Remembering the Dynamic Bob Tynes

This blog post honors the beloved memory of my dear friend Bob Tynes. Bob passed away on the past Thanksgiving Day in 2014. To truly know Bob was to experience the warmth, insight, support, and positive nature of his upbeat personality.  He was also a very giving person to both friends and important community affairs.

Bob T, as many affectionately called him, was a graduate of Stanford University’s MBA program, a project manager for top Fortune 50 companies, and a knowledgeable tech guru who gave his efforts tirelessly to help small businesses and nonprofit organizations.  He will be greatly missed by many of us.

I remember Bob was one of only two people who would come visit me in a gritty rooming house I had to live in for a while while recovering from cancer treatments.  He came there and we worked on business deals like it was a posh corporate office.

The last time I talked to Bob Tynes I needed his urgent help in a personal matter.  His last words to me were "I wouldn't do this for most people but for you I will." 

I hadn't seen Bob in almost a year largely because my daughter came to live with me and it was very demanding on my time to get her situated with a new school and living environment.

The next time I saw him he was hooked up to a respirator and couldn't talk to me because he had a tube in his mouth.

He had to communicate to me by writing to me on a pad.  Bob usually insisted on the fist pump but the last time I saw him in the ICU he gave me a nice tight hand clasp.

Remember to cherish and keep in touch with good friends.  Also men, especially Black men, make sure you get your regular prostate exams.  Life is just too short and we need positive people around as much as possible in these days and times.

Don't let life and social media alienate you for the most important people in your life.  Bob I will miss your brilliant insights, big picture marketing strategies, your diagrams breaking down complex business strategies, your social commitment, your bleaky humor, and most of all your eternal optimism.  You are gone but not forgotten.  RIP my friend.

We plan to do more formal memorial services for Bob Tynes in the future.  We'll keep his friends and family posted.

Here is a video Bob Tynes took and edited with David Steward, Chairman of Worldwide Technologies, the largest African American business in the country doing about 6 billion dollars in sales a year.

Bob is also talking to John Robinson, President and CEO, National Minority Business Council, Inc., in this video. Bob was very involved with this nonprofit organization and many others.

 

Bob was not only a brilliant tech guru and business mind he was also equally had a passion for the arts and was a talented digital artist.  Below is a video of Bob T took at one of his art exhibits in the Montclair Library of his digital art...

Celebrate Kwanzaa In View of Rebuilding Unity in Our Community

Photo Courtesy Bob Tynes (RIP)

Kwanzaa isn't a replacement for Christmas or any other Holiday. It focuses on 7 Principals. The 1st principle today is Umoja or Unity. The biggest hindrance to progress for our people isn't lack of uniformity many advocate, but is lack of unity of purpose on larger issues.

The reason our community suffers isn't primarily because of any various ill informed religious or ideological perspectives IMHO. The reason we struggle is because we don't look beyond our differences and unify with a Kwanzaa inspired concept of Umoja.

Tribalism or using our differences to turn each other against others in our community is how slavery, Jim Crow, and racism are maintained i.e. Willie Lynch theory.  The Black community has some very serious problems going into 2015 including:



1. the perennial problem of police brutality;

2. increasing militarization of the police forces in our community;

3. the growth of the prison industrial complex producing profits off of criminalizing Blacks and other Americans

4. intransigent racism in the media, popular culture, and society,

5. income disparity

6. Lack of more community economic development;

There are more Black men with
College Degrees than in Prison

For instance It was recently reported in new research that a Black man with a college degree is about as employable as a white high school graduate. The average Black household makes $20,000 less a year than white household.

Over a 40 year work career at a 6% compound interest if we invested in stocks, bonds, or a business that is 3.5 million dollars African Americans are losing per family.  Only about 32% of whites have college degrees.

Therefore, all the current income disparities aren't because of Blacks having less education.  This just isn't the case because 82.7% of Blacks have a high school diploma just like the majority of whites.

