ROB MORRIS:
We can sort of dehumanize people by putting them under categories that we label them, right, we talk about “the homeless,” “the poor,” “the refugees,” “the trafficking.” We put “the” in front of these labels, and we forget that there's real human beings that are involved in this.
INTRO:
You're listening to CX Confessions, brought to you by Khoros. In each episode, we’ll share the customer experience stories and insights you need — straight from the sharpest minds in CX — to better connect with your customers and create customers for life. Let's start the show.
SPIKE JONES:
Hello and welcome back to another exciting episode of CX Confessions — your podcast for all things customer experience and engagement. My name is Spike Jones. I have the privilege of being the general manager of Strategic Services here at a place called Khoros. And as always, I am joined by my amazing co-host, the CMO of Khoros, the illustrious Katherine Calvert. How're you doing, Katherine?
KATHERINE CALVERT:
I am great, Spike. It's so good to be back, as always, for another great conversation with you and a very special guest.
SPIKE JONES:
A very special guest indeed. And I am super excited about our guest today. Not only are he and his crew doing amazing things out in the world, but he's also a hell of a nice guy and I get to call him my friend, which is pretty cool too.
He is the CEO and co founder of Love 146, an international human rights organization working to end child trafficking and exploitation. Prior to Love 146, he worked with Mercy Ships international directing training schools at an international operations center. He has lectured and taught in over 20 countries on the issues of social justice, compassion, and human rights, and has been featured in the Huffington Post, the CNN Freedom Project, Forbes, NPR, the list goes on and on and on.
Ladies and gentlemen, I am so excited for you to meet our guest today. Mr. Rob Morris. Welcome, Rob.
ROB MORRIS:
Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
SPIKE JONES:
So you're a little bit of a horse of a different color when it comes to our guests. Usually we have folks firmly planted in that business world, but we wanted you to come on because there are so many lessons that I know you can teach them through you and your organization and the journey that you've been on. So why don't we start there?
Love 146. I know you get the question all the time. What is that? What is that? And how did y'all get that name? So a little background would be awesome.
ROB MORRIS:
Sure. So love 146. We are an international human rights organization working to end the trafficking and exploitation of children. We're doing that through two key programs. One is a prevention program and then the other is survivor care where we take care of children who have been exploited and trafficked.
We started — actually this year will be our 20th anniversary — about 20 years ago, and it was after an encounter with the issue — myself and a couple of friends. We were doing different things at the time. I was actually a drummer in a band, another friend of mine was a singer in a band. We had an artist, a photographer, we were friends and we care about children.
And we started hearing about this thing called child trafficking. And back in 2002, not a lot of people were hearing about that. In fact, it was new terminology — human trafficking — as a term to describe this kind of crime against human beings. Was relatively new terminology. So not a lot of people knew what it was and we had heard about it. I just thought, this is insane that this kind of thing is happening to children who are being sold and abused like commodities. And so my friends and I were like, what can we do about it? You know, what, is there any way that we can be helpful in addressing this and in that process, we just start to educate ourselves, learning about the issue, and in that process we connected with a fairly large organization made up of criminal investigators and lawyers who work specifically to end these kinds of atrocities against people.
And in that process, one of the co-founders, eventual co-founders of Love 146, developed a really solid friendship with the director of this organization. And the director of this organization said, hey, look, if you're going to be talking about this publicly, you should really understand it and learn as much as you can about it. And in that process, he invited us to one of their operating centers in a Southeast Asian country to see firsthand the kind of work that was being done.
And so we went. And when we got to this particular country, we're in a city and meet with their team there and I will never forget this particular night. They were actually in the middle of an investigation of a brothel where children were being sold and exploited and their criminal investigators were going in and they invited us to come in with them.
And this is not something that we would ever recommend an organization do and we would never recommend that people would do this. But because of the trust and the relationship there, they thought it was safe and they invited us in. And what these guys do is they go in basically undercover. They pose as customers interested in these children. They have undercover surveillance equipment on, they gather evidence, they have to do a separate investigation of local law enforcement to weed out those that might be corrupt or getting paid by traffickers or brothel managers to look the other way. And so there's all this investigative stuff happening.
