Joy Otadoh Morgan

I attribute my success to God. As I mentioned, I'm religious, and I don't think I would have my success outside of him. That is easy for me to answer because my faith is central to everything I've accomplished.

I would say do it. I feel like we need more women leaders, we need more women in positions of influence. Because of the compassion we naturally carry as women, I feel like we need more of that in leadership positions, especially in student nutrition, because we're able to connect and see the bigger picture and be influential enough to make the decisions that need to happen. For young women who want to venture in food service, student nutrition is just one path, but there are very many different paths that you can take. I've only been in student nutrition 6 years, but before that, I've been in different areas of food service. Let them not think it's just a one-track path - there's so many different ventures and paths you can take to find what works for you.

The challenges are twofold. Operationally, the high cost of everything makes it challenging to run an operation where you're still breaking even and making a profit without making the prices of the items you sell unattainable. Our cost of living has made it challenging to balance the day-to-day operational costs. The second challenge is finding good team members, especially our hourly staff and temporary laborers who work 4 or 5 hours a day. Most people are looking for professional positions, and when you do find people willing to work the temporary labor, sometimes you don't find the most hard-working, dedicated people, so that's very challenging. On the opportunities side, my favorite part of working in student nutrition is the students - being able to interact with them, getting feedback from them, talking to them as you walk through the cafeteria, seeing them eating and enjoying the food we provide. One of the other big things is the impact we have on families and lives. With student nutrition, we impact the whole child, especially with families that may not be able to afford breakfast and lunch. We're able to provide that for them, and having good nutrition helps them succeed in school. We're part of their overall well-being.

Integrity is one value that I hold for both work and personal life. I try to uphold that in how I interact and how I go about my day-to-day life, whether it's with the people in my personal life or the work that I do. Integrity and what you do is very important - you have to be a trustworthy person, especially in this business. Another value I live by is probably compassion and gratitude. I am very fortunate to be where I am, and I'm very religious, so gratitude and compassion is part of my inner being, and I carry that in my personal life and my professional life as well.