The 10 Most Influential Business Leaders of 2021 insights_compressed

VOL 03 | ISSUE 02 | 2021
+
LEADERS VIEWPOINT
Business Leaders who
changed the World
10
THE
MOST INFLUENTIAL
BUSINESS
LEADERS
OF 2021
A GLOBAL KEYNOTE
SPEAKER, RENOWNED EXPERT
SURGEON AND PROFICIENT
BUSINESS LEADER
RODNEY
PEYTON

Editor’s Desk
To Lead is
Destiny
eadership in other words means Power. A leader has
La great influence on the people he/she leads, and the
actions taken by him directly impacts the life of the
people.
Before we begin the editorial on leadership, who exactly is
considered a leader? Let’s try to be reasonable and make
justice by answering the question through this editorial.
Anyone who keeps others first and leads should be
considered a leader. The one who supports motivates and is
always ready to help others is a good leader. A leader can be
anyone, just like the healthcare workers working to save
lives in the tough times of pandemic. They took the stand to
save humanity, risking their lives and can be called a leader.
Our parents who work day in day out for us, sacrificing
their own dreams to fulfill ours are leaders. In the same
way, there are leaders in society who are always there for
people in times of need.
For a Leader in business, leadership has more to do with
getting the job done. So, it becomes crucial to take
important decisions with a lot of patience and research.
Managing the team and putting the best people at the best
place brings the best out of the team. When innovation and
technology are the buzz the business leader takes the
courage to implement it in the organization. As it gives a
competitive edge over all the competitors and the
companies.
As the quote from Spiderman goes, “With great power
comes great responsibility”. The leader represents the
people in the business that is a big responsibility. The
motive is serving people for good and making a difference
in their lives.
Leadership is a calling too. The very fact that you worry
about being a good leader makes you already one. To the

world, they may be a leader, but to us they are Hero.
It is the act of a leader to awake creativity and
knowledge in the business and society. The
involvement with the team members in the company
brings the best out of the employees. As Benjamin
Franklin righty quotes - “Tell me and I Forget, teach
me and I Remember, involve me and I Learn”.
Leaders can change the world, examples are Steve
Jobs, Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk. They involve in the
ever-learning process of innovation as there is
always something to improve. The best part of being
a leader is holding the power to mold the team and
build a knowledge-based society. Although the
position is challenging but success tastes sweeter
when earned. And failure is a part of it.
With such ability to bring the change in the business
or society Insights Success features such business
leaders in its upcoming edition -The 10 Most
Influential Business Leader of 2020. Featuring its
Cover is Rodney Peyton, Owner and Consultant
Surgeon at Peyton Medico-Legal Services. Rodney
is involved in the healthcare industry for over 40
years. His proven systems and techniques are used
around the world to teach surgical skills to everyone
from trainee surgeons to experienced consultants.
His core belief is the leadership role is all about
adding value to and making a difference for, others
and that the ability to bring about change for a group
or for society is the key distinguishing feature
between success as a person and success as a leader.
Sourabh More
sourabh@insightssuccess.com
Lastly, do not forget to read about the CXO
standpoints written by the industry experts and the
creative articles drafted by the in-house editors.

08
Rodney Peyton
A Global Keynote Speaker,
Renowned Expert Surgeon
and Procient Business Leader
COVER STORY

ARTICLE
16
LEADERS
VIEWPOINT
A Global Keynote Speaker,
Renowned Expert Surgeon
and Procient Business Leader
26
Healthcare in
Pandemic
Amy Schoemehl
Pandemic and Challenges for
Socio-economic issues,
and Healthcare
18
Alexey Chalimov
A Tech-Savvy Helping Businesses
Bring their Ideas to Life
22
Elton Johnson, Jr.
A Combat Vetrepreneur
28
Jeff LoCastro
A Remarkable Record of
Developing Companies

Editor-in-Chief
Sumita Sarkar
Managing Editor
Anish Miller
Executive Editor
Hitesh Dhamani
Assistant Editors
Jenny Fernandes
Sourabh More
Visualizer
David King
Art & Design Director
Asha Bange
Associate Designer
Kushagra Gupta
Co-designer
Kartik Balapurkar
Senior Sales Manager
Kshitij S
Business Development Manager
Peter Collins
Marketing Manager
John Matthew
Sales Executives
David, Martin, Sagar, Maneesh
Technical Head
Jacob Smile
Business Development Executives
Steve, Joe, Aidan, Binay
Technical Specialist
Aditya
Digital Marketing Manager
Marry D'Souza
SME-SMO Executive
Amol Wadekar
Research Analyst
Frank Adams
Circulation Manager
Database Management Technology Consultant
Robert Brown Stella Andrew David Stokes
sales@insightssuccess.com
March, 2021
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Reprint rights remain solely with Insights Success.