Therefore if we were to calculate that just 2 million out of the 9 million Black families were loosing this type of income due to unexplained social favoritism or racism, that would equate to over 7 Trillion dollars less income over a 40 year period! 

Can you imagine the amount of wealth Blacks could create with 7 trillion more dollars or more?  This is one of the reasons we have the incredible wealth difference between Blacks and whites in this country.

To overcome this tremendous income and wealth disparity we will have to 1st start by supporting each other in business.  If we could increase Black businesses to just 3% of total business receipts in the US we could employ all unemployed African Americans.

This would mean we would have to increase our patronage of Black businesses from the current 7% to about 25% of our spending patterns.  Moreover, this means we need more Black businesses to support in our essential spending like food, shelter/housing, and clothing.

In order to get more of these types of business we will need to come together in unity of purpose and start strong financing institutions for Black businesses like:

1. credit unions

2. micro-finance organizations

3. crowd funding platforms

4. angel investor groups

5. venture capital funds

6. shadow funding and...

7. take more of our businesses public in the stock markets.

It is easy to complain or chide others about our lack of economic opportunity.

But the question is do we have 1st the will and unity of purpose with a plan to get more economic empowerment in a global economy?  And more importantly do we have any other viable choice?

Being Black going forward will either "make us or break us. The Kwanzaa Concept of Ujoma or Unity is a step in the right direction to overcome our challenges. Unity or Umoja is hard to obtain but necessary to move forward in increasing strength.

©2014 Kamau’s Kwanzaa Qu!ps

About the Publisher of Kamau's Qu!ps

Kamau's Qu!ps is Published by Kamau Austin. Kamau is a popular Blogger, Writer, and Internet Marketing Professional helping small businesses grow more profitable businesses online. If you need web design, blogging, search engine or social media promotion contact him at Search Engine Plan

Kamau's Qu!ps reaches over 30,000 web users a month through it's Blog and Social Media Promotions. For Advertising Opportunities visit our Advertising Page

Why the Black Community NOW Needs to Focus on Economic Empowerment

It was recently reported in new research that a Black man with a college degree is about as employable as a white high school graduate. The average Black household makes $20,000 less a year than white household.

Over a 40 year work career at a 6% compound interest if we invested in stocks, bonds, or a business that is 3.5 million dollars African Americans are losing per family.  Since only about 32% of whites have college degrees, all the income disparities isn't because of Blacks having less education since 82.7% of Blacks have a high school diploma.

If we were to calculate that 2 million out of the 9 million Black families were loosing this type of income due to unexplained social favoritism or racism, that would come out to over 7 Trillion dollars in less income over a 40 year period!  Can you imagine the amount of wealth Blacks could create with 7 trillion more dollars or more?  This is one of the reasons we have the incredible wealth difference between Blacks and whites in this country.

While some people like Dr. Claude Anderson, feel blacks have lost economic footing since integration if you look at the income of Blacks now of 1 Trillion dollars and some Black communities whose average income is almost double that of the average white family you'd see this is a questionable perspective at best.  The Black middle class is much larger now than before integration.  It does still have issues with wealth accumulation.

However conditions of Black Americans would have been even worst if segregation was continued. There is an explosion of Black business, with growth at 60.4% between 2002 and 2007, with Black women starting businesses faster than any other demographic. Also Black women are enrolling in grad schools faster than any other demographic.

There are 1.9 million Black businesses. About 8% of the Black adult population has started a business (about 22 million Blacks over 18 or 50% of 44 million Blacks). There are 14,500 Black businesses currently with revenues over 1 million dollars. I doubt if we would have had so many under segregation since many Black business make over 1 million dollars serving the government or corporate America sectors. Obviously those opportunities would have been closed to us under segregation.

Black businesses have total receipts of 137.5 Billion dollars and employ 1 million people. Currently at 137.5 Billion dollars Black businesses only make up 1/2 of 1% of total businesses receipts in the US. If Blacks could just increase the support of our businesses from 7% to more like 25% we could employ all unemployed Blacks in this country (about 11% or 2.4 million Blacks are currently unemployed).  So I agree with people like Dr. Claude Anderson that we have to focus on Black business development from a community economic base.  I just come at similar solutions from a totally different perspective and I feel we should look at the glass as being half full rather than half empty on Black progress.

