Jimmy’s Blog

This was a terrific week in Washington, DC — a mixture of family, work, education, non-profits and friendships.  And, to top it off, we’re getting hitting with the biggest snowstorm of the past 6 years.   They’re now calling for 18 – 24 inches of snow in the greater DC area.  I just took a walk over to the hotel next to my house for breakfast and to read the paper.  It was so peaceful and quiet — very few cars on the road and I didn’t see anyone else walking around.

Last Sunday, I took two of my mentees Christmas shopping at Leesburg Premium Outlets and then to Toys r Us.   Each year, I normally buy Christmas presents for about 12 – 15 children (the children of good friends and mentees).  Normally, I ask the parent for the Wish List, then I buy the presents online or go to the mall by myself.  But, this year, it was different since I was going shopping with two of my mentees – ages 10 and 14 years old.  Wow, the energy in the car as we were headed to the mall.  Then, the flat-out dash to their favorite stores.  And, the ear-to-ear grin as we went out and picked out presents.  I absolutely loved it … the joy and happiness on the faces of my mentees was priceless.

On Monday morning, I was fortunate enough to be invited to the White House for a holiday tour of the White House (pictures are posted on my Facebook page) and on Tuesday afternoon I went to the White House for a holiday reception.  President Obama received a rousing ovation from the crowded room of guests — his positive remarks were well-received by the audience.   Whoever did the holiday decorations for the White House did a spectacular job.   It was breath-taking … room after room was stunning.

I attended a number of holiday parties this week but the one that topped my list was the Asian-American LEAD party on Monday afternoon.  Why?  Because the performances by our elementary students was off the charts.  Various groups of children sang Christmas songs, some read poems and stories, and one group did a fashion show.

This was a good week for my new business, JLynn Associates — making good traction on a couple of key projects and reviewed my corporate website, which should be ready to launch in early January (designed by the terrific folks from the Pappas Group).  I also was on the Georgetown campus all week for student meetings, independent study presentations and faculty meetings.

I also went Christmas shopping one day this week with my mother and brother.  So, all in all, it’s been a great but exhaustive week.  This snowstorm comes at a good time … can’t really go anywhere so it’ll be a good time to chill, read and relax.  Peace.

Tonight’s Heisman Trophy Presentation Ceremony should be interesting … especially with five worthy candidates.  This is just one person’s opinion — here’s my prediction on the outcome for this year:

1) Mark Ingram, Alabama — he will be first Crimson Tide player to win the award.  I actually think Suh deserves the Heisman since he’s the most talented player this year, but voters seem to prefer offensive players, especially QB’s and RB’s — particularly from big-name programs.  His 3-TD performance in last week’s SEC Championship Game will help him garner this award.  The only drawback is he’s only a sophomore and will have more cracks at the Heisman.

2) Ndamukong Suh, Nebraska — he’ll probably be one of the top three picks in the NFL Draft next April.  Of course, it depends on the team’s needs, but he could also go number one in the draft.  He’s simply a dominating and havoc-wreaking defensive tackle.  He’s NFL All-Pro written all over him.  It’d be great to see a DT win the Heisman.  Although I think Ingram will win it, I won’t be surprised if Suh ends up the winner.

3) Colt McCoy, Texas — I think Gerhart should ranked higher, but voters love QB’s, especially ones from high-profile, glamorous programs.  This award was his to win but he came up short last week in the Big 12 Championship Game.  But, he was the front-runner and many of the midwest voters will probably choose him.

4) Toby Gerhart, Standford — a rock star and animal.  Total stud athlete — also a good college baseball player.  But, playing on the west coast will hurt him.  Not enough voters, especially from the east coast, saw him play that much this season.  He’s deserving of the honor.

5) Tim Tebow, Florida — no sympathy for Tim.  He’s already won one Heisman and two national championships.  He’s a class act — on and off the field.  He’ll go down as one of the greatest college football players in history.   But, he didn’t get it done in last week’s SEC Championship Game – and that’ll hurt him with voters.  Again, he’s a class act and I hope he finds a good fit in the NFL.  Quality people like him deserve to be honored and admired.

