“Changing Lives One Meal at a Time.”

This is not a phrase I came up with, but the mission of Light House Bistro in Annapolis, MD. I share this story here, as I reflect and prepare on my upcoming journey supporting IBM’s Corporate Service Corps (CSC).

My wife and I recently re-visited Annapolis. We were married here on a warm September day in 2015. As we reflected on how far we’ve come and all the possibilities of our future, we strolled down the street toward Miss Shirley’s Café…one of the essential brunch spots in town, as evident by the folks lined up to wait 2 hours to applaud their many amazing breakfast items. However, further down the street was the Light House Bistro; a restaurant that was new to me, having just opened their doors in 2017. We were greeted warmly upon our entrance, and were seated shortly afterwards in the heart of the restaurant, surrounded my inspirational messages on every wall.

Well I could wax-poetically about the food and service, it is the story of this restaurant that I want to share. The Light House Bistro is a social enterprise created by The Light House Homeless Prevention Support Center to further train culinary students that have graduated from their workforce development and other partnering programs. The Bistro — in short — gives people with employment barriers the opportunity to learn while developing a resume and earning a living wage. Sitting there during brunch, I was reminded of an article I read in graduate school by C.I. Prahalad and Allen Hammond. In the Harvard Business Review, they co-authored “Serving the World’s Poor, Profitably”. In summary, they argue that improving the lives of the 4 billion people that are living in poverty (those at “the bottom of the economic pyramid”) is not only a noble endeavor but one that can be lucrative as “untapped potential” since the aggregate buying power of poor communities is actually quite large (even though individual incomes may be low). While IBM is in no way using CSC as new source of revenue growth, I would think IBM would agree with Prahalad and Hammond when they say: “big corporations should solve big problems”. And that in a small way, is why I am honored to bring IBM’s innovation in skills and technology to Chandigarh, India to support the DON BOSCO NAVJEEVAN SOCIETY (http://www.dbcnavjeevan.ngo/).