Right across the country are struggling to address homelessness. As housing prices increase and supply is in desperate demand. Folks are going to continue to struggle, particularly young folks who are significantly and I sold the only item I had left in the world, which was a on it, and I sold the only item I had left in the world, which was a pair of boots. And I remember I walked out of the place where I sold Three, and my foot touched that whole concrete
sidewalk. And honestly, Tony, I like, I just didn't wanna be here anymore. Today's episode's gonna hit close to home for Key, and I have to believe for all of you. We're gonna delve into an issue that deeply troubles us. The growing number of people in our country are unhoused. Breaks my heart to see so many people living in their cars and tents and shelters, couch surfing, without a place to truly call their own.
And the mental health crisis that comes with it. So I feel immense gratitude each day when I walk through my front door into a home where I know I belong, where everything's familiar, where I can welcome friends and family. That sense of belonging problem is not only present, but growing. As I stated problem is not only present, but growing. As I stated earlier, the mental health issues that come with it, the economic challenges, the lack of dignity, and more importantly, the lack of affordable
housing. We need to confront these issues head on and find sustainable solutions. Today, I'm honored to speak with Joe Roberts, the Skid Row CEO, whose remarkable journey from homelessness to becoming a successful entrepreneur, author, motivational speaker is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit. For how so many years I had all this potential and value, but I didn't treat myself with any respect. How could I expect the world to value
who I was? Something I've learned along my journey is that each individual human being and soul has such huge value. That is Chatter that matters with Tony Chapman presented by RBC. Joe's advocacy work, particularly through the Push For Change campaign, has made a tangible impact on raising awareness and funds for youth homelessness in Canada. Joe, thanks for joining me today. I mean, I used AI.
I looked at your tapes, excerpts, people that have attended your speeches and stuff, and you just are a remarkable human being, and I hope I do justice to your story. Thanks for having me on the program. Although I would I would say just to sort of offset that a bit, I don't think I'm particularly special, Tony. I had access to resources. You know, I'm I'm, a common story of someone who bounces back, finds recovery, and moves forward. I'm just kinda loud in from the stage with it. You know
what I mean? Yeah. I think that's a fair point, and we're certainly gonna get into the need for having resources and and some of the people that helped you along the way. First of all, I wanna just say as a marketer, I love this concept of framing your entire journey into Three words, Skid Row CEO. How did that come about? Because that to me is just it's it's so compelling that it it I I have to open up that book and dive deeper into, Joe's life.
Yes. I'd love to take credit for it, but it wasn't me. It was, it was actually, that province newspaper out here in Vancouver when I won the courage to come back award, in Three. So 21 years ago, that's, that was the moniker they gave me. And Three was some of us were sitting around the table saying, boy, that just really kind of covers it in 3 words from skid row to CEO. And so it stuck, Courage just had their, their, their annual event, the 26th, version of
that, the other night. And, yeah. So that's where that started. Even before the Skid Row, when you hit Skid Row, there's obviously Joe the child. And I wanna talk a little bit about these 2 polar opposite males that really influenced your life. And the first was your dad. He was your hero. So tell me a little bit about what he was all about. Well, I grew up in a lower middle class family, in Midland, Ontario, so an hour and a half north of Toronto. Dad worked at the seatbelt factory.
He worked for Decor and Metal. It's called something else now. He was, you know, he was a great dad. He loved being a dad. He was a hockey coach, baseball coach in his shadow. I felt love, safe, and protected. You know, he used to say things to me like I love you. You can do and be anything. Unfortunately, dad passed away really young. I was 8 years old. Dad was 35 and, you know, just like that, our family trajectory changed. I lost my dad, our family lost our our economic security. My mom
lost her partner in this relationship. So what happened next was mom remarried. The only problem is the man who came into our into my life next was couldn't be more polar opposite to my father. He was a violent, abusive alcoholic. So I went from a guy, a guy, a dad who said things like, I love you. You can do anything to a man who'd say things like, you're stupid, you're dumb, and you'll never amount to anything. How do you deal with
that? Because you're 8 years old when he when your dad dies. How soon after did your mom remarry? Relatively quickly, but I don't fault her for that. You have to understand, Tony, this is the early 19 seventies. She's got a mortgage to pay. She's gotta food on the table for these 3 kids, aged 5, 8, and 11. Right? So I think it was that marriage, the actual marriage didn't happen for some years. It was the coming together and and, you know, co sharing that that house together and
living together. I think that happened, about a year after dad died. And did you ever have any resentment that how's she moving on and I'm still dealing with the loss of this hero, or it was were you just too early to even compartmentalize that? No. I don't think so. At 8 years old, I had a whole bunch of you gotta remember there's 2 things that happened at once.
