02 · Area of work
Communities should not only be made safer. They should become prosperous.
Jeff's work has consistently focused on pathways for communities cut off from capital, employment, networks and institutional power, through workforce development, entrepreneurship, education and ownership.
His argument is that the prevailing frame, intervention against poverty and harm, sets the ambition too low. A prosperity frame asks different questions of the same institutions: whether a job leads somewhere, who owns what gets built, whether young people are being prepared for the economy they will actually enter, and how AI will change that economy.
The Gentlemen's Agenda, a data platform built by Gentlemen's Factory with the Black Dollar Initiative, makes this concrete. It tracks Black men's economic mobility across wellness, work and wages, wealth and voice, using federal data the government already collects.
In practice
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Built · Ongoing
A living data platform tracking Black male economic mobility across wellness, work and wages, wealth and voice. It draws on federal data, including more than 72,000 searchable corporate EEO-1 filings.
View the researchBuilt · Ongoing
Founded GroomedSuccess, an M/WBE-certified firm that contracts with government agencies to mentor, train and coach young people. Today Gentlemen's Factory designs and delivers workforce, leadership and youth development programs for public, corporate and nonprofit partners.
Institutional servicesConvened · Ongoing
Gatherings designed to put people with ideas, influence, resources and execution capacity in the same room. They include seven editions of the annual Change Agent Mixer and Bridging the Divide: Black & Brown Leaders in Tech.
GF eventsIdeas
Occasional essays and analysis on human development, economic mobility and the institutions we need next. No spam.
