Ahmed Young, currently director of public and government affairs in Walmart’s Corporate Affairs division, is making the jump from the No. 1 company in the Fortune 500 to leading the 110-year-old Indianapolis Foundation.
Young regards the jump from corporate to philanthropic work as his next challenge in a winding career that he began 23 years ago with teaching middle school social studies in the Lawrence Township district.
Before joining Walmart, Young served as chief of staff and general counsel for Indianapolis Public Schools (2017-2022) and director of the Office of Education Innovation and Charter Schools for the city of Indianapolis (2016-2017). His prior positions included associate attorney at Bose McKinney & Evans LP and deputy prosecuting attorney in Marion County.
Ultimately, his combination of education, government, and civic engagement work led the Indianapolis Foundation’s board to select Young in what it called a competitive national search.
Young said that it all ties together in the way of relationships, and that he looks forward to working more directly to improve the city his family calls home starting Sept. 1.
IBJ talked to Young about his career and what the next step will entail. Read on for a transcript of that conversation, edited for length and clarity.
You’ve done a lot of different things in your career. Can you talk about why this felt like the next step for you?
My career started in education as a teacher here in Indianapolis on the northeast side, in Lawrence, and I loved my eight years of teaching. I loved that time in the classroom.
You’ll see this trend over the course of my career, but after that time in the classroom, I needed a new challenge. I saw that challenge in law school, and started my career as a prosecutor, then law firm, and then [Joe Hogsett] decided to run for mayor and invited me to lead his education team.
I made the jump to the Mayor’s Office, and then over to Indianapolis Public Schools, and then to Walmart.
There have been several themes in every single part of my career. Those things center around relationships, service, impact, integrity, and every single stop that I’ve had over the course of the last 25-plus years has built upon the previous.
Going from teaching to the practice of law, it was about how do you connect with people? How do you understand people’s lives? How do you understand the decisions a middle schooler makes, to someone who’s accused of breaking the law, to someone who is looking for a fantastic learning environment for their children, to someone deciding on policy, and how do we advocate for things that will benefit the business? And each step builds upon the previous step.
Do you feel like there’s a particular place you want to start when it comes to that learning?
When I think about my first 100 days, I think about a series of catalytic conversations with stakeholders, partners that we worked with extensively over the last several years, identifying new partners and engaging in rigorous thought and conversations about where we are as a city and where we ultimately need to go.
I think about issues pertaining to the environment. I think about issues around housing affordability. I think about issues around health care access and affordability, economic mobility. All these things are things that are priorities for not only the Foundation, but for the city of Indianapolis, and for us to be a preeminent city that is able to serve everyone and welcomes all and supports people, going from one part of their career to the next, and bringing in newcomers to the city, and making sure that we’re able to provide the essential resources to all.
That’s what I’m most excited about, but in those first 100 days, it’s a lot of just understanding where we are internally as an organization, and strengthening partnerships that are already existing, and exploring what new partnerships could look like and the impact that we can have
In your career, you’ve done a lot of work in government, and tangentially, maybe a little bit of politics, too. How does this role relate to that work?
In every single facet of my career, it’s always about relationships.
In politics, it’s about relationships. It’s how you relate to people. In retail, it’s about understanding your customers. It’s about talking to your customers. In education, it’s about a teacher understanding their students and what they’re bringing to the table and how to get them from passing to excelling, and in order to do that, you have to understand your students and connect with your students.
So it’s always about relationships, no matter where you are, whether it’s politics, retail education, government, a law firm, it’s about how you connect with people and build really strong relationships.
Do you have any specific plans for what this last month looks like before you officially take the job in September?
I have bifurcated the next month in two ways, winding down and winding up. The winding down part is is bittersweet, because I have truly learned so much from my colleagues at Walmart. And at the same time, I’m so excited about what’s ahead.
I feel like I have two jobs right now, and I’m on my second cup of coffee this morning, and I am hitting the ground running in all aspects of it. And at the same time, we’re in this limbo between the start of the school year and the end of summer. So our three children are somewhat excited about the new school year, and so we’re just juggling, and I’m really excited about what’s ahead.
I’m feeling really energized right now, to be honest with you, I think part of it is a two cups of coffee, but it’s also about the potential to really have an impact and play a major role in advancing this city.
Going from working for Walmart, which is global, then going into something that is more directly focused on Indianapolis, is that something that drove this decision? That feeling of doing work that’s, you know, closer to home in that way?
There’s this concept in Walmart where that hyper-local feel is essential to really serving the customer. You may have heard this stat before, but 90% of Americans are within 10 miles of a Walmart. So Walmart serves everybody, and in order to serve everyone, you have to get proximate.
Doing the work of the Indianapolis Foundation, you have to get close to the people, to grassroots and grass tops, and you have to get proximate, you have to connect with people.
That’s what I did when I was at Walmart, and that’s what I intend to do when I step into this role formally on Sept. 1.
Is there anything specific you know that’s kept you and your family in Indianapolis?
A lot of things. My wife is originally from Indianapolis, and her family is here. My family moved to Indianapolis back in the mid ’90s, and I have extensive family here, strong relationships.
One of the things I love, love, love about Indianapolis is that I get the benefits of a big city, but the degrees of separation are so much smaller, and we can get so much more done here in Indianapolis when I compare it to other cities that I lived in, like New York City and Washington, D.C.
I also see how the intersection between government, philanthropy and the private sector interact in such a full, full intentional way. It’s incredible to see what can be done and what has been done.
I absolutely love our parks here in Indianapolis. My wife and I and our children, we live on the far-west side, near Eagle Creek Park. We love going to the park. We love the trails. We love riding our bikes and being outside.
There are so many amenities here in the city that are accessible. And I jokingly say everything is within 15 minutes here in Indianapolis. Sometimes that’s not true because of the construction, but that’s another story. But we just love the accessibility, the amenities and the cultural events that come up here in Indianapolis. There’s a whole litany of things, and this is our home, and we want to make our home even better.