And so they gave us these brief instructions on how to pose as a customer going into this place. And I have to tell you that it was easily the most disturbing experience of my life, to try to pretend to be the very thing that everything in me is completely and utterly repulsed by. And after this little brief, you know, instruction time, we were about to go in and they said look, if you don't think you can do this, if you don't think you can hold it together with what you're about to see do not come in. We cannot risk you breaking character and destroying this investigation that has been taking some time to do.
And so we were like no worries. Until we got in there. And we walked into this place we found ourselves standing in a room looking through these glass windows at these girls who were sitting there with matching red dresses on, having even the dignity of a name stripped of them.
They had numbers pinned to their dresses. On this side of the glass, I'm standing shoulder to shoulder with predators who are purchasing these kids for sex and the brothel workers and managers were handing us these menus. These cards with the numbers of the children on them, and their so-called specialty of what they can, what they can do, and I remember in that moment, the words of this investigator going through my head — if you don't think you can hold it together — because everything in me as a man, as a father, as a human being was not holding it together very well, you know.
And I remember the thing that's so took my breath away in that moment was the looks in the eyes of these kids. They were sitting there and they were watching children's cartoons on these television sets behind the glass. Waiting to be purchased and abused. And they just had these blank sort of stares staring at these television sets. And trauma can do a lot of horrific things to people. The body has this amazing ability to shut down when things get too crazy and too painful and what I was observing was just the most heart wrenching thing I've ever seen.
And all these kids had that sort of stare, looking at these television sets, except for one girl, and I will never forget her. She was the only one not looking at the children's cartoons. She was staring in our direction through the glass, and the look in her eyes. It was, and I don't know because I was just observing. I don't know what was going on inside of her. Whether that look was defiance, whether it was fight, whether it was trauma, or whatever. But I will never forget that stare and I will never forget her number. Her number was 146.
And so you know, we had to leave there that night. The investigation was not complete at that point in time. But we left there with a sense of mandate. You can't walk away from a situation like that and not engage on some level. And we thought, okay, we've got to do something about this. And then we started to educate ourselves on how we could potentially be helpful.
But I think the important piece of this, and I talk to people about this all the time, is that even naming the organization — we actually renamed the organization. We started with another name in the beginning — but in renaming the organization it reminds us that this isn't just about an issue or a cause. It's about real human beings. And I know this is what you guys are all about, this whole human connection idea. And I think it's such an important thing doing any kind of human rights work, because I think we can sort of dehumanize people by putting them under categories that label them, right. We talk about “the homeless,” “the poor,” “the refugees,” “the trafficking.” We put “the” in front of these labels, and we forget that there's real human beings that are involved in this.
And so renaming the organization was a real good soul searching thing for us, to remind us about her and to remind us that this is about somebody's daughter. This is about somebody's son. This is about real human beings.
And so yeah, so we left there that night, and we learned as much as we possibly could along the way. We met with other organizations, found out how we could be helpful. I ended up you know, we started bringing people into the picture. We started the organization specifically to fill the need of caring for survivors because we saw that as a missing piece that not a lot was happening in that realm.
And then after doing that, for some time, we looked at, man, we if we're going to end this we need to do something to prevent it. So we began looking at what prevention programs would look like. So that was back in 2002. So since 2002 until this day, we've been able to reach a little over 67,000 children on four different continents. And so a lot of stuff has happened in the last 20 years.
SPIKE JONES:
For sure. A very, very powerful story. Absolutely. And I think that's a great takeaway that we all can learn from, especially. On the other end of that communication, there's a person on the other end of that support line, there's a person on the other end of that communication on social or that engagement, there's a person there. But you're so right, we can just put the “the” in front of them and generalize it all and kind of just take their face away, if you will
KATHERINE CALVERT:
I mean it's such a privilege to meet you and to hear your story and I got chills so many times hearing that. I think the “the” problem that we were just talking about, the trick of turning people into groups, makes it easier to be like politely horrified and what you did was to make it really personal, and I think people can be moved by the issue to then say, what can I do? And really get out and change the lives of 67,000 children. That's incredible.
We have so many questions for you, Rob. I don't want to lose the thread on the name. So Love 146 —you started with a different name. I think that's maybe how you met Spike. But since we just heard that powerful story, tell us a little bit about what was the first name and tell us about the impact of changing?