1, the trauma of losing dad. Grief is huge. I mean, look at the last 4 years, you know, COVID and Chapman grief is probably one of the biggest things that we we navigate in our time. So I hadn't dealt with that, and then I had this ongoing verbal, physical, and emotional abuse from stepdad. So I wasn't really blaming mom, and never really that, because she was also caught in in a cycle of her of domestic violence. Just so, you know, she had her own stuff. She was always trying to get
in between me and stepdad. For some reason, I was the target. My little sister didn't get it. My older brother didn't get it, but I was the target. And I think it had a lot to do with a very warm relationship I had with my mom. So your mom's trying to get in the middle. That's obviously causing friction and stuff. But when did you start turning to alcohol and drugs as sort of a means of sort of trying to find some element of escape? So that sort of
happened. My my brother was always someone I looked up to, and I wanted to belong to his group. He was 3 years older than Key, and and you know how brothers, sister rivalry, you know? So he invited me and his old, with his older friends to experiment and I joined and I didn't join because I thought it would be cool. Or I was, I was curious about drug consumption. I joined to belong. You know, Johann Hari wrote in chasing the Three, the opposite of
addiction isn't recovery. The opposite of addiction is connectedness or community. That's what I was seeking, because I didn't fit in at school. I was weird and awkward. Didn't fit in at home. Boom. Three this group of people said, hey. Join us, and I joined. And I used and then that happened is for the first time in my life, I wasn't afraid. I wasn't as scared. And so it became a protection
mechanism. You know, think of the last 4 years. What is it that you use or leaned on when things get uncertain or scary? Sometimes it's food or social media or or escapism. Sometimes it's a positive habit, like exercise or or writing or journaling or yoga. For me, I found a way to stay safe in a very, very uncertain world. And when did that sense of belonging and experimenting become less recreational and becoming something that you needed to have? You became quite
dependent on it. Well, I would say right from the that get go, it was medicinal. It wasn't social as much as it was, as soon as I found, hey, I can feel okay here. That became the go to. The the problem is it set a series of abdominal effects. And by the time I was 14 or 15, the consequences were starting to show up in my life in serious ways. I was non compliant at home. I was getting into trouble in school and the community that 15, I got kicked out of the house At
16, I got kicked out of school. And at 17, I was in trouble with the legal system. And by the time you're 15, when you got kicked out of the house, it wasn't like you had a safe landing. What I read that you were starting to live on the streets. Well, not right away. See, that's the misnomer with youth homelessness is I was couch surfing. I was invisibly
homeless. Okay. So a lot of youth, when they, you know, they, they get in a fight with mom or dad in Brampton or Mississauga, and they slam the door and they go, they don't really have a plan. They grab whatever they need for the night or the next couple of days. And if they're lucky, they got a good safe couch to land on or an uncle or an aunt or a grandma or a girlfriend's parents' place. For me it was, I was couch surfing. So I wasn't visibly homeless at 15 years old.
I wasn't, you know, sitting in front of the liquor store with a cardboard sign that happened Chatter, But make no mistake, there was a high level of vulnerability in those first, you know, 90 days. And statistically, we know that. Like, when you look at the the research from, homeless hub and and the Canadian Alliance and, Away Home Canada, those those early weeks are really, really crucial to wrap around a
young person. This is why I like organizations like like Covenant House who, you know, do a really good job that trying to get and reach that young person before, a lot more happens when they're out out in the Three spinning for prizes. What I'd learned about when I was reading about you is that this became a fairly steep downward spiral. A combination of drugs, your mental wellness, maybe running out of coaches to surf on. Can you just frame for the audience how
you know, when you felt completely alone in this world? Yeah. So the the the degradation Chapman slowly. It's kinda like the boil the frog, you know, a degree at a time. I wore my welcome out in the Midland Barrie area, decided I was gonna go to Vancouver at, at 18 years old, jumped on a Greyhound bus, landed in Vancouver. It was expo 86. But now I'd moved away from family. I'd moved away from oversight. I'd moved away from a school that I could have reintegrated. I'd
certainly moved away from mom who had her eyes on Key. And I found myself in the streets of Vancouver and things went from bad to worse. And before my 20th birthday, I was now graduating into more dangerous drugs and dangerous ways of using those drugs,
pushing a shopping cart and living under a viaduct. On my worst day, going through opioid withdrawal, sitting at Pigeon Park on a rainy cold December morning, 3 days before Christmas, I did the unthinkable on it, and I sold the only item I had left in the world, which was a pair of boots. And I remember I walked out of the place where I sold them, and my foot touched that cool concrete sidewalk. And honestly, Tony, I, like, I just didn't wanna be here anymore.
Like, life hurts so much. The walls were closing in so bad. And for years, I lived in that illusion of self sufficiency. The heaviest thing I ever lifted was my hand for help. I didn't know how to ask for help, because when I was growing up, you know, you learned that nobody was coming to save you. And so, you know, that wasn't an instinct of mine to say, hey, can you help me with this? It is today.
But in that moment, I reached out, I said a little prayer, I asked for help, and I made a promise on a street corner that if I ever got a second chance, I would pay it forward. How did you survive though? I mean, you know, you talk about it, with shopping cart and living under it. I mean, there has to be skills that you learn to just get through the day, to not be attacked, to feel some sense of, I mean, I can imagine you can never feel a sense of belonging, but at least like some sense
of existence. Here. Think about this. The last 4 years, we've dealt with more uncertainty starting with the Q1 of 2020 when COVID hit Human beings are incredibly resilient. We learn how to adapt. I woke up every single morning with unsolvable problems and somehow had to carry on. We've all done that. And what that ends up happening over time is that when you're thrust into that environment, you build really strong neural Takeaways, and you get creative. I learned
how to sharpen my communication skills. I learned how to see creative solutions and ideas. I learned how, you know, I learned what a really tough day looked like. And and, honestly, a tough day is not a 600 point drop in the Dow. A tough day is sleeping behind a dumpster. So you adapt. You grow. You learn. And what's so interesting about that is those became my greatest asset. Know, when I was in front of those kids on Vancouver Island sharing that message, that lived experience, they were
leaning forward. Access to their minds and hearts is is the gift that comes from from that experience. But I don't think I'm particularly special in that. We all have that ability to adapt. You're being very kind to yourself, but, you know, when you're when there's so much uncertainty, how is it possible that you're developing survival skills and skills that you can take with you the rest of your life? You you know, it's funny you say that. One of the guests that you
just had on recently was Malcolm Gladwell. And in his book, Blink, he talks about having these these skill sets. The streets gave me that sense. And it's it's interesting. I've tried to explain to people what it is that I picked up or what it is that I have when I'm in a boardroom or a sales call or I'm standing in front of a 1000 people at a conference. But that empathy piece, that ability to read a room, you know, the I don't know. There's just a whole bunch of intrinsic value that
