Adam Torres and Chris Brignolle discuss entrepreneurship.
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Show Notes:
What are some common challenges students face when learning about entrepreneurship? In this episode, Adam Torres interviews Chris Brignolle, Executive Director at NFTE Southeast, explore entrepreneurship and the Grant Cardone Foundation.
About Chris Brignolle
Chris Brignolle began his journey with NFTE in 2006 and was responsible for promoting and implementing NFTE’s entrepreneurial mindset. Chris has successfully executed NFTE’s pathway by igniting the imagination that takes students through the journey of creating and refining an original business concept.
Chris dedicates his time to working with students, teachers, volunteers, and administrative staff from community-based organizations to assist with tailored NFTE Program implementation. While entrepreneurship fits well within many programs and classes, Chris takes the time to identify unique attributes for individual courses and after-school programming.
Beyond the passion Chris instills within NFTE, he’s also an entrepreneur in his own right. For the past fourteen years, he has successfully launched a few companies from Fashion, Media, and Now an Importing and Exporting Company titled Nicaragua Cargo Express Inc. The knowledge Chris has gained from his personal experiences he embeds within NFTE workshops for teachers daily.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to missionmatters. com and click on be our guest to apply. All right. So today’s guest is Chris Brignell, and he is the director over at NIFTY Southeast.
And NIFTY, for those that haven’t heard of it, it stands for the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship. Chris, welcome to the show. Thank you. Thank you, Adam. Appreciate it. Thank you for having me. All right, Chris. So we got a lot to talk about today. So I definitely want to dive into nifty and also just the importance of entrepreneurship in general.
And I know that you were referred over to us by Philip over at the Grant Cardone Foundation. So I’m just curious. What’s your involvement with the foundation? Like, how do you work with them? So I want to start off by giving a huge shout out to the Grant Cardone Foundation along with Philip. And the whole team over there, along with of course Grant and Elena Cardone as well.
So our affiliation, I was introduced to the Grant Cardone Foundation by Breakthrough Miami about a year and a half ago, if you will. And with that said and done, , I got to see, , what they were doing for the community, and they were actually engaged the community by providing different types of resources for anesthetic children.
At all levels, right? So starting from I want to say from first grade all the way up to , post secondary if you will Yeah, and when I saw that in the nifty program as we teach entrepreneurship throughout the year And in the Southeast region, we work with several school districts.
I was trying to figure out how can we bring our students into the equation with the Grant Cardone foundation and all the dots started being connected after that main event that I attended. Oh man, that’s amazing. And so how did you let’s go back into your journey quite a bit here. So how’d you get involved with entrepreneurship education, even nifty?
How, how all that take place? Well, so I was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. Brooklyn night now reside. I couldn’t tell. I couldn’t tell. No, I’m just saying, go ahead. So with that said and done being , born and raised in New York, , I was always into comic books and to things, , I know if I bought it for 1, I’m gonna sell it for 2.
And that’s how my journey began, and then when I came to South Florida, at the age of 19, I was working at the Intel Computer Clubhouse Network, where I was, , at that time, it was all about breaking the digital divide, and breaking the digital divide, we would take the kids and teach them skills from music production to, , Adobe InDesign Illustrator, and the list continues, but Not only were they learning, they were learning how to create a business.
And at that time, I didn’t even realize that was what we were doing. But then, , nifty came into my life and said, Hey, , we want to bring our program into the clubhouse and work with your students. And we did that and we had a sales event. So my kids created t shirts around the desert storm at that time.
Right. So when, when all the families, , had their loved ones out there and about, , protecting our country. We created t shirts and at the time my executive director Alice was like, well, those t shirts might be a little too expensive to sell But , let’s see what happens Maybe you might want to create bookmarks and coffee mugs something that can keep the cost down and sell More products and I said, , I think we’re gonna be fine And long story short, we, we produced a hundred t-shirts and we sold out before the bookmarks and the coffee mugs.
Wow. And that’s when I was asked to be part of Nifty. And that was 18 years ago to be exact. Wow. That’s interesting. And now, what was one of the things that it may 18 years you’ve been, you’ve been doing? At what point did you realize that this was going to be something that, , your heart was in and that you, , we’re going to spend a significant amount of your time, life and, , resources, your mental energy on like, when, when did you fall in love with it?
I fell in love with Nifty day one. Because the first thing that you knew immediately, like once you were part of like the, what, what was going on, you’re like, Oh, this is me. Absolutely. Because one of the main parts was, , again, growing up in Brooklyn, New York, and depending what, , what your family surrounding was like, you only knew what you knew.
And I’ve always, I’ve always been a firm believer of surrounding yourself with smarter and brighter individuals than yourself. And that’s one of the things that I, I, I do daily. I don’t want to be the smartest person in my circle. I want to be the lowest person in the circle. Fucking constantly learn. So with that said and done, when I got into the Nifty office, I surrounded myself with a lot of smart individuals.