ROB MORRIS:
Sure. It's actually a really crazy story in that, you know, when we started looking at naming, once we started the organization, it's sort of like naming a band. I played in bands for years. And it's like, you think of, what should we name our band? It sounds great, and then the next morning you wake up and like, that's the dumbest name ever, you know?
And when we were looking at naming the organization, we thought about what we want to see happen and we thought, man, we want to see justice happen for these kids. These kids who've experienced one of the grossest injustices imaginable, and so we named the organization Justice for Children International, which has a very, you know, it's a definite non-government organization name, you could see being introduced at the UN for a general session, that the director of Justice for Children International — it had that sort of power to it.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Weight. It has weight to it.
ROB MORRIS:
Weight, right. But right away, people just call you by the acronym, which got mixed up all the time. JFCI was the acronym but we were always introduced as JCFI, JICF, J-, and it was always getting mixed up.
Well, long story short, we then got contacted by a group of lawyers, actually in Texas, who were part of an organization that had a similar name and they were like, hey, we're getting phone calls from people looking for you. You guys have got to change your name. We've had the name a lot longer. It's getting mixed up. You got to change your name. And being that they were a group of lawyers, we thought this probably isn't a good idea to fight this and all of that.
And so we really had to really do like, hey, what do we do about this? And so we contacted, we have a law firm that we contacted, they were like, look, we could, you can fight this and you could probably even potentially win and be able to keep the name, but maybe you may want to take this opportunity to think about the name and think about who you are and all of that and take this as an opportunity to potentially rebrand, I guess, and think about who you are.
And so I’m like, I don't even know where to start. And so literally, I googled naming and branding organizations, companies and all of that. And they were, and there were some big ones and some great ones that worked with organizations that we all know who they are and all of that. And there was this one name that popped up that struck me. This company called Brains on Fire and I thought, well, that's a weird name, but I like it, and I think they might get us.
And so I called the number and interestingly, it was Spike that answered the phone. This is a classic, and it's so appropriate that it’s Valentine's Day, right? Because this was a mutual falling in love thing, and I call Brains on Fire, and I hear this guy get on the phone who just goes, “Brains on Fire, talk to me.” And I'm like, that's the weirdest way to answer, and I thought it was a recording. I didn't even know it was a real human being — ”Brains on Fire, talk to me.” And I'm like, silence, waiting for, and then finally I realized this is a real human being, and so I spilled my guts to Spike.
Long story short, Spike arranged that we were able to meet with their team at Brains on Fire. We had a sit down session. And I'll never forget that particular day. They were like, tell us your story. And I told them the story that I just told you. And I mean, people had tears coming down their faces and they were just like, you know, somehow this story is going to be connected to the name, and that eventually became Love 146.
And I'll be honest with you, when I first brought the name to our team and brought it to the board, because our board had to approve something as significant as changing the name of the organization. I was just shot to pieces. They were just like, there's no way, that name doesn't make sense. It doesn't say who you are. I can't imagine being at the UN and somebody saying, oh, right, will the director of Love 146 — I mean, it's just, it doesn't — and I remember calling the folks at Brains on Fire saying, I'm in big trouble here. The board doesn't like it. A lot of my team doesn't like it. And they're like why? And I said because the name is such an obscure kind of thing. And I remember, somebody at Brains on Fire, they were like, that will be the genius of the name. It's going to force her story to be told which will be honoring to her and it'll engage people in a depth that you probably haven't seen before.
And they were absolutely right. From the moment we changed the name — it was a little clunky, like a new pair of shoes, for the first six months or so as we transitioned to that. But as people began to hear about us and connect with the name, we saw, I mean, we have people still to this day, send us where they've tattooed the name of the organization — who tattoos the name of a charity onto their body permanently, you know? And people that have just gone way overboard. Bands and people that you know wear the number and it forces a story to be told.
I can't tell you how many times on airplanes I've had conversations when I'm flying on a 15 hour flight someplace overseas, you get into the conversation at some point: so what is it that you do? I run a nonprofit called Love 146. Almost every time it forces a conversation. There's a quizzical look of like, love what? Love 146. What does that mean? What do you do? And then I get to share the story. And sometimes it's the sixty-second elevator version. Sometimes it's the longer version. And I've had people actually write checks in the moment after hearing the story.
