08:00 AM • 03/10/16
Young Ones to Watch: Jennifer Kushell
Jennifer Kushell is on a mission to ensure that no young person lacks access to the opportunity to achieve their full potential.
BY: CHAD COHEN
VP of 1851
Jennifer Kushell is the founder and CEO of Young & Successful Media and YSN.com (Your Success Now), which supports the cause of economic empowerment among young adults and entrepreneurs in more than 100 countries. As a relentless advocate for the emerging workforce, Kushell has traveled two million miles and visited 50 countries, impacting the lives and futures of millions of people. Her personal missions and career are dedicated to ensuring no young person anywhere in the world lacks access to the opportunity to achieve their full potential. For that reason, Kushell is truly a force to be reckoned with in the world of business and franchising.
Why do you love franchising?
One word: opportunity. Franchising is the most beautiful business model because it enables entrepreneurs to grow their concepts into big global brands that impact economies, give others the chance to be in business for themselves, and puts lots of people to work with jobs.
What is the top challenge facing young people in franchising?
I’d have to say exposure. Knowing what’s possible—what the term “franchising” really means, how the model works, how broadly applicable it is, how much opportunity it really unlocks, and how accessible it is to almost anyone, anywhere. At the same time, exposure works the other way, too. Older, more established people in the world often don’t believe young people are capable of being franchisees or building their own franchise concepts. And young people need all the support they can get when they’re starting out. We all do! That’s why I’m so excited about NextGen—because it’s changing the narrative.
What is your dream position/goal?
My biggest goal is to scale the best of what we’ve learned in working with young people from over 160 countries over the past 23 years to impact millions. Ironically, I sometimes wonder if we could be doing more to be leveraging the franchise model for ourselves. Everywhere we go, we hear people say they want more of what we do at YSN. That’s a great feeling. But like any founder, I’m always trying to figure out what’s next, how do we keep expanding our reach and impact, and how we can build our own company as an invaluable resource to both young people and those who care most about engaging young leaders.
We’re spending a lot of time building our first online learning product with Bloomberg, called Exploring Your Potential —and in a few months, that will start sculpting the futures of thousands of business school students. We’re also working on an exciting new media platform to distribute news and information to millions of young people globally. Along the way, I love building strategies like NextGen in Franchising for companies, industries and even governments. And I hope to do more work as a Policy Advisor now that we’ve built so many globally scalable tools and resources. Speaking on global stages for the UN and State Department have really given me the bug to want to do and contribute more. It’s all about scaling impact now.
To connect with Jennifer Kushell on LinkedIn, click here.
