Louis Green is taking a big, bold shot on behalf of southeast Michiganβs minority business community. Itβs only the randomness of another shot that allowed the opportunity.
βThree of us were sitting on a porch, kind of a typical scene out of Boyz n the Hood,β Green, outgoing president and CEO of the Detroit-based Michigan Minority Supplier Development Council (MMSDC), relates of one moment growing up in β and ultimately escaping β the notoriously tough neighborhood of South Central Los Angeles.
βSuddenly thereβs a drive-by, right? The car speeds up to shoot one of us, but most gangbangers donβt practice shooting from a moving car and they donβt know physics.
βSo although the bullet was intended for the guy on one side of me, the guy on the other side gets killed, and Iβm sitting right in the middle of them! I mean, we were bunched up! Life is just so random,β Green says. βI can only assume it was God, dumb luck, or some combination thereof.β
After Green enrolled in LAβs Dorsey High School, βtwo people were shot the first day,β he recalls. His mother, Althea Green, had enough. She finagled to get him into a special program for inner-city students at Beverly Hills (Calif.) High School, eventually leading to a full-ride scholarship at Ohioβs Oberlin College β in physics.
Green graduated with a degree in government and communications with an economic concentration, earned a masterβs at the University of Michigan, and assembled a resumΓ© that includes working as an economic adviser to Govs. Jim Blanchard and John Engler, chief deputy director of the Michigan Department of Civil Rights, and national director of supplier diversity for NBC in New York.
With the MMSDC for most of a decade, Green, 53, has made it his business to assist more than 2,000 member businesses to secure a greater share of work with corporations, particularly the Big Three.
Has he succeeded? Follow the money. Since Green took leadership of the nonprofit organization in 2005, annual contracts for MMSDC members have soared from $16 billion to $28 billion.
βThatβs a hard number to get my head around,β Green says. βAnd itβs risen steadily save for one year, the automotive implosion in 2008 β when GM and Chrysler filed for bankruptcy.
βThe numbers just sound insane.β
The numbers also include a $5 million βrainy-day fundβ Green amassed for MMSDCβs coffers.
So last August, when Green made the announcement that he was leaving the council to pursue those ever-popular βother interests,β the membership was, well, dismayed.
βA true leader, in my opinion, serves β¦ and he served everybody,β says Andra Rush, MMSDC board member and trailblazing CEO of Rush Trucking Inc. βHe was able to grow the organization. Heβs just a solid person. A-plus. Those are going to be hard shoes to fill.β
Poppycock, Green differs. βYou know that famous quote from Charles de Gaulle?β he asks between bites of salmon at Joe Muerβs. βThe graveyards are full of indispensable men.β Besides, he reasons, his new endeavor allows him to maintain his ties with the metro Detroit executives he has grown to admire.
On Nov. 12, flanked by Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and prominent business leaders, Green unveiled the Minority Business Access Fund, a $100 million-per-year fund aimed at helping small- and medium-size businesses survive and grow.
βI accomplished everything I wanted to [at the MMSDC],β Green explains, βand it has been great to work with minority businesses and help them get access to contracts.
But more importantly, one of the things I realized was that these folks were doing very well and some still canβt get financing.
βI was on a panel at the Federal Reserve and they talked about a study that minority businesses are less likely to get loans, and when they do, theyβre at a higher rate. Theyβre so put off by the process, they wonβt even bother to apply. I realized I could change that dynamic.β
Green reached out to private equity sources to create the fund, building coalitions along the way.
This comes as no surprise to those who have watched him work. βHe took the council to the next level in making connections between diverse suppliers and corporate America,β notes MMSDC member Roderick Rickman, chairman and CEO of the Detroit environmental and industrial services company that bears his name. βOne of his commitments is to identify and develop relationships, and commitment is within his DNA.β
Green expects the fund to grow in years to come, as outside investors view Detroit as a land ripe with opportunity.
βAt the end of the day money makes everything happen, right?β he says. βYou see all these things going on in Detroit, the M-1 rail, Midtown. All this stuff, without money, is not going to happen for us, for businesses of color. If the banks were doing their job, we wouldnβt have this fund.β
His other reason for making this transition now is deeply personal: His mother, in LA, is in the middle stages of dementia; his father Louis βwas healthy as a horseβ in San Diego until suffering a stroke at 78.
Being so far away, combined with the astronomical costs of care, inspired him to investigate buying an assisted living facility in California, providing a measure of reassurance for Green, his wife, Sulan, and their three children.
βI knew the only way I was going to get the kind of care I wanted was to buy and own the home,β he says. βIβm just starting on that venture, but you know what? When youβre forced with something, you find the capacity. This is the proverbial gun upside my head. I have to do something I never thought about.β
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