comes from that negative life experience. So when we layer that onto people and what's going on today, I think that there's an enormous amount of that blank that has happened from COVID in the last 4 years, that that may be just sitting there dormant waiting for people to tap. But experience is the the lens that we see life through that gives us context. I've read by the time you're 24, you say you've hit bottom. You're exhausted both physically
and mentally. No path forward. Did you ever think that it would be easier just to leave this life, or did you realize was there always something inside you that said something out there is worth fighting for? My experience, I vacillated in between hopelessness and a belief in something beyond. It depended on the day, whether I was going to entertain hopelessness or there's
something beyond this. The thing is is that, you know, having fun and and, and using drugs and and pain and misery before you're 20 and after you're 20 are different experiences. And I started to lose friends, and I started to get scared, you know, and, and I remember one day sitting on a park bench in front of RBC and navy, there was that, I had probably the most important leadership discussion I ever had in my life. I was sitting beside this guy named
Gus, an older gentleman. He had these beautiful blue eyes filled with love and compassion. And he looked at me and he said, Joe, there's more to you than you can see. And and in that moment, I was a dirty, disheveled, selfish, rough around the edges, street involved young person, dirty clothes, scruffy beard, you know, but he looked beyond how I was presenting, and he spoke to my potential, my possibility. Shortly after that, and and selling the boots, I reached out to my mom. I
asked for help. She came out to Vancouver, brought me back to Ontario, set me up in her basement in Midhurst, Three. And in many ways, mom provided that housing first strategy for me. Was the stepdad still around? No. What had happened is when I left the house and went out to Vancouver, she finally, divorced him, and and he was living in an SRO in downtown Barrie. Unfortunately too, that that's sorta how his story ended. And what's interesting about that is I
I I hated this guy. Like, I I wouldn't I remember people in in, in in recovery saying, you gotta forgive. I didn't want to. Like, he had done some serious damage to mom, me, my brother's sister, our family. But when he passed away, I remember not feeling that sense of victory or not feeling that elation, and and that hit Key. But for the grace go I. He he was just a guy struggling with his own demons, and he just never found a day of sobriety, and and that's
kinda sad. And you hurt people, hurt people. And I've since forgiven him because you can't really move forward in this life carrying around a burlap sack full of hate and resentment. Before I get into it, there's 2 things that you said that I wanna just do a sidebar because part of this is lessons in life. You talked about on the streets, you had to learn to survive every day. And within that,
you develop some and hone some skills. Do you think that today, our youth has that opportunity, or do we give too much of life on a silver platter? And I'm not talking about when you're leaving school, but I'm just saying track meets, they no longer measure your time. Everybody gets a medal for participation. We don't wanna have failure or success. We don't wanna have winners or losers. We just want this
level playing field. Did you think in some ways that could be hurting their ability to develop some of the skills you developed in a much more traumatic situation? Yes and no. Key, the danger is is that the older generation always judges the younger generation by their context. So it's tough. I don't know. Time will tell. My experience on the street, I wouldn't wish that on anybody. However, for me, it's given
me some mad skills. Young people today who have grown up with the Internet in their pocket, who who have maybe had a little bit more leeway and and not as much accountability that may produce something negative, might produce something extraordinary. We don't know. You know, like, the last thing I would want for anybody is to to be living in the downtown east side, but it gave me the ability to communicate. It gave me perspective and hard work. It gave me, that
spidey sense. You know, it gave me the ability to solve unsolvable problems. When I got into the business world, it was like, I saw the matrix. So when I look at young people, now my daughter's 21, she's in her 3rd year at uni. She has a very, very unique experience that will color the rest of her life. She graduated high school during COVID, You know, there's all of the stuff that's going on for her today. So I'm not
sure. Now one of the things that I have subscribed to is doctor Carol Dweck's work on effort based, effort based leadership. So get kids interested in taking steps forward. I do believe that our possibility comes to the surface when we, when we move forward in the face of negative emotion. So that's how I try to lead. That's how I try to parent. But, yeah, to sort of cast the net broad on that, I think, is is just like my mom saying she didn't like Zeppelin. So I I I
just have to be careful that way. No. It's a fair point. And and talk to me about when your mom flew out to see you in Vancouver and to bring you back home, what did you look like to her? Do you think? I think she was scared. I was a £155, and I had scabs on my face from yeah. And I was emaciated. I had, you know, hollowed out cheeks. I looked like a living skeleton, and I remember the hug. She didn't say anything, but I remember the hug she gave me was the hug of a mom who was scared.
And she gave me this bear hug and whispered in my ear, I love you. Let's get you the help you need. And brought me back to Ontario and then fought to try and get me into, you know, a detox and then a treatment center. And how hard was it for you to clean up? Because the you know, intent and actually holding that intent I hear is one of the hardest gauntlets to run when you're when you're an addict. It was absolutely brutal.
Because here here's the thing. It didn't just, it didn't just happen. I didn't just go to mom's and then clean up. I went to mom's. Now I was away from the street. I was away from illicit drugs. My health began to improve. I had a place to do my laundry, but I still had that early trauma that was driving that substance use disorder. So I continued to drink and drug. And, one night,
I was quite despondent and threatening to hurt myself. My mom came into my room and I was sitting there with with a with a weapon, And she called the OPP. And that night, a guy named Constable Scott McLeod diffused this incredibly dangerous situation, which got me an ambulance ride to Royal Victoria Hospital, their mental health unit, and then a referral into drug treatment. But by the, to answer your question, Tony, by the time I got to that place, I couldn't
see myself going back. I was so afraid of what would happen if I relapsed or tried. So from that period, the dominoes started to drop for me. There were many days where I got scared, and I wanted to run. And when I say run, I wanted to escape through alcohol and drugs, but I didn't. I found a community. You know, I went down to Belleville. I found myself in this drug treatment program for 6 months, which led to a referral to go back to community college. I went to Loyalist.
And now I had this, I was in this smaller community with this really great group of folks around me, and I started to use the tools and days turned into weeks months, and I started to build this this foundation or stability. Were there were there dark days where I wanted to run? You bet. Three still are. You know? There's like, I've got decades, but it it it I still have when the emotional stuff comes up for me, the way that
triggers in my brain is different for other people. I can only imagine. And what you know, when you're going to school and, you know, you graduate with honors and stuff, but there must have been many times where you're around schoolmates that are doing drugs, drinking. How did you cope with that? Not so much even your desire to do it, but just to establish your journey and having them accept that. I think it's like anything. It's just really clear boundaries.