Featured Person
Company Name
Brief
Alexey Chalimov
CEO
Eastern Peak
easternpeak.com
Eastern Peak is a technology provider of custom hardware and
software development solutions and digital transformation
consulting services.
Asa Tamsons
Head of Business
Ericsson
ericsson.com
Ericsson is one of the leading providers of Information and
Communication Technology (ICT) to service providers.
Elton Johnson
Executive Chairman
AmeriVet Securities Inc.
amerivetsecurities.com
AmeriVet Securities, Inc. is an institutional broker/dealer,
owned and operated by disabled U.S. military veterans.
James Gorman
Chairman and CEO
Morgan Stanley
morganstanley.com
Morgan Stanley mobilizes capital to help governments,
corporations, institutions and individuals around the world
achieve their financial goals.
Jeff LoCastro
CEO/Founder
Neener Analytics Inc.
neener.net
Neener Analytics Inc. is the only social media analysis that
actually delivers direct, immediate, monetizable results --- in a
100% friction-less environment.
Jim Henderson
CEO
AssuredPartners
assuredpartners.com
AssuredPartners is committed to partnering with successful
regional and local insurance providers that share the same goal:
to service customers better than anyone.
Mteto Nyati
CEO
Altron
altron.com
Altron combines technical expertise with in-depth customer
understanding to provide highly differentiated technology
solutions that are end-to-end, holistic and digitally transformed.
Rodney Peyton
OBE MD MPM
Peyton Medico Legal
rpeyton.com
Mr. J.W. Rodney Peyton OBE is internationally highly
regarded as an accomplished consultant trauma surgeon, author
and trainer with a longstanding track record.
Rona Ambrose
Deputy Chairwoman
TD Securities
tdsecurities.com
TD Securities offers a range of capital markets products and
services to corporate, government and institutional clients, who
choose us for our innovation, execution and experience.
Shannon Susko
CEO
Metronome United
metronomeunited.com
Metronome United works with CEOs and their leadership
teams to help them grow confidently and predictably.

PEYTON
A Global Keynote Speaker, Renowned Expert Surgeon and Procient Business Leader
SUCCESS is a JOURNEY,
not a DESTINATION

Rodney Peyton,
Owner & Consultant Surgeon,
Peyton Medico-Legal Services

Mr Peyton OBE MD MPM has been involved in
the healthcare industry for over forty years. He is
an internationally renowned trauma surgeon,
author, trainer, and keynote speaker who has enjoyed a long
and distinguished career spanning several decades and is
regarded by many as the world’s leading surgical coach. He
was head of faculty development and then examiner
training for the Royal College of Surgeons in England and
has spent much of his professional career driven by a desire
to improve surgical practice and ensure better outcomes for
patients. His proven systems and techniques are used
around the world to teach surgical skills to everyone from
trainee surgeons to experienced consultants.
Mr Peyton is regarded as a leading authority on surgical
education and the demand for his expertise has seen him
travel the globe, winning a plethora of prestigious
international awards in the process. To date he remains the
only person who has been awarded five fellowships from
the Royal Colleges of Surgeons and Physicians in the UK
and Ireland. His core belief is the leadership role is all about
adding value to, and making a difference for, others and that
the ability to bring about change for a group or for society
is the key distinguishing feature between success as a
person and success as a leader.
Fostering Practice Based Learning
When Rodney first took on his role as Head of Faculty
Development with the College of Surgeons in England
more than 30 years ago there was limited acknowledgement
that teaching adults was a particular skill and dependant on
an understanding of how people learn. Most professions at
that time followed an apprenticeship model where trainees
learned on the job by working alongside more senior
colleagues. Also, university lecturers were typically chosen
as they were good at research, rather than at delivering
information. The rapid advances of knowledge and
techniques in recent years have made an apprenticeship
model redundant. Learning no longer has an end point and
even the most expert and experienced in every speciality
must be committed to life-long education.
Rodney’s pioneering Training the Trainers courses
developed at the Royal College of Surgeons are now taught
somewhere in the world on an almost daily basis and the
main theories are captured in his bestselling textbook
“Teaching and Learning in Medical Education” (1998).
What was then a revolutionary idea is now mainstream,
with most university and postgraduate trainers now being
required to have a formal teaching certification.
Healthcare Transformation During Pandemic
While all industries have been affected by the pandemic, it
has perhaps had the greatest impact on healthcare, stressing
the delivery of patient care and forcing health services
globally, as well as individual hospitals and service
providers, to make enormous changes. These include
introducing safety arrangements to protect staff and
patients, making choices between prioritising the response
to patients with Covid against the ongoing needs of patients
with other life-threatening illnesses and coping with the
impact on colleagues of staff succumbing to the virus.
On a personal level, Covid has impacted on emergency
workers as family members as they, like others, have had to
cope with the new challenges of home-schooling and
isolation from relatives, friends, and colleagues.
Leadership is all about adding value to, and
making a difference for others, which is the
key distinguishing feature between success as
a person and success as a leader.
COVER STORY