Yesterday, the Internet Innovation Alliance hosted the IIA’s Biannual Symposium:  Universal Broadband:  Access for All Americans at the Newseum in Washington, DC.   Co-chaired by Bruce Mehlman and  David Sutphen, the IAA is a coalition of businesses, trade associations and non-profit groups.  The focus of IIA is to promote broadband availability to all Americans, particularly those in under-served communities.

The symposium started with a terrific opening presentation by the outstanding pollster, Cornell Belcher (he gained much fame as the pollster for the Obama presidential campaign last year).  His presentation clearly showed the need for the adoption of broadband, particularly in the under-served African-American and Hispanic communities.

I was then fortunate to be a part of the first panel, which was hosted by Jeff Johnson – Managing Editor, The Truth with Jeff Johnson.  The other panelists were Denmark West – President, BET Digital, Maria Teresa Kumar – Founder, Voto Latino, and Derek Douglas – White House Director of Urban Affairs.  It was a quite an honor to share the panel with such esteemed experts.

Our panel session was focused on the benefits of online content for minority communities and addressing the wireless internet as a bridge over the digital divide.  My area of expertise is Sports — earlier this decade, AOL invested heavily in strategic partnerships with all of the professional sports leagues as consumers started to make the switch from dial-up, narrowband connections to broadband and wireless connections.

The video of yesterday’s symposium can be viewed as http://www.internetinnovation.org.

I went to a couple of neat events in DC last night.  The first one was a Congressional French Caucus reception at the stunning home of the Ambassador of France.  Wow, what a spectacular and beautiful home.   The event was hosted by Dior — they put on a fantastic fashion show.

This is one of the unique things of living in the Washington, DC area — the many beautiful embassies and the homes of the ambassadors.   I’ve been fortunate enough to attend events at the home of the Japanese and French Ambassador in the past month — each are distinct and pay homage to the home country.

I then attended the Brunswick DC Group’s holiday party, which was held at L2 in Georgetown.  Despite the dreary wintry weather, there was a great turn-out.  There was an eclectic and interesting gathering of clients, friends and supporters of the Brunswick Group — which is a superb strategic communications firm.

Last night was the first of many holiday parties to attend in the coming two weeks.   Cheers.

I’m enjoying my role as the “Visiting Professor of Sports Industry Management” for the Georgetown University School of Continuing Education’s Sports Industry Management program.  This position includes advising students and faculty, teaching, serving as an ambassador for the program and working on strategic planning with the Associate Dean of the program, Matt Winkler.

This position is very gratifying … I mentored / worked with many of the younger employees at AOL over the past 14 years … so it’s a natural fit to consult and work with the graduate students – who are in the same age range.  It’s great to see when the “light bulb” comes on.

I’ve written many times about our program — I’m proud to see the growth of the program — we have an outstanding group of sports execs that are part of our faculty — and I continue to be impressed with our students.  I look forward to seeing this program grow over the coming years.

To learn more about the program, please go to http://scs.georgetown.edu/departments/14/master-of-professional-studies-in-sports-industry-management.

BTW, I am still teaching in the GU McDonough School of Business.  I’ll start my fifth year of teaching Sports Marketing Strategy next month.  It is a good and interesting mix of teaching /advising both graduate and undergraduate students.

After posting about 165 blogs over the past year, I took off a couple of weeks, but I’ll get back to posting a few blogs per week.  Here’s some highlights / fun things over the past few weeks —

Sat, Nov 21 — took two of my mentees, Sally and Da-Zhi to the movie, “The Blind Side.”  All three of us loved the meeting.  I thought it told a great story … I’m sure many of you have seen it so no need to re-hash the story.  Sandra Bullock definitely delivered an Academy Award winning type of performance.

Week of Nov 23 — definitely the highlight was going with my mother and brother to Tucson, Arizona for Thanksgiving and a Lynn family reunion.  My cousins hold a reunion every two years — this year, Cousin Kathy, hosted at her wonderful home in Tucson.  We had about 40 Lynns there for the holiday and reunion.  It was absolutely terrific.  My cousins are wonderful people — and they were so supportive after the passing of my father in 2008.

For my brother and I, it’s been a good year for reunions — we had a reunion with the Japanese side of our family in Tokyo in June; and now, we just had a reunion with our American relatives.

