We had the good fortune of connecting with Shahriar Afshar and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Shahriar, what’s the most difficult decision you’ve ever had to make?
The most difficult decision was to leave the comfort & safety of my 25-year government career for the private sector. The longer you stay, the more you feel the golden handcuff ie. retirement, benefits, security, familiarly, etc. All are wonderful things to have at some point but you will never be free if you don’t take that jump or at least lean into a new direction.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I am a servant leader creating value, inclusion & innovation in autism acceptance as the Executive Director of the Autism Society of San Diego & the host of Autism Spa Podcasts.

As a public servant, I started my career with the City/Port of San Diego and spent 25 years in various leadership roles in land use, real estate, entitlements, infrastructure, project management & government relations. I led $500M public-private projects, developed local-state-federal policy initiatives and facilitated technological innovations across multidisciplinary teams.

As a nonprofit leader, I established a trade association to advance international economic engagement. I organized monthly events in Washington DC, lobbied Capitol Hill and gained the sponsorship of Fortune 100 companies like General Motors, Exxon-Mobil & Caterpillar.

As a public speaker, I’ve been a media spokesman & public communicator with the mainstream media, TV, radio & print on hundreds of occasions from San Diego to Washington, DC. Public speaking is my superpower.

As a social entrepreneur, I created Evregy to offer EV charging station site hosting, support CleanTech startups & create an ecosystem of EV infrastructure & smart cities. Let’s leverage our core competencies to change the world together.

With the Afshar Group, I created public-private partnerships in real estate projects, build community engagement strategies & navigate local, state & federal bureaucracies in procurements, permitting & RFP’s.

As an Autism parent & advocate, I push for new technologies & partner with startups to help the ASD community. I also host three AutismSpa.com Podcasts.

As a philanthropist, I am a Board Advisor & activist in several nonprofits active in food insecurity, disability rights, philanthropic giving, social justice, political education & voter empowerment.

As a bilingual political media podcaster, I brought together thought leaders, activists & subject matter experts on Politics365.com, every week on YouTube, Spotify & KIRN670AM in Los Angeles, CA from 2022-224.

After all of that, the Top Ten Lessons I’ve learned in my public life have been:
1. Be a good listener and if you don’t know how, start by talking less. It’ll come to you.
2. Good leaders don’t have a lot of followers but they are always looking for people to cultivate and empower as future leaders. No one lives forever.
3.Think of yourself as a permanent empathetic servant-leader, here to serve others and don’t get caught up with your temporary title or position.
4.Learn to become self aware of your core strengths & weaknesses. No one has it all right and your mom is not here to tell you otherwise.
5. Seek continuous feedback and don’t get offended regardless of how clumsy the feedback comes to you.
6. Play, watch or study team sports like soccer to keep you humble and a team player, not solitary ingratiating sports like golf.
7. Never ever stop giving to others, donating and contributing to the disenfranchised, minorities and people outside of your echo chamber.
8. Always make sure there is someone in front of you to clear the path, remove obstacles and help you on the horizon.
9. Always make sure there is someone next to you covering a glaring blind spot(s) you have. Yes, you.
10. Always make sure there is someone behind you, cleaning up whatever mess you leave behind. Again, your mom is not here.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I would bring them to the water and make sure they watch a San Diego sunset and walk on the beach but beyond that, I am not a tour guide.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I have only made it so far because there has always been three types of people around me. One in front, clearing the way & perhaps pointing out a direction. One next to me covering my many blind sides. And one behind me cleaning up whatever mess I left behind. I have never accomplished anything of note or worth completely alone and those leaders that say they did, are abandoning their troops on the field.

Website: https://www.AutismSocietySanDiego.org

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afshar365/

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