We give them an opportunity every day to be able to meet

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We do a reflective practice every morning, that anchors people. Certainly, people come to work sometimes with things that are on their mind that might be happening in their personal lives. And so we feel the really strong need to acknowledge that. So every morning we have a meeting that kind of anchors people around the reflective practice, and then we go into the business items of the day. And that's Email List covering what sales we have gotten in either from our online store or from a corporate partner. We talk about where we need to distribute, where there any particular stores and our major grocery store partner that needed to have shelves restocked. We talk about inventory and actually looking at what needs to be made in terms of production for the day. So after we do kind of our reflective practice we really dig into sort of those business aspects of what needs to happen from operations and production standpoint. Sweet Beginnings' employees working on the last few steps of production.

Employees of Sweet Beginnings get to be a part of the whole process from beekeeping to packing of each product. Sweet Beginnings The team in the first month are learning the ropes of how we function, then as we move into the second month, we start to lay out more expectations around being a contributor. Looking to see where there are opportunities for someone to lead on the production line, looking for opportunities to someone to take the lead and sales. So that second month we're really focused on even getting people our team out there into the community and selling and building up their comfort level for that. The third month that they're here is all about giving them that confidence that they can actually go out and start looking for a job on their own. So in the last month, the very last two weeks, we continue to engage with North Lawndale Employment Network and send our clients back there to participate in something called Job Club.



And the Job Club is where they are working on their resume. They're working on their interviewing skills. So they're continuing all throughout the time they're here at Sweet Beginnings, but they're really ramping it up that last two weeks here at Sweet Beginnings because they're going to have to move on and find work on their own. Felix: What’s involved for individuals who want to start a social enterprise similar to Sweet Beginnings? Daphne: We get inquiries all the time around, how to start a social enterprise? And we have an interest in doing this for a similar population of people. So that's something that we've been able to provide some advice and counsel to other people in other parts of the country around that. We encourage people to find ways that they can engage any population, whether it be youth or formerly incarcerated to have a social enterprise around that and give them the opportunity to work and establish a work history. Felix: When people ask why someone should hire from youth and formerly incarcerated populations, what is the point of view you share? Daphne: I would say that it's a confidence builder for our team. So many of our men and women that come into Sweet Beginnings, they've really lost a sense of their self-worth. And we're giving them an opportunity to start over.