All For Business

As we all know mental health is often intricately tied together with our working lives. Stress, conflict, poor environments, and relationships all impact our mental health and whether we can feel at the top of our ability and happy. Since May is Mental Health Awareness Month, we'll be diving in with local leaders and experts on mental health and what we can be doing to ensure both employees and employers are aware of the importance of mental health in our daily lives. 

Laura is the founding Executive Director of Lynchburg Beacon of Hope. 

As the idea for Beacon of Hope originated, she came on board to help build the model. She was tasked with building the structure, focus, and 501(c)3 organization status of Beacon of Hope. She naturally merged into the Executive Director as Beacon of Hope launched our Future Centers in 2012. 

Laura spent decades in public policy work, both in Lynchburg and the District of Columbia. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Public Policy from the College of William and Mary and her Master’s degree in Public Policy (MPP) from Georgetown University in Washington, DC.  Laura served the Clinton Administration as a budget and policy liaison for the DC Budget and the Defense and Energy policy at the Office of Management and Budget.  She also worked as Development Director for Discovery Creek Children’s Museum/The Children’s Museum of Washington.  In addition, her strength in recent years has been cultivating the public/nonprofit partnership that has evolved between Lynchburg City Schools and the Beacon of Hope, including a strategic vision for the first Promise Program in Virginia.

In 2008, Laura was named as the top 20 change-makers in Lynchburg under the age of 40.  She’s a visual-rated private pilot and drives a 40-foot RV.

On this episode of All For Business, Anna Bentson, Assistant Director of Economic Development for the City of Lynchburg, joins Jamie Glass, Director of Economic Development at the Alliance, to discuss the City of Lynchburg's exciting new brand campaign: "LYH Loves You". 

The new place brand strategy for the Office of Economic Development is the next step in the implementation of the Blueprint for Opportunity, the five-year economic development and tourism strategic action plan launched in 2018. The Blueprint strategy is built upon five goals:

The concept behind LYH Loves You revolves around the citizens, businesses and organizations of Lynchburg—and their stories. From print to social to organic promotion, the campaign will be a central rallying cry, one platform with spokes that reach residents, talent, businesses and visitors alike.

The campaign showcases Lynchburg’s brightest, kindest and most creative and hard-working communities through ambassadors – featuring the business owners and citizens who are doing this work every day – revealing the character of the city, the inclusive nature of our people, and our outsized ambitions.

All For Business is back for our second season! We're excited to kick it off with another "Around The Table" mini-series with Leadership Lynchburg in honor of Black History Month. Leadership Lynchburg believes that creating opportunities for healthy conversation builds awareness, trust and ultimately relationship. Relationships can create productive action and relationships enable you to "go there" on difficult topics trusting that the benefit is greater awareness and mutual understanding. In short, relationship create community. We aim to inspire leaders and educate allies and potential allies so they can create tangible actions within their respective spheres of influence. So, it’s February, Black History Month and we thought it would be great to feature some of our local friends who can speak to their work for the black community. We’re uniting these podcasts under the theme of "Tell me what I need to know . . ."

Our final two guests are Donise Farmer and Justin Mercer. Donise serves as the Diversity and Inclusion Specialist at Genworth and Justin is an RPO Recruiter at Aya Healthcare.

All For Business is back for our second season! We're excited to kick it off with another "Around The Table" mini-series with Leadership Lynchburg in honor of Black History Month. Leadership Lynchburg believes that creating opportunities for healthy conversation builds awareness, trust and ultimately relationship. Relationships can create productive action and relationships enable you to "go there" on difficult topics trusting that the benefit is greater awareness and mutual understanding. In short, relationship create community. We aim to inspire leaders and educate allies and potential allies so they can create tangible actions within their respective spheres of influence. So, it’s February, Black History Month and we thought it would be great to feature some of our local friends who can speak to their work for the black community. We’re uniting these podcasts under the theme of "Tell me what I need to know . . ."

Our fourth guest is John H. Hughes, IV. Mr. Hughes was appointed as Assistant City Manager for the City of Lynchburg in December 2016. He previously served the City as the Children’s Services Act (CSA) Coordinator in Human Services from 2007-2016, as a Foster Care Social Worker from 2004-2007, and as a Youth Care Worker at the Lynchburg Regional Juvenile Detention Home from 1998-2000.