Healthcare personnel have also had to lead on the logistics
of implementing the vaccination programme. This has
required a project management approach, with appropriate
planning, delivery processes for the vaccine itself, complex
arrangements for safely administering the vaccine on a
phased based to identified groups and all in the context of
worldwide knowledge sharing and dissemination of
information on an almost daily basis.
This has brought into sharp focus the need for Rodney’s
current collaboration with international experts with the aim
of introducing a bespoke project management approach into
the healthcare environment.
Persistence is The Key
There are currently enormous opportunities for aspiring
entrepreneurs in the healthcare industry, an area which
spans everything from digital technology to the
development of medical instruments and from educational
provision to the direct delivery of private healthcare
services.
Achievement of any goal requires persistent action, as any
significant change is likely to face resistance. Entrepreneurs
need to form strong strategic alliances within and outside
the industry and with other sectors, often on an international
scale.
As with any undertaking, it is important to be clear on the
vision, purpose, and outcomes of any project from the
outset. Furthermore, success is a journey, not a destination
and, for the individual, encompasses an all-round prosperity
to include family life, financial freedom, good physical and
mental wellbeing as well as having a satisfying professional
practice or business.
A Needed Change for Improvement
Rodney believes that the single most significant initiative to
transform healthcare provision globally would be the
introduction of relevant management techniques, in
particular project management approaches, specifically
adapted for the healthcare sector. A project management
approach would radically improve the quality, effectiveness,
and efficiency of all aspects of healthcare delivery resulting
in better patient outcomes.
management tools so they are properly contextualised to the
uniqueness of the sector.
Combining Passion and Business
Rodney’s vision for the future combines his entrepreneurial
and business spirit with his passion for education. Those
who undergo training at the Institute can be recognised with
global certification and also have internal qualifications in
leadership and project management. Having leapfrogged
into a world of virtual meetings, all kinds of education are
now available online, including leadership skills. Another
venture in which Rodney is involved, this time with his son
who is an accident and emergency doctor in Western
Australia, is an online education forum for doctors
internationally to share their knowledge and expertise on a
secure social media platform (see www.ediofy.com).
Positive Work Culture
It is a true saying that “culture eats strategy for breakfast”
and the need for being attentive to the value systems and
wellbeing of staff has never been more important than
during the present pandemic when everyone has had to
cope with radically changing lifestyles.
While in his business Rodney has adapted fairly easily to
remote working with office-based rota arrangements, far
greater pressures have been faced on a daily basis by health
care professionals including not having the opportunity to
switch off with a quiet meal or go the gym after a long shift.
Changes of this magnitude need to ensure appropriate
engagement of staff and regular communication which
acknowledges commitment and achievements. Trust within
an organisation takes time to be built but can be damaged
quickly if leaders do not remain sensitive to evolving
challenges. It is also important to maintain teamwork at
every level and to understand that each person’s experience
of the pandemic has been unique, and many have been
placed at considerable personal risk.
In conclusion, leaders should model and encourage staff to
maintain a positive mindset, to have daily disciplines for
selfcare and to set appropriate boundaries around work and
home life.
Through his involvement with the International Institute of
Medical Project Management (IIMPM) Rodney has been
engaging with health professionals to ensure appropriate
systems are developed to improve the planning and
execution of projects such as responding to Covid-19,
which has been a classic example of “agile” project
management. Work is ongoing to adapt traditional project
COVER STORY

&
20
The
Most
SUCCESSFUL
BUSINESSWOMEN
to Watch, 2020
kimberly Khoury
Paving her Way in Sustainability Development