I think a community based economic development theory is  doable if we have the will and want to do more than complain. I'm dedicating my life to trying to get more of us to do this. I hope more of us would consider this as one viable strategy to employ.

We have to get a lot more of us to own businesses. Also we should start more microfinance and crowd funding endeavors to launch more viable businesses.We should start national grocery chains and real estate investment firms since food and housing are our most essential needs. Since these things take the lionshare of our income we should own or invest in those essential needs.

When I did a lot of my activist work I noticed we were relying a lot on the major media to tell our concerns and advocacy. We really needed to own more of our own media to tell our story in a more actuate fashion. I think we should work together and galvanize ourselves economically and financially at this point and deal with political power from a position of strength.

I think Blacks with wealth could come together as angel investors or venture capitalists and structure a peer-to-peer finance platform similar to how Prosper.com was started. This way Blacks can invest and make a return on their small capital investments on a large aggregate scale.The investment groups should then recruit managers with business savvy and experience building national supermarkets chains and real estate properties. This way the community buys essentials like groceries and housing from this business endeavor but also gets a repayment of their initial investment too by loan repayments.  We might try starting national food and real estate coops where income is shared with member investors. But first we need national finance organizations.

For instance multi-billion micro-finance organizations like Accion and Grameen Bank have above 90% repayment rate for loans. These are nonprofits and repayment as much as possible are reinvested back in to give more business loans.

Grameen Bank a couple of years ago netted a profit of $20 million dollars.  Grameen Bank was started in one of the poorest regions of the world Bangladesh.  It helped the economy in that poor country.  Grameen Bank is a multi-billion dollar bank extending loans to small business globally now. It even gives people of color in inner cities loans in the US today.  It was started by an Ivy league trained economist Muhammad Yunus.

Professor Muhammad Yunus receives award from
President Barack Obama for his Microfinance Efforts

Yunus went back to his native country Bangladesh, and started giving rural women business loans out of his pocket.  He then got banks to give micro-loans to rural business owners.  Now the bank he started loans out billions and has spun off other businesses.  Grameen Bank now gives out loans to small business owners in Bangladesh and also the US.  It is even exploring relations and operations in developing nations like China.

The Latino microloan organization Accion, the last I read raised over 30 Billion dollars for small business finance. In the Black community we need to do more microfinance and crowd funding like this in our community.  I got business loans of revolving credit for about $10,000 from Accion.  If we've raised a lot of money for political campaigns in our community why can't we do the same in economic development? 

We've raised a lot of money in political contributions why not economic contributions? For instance years ago it was reported that George Bush raised a huge amount of money for his presidential political campaign at 60 million dollars in total. That was considered a hell of a lot of money for a political campaign.

In contrast back in the 2008 Presidential campaign women, young people, progressives, and people of color helped Senator and now President Obama raise over 80 million dollars in some months in his campaign. In fact in one month Obama raised 150 million dollars! In total President Obama raised more money than any Presidential candidate in history with a whooping 750 million dollars! That was unheard of.

I realize all the money didn't come from Blacks. But a lot was done by small donors over the Internet. Why can't we make a shift from just funding politics to funding economic investment?

Especially when we stand to increase our financial viability in this country and get a return in investment. I think the marketing of the tech funding platform should stress the economic return on investment to African Americans and not just rely on the ethnic unity aspect. I think the dollars of the business venture/s has to make sense to all parties concerned.

To see the background stats and research for this article click here

Although I take Issue with a good bit of his analogies
Checkout this Video by Dr. Claude Anderson
On Why We Need More Black Business Communities

About the Publisher of Kamau's Qu!ps

Kamau's Qu!ps is Published by Kamau Austin. Kamau is a popular Blogger, Writer, and Internet Marketing Professional helping small businesses grow more profitable businesses online. If you need web design, blogging, search engine or social media promotion contact him at Search Engine Plan

Kamau's Qu!ps reaches over 30,000 web users a month through it's Blog and Social Media Promotions. For Advertising Opportunities visit our Advertising Page

Is Rev. Al Sharpton Denigrating the Tradition of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.?