You know, they say, you don't go and sit in a barber seat if you don't wanna get a haircut. So I, I wasn't hanging out in the pub on Thursday night on chicken wing that. I was doing something else. And every I was also transparent Chatter a certain period of time. I sought to be an asset of mine to let people know, look, that's part of my journey. So, no, I I don't drink. I don't I don't do weed. No judgment. Knock yourself out. I just, that's not my gig. That doing
this thing over here. And it's still like that. There's a bunch of things in my life that I don't do. When I get invited to go and do those things. I just opt out. You know, you graduate and you you get a a job, and then you turn that into another job, and you're doing really well. That, their people are seeing leadership, and people are seeing all sorts of things come out that as you said,
and I think it was in your book. They're saying it was the survival instincts I used in the street and the hustling and everything else that I learned in communication proved to be quite advantageous to you as you started taking on sales and leadership roles. Yeah. I graduated with honors. I moved back to BC. My brother's wife at the time got me an interview at Minolta Canada selling copiers and fax
machines. And I thought that was the greatest gig in the world. And I remember walking into the sales pit one day and, and, my sales manager goes, he goes, don't don't you ever get discouraged from cold calling? Cause I was a cold call monster. I would just knock on doors until I was exhausted. And Key said, aren't you afraid of the rejection? I said, rejection. Go try and panhandle in front of 7:11. That's that's rejection. They just didn't wanna buy
a copier from me next. So there were some in there were some spillover. Like, I had really good empathy skills. I had the ability to read an individual. I had the ability to read a boardroom. You know, you go into a boardroom and there's Three person who's smiling at you, but they're not really on board. And so I I knew I could see the matrix. So sales to me was easy. I also understood that it's really up for sales. It wasn't about selling. It was about solving. What is it that I have that
you need? Where's the gap? Right? And so selling was easy. And and so I excelled at Minolta, and then a friend of mine was doing a little tech startup and he wanted to join. I didn't even honestly, Tony, I didn't even understand half of what he was talking about. He was content development, video production websites. And he he was a, he was a bit of a geek, a propeller head, but he believed in me. And I said,
ah, what do I got to lose? And so we, we threw down and, you know, four and a half years later, I came up and and I was more successful than I could have ever imagined. I was the, you know, I was the Canadian version of the American dream. This is where I found was really interesting. You finally find security in terms of a job. You're passing the streets you used to live on in a suit, and you
surrender all that security to go to a startup. And if you're somebody that I have to believe that most of your life, you could never plant roots, whether you're a tumbleweed on somebody's couch or on, you know, your shopping cart is your only possession. I was surprised that you made that move. Well, the thing about being on the streets and homeless and having a shopping cart as your vocation, it is entrepreneurial. I have been an entrepreneur since my kool 1st kool aid stand when I was 4
and a half years old. So I can thrive in an organization and bring something to that. But I think that I've always had that one, it's sort of the lone wolf piece, which is good and bad. It's it's it's it's been great because I always seek out sort of driving my own bus. It's been difficult when we're trying to build bigger things because that level of collaboration and trusting others doesn't come naturally.
But, yeah, I think that I've I've I've been fortunate and and always been a little entrepreneurial and and leaning on that sort of sales, stuff. I also I'm I'm creative. I like to build. I like to look at something and say, hey. What could we do here? And I think that was an element that
that really lent itself well into the development of Mindware Design. So the next move on the chessboard is that, you know, you've had success, you've built this business, and then you decide to really become that lone wolf again. You're gonna build your brand in terms of motivational speaking, you're gonna build your brand in terms of advocacy, but this is gonna be
on your terms. So what prompted that move? Because again, I I'm just fascinated by how this trajectory and how you've become one of the most successful speakers, arguably, in Canada, if not around the world. I mean, I've read the reviews. People love what you have to say, but that again was I'm leaving that thing I built to was it just the need to to say I'd rather be the lone wolf Takeaways have to deal with trust issues? No. It was actually something completely different. It was purpose and
passion. So I had some big setbacks in Three. And I also, my daughter was born in oh Three. And so I had this sort of existential moment where I was doing 60, 70 hours building this business. And I wasn't happy. I, I required all that stuff. I got all the, you know, the things to hang on the wall and the fancy German car and I got it all, But I wasn't Tony more fulfilled. And so I I said, I wanna do I wanna do something that
that drives my purpose and passion. I was fortunate. Peter, Doctor. Peter Legg was my mentor and he's a speaker. And, and so was, so was Mike Ballard. He was somebody who was in my life early. And, and so in Three, I pulled the plug in and decided to distance myself from the company. And I, how it started though, Tony wasn't like, I'm going to go out and be a motivational speaker. I started to speak to kids in schools. I started to go to alt class.
I started to go into institutions, and then that led to chambers of commerce. And then that led to me being invited to speak in municipal and and share lived experience in various different places for people trying to wrap their head around policy and and different things. And and then I wrote the book, and that's when it then then I got invited to do sort of the professional association conference stuff.
