CEO Has Unique Gift For 2022 Grads Of Her Alma Mater

While speaking to the graduating class at Clark Atlanta University this past weekend, restaurateur Pinky Cole, who graduated from the school in 2009, gifted each of the more than 800 graduates with their own limited liability company.

“I have partnered with Varo Bank to provide every single graduate in this audience with a new LLC and a path to entrepreneurship,” Cole said in the address. “Every single graduate in this audience will leave this stadium as a business owner.”

Cole is the CEO of a $100-million vegan brand and found her path to success after the failure of her Jamaican-American restaurant in Harlem. She encouraged the graduates to get out there and fail. “I’m telling this to you, the class of 2022, that I want you to fail. I want you to fail so hard you become an expert in failure and you get a PhD in failology,” she said. “I want you to fail because failing is not failing at all — it is finding aspiration in the losses.”