Reimagining Equitable & Prosperous Communities… & Then Making Them (with Jordan Davis)

How do you do something that’s never been done before?

It’s a difficult question to answer, no matter what problem you’re trying to solve, but Jordan Davis has managed to pull it off over and over again:

Jordan was instrumental in Columbus becoming the sole winner of the U.S. Department of Transportation Smart Cities Challenge in 2016; she played a founding role as director of Smart Columbus for the Columbus Partnership, leading strategy and partnerships for deploying emerging technologies to improve people’s lives in cities; she’s overseeing one of the country’s first self-driving vehicle deployments, representing $720M of aligned investment, breaking world records for EV education, and leading the Midwest in market growth; and she incepted Can’t Stop Columbus, the grassroots innovation movement responding to the unprecedented challenge of COVID-19 that has attracted over 600 virtual volunteers and launched over 30 projects in 12 different issue areas of the community.

And that only counts her never-before-done accomplishments after graduating college!

Jordan also went through a unique and traumatic adolescent experience that helped shape her perspective and instilled in her a drive that very few people have: for every year from 9th grade to sophomore year in college, she lost someone important to her. It was incredibly traumatic, but coming together with her community gave her much-needed support — and it taught her that all you need to solve a problem is community buy-in and support.

What Brett asks:

• [08:15] How did growing up surrounded by unconditional love help shape your life?
• [14:50] From 9th grade to sophomore year in college, you lost someone important to you every year?
• [18:45] When experiencing tragedy as a kid, did you allow yourself to feel it or were you spiritually bypassing?
• [22:33] Tell me more about the experience of distrusting faith after being raised religiously
• [33:10] How do you get such a clear vision of what needs to happen and then actually make it happen when what you’re trying to do hasn’t been done before?
• [39:30] How difficult is it to get people on board to make things happen that have never happened before, especially as a young woman?
• [45:17] Let’s talk about the Columbus Partnership and Smart Columbus
• [56:55] What does the future look like for Jordan?
• [59:15] Tell us a little bit about Can’t Stop CBUS

Lessons for intentional living:

• We don’t all need to go through significant trauma to do what Jordan does. If anything, Jordan has shown us that no one person needs to take a new initiative onto their own shoulders — the power to truly innovate and solve problems is in the collective. Getting the ball rolling does, however, require leadership with the willingness to bring people together and start conversations.

Resources:

• Can’t Stop Columbus
• Smart Columbus
• Instagram: @jdlead
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jordan-davis-96116310
• Twitter: @JDLead