The story of this medium-sized town start like that of so many other medium-sized towns in North America: Early industrialization and heavy manufacturing provided post-WWII economic windfalls to shareholders, employees and citizens alike. The 1980's then resulted in a consecutive collapse of industrial operations. The town is left with vast tracks of vacant lands and the resulting economic hardship. But in this story, the town identifies an under-utilized, seemingly unused asset that can help to create jobs, rebrand the city identity and rally a community around a new source of future economic gain.

Arwa Mahdawi on "The Surprising Solution to Workplace Diversity" at TEDxHamburg (http://www.tedxhamburg.de)

Arwa Mahdawi is the founder and Chief Minority Officer of rentaminority.com, a revolutionary new service offering diversity on demand. The site has gained worldwide attention and been covered by the likes of the BBC, Le Monde, the Huffington Post, NPR, and the Atlantic. Arwa is also a partner at cummins&partners, an independent creative agency with offices in Australia and New York. She is a regular speaker at advertising/tech/media conferences, so if you need a minority last minute, give her a call. Arwa is also a freelance writer and writes regularly for the Guardian on issues including marketing, technology, cryptocurrency, and lesbians. Frequent comments on her articles include “Was someone really paid to write this?” and “This comment was removed by a moderator.”

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx