Where did this vision come from?
My vision came from back when I played football and back in Silver Spring.
I grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland, and I was fortunate enough to be dedicated for two football programs,
two football organizations that became nationally known organizations.
For me, as you just experienced, my name could be fairly difficult to pronounce.
It's Aswan Crookshank, and the game of football is where I got my acceptance.
The game of football is where I was able to, it didn't matter how different I actually was.
The game of football is where I was able to, it just didn't matter if you were different.
The only thing that matters was were you willing to work hard.
And the vision came from a dedication to these two organizations that I was a part of
that again became nationally known and have a championship level expectation about them.
And knowing what it took to build these programs, to be a part of building these programs from scratch,
is what built my vision to know that teamwork actually does work.
One of the titles to my keynotes is Team Works, because I've seen it work,
and I've seen it create just incredible, incredible things for people.