Conversations with Juan Mejia

Today we’d like to introduce you to Juan Mejia.

Hi Juan, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Thank you for reaching back out to me, I often state my mother and I migrated from Colombia looking for the American Dream. When we arrived to the states, we did not know the language or culture but knew this was the place we wanted to call home. I am graduated from Gwinnett County Public Schools and pursued a bachelor’s from Kennesaw State University.

I started working from a young age in various industries ranging from retail to law firms. At the age of 18, I managed my first political campaign and found the importance of being civically active. After finalizing the campaigns, I worked in-house as an internal consultant specializing in the intersection of operations, human resources, and finance. I became passionate about helping other organizations, which is when I founded JCM Ventures to help organizations with strategy, development, and innovation. As the organizations grew, we became licensed to also be able to help them with their commercial real estate.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
In the last interview, I was able to share some of the hurdles of being an immigrant and entrepreneurship. Two years later, we have gone through a worldwide pandemic. In the end of 2019 and beginning of 2020, JCM Ventures’ revenue stream had switched to majority of it being from our commercial real estate division. When the pandemic hit, most of our clients had to send employees home or shut down operations. This froze their commercial real estate plans and froze our deals. We had to become a resource to our past clients and see how we could assist them in renegotiating leases or create ways for their operations to continue during the pandemic. We kept thinking outside the box and innovating our services to better serve the community. We have started to create a “new normal” and new protocols have been created to help organization’s leaders reevaluate and continue plans the pandemic had delayed. We are here to bring value to our clients rather than provide a service.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
JCM Ventures has two major divisions: consulting and commercial real estate. In our consulting division, we help with strategy, development, and innovation. A client that we were able to help during the pandemic was Rehabilitation Enables Dreams, Inc. a nonprofit working to end recidivism and improve our criminal justice system. We were able to work with leadership to improve processes, onboard new roles, develop strategic plans, and expansion into a new jurisdiction. We are most proud of helping organizations grow and succeed. Whether they are for-profit or nonprofit being part of the growth and helping them turn a dream into reality makes it all worth it.

In the real estate division, we are proud of the work we have been able to do over the years. We have made a strong presence in three verticals: Spanish speaking businesses, nonprofits, and government (both foreign and domestic). Some of our most complex deals have occurred with foreign government entities as we place their consulate offices serving the Southeast. The complexity comes from managing the local needs, US Department of State’s approval, as well as the back home government officials. We have been able to work with several nonprofit organizations and consulates here in Metro-Atlanta and look forward to continuing to serve those serving our community.

We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
What people often refer to as luck, I look as opportunities in life that you took. Some of my luckiest moments have been fostered through raising my hand and not being afraid of a challenge. One of my first lessons of that was my first “big boy” job, I was asked to manage a political campaign. I had never worked in that industry but the candidate had seen my work ethic and asked if I would join his team. A lot of the “luck” in my life has been a mixture of being at the right place, at the right time, with the right experience. A passion of mine is volunteering in my community. I have been able to meet amazing people through serving alongside others and making genuine relationships. As you meet people, sharing a bit of yourself and learning about others allows us to elevate and empower one another.

Contact Info:

• Email: info@jcmvpro.com
• Website: www.jcmvpro.com
• Instagram: http://instagram.com/jcmventures/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jcmventures
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/jcmejiatl
• Other: https://www.dtspade.com/welcome-juan-mejia/

Image Credits:
ACBR, FWD.us, GHCC, RED Inc.