With the time, businesses also rise and fall like
empires. Few stays at the path of success for
ages, while others fail out within a couple of
years. The major difference deemed to continuing sustained
success is through great leadership. And It is obvious as a
great leader can inspire others and leads with a clear vision
other can believe in and can bring innovation within an
organization. Companies under the great leadership taking
the reins, investors, consumers, and employees are all going
to want to buy in.
To manage a team effectively, one also need to be a great
leader, and that’s the reason why the world’s most eminent
companies have some extremely smart people at the board.
It does not matter whether a leader is managing a new start
up or directing a reputable brand, he/she must innovate to
keep the company fresh at the lead.
The individuals we are mentioning in this article are hail
from a broad range of backgrounds, however all of them
have pushed their boundaries through unwavering
determination and turn up with visionary ways to accelerate
progress in their businesses. One can by having a business
management degree possibly learn a great deal of the skills
needed to operate a successful company but at the same
time, it’s essential to have a visionary outlook. “Constantly
think about how you could be doing things better and
questioning yourself,” says PayPal co-founder Elon Musk.
In this article, we are going to discuss about six business
leaders who have shown the capabilities to completely
changed the world we live in today.
Elon Musk- Tesla Motors and SpaceX
Elon Musk is the CEO and CTO of one the biggest space
agencies SpaceX and is also the CEO and Chief Product
Architect of EV car company Tesla Motors. It clearly
shows, he has a deep interest in advanced technology. In
2013, SpaceX made headlines as the first private company
to release a satellite into geosynchronous orbit.
Jan Koum- WhatsApp
Jan Koum, co-founded the WhatsApp in 2019. The app has
gained popularity in no time and in three years later it was
processing 10 billion messages daily. In June 2013
WhatsApp stated a new record of 27 billion messages
carried in one day, and by the end of the year, the company
announced that it had 400 million monthly users. Koum is
also the company CEO and against the advertising and
makes sure he will not have it on WhatsApp. “The user
experience would always lose, because you always had to
provide a service to the advertiser,” Koum said.
Evan Spiegel- Snapchat
In 2011, Evan Spiegel, CEO and co-founder of Snapchat
launched the photo-sharing app from his father’s living
room. Till June 2013, Snapchat wasn’t generating any
revenue, yet due to high venture funding, the company was
valued $860 million. Spiegel says, “Somewhere along the
way when we were building social media products we
forgot the reason we like to communicate with our friends is
because it’s fun.”
Jeff Bezos- Amazon
Recognized as world’s richest person founder and CEO of
Amazon Jeff Bezos started with online bookstore in 1995.
It is leadership that in 2013, Amazon replaced Apple from
the top spot and become America’s most trusted company,
according to a survey by Harris Interactive. Today, Amazon
ships to more than 50 countries and distributes millions of
unique products every day.
Steve Jobs- Apple
Known as the founder of Apple, Steve Jobs is considered as
one of the most influential entrepreneurs, visionaries,
innovators, and business leaders who changed the world
through his technology. He made computer more exciting
and accessible for the world than ever before. Due to his
contributions three industries had revolutionized- music,
mobile, and personal computing. The smart devices
developed by the company set the stage for the mobile and
smart devices. And today, Apple leads as a premier factor in
the electronic and technology industry.
Warren Buffet- Berkshire Hathaway
Known as “Oracle of Ohama,” Buffet is considered as one
of the wealthiest business investors of all time. He is the
CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, a multinational holding
company which transects billions of dollars worth of stocks
every year. As Buffet is considered the all-time best in the
trade field, many top financial holders follow Buffett’s
expertise and approach to stocks and trading. He also
vowed to donate the vast majority of his wealth after his
death like Bill Gates.
16 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

BUSINESS LEADERS
WHO CHANGED THE
WORLD
www.insightssuccess.com
March 2021 | 17

Alexey Chalimov,
Founder and CEO
18 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

