Veronika Scott is the founder and CEO of the Empowerment Plan, a Detroit-based workforce development organization addressing homelessness in two critical ways. First, they provide full-time employment and services for individuals recovering from homelessness in Detroit. Second, they produce innovative sleeping bag coats, which are distributed to those who are unsheltered globally. She began this work out of a desire to break the cycle for her own family. Born to parents who struggled with mental health, addiction, unemployment, and abuse, she grew up in poverty against a backdrop of violence and instability in Detroit. Today, Empowerment Plan impacts the lives of thousands around the globe through the coats they make and the jobs they create. After a decade of doing this work, she has been awarded IDEA Gold Award from the Industrial Design Society of America, the People’s Voice Award from Diane von Furstenberg, Forbes 30 Under 30, one of CNN’s 10 Visionary Women, and the youngest recipient of the John F Kennedy New Frontier Award from the JFK Library Foundation and Harvard University. The Empowerment Plan story has been told worldwide and featured by Good Morning America, 60 Minutes, Erin Burnett OutFront, Mashable, and Dreamworks Animations.