There’s also a sense of pride: “The mission makes you feel good about what you’re doing,” Sierra said. “Everyone gets comfortable with each other and with constructive criticism,” one of the areas covered in the training. “The process brings everyone closer together,” says Manny Sierra, who originally took the training at the beginning of the summer and has been working for Green Box for four weeks. “It’s a little like school,” said intern Brandon Williams, “but it’s to help you, not just send you out. The 20-hour training program includes two days of design thinking and character-driven leadership exercises, delivered tag-team style by Shirmeister-Gess and Jones two days of on-site hard skills and one day to discuss what they’ve learned before starting the job. Market St., and the staff will continue to be made up entirely of local youth.įor this project, the teens - technically interns - are paid by funds from the Delaware Department of Labor. This year, he’s opening Green Box Kitchen, a plant-based restaurant at 400 N. The experimental method is not only empowering for young employees, it also uses youth productively rather than squandering its access to a valuable demographic.Īviles has been working almost exclusively with inner city Wilmington teens since he launched the Green Box kiosk in 2017. As employees, they can then propose those solutions to Jason Aviles, founder of Wilmington Green Box. The answers to those questions become the catalysts with which they develop solutions. “It could be, How might we make healthy food accessible? How might we sell more juice? How might we get more foot traffic?” said Shirmeister-Gess. In a morning exercise, the teens were armed with what Shirmeister-Gess calls a “how might we” question and conducted interviews with people in Rodney Square. Unlike many kids starting their first jobs, these young employees aren’t simply low-level cogs in the machine - they are an active part of Wilmington Green Box’s evolving business plan. ![]() At the end of the program, the new employees will start their new jobs with Green Box, making the cold-press-juices, manning the kiosk and selling juice from mobile Green Box unit (a converted bike with coolers attached). The Post-it exercise is part of a job training program for Wilmington Green Box, where corny training videos and endless lists of rules are traded for a “ Culture of Problem Solving,” a five-day, highly interactive onboarding process. “That’s the genius of Zack’s Post-it note method,” says Linda Shirmeister-Gess, director of advancement for Strive, the youth leadership organization best known for its annual Sports Challenge. Lots of Post-it notes.Īt the direction of Dual School program director Zack Jones, a small team of teenagers writes a single idea on the sticky notes at a time and attaches it to a board. ![]() The tables in the Hagley Room at The Mill are strewn with LEGO bricks, Play Doh and Post-it notes.
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