September 9, 2024 • 37 mins
Kelley serves as the President and CEO of The Women’s Fund of Central Ohio, a public foundation that is fiercely committed to igniting social change for the sake of gender equality. A bridgebuilder with an unwavering commitment to gender equity, inclusivity and women’s and girls’ leadership, Kelley has a proven track record of creating opportunities and sparking change for women, girls, and families in central Ohio.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Columbus in Central Ohio have a rich history of companies
being headquartered here, everything from technology, manufacturing, retail, insurance, and more.
But what about the leaders behind these companies? What makes
them tick? How do they get their start? This is
where you get to meet the captain of the ship.
Welcome to CEOs You Should Know and iHeartMedia Columbus Podcast.
(00:20):
Welcome back to another episode of CEOs You Should Know.
It's always a pleasure to get to meet those that
are making a big difference here in Central Ohio, whether
it's the corporate world or the philanthropic world. And I'm
really excited about our latest guest here. Kelly Griasmer is
the president and CEO of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio,
(00:40):
and she's going to explain more on that, just a
little bit. What they do. I can dissect it, but
I think Kelly would do a much better job on
top of it. She has quite the story, So I'm
really excited to have you, Kelly.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Welcome, Hi, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Tell us what is the Women's Fund of Central Ohio.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
The Women's Fund of Central Ohio is a public foundation,
which means that we are five and one C three
We raise money though from the grassroots, from the entire community,
and then we as a foundation save and invest that
money so that we can reinvest it in our mission,
which is to transform the lives of women and girls
to the collective power and passion of all people working together.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
So, Kelly, how did this foundation start?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Fifteen women got together in two thousand and one. They
were thirteen white women, two women of color. All of
them had means of some sort. But they looked around
the community and said, women and girls are not reaching
their full potential. There should be more of us in
this philanthropic world. And that means that there should be
(01:44):
more of them that feel that they have the wealth
to be philanthropic. Why aren't they around us? And they
looked around that there was one founder, Emily Rutherford, who
had seen women's funds working around the country wanted to
get one started, and so she came to the friends
here in Columbus, Ohio, and said, I can't get when
(02:05):
started right now where I live in Granville, but I'd
like to try to do it here in Columbus. And
the fifteen of them decided that they would start. Put
in the money, find it, give it, find it, and
build it and they did, and we started giving grants
in two thousand and one.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
So what's the reach for the Women's Fund of Central Ohio? Kelly?
Does it go? I mean, how far does it reach?
Speaker 2 (02:27):
So we serve the seven county MSA of Franklin County
and the six surrounding counties what's considered central Ohio. But
we are also connected nationally to the Women's Funding.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Network, so amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Yeah, we serve here, but we also are part of
that national conversation.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
We are going to dive into that a little bit more.
But first, if you're just jointing to us, Kelly Griesmur's
with us. She is this week's guest on CEOs. You
should know president CEO of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio.
Let's talk a little bit about you. I always like
to ask our guests about their journey. Where are you from?
Where did you grow up?
Speaker 2 (03:02):
I am from Akron, Ohio, and I grew up there.
I went to Indiana University as to become a I
thought it was going to go into journalism, huh. And
that's a big part of how I end up at
some place at the Women's Fund Because I had dreams
and goals at the time, and then you know the
kind of advice you get as a young person. I'm
a gen xer, so you know, was graduating right around
(03:24):
nineteen ninety. It was interesting the kind of advice I
was getting, and so I started to make safer and
safer decisions. I became a lawyer, which was a super
super safe decision, but came back here to Ohio to
study to be a lawyer, and I've been here in
Central however since, Kelly.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
I'm just curious, because of the business that I'm in,
what kind of advice were you getting about journalism, What
things were begin told to you.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Well, you know, it's funny. When I was doing it,
broadcast journalism was becoming really the popular lane. I had
gone there to be a writer, but broadcast was really
the up and coming thing. And I think, but honestly,
I I wanted to work for Rolling Stone Magazines. That's
what I wanted to do. I love music and I
wanted to write about it. And I think if anybody
had really been listening to me, what I needed to
(04:08):
do was go to New York or one of the
big markets. And I was getting really good grades. I
was in one of the best journalism schools in the
country and pretty much virtually. Now I look back and
realize no one was giving me the advice to chase
those dreams. No matter how well I was doing, everyone
kept trying to put me into a safe lane. And
(04:28):
I think that that's where I didn't realize the gender
norms around women. In nineteen ninety you didn't necessarily tell
a five to two, one hundred pound female to move
to New York on her own, with no family and
chase her dreams. We do that a lot more today,
and I'm really but New York was a little different
place then, and I get it. But I wonder now,
(04:50):
given my drive, my ambition, my grades, if I might
have gotten different advice if I had been a young
person who identify his.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Male Kelly, I'm glad you brought that up, and not
to get all deep, but when you get someone in
front of me, like yourself, who's clearly very accomplished, very successful,
do you ever look back and go, even you someone
like you? What if?
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Yeah? Sure, yeah, yeah, And I mean I think that's
what's made me really fascinated is is you know when
I went to law school, there was fifty percent women
in my class fifty percent men in my class, so
we felt very equal. But by the time I was
working for a very large law firm and I did
indeed make partner. I realized though I was one sixth
of the partnership fifty you know, five six we had
(05:37):
six hundred partners, five hundred of them, wow, identified as male,
one hundred of us identified as female. We were the
first class of one hundred women to make So in
nine years I had gone from being half of my
peers to one sixth of my peers from a gender perspective,
And that tells me that there are things kicking in
(05:57):
as part of our systems that don't allow everyone to
navigate it the same. And if I'm honest, I really
adapted more easily, I think, to the systems that we're
looking for some of those characteristics that are more traditionally male.
Ye you know, I am outgoing, I'm not you know,
(06:19):
there are things about me that I'm not saying are
better but more fit that mold. So I sometimes say
I was really good at being a twenty something male.
I just knew how to do it. And I started
to really look back and wonder what about the women
who don't feel as comfortable acting like that. But I
knew we're just as smart as talented as me. It's
(06:40):
not that anyone was really attempting to intentionally, in many
cases hold us back, but they were looking for things
that are more norms than realities.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Yeah, Kelly, do you feel like and this would have
been the nineties, so do you feel like you had
to push a little harder to get into a door
that maybe was typically reserved for men.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Sure? Well, And the hardest part for someone like me
is also I'm very direct, I'm very see. I like that.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Would I would like to know if you're upset at
me or I could do something better? Absolutely, I like that.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
But it's not expected. I'll be honest, and especially.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
In the world even today.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Yeah yeah, oh, I mean the people. The number one
thing that people often say about me, she's really edgy,
you know, or you know, and I am maybe. But
my point is, I think if we look at the norms,
if I presented as a male, you might see that
as ambitious. For me, it's edgy, you know. And I
(07:41):
do think that that still kicks in. People aren't as
used to people who present as female.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Being that bold so you remind me and my wife.
My wife is exactly like you. But how would you
describe yourself? Do you like being told? Or if someone
were described you and you overhear it, she's edgy?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Do you like that? Well? I am, But I think
what I want to be is respected for that, yeah, transparency,
and not feared. And I think that because people are
just not as used to seeing women use their voices.
I mean, we do see this play out in our
in our elections, in our in our jobs. There are
(08:22):
not as many female CEOs. It's just these are facts,
and it's because as we make that journey, the words
of my come out of my mouth are very similar
to my colleague who identifies as male. But the norms
tell us women don't usually say that. I'm used, you know,
And and I've raised I've raised a son now who's
to twenty two, and we talk about this a lot
(08:44):
because I think that I see him do things that
I was like, if I had done that, I would
have been treated very differently. And we have a really
open relationship about that because I he's my one child. Yeah,
so he's the only one I got to watch and
I was so I point out to him every so often.
How it's different.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
This is CEOs you should know an iHeartMedia Columbus podcast.
