Just last
year... Our Alabama mission
started with this celebration. Both Afiya and Dr. Mayfield further illuminate
or vision for Developing a Culture of Business in this excerpt from her
celebration in Montgomery, Alabama last September.
2012 Montgomery Advertiser:
A national company will honor an Autaugaville native for her work in helping new businesses get off the ground, with the hopes that her story will inspire others to reach for similar goals.
n Caver, is Afiya Madzimoyo, formerly Carolyn Caver being recognized by ComproTax for her work in entrepreneurship training and professional development in contributing to the mobile tax office trend. She'll be honored Sept. 15 at the Renaissance Montgomery Hotel & Spa at the Convention Center.
"Her story is a textbook for those who want to know how to succeed in business by rendering distinguished service to our community," said Sophia Bracy-Harris of the Federation of Child Care Centers of Alabama.
Martha's Place, a longtime fixture in Montgomery dining, got its start in part through Madzimoyo's work with FOCAL's Black Women's Leadership and Economic Development Project, and Madzimoyo said she still recalls the wisdom of restaurant owner Martha Hawkins.
"Martha once said something that stuck with me: `Being brave doesn't mean you don't feel scared. It means that you do it anyway because it's the right thing to do,'" Madzimoyo said.
Madzimoyo, a graduate of Autaugaville High School, Huntingdon College and the University of Alabama, now works in the Atlanta area for Compro-Tax, an income tax preparation and bookkeeping company which has 220 offices in 26 states.
"Year in and year out, she outshines others and leads the company in professional income tax and bookkeeping service, community service, entrepreneur development and education," Compro-Tax founder Jackie Mayfield said.
Mayfield will be the keynote speaker at the Sept. 15 event, where Madzimoyo will receive the "Culture of Business Award." The company said the event will try to offer hope to young adults interested in business by celebrating Madzimoyo's successes in turning people like them into successful entrepreneurs and managers.
But Randall Williams, editor-in-chief of New South Books, remembers her from her work with the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Montgomery Black Film Project.
"Civil rights was in her blood," Williams said. "Her father was active in voter registration and early protesting efforts from Selma to Montgomery. He passed that courage on to Carolyn _ I mean Afiya. She researched and traveled the Southeast helping to track the KKK for the Southern Poverty Law Center. She then turned her efforts homeward and organized an extremely well-supported showing of the play `Freedom Days' at the Capri Theatre."
"It's been quite a journey, and I think my father would be proud," Madzimoyo said. "After all, it was when I went with him selling watermelons from the back of his truck that he taught me the rudiments of business success _ great vision, great relationships and great service."
Part of that journey included time as an adjunct professor at both Alabama State University and Troy University Montgomery.
"At first, I have to admit, I was scared for her," ASU university editor Lois Russell said. "Most of us use our education as a step to job promotion. That path is tried and true. Higher education to business success is a road less traveled.
"But she succeeded in using her degree to build relationships for business and professional service with people of all walks of life."
ComproTax the nation's largest black-owned income tax and bookkeeping company is on a mission to ignite our community to once again develop a culture of business to lift all business and to lift the economic and social agenda of our community nationwide.