So it's been a powerful thing in so many ways. When we talk about movement in, I remember having these kinds of conversations with Spike early on. I would hear this similar language when we say man, it would take a movement to end this kind of atrocity. And I would hear similar language from marketing people and branding people. And people that are using the same kind of language of movement, and word of mouth and all of that and we've seen that become a real powerful thing within the context of what we do.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Well, thank you for sharing that story. And that is how you came onto my radar because Spike has told your story and it is an important reminder that a name doesn't have to do everything. It has to sort of be the door opener. It's a really, it's classic Spike: provocative and inspiring. From the world of Brains on Fire we got him over into tech.
I do want to change gears a little bit. As you know, we've talked to all kinds of leaders on our show, but we do try to think about a customer experience, experience and connection through that lens of technology. And as I think about your story and the world that you're in and the world you're trying to change, I mean technology, it's got to be a real double edged sword. It's a tool for good and a tool for bad — tool for evil. How does a global nonprofit like yours think about the role of technology to achieve your mission, but also I’m sure you have mixed feelings.
ROB MORRIS:
Yeah, I mean, I think you just nailed it. There are mixed feelings, right? Because I've seen technology used for great good and I've seen it used for horrific evil. So yeah, it is. I love that description. It's a double edged sword. I mean for the great good part of it, I mean, and we, this has obviously been highlighted for everyone during the pandemic, right, to be able to be connected. And being a global organization, I mean, we're we're located in several different countries as well as several different states throughout the United States and to be able to stay connected virtually has been absolutely vital. And we never saw that coming, the need that we would have, that tech has been able to create great opportunity. And not just when it comes to like, okay, we're having a lot of Zoom meetings, but you know, interoffice, you know, we use Slack a lot, and being able to communicate that way which has been great internally. So there's been a lot of that happening connecting our global offices as well as our domestic offices.
And then, tech as far as social media goes, I mean things that have just, you know, exploded social media-wise has been, it's been super helpful to get word out there about the issue, to be able to use social media to educate people so that there's deeper understanding to connect with people to say this is how you can be involved and it just kind of again, it's it spreads like crazy.
The negative side of that is that those that would seek to exploit and harm children also are using tech to do so. In fact, I would say that probably 90% of the kids that we care for both in the States as well as overseas have been exploited online. They've been victims of everything from child pornography to online exploitation, and it's interesting because I remember years ago meeting with, there was an officer who headed up the NYPD anti-trafficking unit and I remember him saying way, way back, he said, the new streets, it will be the internet. He said that's where this is going to start happening. So what used to happen on street corners and in dark alleys and everything, it's all going to be online and that has actually become a reality.
So yeah, and then tech savvy people that are involved in doing this. and so you can exploit a child in the Philippines and reach people in the United States or in the UK, or, or whatever. It just has brought everything so much closer. And then you have especially during something like a pandemic when you have so many people at home, that people that would typically see some of the warning signs the child that potentially is being groomed or trafficked online, they're not having that ability to be face-to-face and see those sort of warning signs. So even being in a pandemic, being inside a house — and kids nowadays, pour their hearts out online. And that's what traffickers look for. Those that would exploit vulnerabilities. They look for vulnerability and kids are saying, oh man, I just had a fight with my parents or I'm thinking of running away. And there's these people that are out there that are hunting for kids like that and looking for vulnerability. And so yeah, so it is definitely a double edged sword like you said.
SPIKE JONES:
Frightening indeed.
I want to go back to something, or two things, you said earlier: so the same language, and then also tattoos.
So there is something that you taught me that I, to this day as a marketer, I carry with me and I think about a lot because when I first met you, you had a big tattoo on your forearm of a word, and then I asked a little bit about it, and you explained why you have that and now even as a marketer, when I try to create community and create connections, I always think about that tattoo and the lesson you taught me. Can you share a little bit more about that?