We're here with Kelly Griesmer, who's the president and CEO
of the Women's find of Central Ohio. So what where
was the point, Kelly where you decided, Okay, I'm going
to go to law school. And by the way, not
everyone could just go to law school, So kudos to you, well,
thank you.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I as I said, I really wanted to be a journalist,
but I didn't see the path forward. A lot of
people were giving me very straightforward avice, you know, go
righte obituaries, you know, the Acronbeacon journey. They did not. Yeah, well,
I mean that was the opening job. You know, it's okay,
you know, or go get the job you know, at
the channel and you know, be the be the you know,
two to six am person, right, And I and you
(09:40):
were only going to make probably you know, fifteen thousand
dollars doing it, and I had student loans. I was
really worried about. And this is the thing, women, I
think we try to plan really far in advance, you know,
So I was already trying to make decisions about what
was like to be a thirty year old person when
I was twenty two. Okay again, I think that's a
place where women get slightly different advice. People don't see
(10:04):
us often economically sustaining ourselves in the same way they
think norms have told them that we go find a
bread winner and that's what gets us through. And so
I was already trying to solve all my problems. Well,
what if I don't find that bread winner, I need
to pay these loans. And so law school was not
a regret of mine, but a very safe choice given
(10:25):
grades that I had. I had warrior spirit. I knew
I wanted that to be in journalism, but maybe we'll
do it in law for a while, because that's going
to pay the bills. Why I was making necessarily those
decisions as a twenty two year old is one of
my main questions, because you know, I could have taken
and I love it now. When I see people taking
a gap or trying something else, it doesn't mean But
(10:48):
I thought I would never go back if I didn't
do it then, so I went to law school and
then made the decision. You know, I wanted to be
a public interest lawyer, but I made the decision to
work at a very large law firm. Again, very safe decision.
I also a great opportunity. And I will say that
the best advice I ever got was from the partner
that recruited me to work for that law firm. And
he said, you know, I was going to turn it
(11:09):
down because I said, I'm not going to fit in here.
I swear, I'm bold, I wear red suits. This is
not what this law firm is probably looking for. And
he said, I think you're going to do great. Get
out of your own way, take the job for two years.
What's the worst that happened?
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (11:28):
And that's not advice that women get very often.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
No, No, you're you're right. Kelly griesmur Is with his
president and CEO of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio,
will speed this up a little bit because I want
to focus obviously on the on the Women's Fund. So
you find yourself at Ohio State, you're a buck eye,
you graduate a little bit more about this this firm
that you you go with, what kind of law diage
practice it was?
Speaker 2 (11:52):
It was a very large law firm, a national third
largest law firm in the world at the time that
I was practicing there probably still there. I mean, I'm
sure they're they're that large and that impactful because I
still have a lot of colleagues that work there. I
had a great experience, but I was a bankruptcy litigator
a lot of my career, which meant that when very
large companies, often retailers, went into bankruptcy, I was one
(12:13):
of the quote unquote gunslingers who would go in and
try to settle or work through all the litigation that
comes up when when a company does wowization.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
So, Kelly, you're the great negotiator, then I had to be.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
But but what I often had to be was the
person who wasn't afraid to stop on a dime and
go taked up. As it was very fast paced compared
to a lot of law that you see on TV.
Sure you know, there's a lot of people that need
money or running out of money, and you have to
get in and just start asking the questions, having the hearings,
representing the clients, talking to the creditors. So it was
(12:49):
very it was a very interesting. I always say it
was the closest I could come to doing public interest
work in a large law firm because I was representing
debtors and quite often trying to save the assets of
the company. Sure, especially for the people who probably worked
there many many years.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Hey, Kelly, not and not to throw you curveball, but
I just out of curiosity. There's all sorts of lawyers,
and I realized not everyone can do litigation either. But
is there a show on TV or on a streaming
platform that is this close to what a lawyer does
that you could watch and go, oh, yeah, that's pretty real,
that's close.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
You know, that's a great question. I think all of
them are good. I'm trying to think. I mean, I
was always a huge fan of LA.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Law about Yeah, yeah, that's a good one.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
I think, you know, I haven't watched suits, but everybody
tells me it's amazing. And although I will say, you
just can't practice if you haven't gone to law school,
I mean, you know, that's the part of it. That's
why I can't watch it. I'm like, that's not a thing.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Yeah, yeah, Well, moving forward, there was a point Kelly
where you decided, Okay, I've done my share of practicing law.
I'm ready to move on. What happened there, Well, I think.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
I'd been a partner about six years and law firm.
I had great colleagues, I had succeeded, but as I said,
I also could see that women were not succeeding at
the same rates. I was already involved with the Women's
Fund for several years at that point as a board member,
and I just thought, you know, look, you always wanted
(14:18):
to do. You just have this moment. I was just
about forty years old, and I thought, this is not
at all the road I was on. Yeah, I wanted
to be a journalist. I wanted to work for Rolling Stone.
I wanted to have these these experiences. And I'm really
far now and I've made a lot of good decisions.
I've learned a lot about myself. I love I loved
(14:38):
the legal work I was doing with the people I
was doing it with, but it was not who I
was supposed to be. I just knew it, and so
I started kind of saying that out loud and looking
and my gut was that I would probably end up
at a nonprofit. But that's quite frankly, when I got
like the gift of a lifetime because of the nonprofit
that happened to me starting opening at the time, which
(14:59):
was Peloton.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
How cool is that to see how successful Pelotonia has become.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
You know, it's it's one of those things where it's
almost hard to talk about without getting emotional, but it's, uh,
it's you can't explain it. You know. It was such
a huge risk for all of us that did it
at the time. You know, I left a major law
firm to be their director of operations, the CEO. Tom
Lennox left a major job in finance to to be
(15:28):
the CEO. But he had survived cancer and he was
one of my best friends, and he needed someone to be,
you know, his partner in crime and who would be
able to do the details because there was a lot
of permits, and there was a lot of organization and
a lot of contracts and insurance. And so I did it.
But and we had funding to do it, which was
the gift because each of us could take that leap,
(15:51):
and three more brave people, all very young, took that
leap that first year to pull it together.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Kelly, that just gave me goosebumps because here how Pelotona
was built, I just think is incredible because it's such
a machine now years later, and of course is raised
hundreds of millions of dollars for the James Cancer Center.
But those early days, what were they like trying to
(16:16):
piece everything together and in unchartered waters too.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Yeah, it was terrifying. It was absolutely terrifying, exhilarating, the best,
most fun seven and a half years I've ever had.
I knew that the experience was starting something from scratch,
and literally we didn't have desks or even barely computers
when we walked into the space. Tom very much had
a vision and the board members had a vision, and
we did have funding. And that is people ask a
(16:42):
lot about secret sauce, and with nonprofits, that's the thing
that most nonprofits don't have, is that someone we'd seen
the model at work in Boston. Okay, a lot of
people didn't believe it would work here in Columbus, if
I'm honest. They thought, well, we're not Boston. There's so
much more wealth there. Not true, there's so much there's
different people there. Not true. You have you can't get
(17:02):
people to fundraise, not true. But getting people over that
hump in those first few months was not easy. I
mean we were hand to hand going to lunch at
every company, taking free pizzas and saying please please, we
went into every meeting, we need one three people to
say they'll ride, because we know they'll get more. And
what we also knew is that we had to have
the absolute best first weekend of that event that we
(17:25):
could possibly imagine. That we had to fix everything because
that experience was going to change how people saw it
for the future. And so it was the greatest I
always say. When the first ride left, I turned around
and I literally almost puked because I was like, we're
going now, and it's going one hundred miles away from
me and coming eighty miles back, and I got to
figure out what's going to happen over the next two days.
(17:48):
But we I think delivered on giving people that experience
that they felt the power of each other. Yeah, no matter.
You know, we didn't have coffee on Sunday morning. You know,
we were are goan to grabbing people's bags off the
wrong trucks and running them around. I mean, I've never
sweat so much in my entire life. But we got
it right enough that people felt the power of it,
(18:10):
so then they wanted to come back.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Kelly, this is amazing. I didn't expect to hear that.
The stories of early Peloton Yeah, I just think that's
so cool, these building blocks. What was logistically actually before
I asked that, what companies said, yes, first.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Ah, well, nut Jets was the first funder. Okay, they
were the ones that originally had the vision because of
some philanthropic dollars they had available, so they came in
very strong. They were the only funder of the first year.
A lot of people don't remember that. Then, what I
would say is that, you know, what you might expect
is L Brands and Huntington and many of the companies
(18:49):
that have been the juggernauts AEP nationwide. They all were involved,
but they did start with polotons of three or five people.
Like it wasn't that we had that first year two
hundred people. We would have five, maybe ten from me
to those places. Netche's probably had the most. I don't
(19:11):
really recall, but I mean we were their signature fundraiser
at the time, and so they had more, but again
not hundreds. We had twenty five hundred riders twenty five
hundred and fifty six if I think riders. The first year.
