Who is Darryl Grant?

Darryl Grant is a New York native, born in Harlem. He has 20 siblings and is uncle to over 50 nieces and nephews. He has been a Bay Area resident for the last 4.5 years and enjoys family time with his wife and 2.5 year old son, supporting his clients' needs, sports (former Div-I Greco-Roman wrestler), reading, traveling, cooking, and supporting diversity and inclusion.

Darryl is Managing Director of Merrill Corporation and Founder of Inspiring Connectivity. He has over 19 years of financial communication experience with the top three financial printers. Darryl began as a Customer Service Project Coordinator in Manhattan and later assumed various managerial roles and engineered XBRL operations for two Manhattan offices. Before assuming his role as Managing Director of Sales where he co-leads Merrill's Bay Area Capital Markets team, Darryl spent 6 years as a Capital Markets Account Manager leading teams and working directly with C-level execs, law firms, corporate finance and legal departments to manage IPOs, mergers, spin-offs along with all routine SEC filing requirements. He has also managed three of the largest mergers in stock market history and over 20 prominent IPO's in industries ranging from Tech, e-commerce, transportation, motion pictures, Biotech, retail and broker exchange services.

Show Highlights

• Darryl starts off by talking about the event he puts on with his team called Inspiring Connectivity and why he, as a man, is putting on an event for women.
• Darryl talks about growing up in New York and about his mom who noticed a trend where children were being left behind. This led her to adopting 18 children and raising a total of 21 of which Darryl was one of those adopted by her.

• Darryl shares how he worked with a coach who taught him that because he was having trouble with who he was, he was having trouble coming across authentically.
• Darryl was inspired to create an event for women because of the 2016 elections, the issues women were facing that were coming to light, and a conversation with a friend who fully supported him creating the event. He was inspired by what his mother created around community.
• Terri comments on how important it is for Darryl to set the example for other men to create these kinds of events to support the change for women in society. This is a human issue; not a women's issue.
• Darryl observes that solving problems begins with community.
• Terri talks about her experience at Inspired Connectivity with Barbara Tien and how Barbara introduced her to the other women at the event. This made Terri realize that she is having an impact even though she doesn't always see it.

• Terri commented that a lot of founders don't take the time to get to know her and how important it is to be seen as a person and not just as a checkbook.
• Terri asked Darryl about tribalism in a global community and he responds with the importance of connecting and community.
• Darryl talks about the importance of getting out of your own head when designing an event and thinking about what the guests are going to want.
• Terri asks Darryl if people give him a hard time for not focusing on women of color or people of color and he says that for the most part, no.
• Darryl talks about breaking down the platform, the panel, the awards and focus on the people at events.

• If Darryl could wave a magic wand, he would use it to genuinely connect people without bias.

Terri's Key Takeaway

Creating and building connections and community will be the key to solving our societal issues.

References in the Podcast

• Inspiring Connectivity: https://inspiringconnectivity.splashthat.com/
• Merrill Corporation: https://www.merrillcorp.com/en/
• Barbara Tien (Ponga): https://www.linkedin.com/in/barbaratien/

• Vanessa Grant: Instagram: @beautysecretary

Contact

Darryl can be reached through LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/darryl-grant/.

You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium: https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead.

Feel free to email Terri at [email protected].

To continue the conversation, go to Twitter at @PilotingLife and use hashtag #PilotingYourLife.