Many Christians and People castigate Al Sharpton, but say they say they admire Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  However, are they only saying this out of convenience? 

It seems to me to be convenient that people talk about Dr. King in hindsight away from the heat of his day. But reflect and maybe pray on this...

So many people praise Dr. King, now that he is dead but back in the day many Christians shunned him. Many mainstream churches considered him a trouble maker and didn't support civil rights.

Mainstream Christians called Dr. King a demagogue and trouble maker very similar to Rev. Sharpton. They used almost the exact same type of media attacks on him.

Once he died and they gave him a holiday now he is more accepted. However, when he was alive and taking the "principalities and powers" to task most mainstream Christians in the US distanced themselves from him. This broke Dr. King's heart - that more Christian's didn't get involved in the Civil Rights Movement.

He writes about this in his book "Where do We go from Here? Chaos or Community?" Today many Christians have not learned from that mistake and aren't taking the militarization of the police and growth of the prison industrial complex to task.

We have people being murdered based on skewed stereotypes and a new form of slavery being created in the nation's prison industrial complex. It is easy to just pray and go to service while the oppressed and downtrodden are brutalized and incarcerated.

But the voiceless need a voice or we all will eventually be saying metaphorically "I can't breathe!"

Law and Order without Justice is unrighteous. "But let justice roll down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream."

Some people accuse Al Sharpton of causing racial divison like unruly protestors and rioters.  But these factions are splinter groups of protestors and are more radical factions than Al Sharpton.

Sharpton would never advocate rioting, looting, violence or killing cops. He will stay in a nonviolent stance.

Actually more radical elements hate Al Sharpton and look at him as a pacifier in the community only looking for media attention. These rioters and protestors are totally separate groups.
As an activist in NYC I know there have been much more radical factions who try to stir up trouble and get peaceful protestors killed or in confrontations with the police. Remember these days it's obvious Sharpton want's to be perceived in the tradition of Martin Luther King, Jr., and even has a media position now.

He would never risk that position he worked to get over the years by advocating killing police officers. The last thing Sharpton wants is rioting or shootings on either side.

He has a good job with the media now and has tax problems to address so he can't afford to lose his position advocating something as despicable as killing innocent police officers who had nothing to do with specific police portrayed in the media lately.
.
I've worked around Sharpton. He has evolved over the years. He is a media personality. That's his ambitions to have a cable show now.

Why would he jeopardize that? Yes, he positions himself in controversial matters to promote his visibility. But he is like a lot of people he has a job and family obligations like anyone else.

For him to advocate killing police he would lose his position and standing in political and social circles. There are more radical elements who are being unhinged with all that is going on.

And they don't take any orders from Sharpton, Jesse, or Obama.  Let's face it they feel all 3 are sellouts.

Conservatives and marginally involved political people trust me you want Sharpton's ability to channel anger into peaceful protests. There are other element's who will handle the situation in a totally different way.

And they've been around for years. They want nothing short of armed or combative conflicts. Believe me Sharpton is a not a  player in all of the rioting, looting, or killing going on.  Sharpton is a media spokesperson who needs visibility to promote issues.  He's no Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., but then again no one can ever replace the civil rights icon.

Does Sharpton denigrate Dr. King's legacy?  I'd say no he's on a different path but has value in his ability to bring attention to controversial issues.

Some say Sharpton is a media whore.  I don't understand this reasoning and focus when nothing is said about how the major media pimps out Black issues for ad revenue and profits creating problematic racial conflicts.  Sharpton would only be a reflection of a bigger issue which is the major media fanning the sensationalism of racial conflicts as part of their business as usual modus operandi.