We had to get twenty five hundred for our pro
forma and a thousand of them registered in July and
the riders in August.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
So wow, that's.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
The momentum we had to build. Yeah, we did it
nine months from October to August.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Kelly, Kelly Griesmer is with this president and CEO of
the Women's Fund of Central Ohio. Kelly back in those days,
and maybe it's changed now, but back when you were starting,
it was what was the most difficult logistical thing to
get together with Pelotonia.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
Well, you had to have a route. And I don't
ride bikes normally, and people laugh about that. I'm not
a bike rider. I'm a lawyer. So and Tom said
to me, you know, we would go drive and try
to figure it out.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
I was wondering that.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Yeah, yeah, and we And of course you go start
talking to cyclists that had done that ride. I mean,
there's many many accomplished cyclists in Central Ohio. The problem is,
though Pelotonia is not about cycling. Pelatonia is about curing cancer. Yeah,
so you had to hear from the cyclist what works.
But what they might enjoy doing, the gravel they might enjoy,
riding on the hills they may enjoy, are not what
(20:26):
a cancer survivor or their family necessarily wants. To do. Sure,
So we did hire a company called Cadence that they
still work with, Caden's Sports that they still work to
this day. And they came in and helped me chip
out that for how Tom and I chip out that
first route and where, and then more importantly, where you
put the officers. Yeah, put the signage. My dad and
my husband went out and put signs in the ground
(20:48):
the first year for about twenty four hours beforehand, with
the team that knew what they were doing, but they
were they were the grit and the hard sweat.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
Yeah, such a treat to hear about the early days.
And we're going to get some more of the women's fund.
Just one more question. One of the special things about
Pelotonia is the fact that we have such a great
backing of company headquarters here who take care of the
administration costs. Was it like that the first year.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, that's the key. You couldn't do what you were doing,
so nut Jets underwrote that first year. Some things about
their philanthropy changed after that first year, and that's where
Pelotonia it was a little panic moment because we had
raised four point five million dollars based on a two
and a half million dollar investment, so we had already
started to show that rate of return on investment. Our
(21:36):
goal was to raise, you know, by that fifth year,
we were raising you know, closer to fifteen million year.
It was very fast growth, all based upon a pro
forma that worked. But those companies if they had not
come in, especially the companies that came in year two
to help fill some of the gaps that were left
when net Jets changed their strategy, we would not You
(21:59):
had to underwrite the ride, the experience with the understanding
that when you underwrite that weekend and the staff that
worked year round, a lot of people are like, are
you volunteering or you work part time. I'm like, oh no,
we work year round to do this. We need We
had a very small staff at the time and a
lot of a lot of police officers to pay, and
(22:20):
a lot of food to buy, safety measures and those
sorts of things. And then if they had not underwritten that,
you couldn't return the investment or you couldn't get the
return you did. Because that's what the ride is, the
celebration of what people have done. They fundraise four months
to have that celebration and then do it all over
again and you have to be able to produce it.
(22:41):
So it's but it is a symbiotic relationship for sure.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
So inspiring Kelly. From there, what after seven years you decide, Okay,
what's next. It's hard to move on. And that's where
you found the Columbus Foundation, right.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Correct, correct, So yeah, I'd love that grassroots experience. I'd
done it for seven a half years. They had a
great leadership Doug Aleman when he came in and I
was I was the CEO. So yeah, I went to
the Columbus Foundation to do special projects, do grad grassroots
represent some of the private foundations that are affiliated, help
them with their philanthropy, and also do things like the
(23:15):
Big Table.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
And the oh yeah, yeah, I love the Big Give.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:19):
It's a popular one.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Yeah, and that had been existing for a long time.
I was just there to be the juice to kind
of help get more of the community involved because that
was my that was had been my experience for the
seven years.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
So that's one of my favorite things that they do,
is the Big Give. Of course.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Yeah, it's the same vibe right the community. That's that's
the moment of reaching out to the community and showing
them their power over the things that they want to
make better.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
So tell us about the transition then to the Women's Fund.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Yeah. So, as I said, I'd been on the board
of the Women's Fund for about ten years. I chaired
it at the end of that time. That ended while
I was at Politania, and so just by chance, the
CEO who had been running it so well before I came,
decided she had a new opportunity, and so they reached
(24:06):
out to me. And at first, you know, it's hard
to again to decide you're going to work for something
you love so much, because there's a lot of fear
about whether you'll mess it up. But that role, the
role of CEO opened and I was lucky to be
hired to become the next CEO of the organization. But
(24:27):
that was twenty nineteen, so it turned out to be
kind of an interesting time to take over.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
So, and you're so ambitious, and tell us about some
of the accomplishments of the Women's Fund right now? What
you do?
Speaker 2 (24:38):
Yeah, so we do three things as a public foundation. People,
you know again kind of wonder what we do. We
have to raise the money, so we, unlike most of
the other foundations in the world, that you've the Gates Foundation,
which is the private foundation, or any communicy foundation like
the Columbus Foundation. You know, they historically are a place
that investment philanthropic investments for people, manages them. Then there's
(25:03):
financial models to that, right, there's interests, there's things that
you work from. We, as you heard earlier in the story,
had a very small nest egg, which was real women
putting in, you know, five thousand dollars at a time.
So we didn't start with the large nest egg, if
you will, that a lot of foundations start with. But
we have to build it the same, right, So we
have to have an endowment. They were very thoughtful about
(25:25):
having an endowment, but it takes a long time for
that endowment to start to kick off the kind of
money that can actually help you. So you have to
manage that thoughtfully and just kind of look at it
for a while. And then in the meantime, if you
want to be making grants and doing the things we do,
which is research, grant making and advocacy, you have to
find the money then to do that and have a staff.
And at a women's fund, it has to be a
place where often a lot of women work and they
(25:47):
have to be able to accumulate wealth while they're there,
because it's our mission to make sure that women have
you know, can break down barriers. And so that means
we have to be able to pay people and they
have to have benefits.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
And yeah, so.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
We we base raise that money, manage that money so
that we can do research that makes women visible in
the community. Quite often, because of norms, women just aren't
studied as much. And when we opened, one of the
first things they found is that they just wasn't data
about women economically. There wasn't data because often when they
got married, it's very hard to even disaggregate their wealth
(26:19):
or you know, unless they were no longer married and
then you could see what happened. But so we needed
to do We've done five research projects, we're in the
middle of our sixth making women visible their lived experiences
and also what the barriers and accelerators to their to
their thriving their success are. Then we also make grants,
the part that people know the best. We have a
(26:40):
huge grant making We've since the year we opened, we
have made grants. We've made now over five million dollars
in grants. We've raised on our own about twenty thousand apiece,
although we have some a few other programs that are
going now that are slightly larger grants, but those are
to invest in those women that are leading from their
own lived experiences philanthropically. Less than a penny goes to
(27:05):
women's philanthropy focused on women, and it's our job to
try to fix that. Yeah, and I'll be honest, it's
it's one of the most frustrating things, right because I
just you just you can't you can't imagine how many
women running nonprofits in the city right now still aren't
making a salary. They do it as a hobby, right,
of course it's not a hobby, but they are working
(27:27):
another job during the day and running their program at night.
And it's and it's some of the most groundbreaking work
we have going on the community. So we have to
fund that work and that's what we do. And then
the last thing, when we say advocacy, it makes people
nervous because they know we're a five, one C three
and what it means is that we engage. We have
a program called Gender by Us where we go out
to companies and we talk to all people. As I said,
it's collective power and passion of all people. And when
(27:47):
we know is that people who identify as male are
also suffering from gender norms. I've watched this with my
own son, right, and we know gender norms aren't good
for anyone because we're all much more nuanced and people
than than what what people decided centuries ago. We are
in Greek literature, and it's gone ever since Greek. You know,
I always blame those gods for starting all this, But
(28:08):
the long and short of it is we try to
advocate to people that we didn't start the systems, We
didn't create the barriers. The people sitting on this planet
right now did not do that, but we are accountable
for changing it, for seeing each other and being different,
and so we try to work with people vulnerably on that.
We try to help people understand that policies like paid
leave and equal pay and all that actually our economic
development levers for our entire community. They're not just ways
(28:32):
to prop up women. They are things that will actually
improve the economic base for everyone. And so that's the
kind of advocacy we do. It's not about who to
elect or we don't do that work because we're five
one and C three, but we do talk about the issues.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
Kelly, what kind of do you do any events to
raise money? How are you raising money?