And I said, what? I think it’s time to be an air hustler. And that’s what I call it. So I, it hustled all of my way through nifty and listen to conversations, listen to the mentors and the coaches coming in, coaching the students. And while the students were learning, I was learning, I took that. And I said, what?
I could also, since I am an entrepreneur outside of nifty, I said, let me take a lot of this knowledge to my advantage and learn with the students versus this trying to teach. And bring resources to students. I want to be I want to be a student since I never had nifty growing up I have it now That’s amazing.
And so what are some of the I don’t want to assume that our listeners know this So what are some of the common challenges that students do face when they’re learning about entrepreneurship? And like how does nifty play a role in helping overcome? one of the the biggest challenges is the conversation stops at the dinner table when they get home so with nifty what we try to do is we You created additional curriculum, not just for students, but we created curriculum for adults as well.
So we try to bring our curriculum into the communities that our students are learning in. So when they do go home, their parents, their grandparents, their family members also have access from a different angle, point of view, whether it’s from another local community based organization. Or from, , just, , a free online resource that we shared on our social media or whatever the case may be, they have access to other resources beyond just listening to their kids when they come home, talk about, , their excitement around entrepreneurship and business.
So that’s one of the biggest struggles that the conversation kind of stops at the dinner table and no one is there to continue that energy with those students. Yeah. And so now talk about that curriculum a little bit, like talk about the NIFTY curriculum and like what that entails. So with the Nifty curriculum, we have a whole catalog of curriculum now, right?
Once upon a time when I first started, we had textbooks. Textbooks, as we know now, are pretty much obsolete. So now we utilize an online platform that’s industry standard with universities and colleges, and it’s called Canvas. So on Canvas, we have tons of different curriculums from , a classroom setting where it can be a standalone standalone entrepreneurship course.
We have curriculum for a classroom that you providing a small dosage of entrepreneurship to and then we have a whole pathway model so kids can be learning from 6th grade or even 5th grade as early as 5th grade all the way to the 12th grade year. And then once they go to college or university, they can continue that entrepreneurship track through one of the local universities that we have partnerships with.
So, , it’s it’s a full pathway of curriculum that we have at all levels. One of the biggest things now, right now through CertiPort. It’s called the entrepreneurship, small business certification. So the Florida department of education recognized nifty to be one of those players in that, in that realm where we can come in now and provide our curriculum that’s aligned with that industry certification.
So now students can graduate out of high school with that. ESB certification, again, it stands for Entrepreneurship Small Business Certification, that is meaningful for the employee that they’re trying to get employed with if they’re seeking a job. Because now that employee can look at that credential and say, hey, you’re not just coming here for a job.
You’re going to come here and treat it as your own. You’re going to really take it up a notch and really deliver this curriculum at a whole other dynamic. Thank you very much. And you’re going to want to be part of this job now and be able to, whether you’re going to, I don’t care if you’re going to be a store clerk, not only are you a store clerk, you’re coming with a mindset now that, Hey, have we thought about repositioning these items on a shelf?
And this is why. Have we thought about maybe putting these items on sale? And this is why. And really leveraging the student’s mindset more than ever beyond just their job description. Man, that’s amazing. And in my head, I’m thinking like imagine if, if I had had this when I was younger, like you said, like that, you don’t remember anything like this, or maybe it existed.
I just, I just wasn’t aware of it, nor did I participate, but I’m like, man, to see. And I, I, I participated recently and I don’t know if you’ve, If you participate or had the opportunity to, and maybe if they are, if you have, let me know, but I just I just recently went to one of the pitch competitions and I saw these like young adults, right?
Anywhere between, I think it was 15 was the youngest and maybe 19 was the oldest. Participating. And I was looking at the grant Cardone foundation. I was, and I saw like, , we judge, the contestants, and then the participants, and they were awarded some prizes and other things like that, and I was just thinking to myself, like, how many entrepreneurs have been to a program like that?
Right? All this support, all these other things that are happening, whether it’s through nifty, whether it’s even through some of the other organizations that are out there, , working hard to support our really young entrepreneurs. I just feel like it’s such a blessing to have that type of exposure.
That’s that’s next level. And that, , again, bringing back my Brooklyn side of me, it definitely takes a village to raise a child. Right. And. And what I mean by that in the non profit world, if you can collaborate with the right foundations, the right non profit organizations, we all come together as one.
And I’m gonna even blow some people’s minds here. You might be too young for this, but it’s like forming Voltron. You take all the, and if you don’t know what Voltron is, Google it, please. So you can understand. So you formulate this one huge, powerful robot. And with the help of several different entities that have something different to bring to the table that checks off that one checkbox, right.
