The making of a Tampa entrepreneur

This story initially appeared in Florida Trend Magazine.

Cesar Hernandez is a first-generation American of Mayan immigrants from Guatemala’s Ok’iche Tribe. He grew up poor in Brooklyn.

He was arrested at age 13 and put in a program geared toward serving to inner-city youth keep out of jail. “I wish I could say my life turned around and it was great, but it was a journey,” he says. By his early 20s, he had been arrested 5 extra occasions.

Hernandez landed a soccer scholarship at a faculty in New Mexico however wound up shedding it. He returned to New York and enrolled in a neighborhood faculty, homeless and sleeping in trains at night time. “I just kept saying to myself, ‘this is going to pay off,’ even having all my things in a black trash bag and nobody really seeing my potential.”

Then Hernandez hit all-time low. Trying to guard his sister from a gang of males threatening her, he fought them off. But in a match of rage, he received into an altercation with a detective, touchdown him in a jail advanced generally known as “the tombs,” so named as a result of of the shortage of home windows in that jail. “I’m sitting there in the tombs. There’s a toilet seat right next to me, and I just remember praying: God, get me out of here. I’m going to leave Brooklyn.”

He pleaded responsible and confronted the likelihood of a 15-year sentence for aggravated assault on a detective. But the case was dropped after the officer mentioned he was impressed that Hernandez took accountability for his actions and confirmed regret.

Fulfilling a promise

Hernandez determined to begin anew in Florida. “Three months later, I was in Tampa,” he says. He had researched a few schools and determined to use to the University of South Florida. “A year later, I’m a student body president. I just never looked back. I finally felt free,” he says. “My mindset wasn’t I need to survive. It was what can I create? What can I learn?”

In his function as pupil physique president, Hernandez as soon as filibustered for twenty-four hours in order that tuition wouldn’t go up. He helped put in place a pupil inexperienced power price. It’s contributed to the college putting in photo voltaic panels on its buildings and different sustainability initiatives. He advocated for twenty-four/7 library entry for college students.

During his time period, Hernandez additionally was a USF trustee and led the administration of a $16-million price range for pupil authorities. He sat on the state’s Board of Governors. He was invited to the White House to fulfill President Obama. “A lot of those relationships carry over to this day.”

Hernandez earned undergraduate levels in biomedical science, political science and economics.

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The making of an entrepreneur

“Tampa is sacred to me. It’s why I contribute to the city, and it’s why I’m super active,” says Hernandez, 37, who based the Tampa Bay Latin Chamber of Commerce and the Tampa Bay Mobility Alliance and serves in United Way Suncoast’s Young Leaders Society and different neighborhood teams.

Hernandez labored as a neighborhood organizer for the University Area CDC in his new metropolis, specializing in social fairness points, together with an initiative to scale back road crime by utilizing outreach employees, some of whom have been ex-convicts and former gang members. He labored on widening transit entry as a result of in the event you can’t get to your job, it’s not possible to stand up. He discovered about authorities and coverage as a legislative aide for the Tampa City Council and started to know that changemakers are formed by studying navigate authorities, enterprise and coverage.

Putting this information collectively, in 2017 he launched Omni Public, a consulting agency whose providers embody tech PR, media relations and authorities relations for rising applied sciences.

Tesla was his first huge tech shopper. He has additionally labored with startups world wide. He lobbied for the use of scooters as a substitute type of transportation and is working with Hyperloop Transportation Technologies on different non-traditional types of transportation. Omni additionally counts as shoppers Lazarillo, a Chilean startup with an app for the blind that may very well be rolled out quickly in Tampa and an AI firm that goals to find potential shooters in faculties by way of predictive analytics.

Growing:

• Omni grew to become a seven-figure firm by yr three and now has about 40 shoppers, from Latin America to South Africa, and 11 staff.
• In September, Hernandez graduated from Oxford University with an MBA. He was attracted by Oxford’s novel method to “systempreneurship,” which entails navigating trade, authorities and politics, societal norms and neighborhood for the profit of a particular goal. “I knew if I was a good adviser for my clients, I needed to go where the wellsprings of knowledge for these novel consulting concepts were rising, and that was at Oxford.”