Speaker 2 (28:54):
Yeah, so we have a very large event called Keyholder.
It's almost twenty years old. We've had we have speakers,
major speakers come. We've had you know, Melissa Ethridge whooping,
Gloria Stein, you know, Billy Jean King, Amazing people come
to speak. As time goes, that's a harder raised way
to raise money because they those people become more and
(29:18):
more expensive. But we just this past year we had
Joy Harjoe, who is Native American woman, the first Poet
Laureate of the United States. Really accomplished women that not
only are amazing in their talents, but amazing in the
way that they approach women and the empowerment of women.
And so we do that every spring. It is a
(29:39):
ticketed event. We do it at a major theater, and
we raise funds that way. And then of course we
have a huge individual donor base. We apply for grants,
we do all kinds of things to raise money.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Kelly, how far have we come in society when it
comes to, you know, an equal level with women, women
and getting respect from I don't know, maybe maybe even
a decade ago, twenty years ago, maybe.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
We've come a long way. I'm not here to ever say,
you know, it's it's gloom and doom. It's not, and
I'll be honest. You watch the Olympics, and you know,
it was a very emotional thing to watch women comfortable
enough to lift other women, to watch men comfortable enough
to wear them on their shirts and go to the
you know, you know, Flames one of my favorite people
(30:26):
right now, exactly. But I think that on the other hand,
it's the nuances, the things that you know, when we
do gender by us. You know what one gentleman who
was an attorney said was, you know, I just assume
once women have children that I that I shouldn't offer
them any of the cases where they'll need to travel.
You know, I'm trying to be a good boss, and
(30:46):
I want to be I'm empathetic to them, and they
have all these kids and we need to you know,
so they probably shouldn't try. I should probably find that's
not your decision to make.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Now.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
He was being this is the vulnerability we need, right
because he wasn't going in the room saying how can
I hold her back? How can I keep her from
her part? But the decision he was making to protect
her to he wasn't asking her. He doesn't know if
she has a great support system. I mean, this is
what he would tell me. He wasn't thinking about the
fact she may she may be the only breadwinner in
her family. You know, her or her husband may not
(31:17):
have a job that would sustain them, and so by
not getting they may be ready to manage that the
way they want to manage it. Right. But because his
experience had been that his mother operated a certain way
maybe or his sister operated a certain way. What he
had seen in his life, he had decided how he
was going to then help all of his employees. Those
are the things we have to unearth, and they're in
(31:39):
the system. And I can say that that's one of
the hardest things for law firms, based upon my experiences,
they're built on mostly people identify as male started those firms.
I mean, if you talk look at Ruth Bader Grinsburg,
she was we couldn't even get hired, you know at
some of these law firms after going to Harvard. When
she went to Harvard, they asked her what she was
doing there, you know, why was she taking the space
(32:01):
of another young man? So firms that law firms. If
you look at it, most of them will out they've
been around for hundreds of years. Yeah, that means that
the people who started it, the start of the systems,
the start of the benefit systems, the start of the
vacation policies, are mostly people that maybe have that tunnel
vision about what the experience is and how they should
help other people. So it's hard to unearth all that
(32:25):
and vulnerably say you weren't trying to hurt anybody, But
we need to change that now because you've got really
bright women that you want to succeed, and they may
have a child because their bodies can do that, and
their families may want them to do that. Right, it's
not something you've ever experienced, So don't try to figure
out how to get them to next. Ask them.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
It's so interesting you bring this up, Kelly as we
start to wrap up here, because I grew up on
a farm and my surroundings were you know, mom and
other moms. They help stay back, get the kids, you know,
do the typical stuff, you know, cook and clean and
everything while dad was out you know, in the in
the fields and fixing things. And I get married and
(33:06):
I feel like I learned a lot more about women.
But it wasn't until I had my own daughter. And
she's three, so we got a long waist to go.
But I've it's like every I'm hearing you talk about
what's going on, and then I think about my own daughter.
It's opened up a whole new door that I never
thought about before. And I only want like other women,
(33:27):
I only want the best for them and my daughter.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
So what's that vulnerability? It really is that vulnerability that matters.
And what I would say is I look back based
upon my experience in how I succeeded, and there's certainly
advice I gave to young women attorneys at the time
that probably could have been better, right, because I had
tunnel vision about how I'd succeeded. And so it's this
vulnerability of saying we didn't create the systems. Very early
(33:52):
in our lives, we start to accept the pattern of
what it looks like to be this or that. Yeah,
and it's really he takes a vulnerable moment to interrupt
that and say, hey, wait, I really want her to succeed.
You know that advice that I told you I got
from that attorney's because I think he looked at me
as a young attorney and just was like, I need
that person right now. He wasn't trying to figure out
(34:14):
who I was going to be, and I'm not even
trying to put on him that he knew how to
advise me to be a person who was a mother. Yeah,
but he saw me at that moment as just an attorney.
And if more of us could step out and not
worry about who's who, you know, how am I going
to prepare this person for what the pattern tells me
they should do and just prepare them for the moment
(34:35):
that they're in. Well, people will do things that you
don't expect.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
This has been such an amazing conversation Kelly Kelly, for
those that are listening and including myself. I'd like to
get more involved with the Women's Fund. What can we do?
Where can we go?
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Yeah? I mean, you know, and so this is the
this is the thing, as I said, and it sounds
really crazy, but I'm like, the number one volunteer thing
you can do to start to get involved is make
it donation. We need donations of all sizes and this
is very much the roots that I had in Pelotonia
as well. We're the same thing. Pelotonia and the Women's
Fund are both public foundations. What it requires is the
(35:11):
public to see that and say, you know what, I
got an extra twenty bucks or I got an extra
hundred bucks. I'm going to throw it in the pot
because we are the collective power and passion of all
people working together. So now that means somebody who's got
a million dollars, I need that too. But people always
underestimate the power of a donation. They're like, I'm so busy,
I really want to volunteer. You know, we have grant
reading this fall. We review our grants. For the grants
(35:33):
that we make, we invite at least three hundred grant
readers to come to the library with us to review
a set of three to five grants and to give
us their feedback. Because if we don't have the lived
experiences of the community telling us how are these grants
will create change, we won't get it right. I have
a team of five, we have biases, we have lived
(35:53):
experiences that would inform what I think is best. As
I just described, I need everyone's opinion. So if and
that involves people as female, people identify as male, all races,
all backgrounds. We invite them to come and review those
grants with us. So that's a huge opportunity. It's one
time a year, so that's the hardest part, you know,
it's not that we do it several times. So if
you but it is an October grant reading application is
(36:15):
open right now through August thirtieth, So if people you
have to apply just so that we get a bead
on who all is going to be there right and
how that demographically breaks out so that we can make
those grant readers happen. You can come to our Keyholder event.
We love that in the spring. It's huge. The more
people there, the more money for our mission. You may
just be coming because you love the speaker. You may
be coming because you love gender equity issues. We hope
(36:37):
it's both, but coming to that event is a big deal.
We have a research project happening right now that is
looking at women's wealth. We have a survey out there
that can that people can fill out. We have focus
groups that we're doing that that some people are a
lot of people in the community are participating in. And
we have a story core project where you can actually
go to a link right now through our website and
(37:00):
and record your stories. It's for people identify as women
to talk about wealth barriers or accelerators that they've experienced
in their life. It's going to be very helpful to
our research project, and it's also going to be archived
with the Library of Congress so that we build up
that's great, a treasury of women's lived experiences, which quite frankly,
we don't have enough of those right now.
Speaker 1 (37:20):
There completely agree. What's your website, by.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
The way, it is. It's about the longest you could
ever imagine, but it is www. Women's Fund, Central Ohio
dot org.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
That's easy to remember, though. Hi, Kelly Griesmour, President CEO
of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio. Such a real
pleasure to finally meet you. This has been a great conversation.
Congrats on all your success and thank you so much
for being a driving force in Central Ohio.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
Thank you so much for this opportunity. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
CEOs You Should Know is hosted and produced by Brandon Boxer,
a production of iHeartMedia. Columbus
Columbus in Central Ohio have a rich history of companies
being headquartered here, everything from technology, manufacturing, retail, insurance, and more.
But what about the leaders behind these companies? What makes
them tick? How do they get their start? This is
where you get to meet the captain of the ship.
