Seismic Shift

While a technology professional at VISA, Kevin Jones begins spending his annual month-long vacations volunteering with NGOs in Central and South America. The experience transforms his own perspective as he encounters, up close and personal, the legacy of the African diaspora. Today, Kevin is a powerful photographer whose work is in several collections and galleries throughout the country. See his photos and learn more here: https://www.facebook.com/KBJONESPHOTO/

Meet Manny Yekutiel. Millennial. Son of an Afghani immigrant. Barista. After leaving Hillary Clinton's campaign, Manny explored how he might open a civic-focused space for social change. The result is the wildly popular Manny's Cafe in San Francisco's Mission district. Tune in to hear how he created a space that hosts everything from queer poetry nights, live recordings of the Recode podcast, fundraisers for migrant families and even presentations from 15 of the presidential candidates and so much more.

Kate White is a leader in progressive transportation policy who seeks to make communities healthier, safer and more connected. Her path to that role began when she and two friends started the country's first nonprofit car-sharing operation, San Francisco's City CarShare. Kate takes us back to the early 2000s and what it was like to launch a nonprofit buoyed by revolutionary new technology in San Francisco, amid the dot-com era of IPO millionaires. She also talks community organizing, utopia and her fundamental disdain for the automobile. 

Daughter of immigrants, Xiomara Cisneros excelled in her education and, ultimately, in her career despite years of housing insecurity as a child. Today she advocates for housing in the Bay Area.  Xiomara is policy director at the Bay Area Council. She is active with the YIMBY movement and sits on numerous boards and committees in the region to promote housing production at all levels of affordability.

After graduating culinary school, Fernay McPherson was juggling catering gigs and driving buses full-time for San Francisco's MUNI transit. Today, she's an award-winning chef and owner of Minnie Bell's Soul Movement, a restaurant that has struck a chord in the Bay Area as a leading African American-owned business.  With help and support from her whole community, including her family and the nonprofit La Cocina, Chef Fernay's vision is big and about much more than just delicious food.  

After years as a sex worker and educator, Kristy Lin Billuni found herself navigating identities when she left that world and started a practice coaching writers. She joins us to discuss how she retrofitted her career in the sex industry to a career as a writing coach. As she tells it, those paths have more in common than you think. Today, Kristy’s business Sexy Grammar supports a community of writers, led by Kristy's own unique curriculum. And Sexy Grammar clients are turning out award-winning books, launching start-ups, earning Ph.Ds. Join us to hear the tale of Kristy's creative and courageous path. Visit Sexy Grammar to learn more. Follow Sexy Grammar on Twitter.

Introducing the first season of Seismic Shift, a new podcast featuring stories of everyday people who have made monumental changes in their work-lives. Listen, laugh, learn and get inspired. Special thanks to Ryan McGee for use of his composition based on earthquake data.