The WIBO Stephen Jackson Legacy Fund Launches
Fund will benefit WIBO participants and honor vital WIBO leader
The WIBO Stephen Jackson Legacy Fund Launches: Fund will benefit WIBO participants and honor vital WIBO leader
The Workshop In Business Opportunities (WIBO) has, since its founding almost 60 years ago as the first peer-based entrepreneurial training program, graduated more than 16,000 aspiring businesspeople.
Because of Stephen Jackson, WIBO is still thriving.
In 2022, suddenly and tragically, the world lost Stephen, WIBO’s beloved and fiercely committed Executive Director.
Stephen was a serial entrepreneur. The for-profit and non-profit companies he founded include Hypeitup.com, RDZ Media Group, and Run 2 Live. Hundreds of staff members, partners, and clients have benefitted from these enterprises – really, families – created by Stephen.
Stephen shared his vast experience by volunteering for years as a WIBO facilitator – helping to inspire and motivate, push and raise up thousands of budding entrepreneurs based on his belief that community power comes from economic power, and that comes from entrepreneurship.
About seven years ago, when WIBO found itself in unprecedented trouble, Stephen was asked to step in. It is no exaggeration to say that Stephen saved WIBO.
Partnering with a small but determined Board of Directors led by his dear friend and partner in banging heads, Mike Blumenfeld, Stephen poured his heart and soul into rebuilding WIBO. And despite a pandemic that required WIBO to pivot to online operations, and myriad other challenges, WIBO is still here – largely thanks to a renewed and expanding WIBO family that Stephen helped nurture. That includes Stephen’s sister by choice, Dr. Stacie NC Grant, who is carrying forward his WIBO legacy by stepping up to serve as Chair.
Stephen was fueled by his love of family and community and a deep commitment to giving back. It is therefore hardly surprising that Stephen’s own children – Janelle, Chantel, Cassandra, Tia, and Stephanie – are all out in the world doing wonderful things, carrying on Stephen’s legacy of creativity and community spirit. A generation of wonderful grandkids will extend that legacy even further.
Indeed, Stephen’s last and possibly greatest joy was founding a new company with his daughters to share with young entrepreneurs the accumulated wisdom of his lifetime of creating and growing new enterprises.
Stephen Jackson was, and still is, an unstoppable force powered by confidence, optimism, stubbornness, kindness, empathy, and love. His inspiration calls to all of us to carry this work forward, join together to make a better world, and have fun doing it!
The WIBO Stephen Jackson Legacy Fund will continue to build on Stephen’s lifetime of fighting the good fight.