And we have 20 checkbox on there with a few organizations and foundations We can have more than those top five checkboxes checked off on right now, right? Because we are all coming to the table to bring something different for these youth, whether it’s coaching, mentoring internships seed capital for them to launch their business concepts and so much more.
Talk to me a little bit about kind of like where the role mentors play in this whole, in this whole scenario. Like, how do mentors fit into this? Wow. All right. So that’s one of the things, , nifty secret sauces. Like, we have amazing curriculum, but it’s the nifty experience that we bring to the table.
And not only do we bring you curriculum, but we do bring you knowledge. virtual and physical coaches and mentors into the classroom. In the Southeast alone, we serve 36, 000 youth every year. That’s an amazing amount. You said 36, 000. Yes. 36, 000 to be exact. And this year we have a goal to reach about 37, 000 individuals.
And every year we increase that goal for creative ways that we bring things to the table. So to go back to your original question, the mentors As part of the nifty experience, we create partnerships and we create high level engagement opportunities with local entrepreneurs as well. So they can come back into the classroom, be a virtual or physical coach for our students.
And also, The value of a mentor is now you’re unlocking new layers of the mindset of that student you’re sitting with. Let’s give a big shout out to all of our educators, right? All of our teaching professionals, they have limited time. They can access, , work with those students. And they have benchmarks they got to meet for state standards.
But why not help support them and bring in some of these valuable coaches and mentors That can help elevate what they’re teaching in the classroom now, right? So now that student is not only learning how to identify the target market, they breaking it down even in more detail with the, with the support and and, and ongoing coaching sessions that they have with their mentors along the way.
So mentors are the huge part of teaching entrepreneurship, especially individuals that are living. As an entrepreneur or understand entrepreneurship or understand a small component, because just because someone works in the financial industry doesn’t mean you can’t coach and entrepreneurship, your expertise is going to be in the financials.
So you bring a wealth of knowledge when it comes down to that student and speaking to them about, , their financials when it comes to their business concepts. Yeah, I think about like in my lifetime, like how many mentors helped me along the way when I was younger and heck, even now, like, and I, I like to, I like the fact that that’s a big part of this because then this and, and the interesting part about this is that it’s funny and this has just been my experience, but the more you help, even as an adult, like the more I help, like even going there and seeing and being participating in the, in the pitch competition and like being on site and seeing these kids, like, yeah.
I get just as inspired and filled up as they do. It’s interesting how the mentor learns so much from the mentee, right? It’s like a reciprocal relationship. Yep, absolutely. Yeah, just even being part of the process. That’s amazing. Well, Chris, man, this has been a lot of fun having you on the show today and just really getting to know more about you, , your work with the Grant Cardone Foundation and also, of course, all the great work that you’re doing over at NFTY.
That being said, if somebody is listening to this or watching this and they want to follow up and they want to connect and they want to learn how do they do that? Whether they’re volunteers, whether they’re Donors, whether they’re like, like, let people know how they can get involved and how they can connect.
First and foremost, you’re going to go to www. nfte. com. Once again, that’s www. nfte. com. And tomorrow we’re kicking off our world series of innovation day. It starts September 11th, all the way through December. And it’s a free online program for any individual out there between the ages of five all the way to 24.
And there’s monetary awards attached to it. So go on there. It’s different challenges around UN Sustainable Goals. And you can create a business concept. So we have like sponsors like EY Aramco and several others that take a different sustainable goal and create a challenge around it for youth at a global level to go and create some sort of business concept behind that challenge.
So take advantage of that. There’s tons of money involved for people to win throughout the month. So there’s about, and that’s when does it, you say it starts tomorrow is September 11th. This might come out a couple days after that. So it’s, what, what are the run dates? Just so people know. Yeah. So September 11th, all the way through December 13th, plenty of time.
Great. I just wanted the audience to make sure that they knew that if they’re listening to this in a couple of days, hey, they, they can go check it out. So that’s awesome. And that website one more time. I want people to definitely get that. So that our main website is NFTE. com and then you have if you just Google World Series of Innovation, you’ll get that URL is gonna be the first thing that pops up without nifty program and you it has its own standalone website where you can go download the toolkit and start working on your ideas.
And for everybody that’s listening, just so, you know, , we’ll put the links in the show notes to the website. So you can just click on it and head on over and check it out. And speaking to the audience, if this is your first time with mission matters, and you haven’t done it yet, hit that subscribe or follow button.
This is a daily show each and every day. We’re being new new guests. New ideas and hopefully new inspiration that’s going to help you along the way in your journey as well. So again, hit that subscribe or follow button and Chris, man, it’s so good to meet you and keep up the great work, man. I appreciate all you do.
Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate you for having me on the show.