About the Publisher of Kamau's Qu!ps

Kamau's Qu!ps is Published by Kamau Austin. Kamau is a popular Blogger, Writer, and Internet Marketing Professional helping small businesses grow more profitable businesses online. If you need web design, blogging, search engine or social media promotion contact him at Search Engine Plan

Kamau's Qu!ps reaches over 30,000 web users a month through it's Blog and Social Media Promotions. For Advertising Opportunities visit our Advertising Page

Discover 7 Amazing Advances of Progress within the Black Community

This article is in memory of my dear friend Bob Tynes.  Bob T, as we affectionately called him  exemplified the best of the new educated Black men dedicated to uplifting his community and making the world a better place.


Bob was a Stanford U MBA, Project Manager to top Fortune 50 companies, a tireless supporter of nonprofits, and one of the most optimistic people I've ever met.

In Memoriam, this blog post focuses on the positive advances in the Black community.  It is in keeping with Bob Tynes' approach of looking at life's challenges from the perspective of the glass being half full as opposed to negatively looking at them as half empty.

He will be greatly missed by his friends, family and loved ones. RIP. To read more about the life of Bob T and why you should cherish your true friends click here  And now checkout...

 

 Discover 7 Amazing Advances of Progress within the Black Community

If you listen to the major media you can't help but think that Blacks are largely a poor ethic group who have little morals or work ethnic, abuse social programs, are prone to criminality, and don't value family. Moreover, Blacks are too often portrayed in popular culture as thuggish, looking for handouts and welfare, and even anti-intellectual.

However there is a less known body of research that gives a much different image of Blacks than is usually seen in the media and popular culture.

Below are some startling little known statistics about advances blacks have made in society. I didn't know many of these facts either until I made the effort to search and find the research. Check them out below...

More Blacks are Business Minded Not Criminally Minded

1. The aggregate income of Blacks in the US is over 1 Trillion dollars.  The percentage of Blacks living below the poverty rate is 27.3 % which means 72.7% of blacks now live above the poverty level. 

2. There are twice as many Black entrepreneurs as incarcerated Blacks. According to Wikipedia in 2009 there were 841,000 Black men and 64,000 Black women incarcerated (or about 905,800 black men and women incarcerated). The percentage of Black males in prison presently is only a little over 3% of the Black male population.  But according to the US census there are over 1.9 million African American businesses or more than double the amount of Blacks incarcerated.

3. Blacks are the fastest growing demographic starting businesses. From 2002 to 2007 Blacks started businesses faster than any other ethnic group 60.5% to 18% on average for other ethnic groups. Source US Census

Furthermore, There are more than 14,507 black businesses with revenues over 1 million dollars (source US Census). Black business receipts is 137.5 - 165 billion dollars (depending on how the source describes ethnicity).

Since 50% of the Black Population is older than 18 or about 21 million people this means about 1.9 million entrepreneurs equals about 8% of the Black adult population has a business. Black businesses hire more about 1 million people.  This article shows how only Black business expansion has the potential to hire more Black people check it out.


Also a startling fact is that there are more Black millionaire families than African Americans in jail.  Again there are 905,000 Blacks incarcerated but 1.1 Million Black families with a net worth over 1 million dollars! See the 1st video on the bottom of this blog's post for more on Black millionaires.  Damn! I didn't know this before!

Did you know that 8% of the millionaires in the United States are Black? I think that's amazing giving our history in the US.

There are 9.63 million millionaires in the US. These are millionaires without counting their real estate holdings.

8% of them are Black (Source Statista). If we do the math that's 770,400 Blacks who are millionaires without even counting people who would be millionaires if you include their real estate holdings.

Blacks Aren't Anti-intellectual
 they Take it to School

4. Check this out. Again there are 905,000 blacks incarcerated mostly for nonviolent offenses. However there are over 4.6 million Blacks with college degrees (Source Blacks in Higher Education) or higher or a ratio of 4.5 to 1 over blacks in prison/jail.

