign off?

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Well, I would be remiss, I think I mentioned him but I'm so in love with my three year old right now. I mean, he's not not every every moment of the day because he's still a three year old. But like he's getting into the work. He's doing a potty training thing. And he's like forming full sentences. And he's like, he says stuff like, oh my gosh, and I'm like, What did you even? Yes, so I just want to give a little shout out to my three year old who's my COVID baby, I found out actually kind of like the week before we all we all had to stay home. So when I when I found out that I was pregnant. I was like, Oh my God. Yeah, my going to in a pandemic. What I mean, the lucky thing is no one got to see me like blow up on Zoom. And they were fair. They probably were like, Oh, she's just getting extra like everyone. COVID 20 No one got to see is too funny. waistline expand. Yeah.

Nic  
So we'll have you back to the benefits of COVID.

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Like one of those weird, you know, the two baby showers right, like open presents and take pictures. I got to skip over all of that. Great. That's so

Nic  
great. Well, this has been really, really great. Really enjoyed it. Last but not least, if people do want to reach out to you what's the best way for them to do that? Well,

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
I am on the Linked in. They can for sure. Send me an email. I definitely welcome that. So email is toyon to ally i n dot Oakland Bellagio, O Gu and it's a Nancy efficent crank out a ju act teacups que si obs.com.

Nic  
Perfect. Thank you so much for being on.

Toyin Ogunfolaju  
Sure. Thanks for having me.

Laura  
It's been good. That's our show. Thank you, Julian for joining us today. Please be sure to check us out each and every Friday. Don't forget to subscribe rate and review by ye see everybody

Transcribed by https://otter.ai