I wish that all the elevator pitches I’ve been doing over the last few months were like Iowans Online’s “If this is how it looks, we want it,” where a corporate partner puts the company’s line directly in front of the audience in an out-of-focus black and white panel. Instead of asking a shiny new CEO to tell us about an extension to a service he probably wants to keep from consumers and from “spammers,” I’m asking a compelling person to create an alternate universe where the person can buy something from Amazon (like they are a client, but with better looking headers) that is made by a someone she actually knows (from Etsy).
Ifeoma Ozoma Blew the Whistle, is Blew’s story: Someone who had grown up adoring the Washington Redskins and The Washington Post, and educated her few kids at home without having to work, hears from colleagues that a valuable person has been fired because the boss thinks she’s “acting too aggressively,” Blew was afraid of using the internet for at least six years, with a partner because she’s afraid of retaliation.
Five years later, Blew is president of IOWA Startup Hubs, and learning that she “built great relationships with clients, turned a lot of fires into relationships, changed jobs, and stayed in the industry.”
In the Washington metro area, Blew taught at Montclair State University and later Georgetown’s Gaston Hall. She wrote a weekly blog for six years on public transit, biking, and how to be an entrepreneur. She connects people.
In the process of her job search, Blew grew very interested in Whistleblowers’ culture. Especially since they started a training program last year, and Blew walked into the office and knew immediately why they were a good fit. They found out that her life story resonated with other HR professionals, she shared them her journey for The Washington Post.
Now Blew is training other Whistleblowers across the country and they’re growing “like crazy,” says Blew.