But it was, it was a, it was an evolution that started with me just really wanting to get in front of young people and say, Hey, there's some potholes up ahead. I've been down. I've been up the road. And I'd like to tell you about a couple of these holes. Because you know, back in the day, I was the kind of guy who wanted something from you. Today, I wants I want something for people. I want people to understand their unlimited, untapped possibility and potential,
especially young people. I mean, when I think about your dad and then Gus and then the officers, Scott McCloud, do you think that you're also carrying their footsteps as well when you decide that being an advocate, I wanna sit on those park benches and help the next? So was it part of that, like that you felt that you had a greater calling? Because, or is it more just, I realized that I could make an impact with kids and I enjoy doing that, therefore, that
that's what I was gonna focus on. I think in the beginning, that's what it was. Yeah. It's like it's it's it's kinda like, Key. You've got it. Go help others get it. It's really not more complex than that. And it did I think it's a thing of gratitude. On the selfish side of things, there's it feels good. I mean, who who doesn't want to have an impact? I mean, one of the questions I ask people is if you had 10 minutes with a with a gym full
of high school students, what would you tell them? What have you learned along the way? This really good life experience that you could tell. And I think that all of us intrinsically want to do good. I don't think the world is filled with selfish people. I think the world is filled with people who really care deeply about stuff. Just don't know how to hitch their wagon to it. You know, it evolved from there with the business experience for me to be relevant in the corporate world.
Because it now wasn't just, you know, Joe pushing a shopping cart. It was, how do you extract ideas from this to help people deal with and navigate change and challenge? How do you help people be more productive? You know, it's like surviving the streets and then doing doing what we're gonna talk about here in a minute, the Walk for the hub listeners. Yeah. The walk across Canada point to high performance. So what are the pieces? How do you tap into that?
How do you lead through that? How do you parent through that? How do you draw possibilities? So Gus had a conversation with me. Great. What's the formula to teach people to be able to access their possibility? Tragedy of life isn't that it ends too soon. It's we wait too long to begin it because of fear, and we don't know the formula. But when a gust comes along or somebody comes along and says, here, try this, try this, try
this. I've run into people 10 years later, and they're like, oh, I did that thing and I had this result. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And it's like, hey. Hey. It's not me. I just gave you the the instructions. You stirred the pot and made, you know, made that beautiful thing. So before we get into the walk across Canada, what what is the formula then? Because there's a lot of people feeling overpowered by negativity, growing sense of
impossibility. What what can you say? And I'm not just talking about kids. I'm talking across society right now. You know, I put a lot of blame on social media because I think it holds people's attention by the negative and the conspiracies. So, what can you offer people to say, if I thought about this, maybe I would think differently? Simplicity on the other side of complexity. There are Three things that we need to manage to do whatever it is that we're we wanna
do in life. So whatever you wanna do is your possibility. So whatever that is, think about something that you wanna do, a legacy project, a mark that you wanna make. That's your possibility, or or you can call it a goal. There are Three things that one needs to manage going forward. 1 are the actions. What are the footsteps? What are the steps that we need to take? Sometimes coaching, getting outside influence, inter inter informational interviews. You gotta figure out what you need to do.
Number 2 is the inspiration. Right? What is the purpose of driving reason that'll keep your feet in in motion? So you need something to drive action, because action drops off. Think of New Year's resolutions. Why don't they succeed? I I don't think it's that you don't know what to do. You know what to do. You've just lost the motivation because you haven't tethered into a greater sense of why. And then 3 is roadblocks. So it's a, I, and r. R is the
roadblock. And roadblocks split into 2 areas, Tony. There's there's situational roadblocks. We live in a world right now that is just right with situational roadblock. 2 wars, social media, division in politics, interest rates, housing prices, opioid, like, go on and on and on and on. And those things that impact us internally in the internal roadblocks. What stories do our we tell ourselves?
Right? So it's so easy to get stuck in the emotional ether, and then not take the actions or connect to Three inspiration. We've got to rise above that. And and and what's interesting about this model is is it's actually not mine. It's doctor Sean Richardson. He was the he was the guy who coached me and got me prepared and encouraged me to do this unthinkable walk across Canada. Anytime we take a look at something, it's so easy to go down that wormhole of the
emotional burden of the world that we live in today. Yeah? But that's when we start looking at the world through probability, not possibility. And so all of that AIR has to be built on a foundation of possibility. A possibility mindset is looking at ourselves to the world around us and not asking what's likely gonna come next, but ask what could come next. We spend so much time, you know, saying that if I fail? What if we succeed? Right? And so it's it's not to wash away the fact that these
things out there have negative impacts on us. It's to continue to stay in action connected to our sense of why, moving towards something that's important to us, and navigate those situational and psychological world lives. When we do that, what I've just explained is the road to the Stanley Cup, is the road to an Olympic medal. It's the very thing that drove Terry Fox or Nelson Mandela. It's the thing that that that inspires us in great leaders and great entrepreneurial Three,
because Three they somehow managed to keep going. And this is what doctor Carol Dweck talked about in growth versus fit fixed mindset when she studied kids. The the best thing that we can do as parents and as leaders is to coach and mentor the steps forward in the face of negative emotion because that's when we discover that potential or possibility. That idea of hope and the role that it plays in our
lives individually, but I would also argue collectively. Like, do we feel like She joins She joins me at the end of the show, and I encourage you to stick around because she focuses on a word that I think matters to all of us, and that word is possibilities. And when we return, Joe and I talk more about the push for change and how he kept his promise that if given a second chance, he would pay it forward. And pay it Key did by walking over 9,000 kilometers.
I want to give a big shout out to RBC for powering ideas for people and planet. Starting in November 2024, RBC and the RBC Foundation are making a commitment of $2,000,000,000 in community investments by 2,035. And the RBC purpose framework is built on 3 pillars to support individual, community and economic growth. The first, accelerating the transition to a greener economy, including identifying, financing, and scaling innovative climate technologies and supporting
nature based solutions. 2nd, to equip people with what they need for their future by improving access to skills, training, and resources. And last but not least, to drive more prosperity in our communities by fostering inclusivity and access to equitable opportunities. Powering ideas for people and the planet will help address the challenges of today and improve our individual and collective abilities to thrive and prosper. And that matters to you, to me, and to RBC.
