Scarboro Plans to Weave ‘City Building’ Into New Talent Job

Douglas Scarboro knows that opportunity and engagement are the keys to recruiting and retaining talent.

As director of community engagement at the Leadership Academy, he played a crucial role in finding innovative ways to involve members of the creative class in their community.

And as a founding member of LaunchMemphis, Scarboro helped strengthen the city’s entrepreneurial community by nurturing its technological talent and providing opportunities for innovators to interact with investors.

Scarboro said his experience in the private sector was the ideal training ground for his new role as head of Memphis Mayor A C Wharton Jr.’s Office of Talent and Human Capital.

“At Leadership Memphis, I was around a lot of conversation about human capital and retaining talent,” Scarboro said. “I was able to work with individuals who’ve invested a lot in what this new office will be about. Now it’s about having an impact on an even larger scale.”

Wharton said that for too long, Memphis has gone without a more coordinated strategy for retaining its most employable workers.

“When we fail to provide them with the opportunities they need to thrive, it’s no wonder so many of them leave for other cities. This is unacceptable to me and absolutely must change if Memphis is to succeed in a 21st century economy,” Wharton said, adding that Scarboro’s experience made him a perfect candidate.

“Douglas’ job is critical to developing our communities and strengthening our economic foundation. Given his long track record of success in this field, I consider him to be ideal for the job and am thrilled to have him on board.”

Scarboro, who was previously appointed to the Wharton transition team’s subcommittee on Workforce and Economic Development, said he’ll also implement into city government what he started with LaunchMemphis.

“Memphis has a great history of microentrepreneurs,” he said. “Let’s create an environment that supports our diverse entrepreneurial community, a community where talent can connect with investors. Let’s ask how the city can allow this community to grow.”

The goal, Scarboro said, is to make Memphis a top destination for job seekers and employers.

“I want them to say, ‘Where can I go for good opportunities? I need to go to Memphis.’”

In addition to recruiting and retaining knowledge workers, the Wharton administration has tasked Scarboro with increasing the number of college graduates in Memphis and launching a new coordinated effort to assist public housing residents with work force preparedness.

“We want to help people find pathways out of poverty,” Scarboro said. “We have a lot of obstacles, but we have a lot of opportunity.”

Scarboro said he always felt drawn to community development, but it was as an undergraduate at Morehouse College during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta that he decided to devote his career to city building.

He said the festivities raised Atlanta’s collective self-esteem by bringing citizens together in new ways.

“There’s something extremely intriguing to me about seeing the mentality of a city’s people change. I knew it was something I would like ultimately to do,” he said.

Scarboro tailored his academic career to fit his passion. With no academic programs in place geared specifically toward city building, he varied his degrees to include a bachelor’s degree in political science from Morehouse, a master’s of business administration from North Carolina’s Campbell University and Ed. D. in Higher and Adult Education from the University of Memphis.

Now in Memphis for seven years, Scarboro serves on the boards of EmergeMemphis and St. George’s Independent School and teaches in the MBA program at Christian Brothers University.

“Douglas personifies the type of talent our city aims to raise up, recruit and retain,” said Leadership Academy Chief Executive Officer Nancy Coffee.

Scarboro said he plans to assemble that talent this fall at a citywide summit under the umbrella of human capital.

“So many people think of talent in different areas, only talking about small business or the creative class. We want to get input from a number of people and ask them what happens in their particular areas,” he said.

“You can have industry, infrastructure, but without talent and knowledge workers, it’s hard to have continuous innovation, something a city needs to be able to push forward.”