Welcome to CEOs You Should Know and iHeartMedia Columbus Podcast.
(00:20):
Welcome back to another episode of CEOs You Should Know.
It's always a pleasure to get to meet those that
are making a big difference here in Central Ohio, whether
it's the corporate world or the philanthropic world. And I'm
really excited about our latest guest here. Kelly Griasmer is
the president and CEO of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio,
(00:40):
and she's going to explain more on that, just a
little bit. What they do. I can dissect it, but
I think Kelly would do a much better job on
top of it. She has quite the story, So I'm
really excited to have you, Kelly.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Welcome, Hi, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Tell us what is the Women's Fund of Central Ohio.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
The Women's Fund of Central Ohio is a public foundation,
which means that we are five and one C three
We raise money though from the grassroots, from the entire community,
and then we as a foundation save and invest that
money so that we can reinvest it in our mission,
which is to transform the lives of women and girls
to the collective power and passion of all people working together.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
So, Kelly, how did this foundation start?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Fifteen women got together in two thousand and one. They
were thirteen white women, two women of color. All of
them had means of some sort. But they looked around
the community and said, women and girls are not reaching
their full potential. There should be more of us in
this philanthropic world. And that means that there should be
(01:44):
more of them that feel that they have the wealth
to be philanthropic. Why aren't they around us? And they
looked around that there was one founder, Emily Rutherford, who
had seen women's funds working around the country wanted to
get one started, and so she came to the friends
here in Columbus, Ohio, and said, I can't get when
(02:05):
started right now where I live in Granville, but I'd
like to try to do it here in Columbus. And
the fifteen of them decided that they would start. Put
in the money, find it, give it, find it, and
build it and they did, and we started giving grants
in two thousand and one.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
So what's the reach for the Women's Fund of Central Ohio? Kelly?
Does it go? I mean, how far does it reach?
Speaker 2 (02:27):
So we serve the seven county MSA of Franklin County
and the six surrounding counties what's considered central Ohio. But
we are also connected nationally to the Women's Funding.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Network, so amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Yeah, we serve here, but we also are part of
that national conversation.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
We are going to dive into that a little bit more.
But first, if you're just jointing to us, Kelly Griesmur's
with us. She is this week's guest on CEOs. You
should know president CEO of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio.
Let's talk a little bit about you. I always like
to ask our guests about their journey. Where are you from?
Where did you grow up?
Speaker 2 (03:02):
I am from Akron, Ohio, and I grew up there.
I went to Indiana University as to become a I
thought it was going to go into journalism, huh. And
that's a big part of how I end up at
some place at the Women's Fund Because I had dreams
and goals at the time, and then you know the
kind of advice you get as a young person. I'm
a gen xer, so you know, was graduating right around
(03:24):
nineteen ninety. It was interesting the kind of advice I
was getting, and so I started to make safer and
safer decisions. I became a lawyer, which was a super
super safe decision, but came back here to Ohio to
study to be a lawyer, and I've been here in
Central however since, Kelly.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
I'm just curious, because of the business that I'm in,
what kind of advice were you getting about journalism, What
things were begin told to you.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Well, you know, it's funny. When I was doing it,
broadcast journalism was becoming really the popular lane. I had
gone there to be a writer, but broadcast was really
the up and coming thing. And I think, but honestly,
I I wanted to work for Rolling Stone Magazines. That's
what I wanted to do. I love music and I
wanted to write about it. And I think if anybody
had really been listening to me, what I needed to
(04:08):
do was go to New York or one of the
big markets. And I was getting really good grades. I
was in one of the best journalism schools in the
country and pretty much virtually. Now I look back and
realize no one was giving me the advice to chase
those dreams. No matter how well I was doing, everyone
kept trying to put me into a safe lane. And
(04:28):
I think that that's where I didn't realize the gender
norms around women. In nineteen ninety you didn't necessarily tell
a five to two, one hundred pound female to move
to New York on her own, with no family and
chase her dreams. We do that a lot more today,
and I'm really but New York was a little different
place then, and I get it. But I wonder now,
(04:50):
given my drive, my ambition, my grades, if I might
have gotten different advice if I had been a young
person who identify his.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Male Kelly, I'm glad you brought that up, and not
to get all deep, but when you get someone in
front of me, like yourself, who's clearly very accomplished, very successful,
do you ever look back and go, even you someone
like you? What if?
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Yeah? Sure, yeah, yeah, And I mean I think that's
what's made me really fascinated is is you know when
I went to law school, there was fifty percent women
in my class fifty percent men in my class, so
we felt very equal. But by the time I was
working for a very large law firm and I did
indeed make partner. I realized though I was one sixth
of the partnership fifty you know, five six we had
(05:37):
six hundred partners, five hundred of them, wow, identified as male,
one hundred of us identified as female. We were the
first class of one hundred women to make So in
nine years I had gone from being half of my
peers to one sixth of my peers from a gender perspective,
And that tells me that there are things kicking in
(05:57):
as part of our systems that don't allow everyone to
navigate it the same. And if I'm honest, I really
adapted more easily, I think, to the systems that we're
looking for some of those characteristics that are more traditionally male.
Ye you know, I am outgoing, I'm not you know,
(06:19):
there are things about me that I'm not saying are
better but more fit that mold. So I sometimes say
I was really good at being a twenty something male.
I just knew how to do it. And I started
to really look back and wonder what about the women
who don't feel as comfortable acting like that. But I
knew we're just as smart as talented as me. It's
(06:40):
not that anyone was really attempting to intentionally, in many
cases hold us back, but they were looking for things
that are more norms than realities.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Yeah, Kelly, do you feel like and this would have
been the nineties, so do you feel like you had
to push a little harder to get into a door
that maybe was typically reserved for men.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Sure? Well, And the hardest part for someone like me
is also I'm very direct, I'm very see. I like that.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Would I would like to know if you're upset at
me or I could do something better? Absolutely, I like that.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
But it's not expected. I'll be honest, and especially.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
In the world even today.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Yeah yeah, oh, I mean the people. The number one
thing that people often say about me, she's really edgy,
you know, or you know, and I am maybe. But
my point is, I think if we look at the norms,
if I presented as a male, you might see that
as ambitious. For me, it's edgy, you know. And I
(07:41):
do think that that still kicks in. People aren't as
used to people who present as female.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Being that bold so you remind me and my wife.
My wife is exactly like you. But how would you
describe yourself? Do you like being told? Or if someone
were described you and you overhear it, she's edgy?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
Do you like that? Well? I am, But I think
what I want to be is respected for that, yeah, transparency,
and not feared. And I think that because people are
just not as used to seeing women use their voices.
I mean, we do see this play out in our
in our elections, in our in our jobs. There are
(08:22):
not as many female CEOs. It's just these are facts,
and it's because as we make that journey, the words
of my come out of my mouth are very similar
to my colleague who identifies as male. But the norms
tell us women don't usually say that. I'm used, you know,
And and I've raised I've raised a son now who's
to twenty two, and we talk about this a lot
(08:44):
because I think that I see him do things that
I was like, if I had done that, I would
have been treated very differently. And we have a really
open relationship about that because I he's my one child. Yeah,
so he's the only one I got to watch and
I was so I point out to him every so often.
How it's different.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
This is CEOs you should know an iHeartMedia Columbus podcast.
We're here with Kelly Griesmer, who's the president and CEO
of the Women's find of Central Ohio. So what where
was the point, Kelly where you decided, Okay, I'm going
to go to law school. And by the way, not
everyone could just go to law school, So kudos to you, well,
thank you.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I as I said, I really wanted to be a journalist,
but I didn't see the path forward. A lot of
people were giving me very straightforward avice, you know, go
righte obituaries, you know, the Acronbeacon journey. They did not. Yeah, well,
I mean that was the opening job. You know, it's okay,
you know, or go get the job you know, at
the channel and you know, be the be the you know,
two to six am person, right, And I and you
(09:40):
were only going to make probably you know, fifteen thousand
dollars doing it, and I had student loans. I was
really worried about. And this is the thing, women, I
think we try to plan really far in advance, you know,
So I was already trying to make decisions about what
was like to be a thirty year old person when
I was twenty two. Okay again, I think that's a
place where women get slightly different advice. People don't see
(10:04):
us often economically sustaining ourselves in the same way they
think norms have told them that we go find a
bread winner and that's what gets us through. And so
I was already trying to solve all my problems. Well,
what if I don't find that bread winner, I need
to pay these loans. And so law school was not
a regret of mine, but a very safe choice given
(10:25):
grades that I had. I had warrior spirit. I knew
I wanted that to be in journalism, but maybe we'll
do it in law for a while, because that's going
to pay the bills. Why I was making necessarily those
decisions as a twenty two year old is one of
my main questions, because you know, I could have taken
and I love it now. When I see people taking
a gap or trying something else, it doesn't mean But
(10:48):
I thought I would never go back if I didn't
do it then, so I went to law school and
then made the decision. You know, I wanted to be
a public interest lawyer, but I made the decision to
work at a very large law firm. Again, very safe decision.