That gives us, influence and resources that others don't have. So how do we use that? And how do we use our business to help drive the positive changes in society and the environment that we know we need for us all to be better? You're listening to Chatter That Matters with Tony
Chapman presented by RBC. Those were the words from Andrea Barrett, and she'll join me later in the show to talk about a purpose framework, Three pillars that I believe that we can stand on individually and collectively to make Canada a better place to be. Let's get back to Joe Roberts, the Skid Row CEO, and a hero's journey from the streets of Vancouver to being a Yoda to so many. The push for change was about a promise Joe Roberts made and kept to support
vulnerable young people. That's why I think it was so successful. By committing to walk across Canada, Joe and the team push for change inspired a nation into action. What was inspiring was how tens of thousands of people joined the campaign and contributed their individual promises. Now the other thing that caught my attention is walk through homelessness, which was this crazy, must it how did that thought explain what it is and how it came about. Sure. So I had a deep passion for
wanting to do something and pay it for. Remember that on that street corner, the day I sold my boots, I made a promise to pay it forward. If I got a second chance. So fast forward, 15 years, I'm on an airplane ride into Calgary with Sean, Doctor. Sean Richardson, former Olympic athlete. He and I were doing work together as, as consulting management, gig that we were doing. And I said, Sean, I wanna do something to raise awareness for our vulnerable kids in this country. So they
don't end up pushing a shopping cart. And Sean says, well, when Canadians wanna raise money, they run across the country. Why don't you run across Canada, Joe? And I says, why don't don't you run across Canada? You know, the last thing I was a 45 year old non Three who filled grade 9 and grade 10 gym. Last thing I was gonna do is run across Canada. But then he said something. He tapped into my I, my why. He says, Joe, when you talk to people,
they never leave the room the same way as they came in. What if you walked across Canada and shared your message with kids and stakeholders and and and police and and and, municipal, provincial, federal government? And along the way, you could talk about the change that you're trying to push for. And it was and I said, Key, well, how would it be different? What's my value proposition differential? Right. You'll appreciate that as a marketer. How is this going to be unique to other things that
are out there? He says, I got it. He says, why don't you push a shopping cart? It's a symbol of chronic homelessness. And I remember Tony, the hair on my neck went up and I went, I got to explore this thing. So that was the Genesis. Over the next 3 years, we built a shop and cart. I did a walk from Calgary to Vancouver as a warm up. We went out and raised $1,000,000. But when I tell the story, the arc of the story is the hero's
journey. We had 37 show stopping challenges that we had to navigate in order to get to day 1 in in Saint John's, Newfoundland before we even had a shot at being able to engage the country. And but we slowly we connected to that sense of purpose. We kept our feet in motion, and eventually that first day came. On May 1, 2016, I started a 9,000 kilometer 17 month continuous walk,
pushing a shopping cart. And that the biggest thing that we were advocating for was raising awareness and money to support vulnerable kids, to give them the resources before they cycle out of school, before they leave home, before they end up under the Spadina Viaduct or the Georgia Viaduct, before they get wrapped up into to substance use disorder or all the other dangerous and nasty things that are waiting for them. And so that was the the
beginning. We weren't sure how the country was gonna react, but, you know, I remember walking into Three, and I come across the the bridge just east of, Ottawa, a little place called Hawkesbury. And there was about a 1,000 people waiting for us. The Ontario Provincial Police was our charity, our community safety partner, and they were waiting. And as I got down the bridge, I I recognized somebody who was the greatest hockey dad in the world, Walter Gretzky.
And I knew, I knew Ontario was gonna be special that it was. We raised 100 of 1,000 of dollars. We we raised awareness, but the biggest piece that came out of it was we got to engage over a 100000 kids, from coast to coast. And and I'll tell you something. What they were doing inspired us. A lot of times, you know, we we bang on on young people and say, you know, you're they're just not like we were. But I think it's it's not so much apathy as not knowing
how to plug into something. And we gave them an opportunity to engage with us. And I'm telling you, the things they did just inspired the heck out of us. It was the thing that kept me going on on really tough days. My dad was born in Hawkes Barre. Oh, wow. So it's, when you said that, that brought a smile to my face. And, you know, listen, I spend a lot of time with young people as well. I couldn't agree more. I mean, there's there's phenomenal
opportunity. They are masters of their tools. Three legacy, but Key Now that said, I'm just getting going. You wanna legacy, but you're now you've said, I'm just getting going. You wanna you wanna inspire 10,000,000 people, speak at a 1,000 conferences. Tell me how that putting a numerical goal, was that the action that you needed in this case to say what's next for me? I think it's just about dangling carrots. You know, it doesn't matter
if I get a 1,000 events. I honestly, what it comes down to is my why or my bliss is when I stand in front of a group of people. I don't care who they are, whether they're police leaders or, it's a safety conference or it's a sales conference or it's students. To get them to put their hand in their pocket and pull out and see this thing that they've always had And and to tell them what Gus told me on that park bench, that there's more to you than
you can see. I just wanna spend the time that I have left being like Gus, to encourage, to get people's feet moving because when they do, that's when they discover they're extraordinary. I'm not special. I just had somebody encourage me to get up off that park bench and take some steps forward. I was lucky enough to have mom and Gus and Scott McLeod. And so today, I just I just run around and,
you know, the a lot of what I do is inspirational keynote speaking. I close a lot of events, but it's not just the inspiration, it's the application. Because if they have me around for the second piece, which is the workshop, now I can actually unpack that air model and say, here, take this and run with it. And, you know, I've been sharing my story since 98, since before we had the quote unquote mental health category of speaker. Back that, we were
adversity speakers. And that's that's all I wanna do, you know, that and and the work that we're doing with the foundation and kids. When you said you took something out of your pocket, everybody has it. What were you what was your referencing? About individual potential. We walk around with stories about who we are and how we fit into the world. And most of them aren't accurate. They're
illusions. But they keep us small. And so we see the world through that story and narrative and through a history of potential and possibility against probability. Let me give you an example. There's probably a marathon in you, but if you've never really trained or done that, what's the likelihood that you could run a marathon? So if I asked you to run a marathon in 6