ROB MORRIS:
Yeah, that's, this is, I don't know if you can see that. It's my tribe tattoo, I think is what you're talking about. So these are my kids. These are all the — I have seven kids. And so the tattoo has gotten bigger as we've increased our tribe, but basic bottom line, this is who I belong to, right? This is my family. This is my tribe. This is who I belong to, and so when I think about the bigger picture of that, we often, just like what happened with you and I, Spike, it was like this aha moment of meeting somebody who speaks a similar language. And there's this connection there of like, wow, you're thinking a lot of the same things that I'm thinking and stuff. There's a connection that is made and so I remember that when we left our first time with you and your team there, I remember sitting in the car with one of the co-founders of Love 146 and I just looked at her and I said, same tribe. Same tribe. And there was that sort of, there was like a heart connection that went deeper than your typical acquaintance or business transaction or whatever.
And we see the same thing happen with those that have become part of the Love 146 story. Donors, people in the marketing world you consider customers, or whatever, but people that have come in and said, hey, I want in. I want to be a part of this thing. You know, oftentimes we'll you know, we'll meet some of these folks, and it's just like, oh, I get it. I get why they've connected with us. There's just this sense of hope that some of the values that we carry as an organization, we see some of those same values, oftentimes in the people who connect with us to engage and at whatever level that looks like for them. So yeah.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
That is very powerful. And I think the concept of tribe, it's not about — it's about affinity. It's about a shared set of, you hope, values and aspirations. And that is not very common sort of NGO/UN speak all the time.
Back to the way that you think about the world and think about it a little differently. And so we always ask on this show, Rob, what is a commonly held belief in your industry that you passionately disagree with?
ROB MORRIS:
Oh, man, this is such a good question. I think it would be that more is better. I disagree with that. And what I mean by that is awareness. One of my colleagues and good friend, Marilyn, talks about the attention economy, right. And especially in the last couple of years, there's been a lot of attention on child trafficking, right? There was a hashtag that went viral. And unfortunately, a lot of that is also connected into conspiracy theories. And so there's been a lot of misinformation out there. And so we've been debunking a lot of that misinformation and trying to take down some of these like, hey, that that is a conspiracy theory. That's not a reality. That's not something that's actually happening. This is what it actually — and trying to do that we spend too much time doing that, and we get asked, well, don't you think that's actually a good thing that there's more people now that are aware of it? Well, no, it's not necessarily a good thing. Because if it's based on misinformation, then people are going to be looking in places for trafficking that maybe it's actually not happening or they're going to miss it when it actually is. That it may look a lot more normal than the shady character or the secret cabal that lives under the White House or the pizza joint or whatever and someone will miss it when it's the gym teacher at your kids’ school that might be doing this, or the youth pastor at a church or whoever it might be in our own neighborhoods.
And so yeah, but I think there's this commonly held belief that all awareness is good, and I don't think that that's necessarily a true thing.
And I think also another thing is that it's a black and white issue. The reality is human trafficking is really complex and it is the proverbial rabbit hole that the further in you go, the darker and more complex it seems to get.
So there's actually a lot of commonly held beliefs that I mean, a personal one: often times people mistake me for an optimist. You know, they'll hear me speak someplace or whatever. They're like, oh, you're the most optimistic person ever. And I'm like, You don't know me at all. I'm definitely not an optimist. I've seen way too much to be an optimist. I'm not anti-optimist. I like being around optimists. It's nice, but I'm not an optimist. And I think optimists have a tendency to move a little bit into denial, where like, things are bad, but everything's gonna be okay. It's all gonna work out, and I just don't think that that's necessarily reality.
What I am, and this is what I think where people mistake me for, I am defiantly helpful. One of our core values of our organization is what we call defiant hope. Defiance, unfortunately, as a word has usually negative connotations, right? I used to say all the time that man if I had one dollar for every time that I heard the word defiant applied to me when I was growing up by either school teachers or my parents or whatever, I'd be able to fund our work forever.
But man, as I've taken that defiance and I've attached it to hope it's become a very active thing. Right? It's paying off in spades in that defiant hope, to me is different than optimism. That it recognizes the harshness of the reality of what we're dealing with, but it insists that it can change and potentially change by my action. It's action — it's active, rather than passive, is what I'm trying to say.
So yeah, there's a lot of things that are commonly held beliefs, I think, that maybe I disagree with at times.