I also a great opportunity. And I will say that
the best advice I ever got was from the partner
that recruited me to work for that law firm. And
he said, you know, I was going to turn it
(11:09):
down because I said, I'm not going to fit in here.
I swear, I'm bold, I wear red suits. This is
not what this law firm is probably looking for. And
he said, I think you're going to do great. Get
out of your own way, take the job for two years.
What's the worst that happened?
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (11:28):
And that's not advice that women get very often.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
No, No, you're you're right. Kelly griesmur Is with his
president and CEO of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio,
will speed this up a little bit because I want
to focus obviously on the on the Women's Fund. So
you find yourself at Ohio State, you're a buck eye,
you graduate a little bit more about this this firm
that you you go with, what kind of law diage
practice it was?
Speaker 2 (11:52):
It was a very large law firm, a national third
largest law firm in the world at the time that
I was practicing there probably still there. I mean, I'm
sure they're they're that large and that impactful because I
still have a lot of colleagues that work there. I
had a great experience, but I was a bankruptcy litigator
a lot of my career, which meant that when very
large companies, often retailers, went into bankruptcy, I was one
(12:13):
of the quote unquote gunslingers who would go in and
try to settle or work through all the litigation that
comes up when when a company does wowization.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
So, Kelly, you're the great negotiator, then I had to be.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
But but what I often had to be was the
person who wasn't afraid to stop on a dime and
go taked up. As it was very fast paced compared
to a lot of law that you see on TV.
Sure you know, there's a lot of people that need
money or running out of money, and you have to
get in and just start asking the questions, having the hearings,
representing the clients, talking to the creditors. So it was
(12:49):
very it was a very interesting. I always say it
was the closest I could come to doing public interest
work in a large law firm because I was representing
debtors and quite often trying to save the assets of
the company. Sure, especially for the people who probably worked
there many many years.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Hey, Kelly, not and not to throw you curveball, but
I just out of curiosity. There's all sorts of lawyers,
and I realized not everyone can do litigation either. But
is there a show on TV or on a streaming
platform that is this close to what a lawyer does
that you could watch and go, oh, yeah, that's pretty real,
that's close.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
You know, that's a great question. I think all of
them are good. I'm trying to think. I mean, I
was always a huge fan of LA.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Law about Yeah, yeah, that's a good one.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
I think, you know, I haven't watched suits, but everybody
tells me it's amazing. And although I will say, you
just can't practice if you haven't gone to law school,
I mean, you know, that's the part of it. That's
why I can't watch it. I'm like, that's not a thing.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Yeah, yeah, Well, moving forward, there was a point Kelly
where you decided, Okay, I've done my share of practicing law.
I'm ready to move on. What happened there, Well, I think.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
I'd been a partner about six years and law firm.
I had great colleagues, I had succeeded, but as I said,
I also could see that women were not succeeding at
the same rates. I was already involved with the Women's
Fund for several years at that point as a board member,
and I just thought, you know, look, you always wanted
(14:18):
to do. You just have this moment. I was just
about forty years old, and I thought, this is not
at all the road I was on. Yeah, I wanted
to be a journalist. I wanted to work for Rolling Stone.
I wanted to have these these experiences. And I'm really
far now and I've made a lot of good decisions.
I've learned a lot about myself. I love I loved
(14:38):
the legal work I was doing with the people I
was doing it with, but it was not who I
was supposed to be. I just knew it, and so
I started kind of saying that out loud and looking
and my gut was that I would probably end up
at a nonprofit. But that's quite frankly, when I got
like the gift of a lifetime because of the nonprofit
that happened to me starting opening at the time, which
(14:59):
was Peloton.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
How cool is that to see how successful Pelotonia has become.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
You know, it's it's one of those things where it's
almost hard to talk about without getting emotional, but it's, uh,
it's you can't explain it. You know. It was such
a huge risk for all of us that did it
at the time. You know, I left a major law
firm to be their director of operations, the CEO. Tom
Lennox left a major job in finance to to be
(15:28):
the CEO. But he had survived cancer and he was
one of my best friends, and he needed someone to be,
you know, his partner in crime and who would be
able to do the details because there was a lot
of permits, and there was a lot of organization and
a lot of contracts and insurance. And so I did it.
But and we had funding to do it, which was
the gift because each of us could take that leap,
(15:51):
and three more brave people, all very young, took that
leap that first year to pull it together.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Kelly, that just gave me goosebumps because here how Pelotona
was built, I just think is incredible because it's such
a machine now years later, and of course is raised
hundreds of millions of dollars for the James Cancer Center.
But those early days, what were they like trying to
(16:16):
piece everything together and in unchartered waters too.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Yeah, it was terrifying. It was absolutely terrifying, exhilarating, the best,
most fun seven and a half years I've ever had.
I knew that the experience was starting something from scratch,
and literally we didn't have desks or even barely computers
when we walked into the space. Tom very much had
a vision and the board members had a vision, and
we did have funding. And that is people ask a
(16:42):
lot about secret sauce, and with nonprofits, that's the thing
that most nonprofits don't have, is that someone we'd seen
the model at work in Boston. Okay, a lot of
people didn't believe it would work here in Columbus, if
I'm honest. They thought, well, we're not Boston. There's so
much more wealth there. Not true, there's so much there's
different people there. Not true. You have you can't get
(17:02):
people to fundraise, not true. But getting people over that
hump in those first few months was not easy. I
mean we were hand to hand going to lunch at
every company, taking free pizzas and saying please please, we
went into every meeting, we need one three people to
say they'll ride, because we know they'll get more. And
what we also knew is that we had to have
the absolute best first weekend of that event that we
(17:25):
could possibly imagine. That we had to fix everything because
that experience was going to change how people saw it
for the future. And so it was the greatest I
always say. When the first ride left, I turned around
and I literally almost puked because I was like, we're
going now, and it's going one hundred miles away from
me and coming eighty miles back, and I got to
figure out what's going to happen over the next two days.
(17:48):
But we I think delivered on giving people that experience
that they felt the power of each other. Yeah, no matter.
You know, we didn't have coffee on Sunday morning. You know,
we were are goan to grabbing people's bags off the
wrong trucks and running them around. I mean, I've never
sweat so much in my entire life. But we got
it right enough that people felt the power of it,
(18:10):
so then they wanted to come back.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Kelly, this is amazing. I didn't expect to hear that.
The stories of early Peloton Yeah, I just think that's
so cool, these building blocks. What was logistically actually before
I asked that, what companies said, yes, first.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Ah, well, nut Jets was the first funder. Okay, they
were the ones that originally had the vision because of
some philanthropic dollars they had available, so they came in
very strong. They were the only funder of the first year.
A lot of people don't remember that. Then, what I
would say is that, you know, what you might expect
is L Brands and Huntington and many of the companies
(18:49):
that have been the juggernauts AEP nationwide. They all were involved,
but they did start with polotons of three or five people.
Like it wasn't that we had that first year two
hundred people. We would have five, maybe ten from me
to those places. Netche's probably had the most. I don't
(19:11):
really recall, but I mean we were their signature fundraiser
at the time, and so they had more, but again
not hundreds. We had twenty five hundred riders twenty five
hundred and fifty six if I think riders. The first year.
We had to get twenty five hundred for our pro
forma and a thousand of them registered in July and
the riders in August.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
So wow, that's.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
The momentum we had to build. Yeah, we did it
nine months from October to August.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Kelly, Kelly Griesmer is with this president and CEO of
the Women's Fund of Central Ohio. Kelly back in those days,
and maybe it's changed now, but back when you were starting,
it was what was the most difficult logistical thing to
get together with Pelotonia.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
Well, you had to have a route. And I don't
ride bikes normally, and people laugh about that. I'm not
a bike rider. I'm a lawyer. So and Tom said
to me, you know, we would go drive and try
to figure it out.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
I was wondering that.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Yeah, yeah, and we And of course you go start
talking to cyclists that had done that ride. I mean,
there's many many accomplished cyclists in Central Ohio. The problem is,
though Pelotonia is not about cycling. Pelatonia is about curing cancer. Yeah,
so you had to hear from the cyclist what works.