months, you'd be like, no. I I don't I'm not gonna do that. It's just not something so your probability brain looks at it and says that that's not something that's gonna be in my future. But if I frame the question differently and said, your life depends on it, now you begin to think through that process of possibility. Each of us that, you know, Dave Goggin says that when we're, you know, when we're at our
limit, we're only at 40%. The thing that I've learned by leaning into life and doing things that are outside of my comfort zone is that there's so much more potential. So that what's in our pocket is a lot more than we realize. And if we'd simply get up off of whatever bench we're sitting on and take a few courageous steps forward, we could realize that. You've said many occasions in this interview, you know, I'm just a normal guy or I I if I hadn't met Scott or met
Gus. But Rick Chapman, who's been on my show, Chatter That Matters, I love what he wrote Chatter hearing you. Joe's story reminds us in the power of believing that anything is possible. It is testament to the strengths of the human spirit and what you can achieve when you set your mind to it. Now this is a guy that wheel chaired around the world, so I would say to you
that he doesn't make statements like this off the cuff. You must be feeling very happy with the higher purpose you have in this life, not necessarily by how many conferences you've done, but how many people Chatter hearing you feel the way that Rick Hansen feels? Yeah. I do, but it's always next. You know, it's like, I don't look in the rear view as much. I get I get honored by, you know, Canadian heroes and legacy, folks like Rick, by the way, Rick, I've known him for a long, long
time. Just a wonderful, warm guy. When I was writing that first book, he gave me that little note to put on the back of the book. But but when we were building the campaign, we actually did a think tank and and folks from the Rick Hansen Foundation who had just finished the 25 year anniversary relay came and sat with us and and and and fed us really great information. Look, I just I wanna I wanna take all of that stuff that happened
back there and squeeze as much good out of it as possible. So, Joe, you don't look in your rear view mirror. My last question is when you look through the the the windshield, what's next for you? More global stuff. We we our next year is exciting. In a in a few weeks, we've got global commissioners from police organizations from around the world descending into Vancouver. I wanna I wanna speak and impact as many people as possible.
I love leadership. I I love the idea that we can influence and impact other human beings to be a better version of themselves. I wanna be an encourager. And so I think it's just more of the same, and and doing it in a way where, I'm getting a lot of joy and and bliss out of it. So having an impact, bringing value. Right? But but doing that stuff. And I think some of that, Tony, is doing the stuff, not doing the stuff that doesn't Doesn't matter.
Yeah. And is your mom still with you? Yeah. She's Three. And, she drives. She's still in she's she lives in Burnaby, so stay out of Burnaby. So, you know, I always end my show with my Three takeaways, and this one's a tough one because I've been writing so many little notes and stuff. But I'm gonna tell you that the most important thing one of the most important actions I've heard on Chatter that matters, I'm over 225 episodes, was how you described your mom's hug.
And she saw past the blisters on my face, the skeleton of a son that she want new. And she said, gave you that hug and said, let's get you home, son. We all need a hug like that. And in your case, that hug must have been something that just radiated through you that someone still loved you and cared about you. The second is just how important you know, you talk about the hero's journey, and I'm a a huge fan
of storytelling. And to me, the the protagonist is often, you know, portrayed as the hero, but it's the mentor along the way, the Yoda, the fairy godmother, best friend that tells you in a rom com, you're marrying the wrong person. And then yours was your dad and Scott and Gus, and now you're that parole. You know, you're the person that's going out and being the Gandalf convincing Frodo that they put your feet and start moving, and you can go on in
a a question adventure. So that's a wonderful, wonderful place to be because you're helping others get to where they need, want, and deserve to go. And and to me, that's the highest purpose we can have as humans. And then the third one was just your the simplicity of your model of, you know, Three, then take action and stay inspired and understand that
roadblocks are part of it. The fact that, you know, people can walk away not just feeling wonderful that they heard a great speaker, but actually walking away and start applying the simplicity of your model to their life. For all that and more, I am just delighted that you, you join me in Chatter That Matters. I'm glad I was
able to. You know, the first point that you made is is probably that crux of, what I'm trying to do as far as addressing the issue of homelessness, mental health, and substance use disorder. People ask me, Joe, what was it like to be homeless? What was it? Look, and then and then they'll ask me, should I give somebody a dollar? Should I? Do what your heart calls you to do. Our family
supports fiscally responsible organizations that are able to meet the needs. But the greatest thing I think we can do, Tony, is ask the empathic question, what happened before that happened? If we look through that lens like mom and are able to be like mom or like Gus, empathic in our perspective of what's actually happening in the world around us. I think that that's one of the steps that we need to move to create long term systemic
change. Robert Schuller said that tough times never last, but tough people do. And I learned to take my past and not let it dictate who I was, but let it be a part of who I wanted to become. All of us are human, we're all gonna fall down from time to time, but the good news about falling down is when you're down, you don't have to be up to look up. Returning to my show is Andrea Barrick. She's a senior vice president, corporate citizenship and ESG at RBC. I encourage you to follow her on
LinkedIn. She's had this diverse career path, roles in health care, the public sector, and in politics, but she always finds this common theme in each of her roles in terms of creating, amplifying, and executing ideas to help organizations build a better world. So, Andrew, I'm gonna get a little bit more into what you're doing with RBC and your purpose framework. But first, I just context. Joe Roberts, the Skid Row Key. I mean, what a
story. I mean, this is a Key, broken home, gets thrown out, homeless, down that path of sort of drugs and alcohol just to survive a day on the streets in Vancouver. And then a social worker sits on a bench one day and looks at him and says, you know, you're more than you think you are. And he breaks down. He calls his mom, rescues him. And over quite a long period of time, he he becomes clean, goes back to school, becomes a Key, and now today spends most of his time talking to people
that really need that message that he got on the bench. The sad thing, though, he isn't an anomaly, is he? This is the kind of story that we seem to be hearing more and more in Canada. Yeah. And what I love about that, it is just it highlights how much it's important to be able to imagine possibility. Right? That idea of hope and the role that it plays in our lives individually, but I would also argue collectively. Like, do we feel like