The 10 Most Inuential Business Leader of 2021
Alexey Chalimov
t was Alexey Chalimov’s passion
Ifor building and launching new
tech products that urged him to
found Eastern Peak back in 2010, in
the first place. Eastern Peak is a
professional strategy consulting and
technology provider that helps
companies of all sizes and across
different industries accelerate the speed
at which they do business, improve
their time to market, bring costs down,
and instill productive changes in every
process, employee, and business
model.
As a Wharton Business School
graduate, Alexey felt it was his calling
to help businesses undergo digital
transformation. He was also looking
forward to leveraging my tech
expertise in various industries.
Alexey thinks it's the fact that he has
been fascinated with technology from
the very start that made the major
impact. His previous experience
included working as a CEO, founder,
and tech advisor in transportation,
education, and app development
sectors (GetTaxi, Maximum Education,
and Ubertesters respectively). With it,
he was capable of extending his
experience further, and better
understand the needs of the company’s
clients from different industries and
business domains.
Alexey’s connections with Eastern
Europe were also highly impactful. His
company needed vast technological
expertise and R&D capacities to fulfill
its mission. It could find tech talent in
Israel, but not in the necessary
quantities. So he went to Ukraine, a
post-Soviet country with a large pool
of excellent STEM talent to hire topnotch
developers for Eastern Peak. Of
course, the convenient location and
Ukraine’s strong cultural ties with
Israel also played an important part.
Let’s find out how Alexey has headed
Eastern Peak to make it one-stop shop
in agile digital transformation and
innovation in an interview conducted
between Alexey and Insights Success.
Below are the highlights of the
interview:
Could you throw some light on your
mission and vision statement?
As a tech consulting and development
firm, we believe our mission is to help
companies, large and small, to adapt to
today’s ever-changing business
environment. We believe innovation is
the key to surviving and thriving in the
modern economy. We apply our
expertise in AI, IoT, Big Data, and
immersive technologies to help
organizations flexibly adjust to all the
economical, technological, and
regulatory challenges. We also help
startups enter the market with fresh
business ideas.
Describe your company and its
cutting-edge engineering and digital
transformation solutions which
address all the needs of your
customers.
At Eastern Peak, we offer engineering
and digital transformation services. We
help organizations bridge the gap
between business and technology by
upgrading legacy systems and
preparing their infrastructure for
continuous innovations. Our clients’
business goals come first - we leverage
technology to help companies achieve
better operational efficiency, accelerate
time to market, improve and automate
every process, starting from the most
meticulous ones. We also build new
products from scratch and offer a range
of services to startups - from product
discovery and branding to help them
create powerful investor pitches in
order to attract funding.
We specialize in IoT, enterprise digital
transformation, SaaS, mobile app, and
Uber-like solutions development,
building websites, marketplaces, as
well as fintech tools and platforms. We
offer a range of cooperation models:
managed projects, team extension, or
on-demand services.
Needless to say, at Eastern Peak, we
employ best-of-breed experts in these
fields and recruit top Eastern Europe
tech talent. Expertise and talent are our
greatest assets.
Describe in detail the work culture
and the values that drive your
company.
At Eastern Peak we place a high
emphasis on transparency, enabling
clients to communicate with our
remote teams as effectively as if they
were working with their in-house
developers.
www.insightssuccess.com
March 2021 | 19

We value trust, so it is important for us to let clients know
what we are working on and for what purpose. We also
strictly adhere to intellectual property laws, so our clients
can trust us with their ideas. We ensure predictability and
competence by delivering on time and sticking to a
project’s timeline.
Keeping communication lines open is also one of our
strongest values. We run regular calls and meetings and our
clients can always reach us with their feedback.
What is your idea of Corporate Social Responsibility?
We are a global company, working internationally, so we
view fostering business growth and innovation as our major
CSR initiative. For example, in the wake of the COVID-19
pandemic, we were helping brick-and-mortar businesses,
regardless of size and location, to shift online, digitize their
projects and services, discover new business opportunities,
and build emergency response strategies.
An important part of our CSR vision is being a responsible
employer. We make sure our wage structure is fair and
transparent and offer possibilities for employee training and
development. We also put forth significant efforts to create a
safe work environment for our employees, with
professional air-purification and hand-sanitizing stations onpremises
- which is especially important in the postpandemic
reality.
What are your company’s future aspirations? What
strategies are you undertaking to achieve those goals?
In the future, we plan to keep up the good work in line with
our mission: helping businesses across all industries and
domains achieve better outcomes with digital
transformation. In this regard, attracting the best talent,
keeping abreast of the emerging technologies and
continuous learning are the best strategies.
“Our innovative development
team works at the forefront of
modern technology and
employs best practices in
software development.”
20 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

