The leader of a downstate company that focuses on being socially responsible brought that message to Rochester Tuesday night.
It’s a Yonkers based bakery company called Greyston, and while you may not know their name, you probably are familiar with one of their products…they make the brownies that go inside Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream.
What’s unusual about this 34 year old company, is that they practice what’s called ‘open hiring,’ which basically means anyone who walks into their offices can get a job if there’s an opening, without background checks or screenings.
The president and CEO of Greyston, Mike Brady is a Town of Greece native. He says the hiring practice at his company is a risk well worth taking.
"People immediately go to what they think might be a risky component, we like to think of the value; so while there are these thoughts that people coming out of the criminal justice system or having issues with homelessness in the past might be bad people, but the reality is they’re actually just people who haven’t been given a chance to work, and they’re terrific employees," he told WXXI News.
Brady says the profits at Grayston are put back into a foundation to help provide things like housing, child care and other support services for its employees.
He's hoping other businesses adopt this concept.
“We’re very interested in people adopting the open hiring model and it’s really one of the reasons I’m in Rochester in that these communities are really dealing with poverty, and we have a model that we believe scales tremendously to other businesses; it doesn’t need to be a bakery, it doesn’t need to be a food manufacturing business, but only have a business leader that’s thinking progressively around social justice and social issues and wants to give people a chance.”
Brady was the keynote speaker Tuesday night at the Farash Prize for Social Entrepreneurship at the George Eastman Museum.
Phyllis Korn, a longtime advocate for the rights of domestic abuse victims, was awarded the prize which is sponsored by the Max and Marian Farash Charitable Foundation.
As executive director of Alternatives for Battered Women—now known as Willow Domestic Violence Center—Korn opened the organization’s first domestic violence shelter in 1979.
The prize is accompanied by a $100,000 gift to the winner’s affiliated nonprofit organization.