Or, recovery is impossible. It used to be my belief. When I first got into this I thought, is recovery even possible for kids that have experienced this kind of trauma day in and day out multiple times a day? How is recovery even possible? I could tell you after 20 years of doing this work, recovery is absolutely possible. I've seen it happen with my own eyes. I've seen children who you'd think wouldn't have a reason to even smile again dance. I've seen these kids go on and have amazing lives, and so a commonly held belief is that I don't know if that's even possible. Well, it absolutely is. So yeah, I have lots of, lots of things like that.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Wow, there's so much agency in that right, like optimism, I think that's a really cool insight. Defiantly hopeful.
ROB MORRIS:
And we learned that from the kids that we work with. I mean for some of our kids, when they wake up in the morning and choose to live another day, that is an act of defiant hope. How could we not do the same thing? I mean, it's just, it's a no brainer.
SPIKE JONES:
So another question that we ask all of our guests — this is CX Confessions, so it is confession time. What is a hard lesson that you have learned along the way with Love 146?
ROB MORRIS:
Oh man, wow. That, wow, that's a great question. I think a hard lesson is that it takes too long to see justice happen. And this may be sort of an American thing. I think we like to see things fixed quick. Part of that is selfish, right. Part of it is I like the satisfaction of knowing that my action somehow has accomplished something. And so because this is work that takes a long time, I think that's, it's just hard to live with that.
You know, I remember back, I think it was in 2003, I was talking to the director of a large human rights agency and she looked at me and she goes, You know what your problem is as Americans? This was in Cambodia. She's, you know what your problem is, as Americans? I sort of brace myself thinking okay, I can think of some things, but I know you're gonna tell me. Go for it. What's our problem? And she looked at me, she goes, You don't think. Instead, you react. And I was like, wow, that's an interesting observation. And she started to unpack that a little bit. And she says, I think you see some human rights abuse happening in the world or, or whatever and maybe even had a good motivation. It's not good motivation all the time. But maybe if it is good motivation, you don't necessarily take the time to think through solutions that are going to be effective and sustainable. Instead, you just react and because you haven't put thought into your reaction, oftentimes your reaction causes more harm than good.
And I will never forget that because I felt like somebody laid a house of responsibility on my shoulder of like, we've got to be thoughtful so that what we do is effective, and is actually going to work. And so the tension there, the hard lesson is learning to live with this tension of the time that it takes to create thoughtful and sustainable solutions that are effective, versus the emergency factor that while we're taking the time to think through these things, children are being hurt. Children are being exploited. And so living with that tension has been a really, really hard thing.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
I am picturing the law and order episodes, right? Americans, we're used to a problem, you identify, goes to the justice system, we're all done. It's all tied up and people go to jail within an hour. You know, all we have to do is see it and then we fix it and then it's resolved and that's a really important, really important insight — that these are long, there's a long tail of resolution but you have to carry the hope with you.
ROB MORRIS:
Everybody wants a Liam Neeson character to show up, right. I've got skills. And that's not real life. That's not actually what it looks like in real life. Oh, but we love that storyline. We love that narrative. But it's way more complex and harder than that, for sure.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Wow. My heart is very full. We could talk for another half an hour, probably two more hours. We're getting to the end of our conversation. But as you said earlier, Rob, it's actually, we're having this conversation on Valentine's Day. And I've always had a little bit of mixed feelings on the holiday, Hallmark-y, whatever, but it feels very appropriate to be having such a powerful conversation about love and about meaning and about taking care of our fellow humans around the world. And super inspiring, super grateful to know you and to be able to share your story with our group.
We'd love to know a little bit more about you. Rob. We just heard about you — seven children — incredible — in your immediate tribe. We always end our show with five questions to get to know our guests a little bit better on a personal level. Very excited to hear your answers to these.
Number one: What was your first concert?
ROB MORRIS:
Elvis.
SPIKE JONES:
What?
KATHERINE CALVERT:
What!
ROB MORRIS:
1972, Madison Square Garden, with my mom. I was 10 years old. I’ll never forget it.
SPIKE JONES:
Best mom ever.