The 10 Most Inuential Business Leaders of 2021
ELTON
JOHNSON, JR.
A Combat Vetrepreneur
Being a business leader is a calling. One should not
do it just because it is a job. It is a calling, and you
have got to be involved in it with your head, heart,
and hands. Your heart has got to be in the job; you got to
love what you do; it should consume your consciousness.
One such conscious and intuitive business leader is Elton
Johnson, Jr., the Founder, Chairman and Former CEO
of AmeriVet Securities, Inc. (“AVI”, “AmeriVet”).
AmeriVet Securities was formed in 1993 to take advantage
of a new California law that placed disabled veteran owned
and operated companies in the same special category as
female and minority owned and operated companies. Elton
Johnson, Jr., is a disabled veteran due to an injury he
suffered during a parachute training exercise in 1988 when
he was serving in a U.S. Army Reserve Special Forces unit
(Green Berets).
Exemplifying Proficiency in the Financial Services
Industry
Elton has 43 years of experience in the financial services
industry. He started AmeriVet with a borrowed $1150 and in
twenty-seven years as its CEO, he grew the company to
forty full time employees and registered reps who
altogether, generated over $8 million in annual gross
revenues resulting in over $1 million in profit in 2020. The
mission statement of AmeriVet Securities, Inc., read as
follows: “A Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Business
(SDVOB) and a Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) that
specializes in capital markets, public finance, agency
trading, and other financial services for institutional clients
and is committed to hiring and training U.S. military
veterans and providing them with opportunities for
advancement in the financial and corporate sectors.”
Effective use of Securities Platforms
AmeriVet Securities, Inc., is a full service, special category
(SDVOB and MBE), institutional broker-dealer providing
the highest, most dedicated, and most professional
standards of service through its multiple lines of business
for its institutional clients. The company’s cutting-edge
solutions, which address all the needs of its customers, all
deal with its focus on the most effective and expedient use
of the latest financial/securities platforms in its industry that
include both commercial and proprietary platforms. It
prides itself on its reputation for the effective use of
financial/securities platforms to service its clients and it is
this reputation that sets it apart in the securities industry
from the other special category broker-dealers.
Licenced Stockbroker
Elton Johnson, Jr., has been a licensed stockbroker for over
forty-three years. He currently holds fourteen
securities/commodities licenses putting him in a small
unique group in the securities industry whose members
hold, or have held, a dozen or more licenses. His mark upon
the securities industry is that he is the first Main Principal
of a broker-dealer to operate his company from a combat
zone since World War Two. He also has the distinction of
being the only Main Principal of a broker-dealer to have
ever served in combat and have a price (bounty) put on his
head. This happened twice: in Iraq in 2004 when he served
as the official Paymaster for the Iraqi Armed Forces
($20,000 bounty) and in Afghanistan in 2011 when he
served with the Afghan National Army Special Operations
Advisory Group (ANASOAG; $1000 bounty).
22 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

“
AmeriVet
leads
the
way!
Lieutenant Colonel Elton Johnson, Jr.
Founder, Chairman, Former CEO
www.insightssuccess.com
March 2021 | 23

Ensuring Great Success
Elton Johnson’s influence over his company comes in the
form of the leadership skills and principles that he has
applied to the successful operation of AmeriVet which he
learned in the US Army and the US Marine Corps. Having
completed several military leadership professional
development courses during his military career, including
courses from the US Army Command and General Staff
College, and having been the Commanding Officer of two
combat commands, Elton has applied all of what he has
learned in the military to his business after noting the many
similarities between success in the military and success in
business. The great success of AmeriVet today is primarily
due to the military experience and the military education of
Elton Johnson. He has effectively applied both to ensure the
success and growth of AmeriVet Securities, Inc.
Unprecedented Achievements
Relying on his experiences and training while serving in an
U.S. Army Reserve Special Forces unit (Green Berets),
Elton realized that building an efficient and highly capable
corporate team was the key to the success of AmeriVet.
Thus, when AmeriVet had its relaunch in 2018 after being
inactive for over seventeen (17) years due to Elton’s
wartime service, top priority was given to recruiting and
building a top-notch corporate team. This strong emphasis
on team building has greatly benefited AmeriVet. The result
of concentrating on putting together an efficient and highly
capable corporate team can be readily seen in the
company’s current bottom line. In just two years (2018-
2020), AmeriVet has increased its annual gross revenues by
almost tenfold. It has also gone from being in the red to
being in the black in just two years. Both financial feats are
nearly unprecedented in the securities industry.
Supporting Veteran Community
At AmeriVet Securities, Inc., its idea of corporate social
responsibility is to support, to the best of its ability, the
veteran community, and the veteran service organizations
(VSOs) that assists the veteran community. The best way it
believes that it can support veterans is by employing as
many veterans as it can and by doing all that it can do to
support the veteran community and veteran service
organizations.
Growth Oriented Approach
The future aspiration of AmeriVet is quite simple: to
Major Elton Johnson, Jr.
Iraq-2004
US Military Advisor/IAF Paymaster
become the best and most successful Service-Disabled
Veteran Owned Business (SDVOB) and Minority Business
Enterprise (MBE) broker-dealer in the business. AmeriVet
Securities, Inc., is the second oldest SDVOB in the
securities industry and it is very proud of that distinction,
but it is its goal to also be the best managed and the most
successful SDVOB in the securities industry. The strategies
that it is undertaking to achieve this goal all deal with
detailed long-term planning, either regarding increasing
current revenue streams or creating new revenue streams.
Since the battle focus of any successful company is to grow
the company and one of the best ways to do this is to
increase the amounts of the existing revenue streams and to
endeavor to always create new revenue streams, practically
all of the AmeriVet strategies concern these two objectives.
24 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