A native of Lynchburg, Mr. Hughes has earned an A.A.S. in General Studies from CVCC, as well as a B.S. in Social Science, a B.S. in Business Administration, and an M.B.A., all from Lynchburg College. Mr. Hughes received the Lynchburg College Distinguished Alumni Award in 2013 and is currently pursuing the Doctor of Education Degree in Leadership Studies at Lynchburg College with a focus on local government leadership and the phenomenon of gentrification.

Mr. Hughes is a member of the Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc., the Phi Alpha Theta National History Honor Society, serves on the City’s Community Policing Advisory Committee, and is active with professional organizations including the Virginia Local Government Management Association and the International City/County Management Association. He previously served on nonprofit boards in the City of Lynchburg including Mary Bethune Academy, Hill City Youth Football and Cheerleading, and The Festival Center, and currently serves as a Board member for the Old City Cemetery and Virginia Center for Inclusive Communities (VCIC).

Mr. Hughes most enjoys the pleasures of fatherhood, music, history, recreation, and opportunities for transformational leadership.

All For Business is back for our second season! We're excited to kick it off with another "Around The Table" mini-series with Leadership Lynchburg in honor of Black History Month. Leadership Lynchburg believes that creating opportunities for healthy conversation builds awareness, trust and ultimately relationship. Relationships can create productive action and relationships enable you to "go there" on difficult topics trusting that the benefit is greater awareness and mutual understanding. In short, relationship create community.   We aim to inspire leaders and educate allies and potential allies so they can create tangible actions within their respective spheres of influence.   So, it’s February, Black History Month and we thought it would be great to feature some of our local friends who can speak to their work for the black community. We’re uniting these podcasts under the theme of "Tell me what I need to know . . ." 

Our third guest is Stephanie Andrews, CEO of YWCA of Central Virginia! Stephanie formerly served at Lynchburg City Schools, where she worked in Grant Management, State Reporting, and Record Maintenance. She previously worked with Centra, Horizon Behavioral Health, and Genworth Financial. She is an upstanding member of the community and a champion volunteer for over 20 years. She is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated®, Gamma Iota Omega Chapter, a Beacon Buddy with Beacon of Hope, a member of the Lynchburg Junior League, a member of the Coalition for HIV Awareness and Prevention (CHAP), and has served on the Lynchburg Regional Business Alliance Leadership Council among many other engagements in the Lynchburg region community.

All For Business is back for our second season! We're excited to kick it off with another "Around The Table" mini-series with Leadership Lynchburg in honor of Black History Month.

Leadership Lynchburg believes that creating opportunities for healthy conversation builds awareness, trust and ultimately relationship. Relationships can create productive action and relationships enable you to "go there" on difficult topics trusting that the benefit is greater awareness and mutual understanding. In short, relationship create community.  

We aim to inspire leaders and educate allies and potential allies so they can create tangible actions within their respective spheres of influence.  

So, it’s February, Black History Month and we thought it would be great to feature some of our local friends who can speak to their work for the black community. We’re uniting these podcasts under the theme of "Tell me what I need to know . . ."

Our first guest is no stranger to All For Business podcast! Gloria Witt is the owner of Define Success Coaching & Consulting and serves on the board of directors of the Lynchburg Regional Business Alliance as well as with the NAACP. Welcome back Gloria!

On this week's episode of All For Business, Carroll Moon, Chief Technology Officer of CloudFit, speaks on his journey from Lynchburg native to 17 years at Microsoft, to helping found CloudFit, a rapidly growing IT and digital transformation company started right here at the Alliance. 

About Carroll Moon

Carroll has over 25 years of experience in the IT industry. As the Chief Technology Officer for CloudFit, Carroll works to solve CloudOps and DevOps scenarios for the industry through managed scenarios and managed services delivered from a posture of extreme accountability.  Carroll leads a series of Product Groups that deliver managed scenarios, managed applications, and niche consulting for customers and partners.

Prior to CloudFit, Carroll spent 17 ½ years at Microsoft. During his tenure at Microsoft, Carroll spent 10 years as the Senior Director of Service Management for Office 365 from the first customer forward. In that role, Carroll led the engineering team for internal monitoring, tooling, and analytics; led the engineering team for the customer-facing Service Management stack (e.g., admin dashboards, admin apps, APIs, etc.); and built and ran global, automated operations. Carroll then spent four years as a Senior Architect transforming a legacy ITIL consulting practice into a CloudOps and DevOps enablement vehicle for the world’s largest enterprises.

Carroll lives in his hometown of Lynchburg, Virginia with his wife of 20 years (Carolyn), two children (Emily and Jeb), and rescue-dog (Pip).