But what they might enjoy doing, the gravel they might enjoy,
riding on the hills they may enjoy, are not what
(20:26):
a cancer survivor or their family necessarily wants. To do. Sure,
So we did hire a company called Cadence that they
still work with, Caden's Sports that they still work to
this day. And they came in and helped me chip
out that for how Tom and I chip out that
first route and where, and then more importantly, where you
put the officers. Yeah, put the signage. My dad and
my husband went out and put signs in the ground
(20:48):
the first year for about twenty four hours beforehand, with
the team that knew what they were doing, but they
were they were the grit and the hard sweat.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
Yeah, such a treat to hear about the early days.
And we're going to get some more of the women's fund.
Just one more question. One of the special things about
Pelotonia is the fact that we have such a great
backing of company headquarters here who take care of the
administration costs. Was it like that the first year.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, that's the key. You couldn't do what you were doing,
so nut Jets underwrote that first year. Some things about
their philanthropy changed after that first year, and that's where
Pelotonia it was a little panic moment because we had
raised four point five million dollars based on a two
and a half million dollar investment, so we had already
started to show that rate of return on investment. Our
(21:36):
goal was to raise, you know, by that fifth year,
we were raising you know, closer to fifteen million year.
It was very fast growth, all based upon a pro
forma that worked. But those companies if they had not
come in, especially the companies that came in year two
to help fill some of the gaps that were left
when net Jets changed their strategy, we would not You
(21:59):
had to underwrite the ride, the experience with the understanding
that when you underwrite that weekend and the staff that
worked year round, a lot of people are like, are
you volunteering or you work part time. I'm like, oh no,
we work year round to do this. We need We
had a very small staff at the time and a
lot of a lot of police officers to pay, and
(22:20):
a lot of food to buy, safety measures and those
sorts of things. And then if they had not underwritten that,
you couldn't return the investment or you couldn't get the
return you did. Because that's what the ride is, the
celebration of what people have done. They fundraise four months
to have that celebration and then do it all over
again and you have to be able to produce it.
(22:41):
So it's but it is a symbiotic relationship for sure.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
So inspiring Kelly. From there, what after seven years you decide, Okay,
what's next. It's hard to move on. And that's where
you found the Columbus Foundation, right.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Correct, correct, So yeah, I'd love that grassroots experience. I'd
done it for seven a half years. They had a
great leadership Doug Aleman when he came in and I
was I was the CEO. So yeah, I went to
the Columbus Foundation to do special projects, do grad grassroots
represent some of the private foundations that are affiliated, help
them with their philanthropy, and also do things like the
(23:15):
Big Table.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
And the oh yeah, yeah, I love the Big Give.
Speaker 2 (23:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:19):
It's a popular one.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Yeah, and that had been existing for a long time.
I was just there to be the juice to kind
of help get more of the community involved because that
was my that was had been my experience for the
seven years.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
So that's one of my favorite things that they do,
is the Big Give. Of course.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Yeah, it's the same vibe right the community. That's that's
the moment of reaching out to the community and showing
them their power over the things that they want to
make better.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
So tell us about the transition then to the Women's Fund.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Yeah. So, as I said, I'd been on the board
of the Women's Fund for about ten years. I chaired
it at the end of that time. That ended while
I was at Politania, and so just by chance, the
CEO who had been running it so well before I came,
decided she had a new opportunity, and so they reached
(24:06):
out to me. And at first, you know, it's hard
to again to decide you're going to work for something
you love so much, because there's a lot of fear
about whether you'll mess it up. But that role, the
role of CEO opened and I was lucky to be
hired to become the next CEO of the organization. But
(24:27):
that was twenty nineteen, so it turned out to be
kind of an interesting time to take over.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
So, and you're so ambitious, and tell us about some
of the accomplishments of the Women's Fund right now? What
you do?
Speaker 2 (24:38):
Yeah, so we do three things as a public foundation. People,
you know again kind of wonder what we do. We
have to raise the money, so we, unlike most of
the other foundations in the world, that you've the Gates Foundation,
which is the private foundation, or any communicy foundation like
the Columbus Foundation. You know, they historically are a place
that investment philanthropic investments for people, manages them. Then there's
(25:03):
financial models to that, right, there's interests, there's things that
you work from. We, as you heard earlier in the story,
had a very small nest egg, which was real women
putting in, you know, five thousand dollars at a time.
So we didn't start with the large nest egg, if
you will, that a lot of foundations start with. But
we have to build it the same, right, So we
have to have an endowment. They were very thoughtful about
(25:25):
having an endowment, but it takes a long time for
that endowment to start to kick off the kind of
money that can actually help you. So you have to
manage that thoughtfully and just kind of look at it
for a while. And then in the meantime, if you
want to be making grants and doing the things we do,
which is research, grant making and advocacy, you have to
find the money then to do that and have a staff.
And at a women's fund, it has to be a
place where often a lot of women work and they
(25:47):
have to be able to accumulate wealth while they're there,
because it's our mission to make sure that women have
you know, can break down barriers. And so that means
we have to be able to pay people and they
have to have benefits.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
And yeah, so.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
We we base raise that money, manage that money so
that we can do research that makes women visible in
the community. Quite often, because of norms, women just aren't
studied as much. And when we opened, one of the
first things they found is that they just wasn't data
about women economically. There wasn't data because often when they
got married, it's very hard to even disaggregate their wealth
(26:19):
or you know, unless they were no longer married and
then you could see what happened. But so we needed
to do We've done five research projects, we're in the
middle of our sixth making women visible their lived experiences
and also what the barriers and accelerators to their to
their thriving their success are. Then we also make grants,
the part that people know the best. We have a
(26:40):
huge grant making We've since the year we opened, we
have made grants. We've made now over five million dollars
in grants. We've raised on our own about twenty thousand apiece,
although we have some a few other programs that are
going now that are slightly larger grants, but those are
to invest in those women that are leading from their
own lived experiences philanthropically. Less than a penny goes to
(27:05):
women's philanthropy focused on women, and it's our job to
try to fix that. Yeah, and I'll be honest, it's
it's one of the most frustrating things, right because I
just you just you can't you can't imagine how many
women running nonprofits in the city right now still aren't
making a salary. They do it as a hobby, right,
of course it's not a hobby, but they are working
(27:27):
another job during the day and running their program at night.
And it's and it's some of the most groundbreaking work
we have going on the community. So we have to
fund that work and that's what we do. And then
the last thing, when we say advocacy, it makes people
nervous because they know we're a five, one C three
and what it means is that we engage. We have
a program called Gender by Us where we go out
to companies and we talk to all people. As I said,
it's collective power and passion of all people. And when
(27:47):
we know is that people who identify as male are
also suffering from gender norms. I've watched this with my
own son, right, and we know gender norms aren't good
for anyone because we're all much more nuanced and people
than than what what people decided centuries ago. We are
in Greek literature, and it's gone ever since Greek. You know,
I always blame those gods for starting all this, But
(28:08):
the long and short of it is we try to
advocate to people that we didn't start the systems, We
didn't create the barriers. The people sitting on this planet
right now did not do that, but we are accountable
for changing it, for seeing each other and being different,
and so we try to work with people vulnerably on that.
We try to help people understand that policies like paid
leave and equal pay and all that actually our economic
development levers for our entire community. They're not just ways
(28:32):
to prop up women. They are things that will actually
improve the economic base for everyone. And so that's the
kind of advocacy we do. It's not about who to
elect or we don't do that work because we're five
one and C three, but we do talk about the issues.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
Kelly, what kind of do you do any events to
raise money? How are you raising money?
Speaker 2 (28:54):
Yeah, so we have a very large event called Keyholder.
It's almost twenty years old. We've had we have speakers,
major speakers come. We've had you know, Melissa Ethridge whooping,
Gloria Stein, you know, Billy Jean King, Amazing people come
to speak. As time goes, that's a harder raised way
to raise money because they those people become more and
(29:18):
more expensive. But we just this past year we had
Joy Harjoe, who is Native American woman, the first Poet
Laureate of the United States. Really accomplished women that not
only are amazing in their talents, but amazing in the
way that they approach women and the empowerment of women.