Amy Schoemehl
Pandemic and Challenges for Socio-economic issues, and Healthcare
COVID-19 presented multi-faceted challenges to
individuals, families, companies, and communities.
No one person’s experience has been the same, and
we have all had different feelings about different aspects at
different times; even the length of time has impact – on the
sustainability to endure, on life decisions, on matters of
priority and politics. It has been a global challenge yet
polarizing in responses.
When we apply this to technology innovations, disruptive
mindsets, and crisis remediation, my prevailing thought is
how the answers were fairly universal. While solutions
may be specific and nuanced, the broader headline is simple
and consistent – think about the people first, and make good
decisions based on the positive intention to support those
people. If the thinking and decision making was sound and
crisp, revenue and support were sure to follow.
For me as a COO, mother, daughter, wife – it is my
responsibility to keep people safe and thriving. In my
experience, that means a lot of active listening and
compassion. This is where the EQ that I have or have built
over time is leveraged and stretched, but every day I feel it
is a blessing to be in the position I am to be that catalyst.
My empathy for how people are feeling and experiencing
this pandemic has allowed me to make good decisions
about things related to balancing work and life (employees
who are straddling working remotely with caregiving and
home schooling small children, caring for colleagues who
are struggling with quarantined isolation and depression,
creating processes and workflows to keep employees safe
when it’s essential they are in a physical location to
properly do a job); COVID-19 has been a forcing
mechanism for a lot of people to work in a distributed
environment, but also illuminated the need for employers to
think with a tribe mentality and look after their people as
humans first. The human connection is what is going to help
us get through this pandemic together.
Realizing this intersection or overlap between work and
personal life, I began feeling a more acute and urgent need
to be an ambassador of positive change. To see it, is to say
it. The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stated, “He
who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he
who helps to perpetuate it. He who accepts evil without
protesting against it is really cooperating with it.”
All to say, I feel my privileged position is a platform to
advocate for change and positive momentum in all areas –
social and political reform, how we do business, how we
reconcile revenue growth in such a dynamic environment,
and what innovations can be made to better the ecosystem
for years to come. A lot of this is empathy and mindset, but
so much is also using technology and new ideas to
completely reinvent status quo. 2020 was riddled with a
variety of challenges in the independent adjuster world, and
I am so proud of the hard work and grit that our employees
demonstrated in the face of adversity – the single biggest
contribution to our success as a company was our human
capital feeling psychologically and physically safe and
supported. The ways we were able to give that to them (and
our clients) was through a blend of talent management
sprinkled with a heavy dose of ingenuity and technology
investments. E. A. Renfroe understood that our employees
were leaning on us to support them mentally and
financially. We had to reach 17,000 employees without
coming face to face with nearly any of them. We accepted
that challenge, in the face of the pandemic coupled with
2020 having the most named events in U.S. natural disaster
history. The magnitude and gravity of the situation could
not have been a bigger challenge, but with the grace of our
executive team and all the wonderful people in both the
corporate office as well as in our project teams, we not only
survived but thrived.
For me, walking out of that calendar year feeling as positive
about the future as I do is a signal of how important the
work we do truly is. As leaders in any industry, as well as
being members in our families and communities, we have
shared accountability to get things right.
26 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

Healthcare in Pandemic
www.insightssuccess.com
March 2021 | 27

Jeff LoCastro
A Remarkable Record of Developing Companies
Jeff LoCastro,
Founder & CEO,
Neener Analytics
28 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

The 10 Most Inuential Business Leaders of 2021
n the era of personalization, shouldn't
Idecisioning also be personalized? To
understand this concept Jeff LoCastro -
Founder & CEO at Neener Analytics pioneered
the concept of human-based data. His idea was
always to “humanize” the data and use only data
that is unique and individual to a specific human
being throughout the decision chain.
In an interview conducted between Insights
Success and Jeff LoCastro, he discussed using
today's technology to decision people the way
people used to be decisioned, how it all started,
and the concept of Human Data. Below are the
highlights of the interview:
We’ve developed a regulatory compliant AIbased
financial risk decisioning technology using
1-click social media or any media used socially to help
lenders better decision and understand specific individual
risk outcomes for thin-file, no-file, and credit challenged
consumers. 1-click AI-based financial risk decisioning
technology using Small Data.
Better decisioning thin-file, no-file, the credit challenged
and increasing Financial Inclusion, is not a “data” problem.
It’s a “Human” problem. Lenders don’t want to know if the
consumer’s “data” is going to pay them back; they want to
know if the CONSUMER is going to. Which is why we
have pioneered Human-Data and created the branch called
Human-Data Science.
What led to an inception of the company?
I lived in China for two years and about 6-months
before coming home, I made a list of the first
things I had to do when I got back. As my
California Driver’s License had expired while I
was out of the country, that was the first thing on
my list. I wondered why was that? How had that
made #1. I still knew how to drive. So why was
that #1 on my list? I wondered, “So, I was only
‘valid’ if the California Department of Motor
Vehicles said I was?” That’s insane. How did my
grandparents’ function without walking around
with their ID all the time?” How was my
grandfather able to get a loan? or whatever,
without a wallet full of government ID’s or even a
credit score? He was able to do it because his
banker, for example could say, “I know you!” the
banker knew my grandfather’s story. And where
is that story being told? Social Media. Neener
Analytics was born.
Describe your company and its cutting-edge
solutions which addresses all the needs of your
customers.
What if you could sit each customer down with a
psychologist and ask them, “are you really going
to pay us back?” Because that is the question,
right? The question is not CAN they, the question
is WILL they.
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March 2021 | 29

