The World’s Paper Company Rooted in Memphis
Sylvamo's Neki Catron: "This Education Is Not Charity Work"
Sylvamo calls itself the world's paper company, and its corporate headquarters sits in Memphis. On the latest episode of At Scale, Neki Catron, Global Community Engagement Manager at Sylvamo, joined hosts Krissy DeAlejandro and Tyler Ford to explain what that headquarters address actually means for students in Shelby County. Neki is a Memphis native who left for six years and could not wait to get back. Her career moved from criminology and juvenile justice into corporate volunteer management at Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare, stewardship at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and now community engagement at a company operating across the United States, Brazil and Europe. Her advice to students starting out is the same advice that shaped her own path: say yes, raise your hand and get comfortable being uncomfortable.
The heart of the conversation was how Sylvamo thinks about its investment in tnAchieves programming. Neki was direct about it. Businesses do not succeed in isolation, she said, and a company's success is tied to the health of the community it operates in. That reframes the work. Supporting students is not a give-back effort or a line item in a philanthropy budget. It is a strategic investment in the region and in the workforce that will run it. Neki pointed to what drew Sylvamo to MemAccess and MemCOMPLETE specifically: a holistic approach that reaches students while they are still in high school, helps them navigate applications and scholarships and then stays with them so they finish. She also described a culture where volunteerism shows up in annual goals, where an employee ambassadors program grew out of staff asking to do more and where a matching gift program helps employees stretch their own giving.
The hosts and Neki also looked ahead at what employers will need. Technical expertise still matters, but Neki said the demand she sees rising fastest is for critical thinking, problem solving, adaptability and communication. Technology will not replace people, she said, but it will keep changing the work, which makes continuous learning the skill that holds everything else together. Asked what Memphis needs over the next ten years, she talked about resilience, access and a clearer path from the classroom to the workforce. Krissy closed on a line she keeps coming back to: talent is universal, but opportunity is not. Sylvamo's investment is one way that gap gets narrower for Memphis students.
Listen to the full episode of At Scale wherever you get your podcasts.