And so we do that every spring. It is a
(29:39):
ticketed event. We do it at a major theater, and
we raise funds that way. And then of course we
have a huge individual donor base. We apply for grants,
we do all kinds of things to raise money.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Kelly, how far have we come in society when it
comes to, you know, an equal level with women, women
and getting respect from I don't know, maybe maybe even
a decade ago, twenty years ago, maybe.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
We've come a long way. I'm not here to ever say,
you know, it's it's gloom and doom. It's not, and
I'll be honest. You watch the Olympics, and you know,
it was a very emotional thing to watch women comfortable
enough to lift other women, to watch men comfortable enough
to wear them on their shirts and go to the
you know, you know, Flames one of my favorite people
(30:26):
right now, exactly. But I think that on the other hand,
it's the nuances, the things that you know, when we
do gender by us. You know what one gentleman who
was an attorney said was, you know, I just assume
once women have children that I that I shouldn't offer
them any of the cases where they'll need to travel.
You know, I'm trying to be a good boss, and
(30:46):
I want to be I'm empathetic to them, and they
have all these kids and we need to you know,
so they probably shouldn't try. I should probably find that's
not your decision to make.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Now.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
He was being this is the vulnerability we need, right
because he wasn't going in the room saying how can
I hold her back? How can I keep her from
her part? But the decision he was making to protect
her to he wasn't asking her. He doesn't know if
she has a great support system. I mean, this is
what he would tell me. He wasn't thinking about the
fact she may she may be the only breadwinner in
her family. You know, her or her husband may not
(31:17):
have a job that would sustain them, and so by
not getting they may be ready to manage that the
way they want to manage it. Right. But because his
experience had been that his mother operated a certain way
maybe or his sister operated a certain way. What he
had seen in his life, he had decided how he
was going to then help all of his employees. Those
are the things we have to unearth, and they're in
(31:39):
the system. And I can say that that's one of
the hardest things for law firms, based upon my experiences,
they're built on mostly people identify as male started those firms.
I mean, if you talk look at Ruth Bader Grinsburg,
she was we couldn't even get hired, you know at
some of these law firms after going to Harvard. When
she went to Harvard, they asked her what she was
doing there, you know, why was she taking the space
(32:01):
of another young man? So firms that law firms. If
you look at it, most of them will out they've
been around for hundreds of years. Yeah, that means that
the people who started it, the start of the systems,
the start of the benefit systems, the start of the
vacation policies, are mostly people that maybe have that tunnel
vision about what the experience is and how they should
help other people. So it's hard to unearth all that
(32:25):
and vulnerably say you weren't trying to hurt anybody, But
we need to change that now because you've got really
bright women that you want to succeed, and they may
have a child because their bodies can do that, and
their families may want them to do that. Right, it's
not something you've ever experienced, So don't try to figure
out how to get them to next. Ask them.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
It's so interesting you bring this up, Kelly as we
start to wrap up here, because I grew up on
a farm and my surroundings were you know, mom and
other moms. They help stay back, get the kids, you know,
do the typical stuff, you know, cook and clean and
everything while dad was out you know, in the in
the fields and fixing things. And I get married and
(33:06):
I feel like I learned a lot more about women.
But it wasn't until I had my own daughter. And
she's three, so we got a long waist to go.
But I've it's like every I'm hearing you talk about
what's going on, and then I think about my own daughter.
It's opened up a whole new door that I never
thought about before. And I only want like other women,
(33:27):
I only want the best for them and my daughter.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
So what's that vulnerability? It really is that vulnerability that matters.
And what I would say is I look back based
upon my experience in how I succeeded, and there's certainly
advice I gave to young women attorneys at the time
that probably could have been better, right, because I had
tunnel vision about how I'd succeeded. And so it's this
vulnerability of saying we didn't create the systems. Very early
(33:52):
in our lives, we start to accept the pattern of
what it looks like to be this or that. Yeah,
and it's really he takes a vulnerable moment to interrupt
that and say, hey, wait, I really want her to succeed.
You know that advice that I told you I got
from that attorney's because I think he looked at me
as a young attorney and just was like, I need
that person right now. He wasn't trying to figure out
(34:14):
who I was going to be, and I'm not even
trying to put on him that he knew how to
advise me to be a person who was a mother. Yeah,
but he saw me at that moment as just an attorney.
And if more of us could step out and not
worry about who's who, you know, how am I going
to prepare this person for what the pattern tells me
they should do and just prepare them for the moment
(34:35):
that they're in. Well, people will do things that you
don't expect.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
This has been such an amazing conversation Kelly Kelly, for
those that are listening and including myself. I'd like to
get more involved with the Women's Fund. What can we do?
Where can we go?
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Yeah? I mean, you know, and so this is the
this is the thing, as I said, and it sounds
really crazy, but I'm like, the number one volunteer thing
you can do to start to get involved is make
it donation. We need donations of all sizes and this
is very much the roots that I had in Pelotonia
as well. We're the same thing. Pelotonia and the Women's
Fund are both public foundations. What it requires is the
(35:11):
public to see that and say, you know what, I
got an extra twenty bucks or I got an extra
hundred bucks. I'm going to throw it in the pot
because we are the collective power and passion of all
people working together. So now that means somebody who's got
a million dollars, I need that too. But people always
underestimate the power of a donation. They're like, I'm so busy,
I really want to volunteer. You know, we have grant
reading this fall. We review our grants. For the grants
(35:33):
that we make, we invite at least three hundred grant
readers to come to the library with us to review
a set of three to five grants and to give
us their feedback. Because if we don't have the lived
experiences of the community telling us how are these grants
will create change, we won't get it right. I have
a team of five, we have biases, we have lived
(35:53):
experiences that would inform what I think is best. As
I just described, I need everyone's opinion. So if and
that involves people as female, people identify as male, all races,
all backgrounds. We invite them to come and review those
grants with us. So that's a huge opportunity. It's one
time a year, so that's the hardest part, you know,
it's not that we do it several times. So if
you but it is an October grant reading application is
(36:15):
open right now through August thirtieth, So if people you
have to apply just so that we get a bead
on who all is going to be there right and
how that demographically breaks out so that we can make
those grant readers happen. You can come to our Keyholder event.
We love that in the spring. It's huge. The more
people there, the more money for our mission. You may
just be coming because you love the speaker. You may
be coming because you love gender equity issues. We hope
(36:37):
it's both, but coming to that event is a big deal.
We have a research project happening right now that is
looking at women's wealth. We have a survey out there
that can that people can fill out. We have focus
groups that we're doing that that some people are a
lot of people in the community are participating in. And
we have a story core project where you can actually
go to a link right now through our website and
(37:00):
and record your stories. It's for people identify as women
to talk about wealth barriers or accelerators that they've experienced
in their life. It's going to be very helpful to
our research project, and it's also going to be archived
with the Library of Congress so that we build up
that's great, a treasury of women's lived experiences, which quite frankly,
we don't have enough of those right now.
Speaker 1 (37:20):
There completely agree. What's your website, by.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
The way, it is. It's about the longest you could
ever imagine, but it is www. Women's Fund, Central Ohio
dot org.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
That's easy to remember, though. Hi, Kelly Griesmour, President CEO
of the Women's Fund of Central Ohio. Such a real
pleasure to finally meet you. This has been a great conversation.
Congrats on all your success and thank you so much
for being a driving force in Central Ohio.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
Thank you so much for this opportunity. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
CEOs You Should Know is hosted and produced by Brandon Boxer,
a production of iHeartMedia. Columbus
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Decisions, Decisions
Welcome to "Decisions, Decisions," the podcast where boundaries are pushed, and conversations get candid! Join your favorite hosts, Mandii B and WeezyWTF, as they dive deep into the world of non-traditional relationships and explore the often-taboo topics surrounding dating, sex, and love. Every Monday, Mandii and Weezy invite you to unlearn the outdated narratives dictated by traditional patriarchal norms. With a blend of humor, vulnerability, and authenticity, they share their personal journeys navigating their 30s, tackling the complexities of modern relationships, and engaging in thought-provoking discussions that challenge societal expectations. From groundbreaking interviews with diverse guests to relatable stories that resonate with your experiences, "Decisions, Decisions" is your go-to source for open dialogue about what it truly means to love and connect in today's world. Get ready to reshape your understanding of relationships and embrace the freedom of authentic connections—tune in and join the conversation!