Week of Nov 30 — lots of time was spent with some of the non-profit organizations that I serve as a member of the board of directors or advisory council.  I met this week with Asian-American LEAD, Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship and Asian Pacific Islander American Scholar Fund.

Some of my friends / advisers have suggested that I scale back the time commitments to the non-profits while I continue to work on setting up my new business.  But, to me personally, it’s far too important to do what I / we can to help others — especially the youth from low-income families that can use our help and advice.   So, I will continue to plow forward with my philanthropic efforts.

Here’s a couple of articles about the wonderful NFTE documentary, TEN9EIGHT, and the fun after-party —

http://www.politico.com/click/stories/0911/documentary_moves_crowd_to_tears.html

Anne Schroeder Mullins & Patrick Gavin –

“The after party Monday night in the Paris Room of the Hotel Monaco for the movie “Ten9Eight” — a documentary following a group of kids from rough neighborhoods (Compton, Harlem, etc.) as they participate in creating business plans for the National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE) — still had people wiping away tears.

AOL’s Jimmy Lynn – flanked by Redskins cheerleaders – told POLITICO “meeting the students” was the best part of his night. “We were all trying to be cool, but we were all crying.”

That’s something journo Annie Groer seconded: “The movie was amazing!” she cooed. Did you cry? “A little!”

Dem consultant Hilary Rosen said her favorite part of the night was watching “all these important people who want to talk to the kids in the movie.”

Important people like businessman Rick Rickertsen, man-around-town Winston Lord, CNN’s Jessica Yellin, FOX News’s Greta Van Susteren and her husband, John Coale, and Chris Gardner (who wrote the book turned movie “The Pursuit of Happyness”).

Lynn found a new friend in Rodney, a kid in the film. “I said, ‘Rodney, I’m always here for you. … I’m on Facebook, too.’ And Rodney goes, ‘You’re on Facebook?!’ And I said, ‘Yeah, man, I have two thousand friends, I can help you out!'””

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/nov/18/green-glover-the-hillary-diet/?page=2

Stephanie Green and Elizabeth Glover —

<<That’s not the only thing that gets expensive. “I’m blowing through clothes,” Mr. Coale fretted. “I have to go to Filene’s Basement all the time to get blue blazers at over $200 a clip.”

Nothing wrong with helping your heart and the economy at the same time.

Mr. Coale, Miss Van Susteren and other bigwigs from politics, business and media gathered at the National Portrait Gallery for a pre-reception and screening of “Ten9eight: Shoot for the Moon,” a documentary from director Mary Mazzio about inner-city youngsters turning into viable entrepreneurs thanks to a contest run by the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship.

Spotted: the Brunswick Group’s Hilary Rosen, CNN correspondent Jessica Yellin, “The Pursuit of Happyness” author Chris Gardner, VISA CEO Joseph W. Saunders.

In like Lynn

Among the notable Washingtonians making a cameo in “Ten9eight” is former AOL executive and philanthropist Jimmy Lynn, a fixture on the social scene thanks to his deep ties with athletes and sports organizations.

In the flick, Mr. Lynn introduces one of the youngsters, Tatyana Blackwell, to the Washington Redskins Cheerleaders in an effort to promote her fledgling uniform-design business, Just Cheer.

“You can be a champ, just like the Washington Redskins,” Mr. Lynn reminds Miss Blackwell in the film (clearly taped before the Skins’ recent losing streak), prompting the screening crowd to roar with sardonic laughter.

“Well, they were winning then,” Mr. Lynn explained to us at the screening’s after-party at the Hotel Monaco.

Mr. Lynn apparently has taken a shine to the big screen, and vice versa, as he told us he may be featured in the upcoming “Real World DC” on MTV.

“Real World” producers filmed an hourlong meeting between him and cast member Tyrell Ruff, a sports enthusiast from Baltimore, in which the two discussed Mr. Ruff’s career objectives.

According to Mr. Lynn, his new protege ended up landing an internship with the Washington Capitals, which will be chronicled on the show.>>

Last night was the Washington, DC premiere of the outstanding documentary, “TEN9EIGHT,” at the National Portrait Art Gallery.  This is a doc about the NFTE (Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship) case competition in 2008.  This film follows the case competitions in seven cities as well as the finals competition in NYC last October.