ROB MORRIS:
And the thing that I remember more than anything about that concert was being so freaked out by my mom because I saw a side of my mom I never ever saw before as a 10 year old. My mom was screaming her head off and stuff and crying and everything. I was like, you're not my mother. Absolutely. Absolutely amazing. But that was yeah, that was my first concert ever was Elvis Presley, 1972 Madison Square Garden. Never forget it.
SPIKE JONES:
That’s impressive. Wow. How about your first job?
ROB MORRIS:
First job, I was cutting lawns and that was not really a job-job. I think that my first actual official job working for somebody other than myself was I worked at a flower shop as a delivery boy. And I only worked for one day because I got fired after I dropped off a couple of deliveries and had a ton more time left, and so I took the flower van and went and hung out with my friends for the rest of the day. And apparently I wasn't supposed to do that. So I lost that job in a day. But that was my first job.
SPIKE JONES:
Good times. Good times.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Rob, if you weren't CEO and co-founder of Love 146, what profession would you attempt, if you could?
ROB MORRIS:
I would be a teacher. I would love to be a teacher.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Wow, what subject?
ROB MORRIS:
Probably history.
SPIKE JONES:
I can see that.
ROB MORRIS:
Yeah.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
History teacher. Very cool.
SPIKE JONES:
Totally see that. What is your current favorite app on your phone?
ROB MORRIS:
Oh, this is so not like, creative or different. I mean, this is I would say that it's probably my favorite and my least favorite all at the same time depending on what sort of mood I'm in, but probably tweet bot. I mean, just, you know, I get all my news on, scrolling in the morning on Twitter, seeing what's going on in the world. And then at the same time I hate it because sometimes I feel like it's just too much information. But yeah, it's probably my go-to.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Well it sounds like it could be a little bit of a vice, too. But our final question is, what is your biggest indulgence?
ROB MORRIS:
Such a great question. I actually had to really think about this one. I think probably, well it's Valentine's Day, so I'm gonna say watching romantic comedies with my wife. I love romantic comedies, watching them with my wife. And then I also love taking my kids to concerts. So I've sort of had this thing with each of my kids that I get to take them to their first concert ever, and so yeah, I've had, I've seen a lot of interesting — cause it has to be their choice. So I've seen Hanson like four times. I saw One Direction in their heyday. And so it's absolutely sometimes I'm just like, What am I doing? But it's always, I always tried to do that like get as close to the front as possible and yeah, immerse ourselves in the whole thing.
SPIKE JONES:
There you go. There you go. Keeps you young.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
That’s so great.
SPIKE JONES:
And before Katherine closes out, where can we find you Rob? Love146.org Where else?
ROB MORRIS:
Love146.org and that's our website, you can see the same thing — Love 146 on all the social media platforms. My social media, my personal social media is “Rob Love 146” on Instagram and Twitter as well.
SPIKE JONES:
Fantastic. And of course I have to say if you go to the website, please donate what you can, get involved. It's a very, very powerful organization full of amazing people. Love 146 is also a part of our own Khoros social responsibility program, so we're very proud of that as well.
ROB MORRIS:
We love that partnership right now.
KATHERINE CALVERT:
Yes, thank you. It's a privilege today Rob and to get to be a tiny, tiny part of the Love 146 story.
For our listeners, I just want — you heard us say today's Valentine's Day when we're having this conversation. Don't let it be just a day. Spread the love. Go and find out more, learn how you can get involved. We're proud to be partners and we hope you will consider doing that too.
Thank you for tuning in to another episode of CX Confessions. We will see you again very soon for another great convo. In the meantime, like and subscribe.
KHOROS:
Your customers expect to be understood — their likes and dislikes, their history with your brand, and their communication preferences. But so many companies struggle to connect the dots of the interaction across their own teams and channels and its creating customer experience challenges and disasters. That's where Khoros can help. Khoros is the award-winning customer engagement platform built to turn those siloed interactions with your customer into enterprise value. Khoros works with more than 2,000 of the world's leading brands and powers more than 500 million digital interactions every day. Khoros is the award-winning platform for digital-first customer engagement. Ready to create human connection across the digital customer experience to create customers for life? Learn more at Khoros.com.
Thanks for listening to CX Confessions, brought to you by Khoros. If you enjoyed today's episode, make sure the hit subscribe in your favorite podcast player and give us a rating. See you next time.
