Influence
Posted by AGI on December 30, 2007 06:12 PM | Permalink
This month lifestyle magazine 7x7 included AGI's President & CEO Alexis Wong in its annual list of San Francisco's 49 most influential people.
The magazine put Alexis in the "Bricks + Mortar" category where she accompanies David Gottfried, founder of the US Green Building Council, Laurence Kornfield, the City's chief building inspector, Dwight Alexander, the City's Planning Department president, and Maria Ayerdi, executive director for the Transbay Joint Powers Authority, among others.
That's some very good company -- but the magazine thinks its appropriate. As the editors wrote:
If you were a developer and your current pipeline of residential projects -- ones that bring a sophisticated gloss to otherwise-gritty areas of Oakland, Berkeley and San Francisco, including the new 246-unit Soma Grand on Mission -- was worth more than $750 million (and if you had roped in the investing clout of CalPERs and TMG), you'd be on this list too.
The obvious value of this kind of attention is that it helps AGI build greater brand equity in future dealings -- and of course the affirmation inspires us to continue improving ourselves and be better at what we do.
But perhaps more important, AGI Capital is a minority/woman-led business. Being tagged as a key civic leader here in San Francisco helps Alexis set an example. Simply put: being Asian or female shouldn't deter anyone from developing quality projects in this community.
So who would be on Ms. Wong's own list of influential people? Her grandmother first and foremost, she says. And probably another influential local Asian woman: Fiona Ma, the former San Francisco supervisor who is now State Assembly Majority Whip in Sacramento.