Could you throw some light on your mission and vision
statement?
There was always a lot of talk about “Big Data.” And
everybody cheered it. But big data is not a new concept. It’s
been around for a hundred years and it’s pretty basic stuff.
But most people don’t really know what it is. Essentially,
big data are aggregations or bins of motivations, behaviors,
or affinities. And everyone you think that exhibits those
motivations, behaviors, or affinities get tossed into that bin.
But what does it mean? Well, you’re not really sure so you
need more aggregations and bins to toss people into.
Basically, big data is the practice of, “I don’t know you, but
I know people like you.” What a horrible way to make a
decision or form an opinion about someone!
In fairness, big data is a perfectly acceptable way to make,
for example, marketing decisions. But it is a terrible way to
understand authentic outcomes, especially financial risk
outcomes. Big data by its very nature creates disparate
impact. There had to be a better way.
Before big data models, how did people make (accurate)
decisions about other individual human beings? How did my
grandfather get his first home loan back in 1940? He just
walked into the bank, said he wanted a home loan, and the
banker said, Yes. I know you.” The keywords are: I. Know.
You. But how did he know? The banker didn’t have a lifetime
record of all my grandfather’s transactions. And he didn’t
have a collection of his complete payment history. But he
KNEW my grandfather would pay him back. That banker
knew this based on the conversations and communications he
had with him over time. He knew this by having listened to
how my grandfather talked about the things in his life: his
words and his communications. Exactly what human beings
do with other human beings.
This is the innovation, except not using big data. This is not
sentiment analysis or Likes & Friends or Key words or
phrases. We have cracked the code on Small Data. And
Small Data = I know you.
Describe in detail the work culture and the values that
drive your company.
Leaders don’t lead alone. I think the most important job of
any leader is building the team; the #1 priority is putting
great people in the right place to succeed. Great leaders
attract talented people and put them in a position to win.
I don’t like to put too many boundaries on people and what
30 | March 2021 www.insightssuccess.com

We are the leaders in
computational social
science and
the only social media
analytics that delivers
specific, individual, risk
outcomes in a 100%
friction-less
environment.
“
we do. People should not be afraid to make mistakes.
When your daily task is innovation and not caretaking, if
people are “afraid” you at worst stagnate and die or at best
move super-slow and fall behind . . . and die.
1. Hire only people that have shared values. I’d rather have
the second-best player who shares our values than the best
player who doesn’t.
the economy, and the community, filling a void. And
regardless of the business or industry, treat everyone in the
community as if they are customers. Because no matter
what you sell, what you build, or what you scale; good
businesses touch everyone somehow directly or indirectly.
Because the true measure of a man (and a company) is how
well he treats people who can’t do anything for him. My
CSR philosophy flows from that.
What are your company’s future aspirations? What
strategies are you undertaking to achieve those goals?
We are really pioneering the idea that the consumer is their
own data. And the consumer as their own source of data is the
future of all consumer engagement. We are currently in 11
countries and I see us owning specific market regions in the
next 10 years. We’ve already built out 2 product lines, each
delivering 5 decisioning products. We have another line slated
for 2021 and are on track for a new line each of the next 5-
years while continuing to expand our decisioning capabilities.
We’ll have offices globally connecting banks, lenders,
insurance companies, real estate companies and others with 4-
billion currently invisible consumers globally.
2. Give people freedom to make mistakes. Encourage
failure (so-to-speak). When people aren’t afraid to fail, they
try all kinds of crazy things.
What is your idea of Corporate Social Responsibility?
I think people make that idea more complex than it needs to
be. Ideally the business itself is creating value for people,
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March 2021 | 31