Directed by the brilliant and award-winning Mary Mazzio, I strongly recommend this movie.  It will make you laugh, cry and smile — and, most importantly, it will inspire you.  It will inspire you to get more involved and to want to help others, especially the youth from low-income, urban families.

What does the title of the movie mean?  Basically, it underscores the fact that every 9 seconds, another kid drops out of high school in the U.S.   The percentage of young African-American, Hispanic and Native American children that drop out of school is staggering.  But, with the right help, care and involvement, we can help make a difference in the lives of these young men and women.  They want to succeed, but they face tough obstacles.  But, with the right help, these deserving youth can get on the right track, finish high school, go to college, then go on to become a success and a contributing member to society.

As background, I’ve served as a judge for the NFTE case finals competition in Washington, DC on three occasions (AOL had been a strong supporter of NFTE).  I do have a small role in this film (I introduced last year’s DC winner, who designed dance and cheerleader uniforms, to the Washington Redskins cheerleaders at FedEx Field).  And, I just joined the board of directors of NFTE Washington, DC.  I also served as a vice-chair for the NFTE Gala in DC this past spring.

But, it’s not just because I’m involved with NFTE that I’m strongly recommending this movie — it’s because the message of this movie is important.  It shows how if we help others, much good can result.  I wish each and every one of you had the opportunity to meet some of these young men and women.  They will blow you away with their eagerness and desire to learn and grow.

I met this outstanding young man last night at the premiere.  His name is Rodney Walker.  He finished in 2nd place in the National Finals last year.  And, he’s now a sophomore at Morehouse College.   You would be so impressed with his poise.  But, if you found out his background, you would be more amazed.  Rodney was put into the foster care system in Chicago at the age of 5.   And, he ended up living homeless on the streets of Chicago.  He could have ended up living a misguided and directionless life.  Instead, others stepped up to help him and he got involved in the NFTE program.   He’s going to be a future business leader.  Rodney is just one example of the dozens and dozens of students that have been helped by others that.

This movie is showing in 9 different cities at AMC theatres.  It will then be aired on BET, starting in January.  I highly encourage you to go see the movie this week (it runs until this Friday).  I promise you — you will be inspired — and you might shed some tears (like I did as well as many others in the theater).   Thank you.

As a follow-up the VPP / Mentoring blog I wrote about last week, here’s a story about an incident that happened today — and put a smile on my face.

I took my mentee, Sally, to FedEx Field earlier this afternoon where she was going to perform at halftime of the Redskins – Broncos game as part of the Junior Redskins Cheerleaders.  I’ve taken her to two games so far this season.  Today, I was going to drop off her to meet up with her fellow junior cheerleaders at Landover Mall – across from FedEx.  Then, I’d pick her up after half-time.

Well, I had to do something between the 1:00 pm drop-off and the 2:45 pick-up … so I went to have lunch, then cranked out a bunch of emails on my Blackberry while listening to the Skins game while sitting in my car.

I met a happy Sally at the bus, then headed to my car.  I turned the key but the car wouldn’t turn over.  Like a fool, I had run down the battery while listening to the game.  Dang, I thought to myself — who am I going to get to help to get this car started?

Fortunately, there was a Prince George’s County police officer nearby.   I asked for a jump-start and he quickly responded with a positive answer.  In less than 5 minutes, I got the jump-start and I was good to go.  I asked the officer for his card so I can send him a thank you.

This terrific person, named Corporal X. Watson gave me his card, which is like a baseball trading card, with a photo of he and his K-9 partner, K-9 Wolf.  As I was showing the card to Sally, I noted the personal message on his card.  It read, “Always help people who are less fortunate than yourself and lead by example.”

Well, those of you who know me know that I work with over 10 non-profits doing exactly as Corp. Watson’s personal message states on his card.  So, it made me think there was definitely some good karma going on … help others and when you’re in a time of need (such as I was with a car that wouldn’t start), this obliging and polite officer quickly provided the jump-start and we were on our merry way.  Pay it forward, indeed.