Courtesy the Telegraph

There are 850,000 Black men incarcerated but about double that amount with a college degree. However, the media has a vested interest in distorting the image of African Americans in regards to them valuing education. Also Black women are enrolling in grad schools higher than any other demographic;

Here is the academic break down of Blacks with college degrees or higher from the authoritarian website Blacks in Higher Education

"The breakdown is as follows: According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are 3,215,000 blacks in this country who have a bachelor’s degree. And there are an additional 1,078,000 African Americans who have both a four-year college degree and a master’s degree. An additional 150,000 blacks hold a professional degree in fields such as law, business, and medicine. Another 136,000 African Americans have obtained a doctorate. Over-all, 4,579,000 African Americans possess a four-year college degree or higher.

This is breathtaking progress.


In 2008, 19.6 percent of all African Americans over the age of 25 held a college degree. This figure has increased significantly from 13.8 percent in 1996 and 11.3 percent in 1990." (Source Blacks in Higher Education) 

There are 82.5% of Blacks have a high school diploma. Black High School dropout rates have decreased to 8% in 2010.  Presently there are more Black men enrolled in College's granting bachelor's degrees than in prison (source Black Demographics.com) . 18.5% of Blacks have a bachelors degree or higher which is much higher than the amount of Blacks incarcerated which is about 4%.

5. There are more blacks graduating with computer science degrees than Asians. Here is an article by Dr. Bill Spriggs.  He is a highly-respected economist out of Howard University, and former Assistant Secretary of Labor, for the Obama Administration. Here is the background research for his assertions about more Blacks graduating with a degree in computer science than Asians.

Dr. Bill Spriggs shows in
Research More Blacks
Have Computer Science
Degrees than Asians

Remember also that there are 42 to 44 million Blacks in the US (depending on how you classify blacks). Of the 42 million Blacks about 50% are adults over 18. So out of 21 million to 22 million Black adults 4.5 million have college degrees and over 1 million are millionaires. That's almost 20% of the Black "Adult" population has a college degree. That's AMAZING in my view given our history here.

Blacks Aren't Lazy, Unmotivated, or Unpatriotic

45% of Black Families are in the
Middle or Upper Middle Class

6. Blacks are too often portrayed in the major media and popular culture as having little drive to work and are often interested in developing dependency on welfare, public housing, and social programs.  However, there are over 18 million blacks working or actively looking for work which is about the same levels with whites percentage wise.  Plus there are 9 million Black families in the US and 45% of Black Americans are homeowners for approximately 9,450,000 homeowners.  Lastly Blacks have 855,000 people (comprising about 30% of service people) who are members of the armed forces.

Colin Powell Represents a long history
of Blacks in the Armed Forces

Real Black Men are Lovingly Involved with their Children

7. According to the CDC Black men are more actively involved in their children's lives than men of other ethnic groups. Check out this article.  But Nevertheless...

....When I share this information with even good white liberals and progressives they are floored by these stats. And obviously white conservatives are totally incredulous when told these facts.  But to be honest I was surprised to learn these facts myself.

However white conservatives can tell me all the prison and crime stats of African Americans like they have a PhD in criminology. This is because the major media and the dominant culture portrays blacks as thugs and welfare cheats too often.

While there are clearly problems with a significant portion of the Black community, as far as keeping step with society economically and financially, these little known statistics may give a more balanced and nuanced view of the Black community.  I hope this info begins to give a more comprehensive view of the aspirations, contributions, and potential of the African American community.

Given the past problems with slavery, Jim Crow, and even current income disparities if you look at our growth economically, politically, and education we've come a long way!

Checkout this videos on the Distortions of the Media on Black People

 

About the Publisher of Kamau's Qu!ps

Kamau's Qu!ps is Published by Kamau Austin. Kamau is a popular Blogger, Writer, and Internet Marketing Professional helping small businesses grow more profitable businesses online. If you need web design, blogging, search engine or social media promotion contact him at Search Engine Plan

Kamau's Qu!ps reaches over 30,000 web users a month through it's Blog and Social Media Promotions. For Advertising Opportunities visit our Advertising Page