By Jana Shaw, Editor and Chief
North Carolina Agriculture and Technical State University has immersed itself in the spirit of entrepreneurship. On April 20th, the University hosted The Big Ideas Conference.
The Big Ideas Conference was a platform for a new scholarship announcement as well as workshops to help empower women through education. The conference was led by James Rhee, CEO of the leading plus-size retailer, Ashley Stewart.
“This is the largest historically black university in the country,” said Rhee. “I couldn’t think of a more meaningful place to start the scholarship.”
The scholarship is an award of $10,000. The award will go towards Spring 2018 tuition, and the winner will be announced Sept. 16, 2017. Any deserving female, N.C. A&T business student can win the $10,000 award.
The “Fireside Chat” was a discussion between James Rhee, Patricia Miller Zollar and mediated by Detavio Samuels.
Samuels arranged questions for the discussion that invited Rhee and Zollar to chat in a theme of finding success.
Rhee answered, “This is what I would tell my 20-year-old self. To be healthy, to have a great family and to have good friends to rely on when things are both good and bad.”
Samuels noticed that neither investor mentioned money in their definition of success.
His next question searched to understand where money fit in Rhee and Zollar’s success equation.
“We grew up with no money… I went to Harvard University…and I told my dad I want to teach high school… for $12,600 a year,” Rhee shared. “I can’t think of anything more impactful than being a teacher.”
Rhee continued to share how his career in private equity allowed him to continue to impact others.
“I read people and care about people…being a teacher has made me a better investor,” said Rhee. “If you can love numbers and not lose people, you will be successful.”
Zollar continued by suggesting one thinks of money as a legacy. She expressed that upon finding financial success, one should locate the good that money can do like “funding scholarships.”
Understanding their ideas on money, Samuels questioned the role of purpose in Rhee and Zollar’s lives.
Rhee explained that along with his wife and three daughters, teaching was his purpose. He discussed being committed to wearing both a teacher and investor hat.
For Zollar, purpose “reveals itself as you grow.”
Samuels moved the conversation from success to failure by asking Rhee and Zollar’s greatest failures and how they grew from them.
“My biggest failure was Ashley Stewart,” said Rhee. Rhee worked at a firm that made the initial investment to save Ashley Stewart. The investment was not successful. He was then asked to head the next investment to save the retailer which summoned the company.
“We fought, and we’re now sitting on a stage with Macy’s and Walmart,” said Rhee. “I’m proud of that.”
“The lesson from my failure is you have to be willing to let a door close,” said Zollar. She discussed leaving a job due to being unhappy and how it ended up being the “best decision [she] ever made.”
To close the discussion, Rhee and Zollar shared their two separate “big ideas.”
James Rhee is the plus-sized retailer Ashley Stewart chairman and CEO. Rhee founded the investment firm, Firepine Group. The firm has impacted change in a number of enterprises. He is a regional winner of the E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year Award and various other awards. He is also a former teacher.
Patricia Miller Zollar is the managing director at Neuberger Berman. Zollar and an N.C. A&T alumna, where she served as Chairperson of the Board of Trustees and received an honorary doctorate.
