Justice Champion Spotlight: Greyston Bakery’s Joseph Kenner
What is Greyston Bakery?
Greyston Bakery is a world-class commercial and artisan bakery in Yonkers, NY. We provide brownie inclusions for ice cream manufacturers like Ben & Jerry's/Unilever. Our packaged brownies sell in retail outlets like Whole Foods Markets and are available to order online for corporate and business gifting at greyston.org/shop. We hire the incredible people who bake those brownies through a process called Open Hiring®, a concept Greyston developed over 40 years ago. Greyston Bakery was also New York’s first registered Benefit Corporation, a designation that holds businesses to a higher standard of corporate purpose, accountability, and transparency.
What is Greyston's Open Hiring® model?
Open Hiring is a simple yet profound way to eliminate employment barriers, particularly for those entry-level jobs where you can learn the position on the job. For Greyston Bakery, it means adding your name and contact information to our bakery apprenticeship waitlist. When we're ready to hire, you get the job if your name is next on the list. No questions asked. No resume. No interview. No background check.
What impact has Open Hiring had on the community?
Many of the people we have hired had one or more employment barriers, whether it be previous justice involvement or lack of education or work experience. When we hire, we are not just hiring a person. We are extending a lifeline to the family connected to that person. We are providing a benefit to the community in which that person lives because that person is now earning a living, getting off public assistance, and avoiding the criminal justice system. In 2021 Greyston delivered approximately $14 million in economic impact between the people we hire at Greyston Bakery and the inclusive employment work we do at Greyston Foundation.
What role do businesses and their leaders play in creating a fairer and more equal society? How has that role evolved in recent years?
The one lever we, as business leaders, control is the ability to hire. We can literally change a life by employing a person, especially those traditionally excluded from the workplace (such as disconnected youth). A job affords a person the dignity of work. They can provide for themselves and their families. The opportunity to work sparks a thriving employment trajectory that benefits individuals, their communities, and society long term.
Open Hiring is as much a business strategy as it is a people strategy. It serves as a way to find good and loyal talent. Folks hired through inclusive hiring are more grateful for the opportunity to join your organization after hearing "no" so many times before. For the business leader and the human resource professional, this means a lower turnover rate, a decrease in time to hire, and an increase in productivity.
What does the Greyston Foundation do? How does this relate to your hiring work?
Greyston Foundation takes a more holistic approach to human capital and talent management strategy through what we now call the Greyston Employment Opportunity Center (GEOC). We provide a one-stop shop for inclusive employment strategy and solutions through the GEOC's four prongs: transitional employment, workforce education and training, wrap-around support, and of course, open and inclusive hiring replication efforts.
Why is Greyston joining Unlock Potential? What is the role of hiring in driving meaningful change?
With millions of our fellow citizens on the sidelines and dropping out of the labor force, we are obligated to demonstrate to other business leaders what Open Hiring or inclusive hiring can look like within their organizations. As we have shown, by removing unnecessary employment barriers, we provide a win-win-win approach that benefits the employee, employer, and society as a whole.
What most excites you about the Unlock Potential program?
We have an opportunity to gather with other disruptors to break the prison pipeline with meaningful and innovative inclusive employment strategies.
When you aren't working, what else do you enjoy doing?
Our family likes to travel, especially to destinations that involve a passport and have a beach — especially as the New York winter months are approaching!
What's a fact about you that would surprise people?
It would not be a surprise to the people around here, but my favorite Greyston product was the Brown Sugar Blondie, until we created the Vegan Birthday Cake Blondie. I am nowhere near being a vegan, but that is one good blondie. Try it!
Joseph Kenner is the President and CEO of Greyston Bakery.