we can have a better future than the one we've got now? Do we set ambition? You know, we're gonna talk about RBC and, you know, what what the corporate ambition is. But, you know, there's there's individual ambition. It it translates to then the ambition of a community or or something more local and and then kind of can broaden from there. And in that story, it is that social worker that had the ability to break through and remind him of
his own possibility. Right? And and, I think there's just so much room for all of us to think about not only just individually for ourselves, but how do we help do that to Matters? Whether they be our staff, people who are on our team, whether they be our neighbors, whether they be our kids who are driving us crazy, but actually, you know, that they've got, they've got room to grow and reach a different potential. I think for the average person, when they think of RBC, they think of
you obviously as a bank. Most Canadians have some type of financial relationship, and they also think about the big things you do, the Taylor Swifts and the the TIF and the golf. But what I am so proud of, and I have the inside track as I work with that organization on a weekly basis, is what RBC's purpose framework,
empowering ideas for people in the planet. You're the best to explain it because you've been all over the world talking about it, but just share with my listeners what RBC is doing in some ways to be that person on the park bench, but it with scale. Listen. At RBC, we take the responsibility Key have serious. We're the largest corporation in Canada. We're a, you know, majorly significant bank globally, and that gives us, influence and resources
that others don't have. So how do we use that? And how do we use our business to help drive the positive changes in society and the environment that we know we need for us all to be better. Right? And and so I think with RBC, you know, the purpose you know, we have a purpose at RBC, which is to help clients thrive and communities prosper. And we think we can do both at once. We don't have to trade off one for the other. And so the purpose framework really is an
articulation of how do we do that? So we said, oh, you know, what are the societal challenges that impact our business today, but in the future? Well, it's environmental crisis. It's this rapidly changing workforce. It's growing inequalities in our society. I mean, that affects all of us,
but it affects our the business that we're in as well. So we set these Three ambitions, focusing on both people and planet, and and sort of decided to put some resources and money and energy and our people behind making that happen. Now I heard there's a big number. I wanna make sure I have it right. So what's the plan in terms of the next 10 years that RBC and
the RBC Foundation's investing against this? Yeah. So I mean, in sort of back up to say that purpose framework actually is about everything we do. It's about how we use our products and services. It's about how we use the advice we give to businesses. It's about our people, our own operations. But community investments is a very visible and public way that we can demonstrate
how we're making a difference. And so we set a target for 2,000,000,000 by 2,035 to help accelerate the transition to a greener economy, to help invest in skills for the thriving future, and to really try to drive more
equitable prosperity in our communities. What's the narratives of the individuals listening and getting involved and getting engaged realize that these Three pillars are pillars that we can stand on as a country to grow our top line versus just simply being something that might benefit, for example, your bottom line. For sure. Well, I mean, ideally, as I said, that's that's the trick in, you know, jobs like mine is you have to do both.
You know, RBC is able to make commitments like that $2,000,000,000 because we run a successful business. And so Key need to be able to run a successful business for us to have the resource and have the influence to drive the change that we see possible in the world. And, you know, different companies have
different cultures, I would say. And, at RBC, I've been there about 19 months, as you know, and one of the things that really attracted me to the organization is that from the board and the CEO all the way throughout the organization is people really believe in doing the right thing. That that's why they wanna join RBC. That's why they stay at RBC. And in fact, our team, you know, we run community engagement and volunteers, and we can't find enough opportunities to meet the
demand for our employees who wanna get involved in helping. Like, we actually need sort of more more things for them to do. And so I do feel like it's not just a headline about a big number. It's really just
in the DNA of the culture of RBC. What advice can you give to individual Canadians, small business owners that might not have your resources, but wanna do their part to where you're focused on in terms of the environment and making sure the kids have that sense of possibility and going into some neighborhoods that really deserve to have the playing field level. What what
can we do to support what you're doing? Yeah. I mean, there's a couple of different things that I'll touch on. 1 is at the individual level, because I think that is universal. We are all individuals. So, like, let's look around. What are the networks that we have? Who are we connected to in our community? Do we, you know, I I think one of the things that I've learned over the years is sometimes we're not even aware of the real issues that
are facing our communities. I actually learned that through politics, Tony, when I knocked on over 10,000 doors because I got to hear from real people who live lives that are different than mine. Right? And so, I think just actually really trying to be curious about the communities that we're in, the network they're in, what are people going through makes a difference. And then there's the choices that we make, you know, like on the environmental front. Could
we throw in a meatless Monday? Could we not have bottled water and instead just, you know, use the tap? Because actually, you know, most places in Canada create tap water anyway. Are we looking at could we replace our furnace with a heat pump instead? So, you know, there are small choices of things that we can do in our individual lives. Who, you know, I have to acknowledge have had a bit of a rough time of it with COVID and inflation and cost of,
everything. But, you know, in their own operations, are that, you know, who do they buy from? You know? Are they ordering lunch from maybe even a new immigrant to, you know, the city? Like that makes it, you know, like where you put your business makes a difference. So I think there's things that, you know, we look across that we can all do regardless of where we are in our communities or in our companies that, that will sort of further our
own values, which is what this is really about. I Tony you before, and I'll tell you again, you must come on and be my primary guest in the show. I know you're reluctant to do it because you have such your own beautiful story, but I just think that your words are words of encouragement that there's organizations doing their part and more importantly, some fantastic words of wisdom in terms of what we can do our
part. Because I think if collectively, if we rally behind what you've really rallied behind, treating our planet with love, treating each other with love, helping the young kids feel about talk about possibility, and really just understanding that the more we level the playing field, the better we'll all be. I think if we all take that to heart, I think we'll be better as individuals in a in a better country. So I thank you for joining me in Chatter That Matters. Well, thank you
for spreading the word, Tony. It's always a pleasure. We appreciate the amplification of those ideas. Chatter That Matters has been a presentation of RBC.