Dr. Shanequa Smith is a restorative practitioner originally from Harlem, NY, who has lived and worked in West Virginia for the past 20 years. She is currently living and working in Charleston. Her work centers around joy, education, and connecting people to their desired opportunities.
She is the Founder of Restorative Actions, an organization that is committed to ending the cycle of poverty and generational trauma. With a Masters in Counseling and Doctorate in Human and Community Development from WVU, Dr. Smith focuses on internal healing as a means of breaking these cycles.
She said, “Many times our lives and situations make us feel like we can’t have peace, [and] we continue to live in places where we feel like we don’t deserve it.” This is why Dr. Smith’s motivation for her business is to foster healing for herself and for those that need it and feel stuck in these kind of situations.
She believes that for small businesses the biggest hurdle is lack of knowledge, not only of the resources that may be available, but how people can take a specific skill and use it to its full potential and she believes that education on financial literacy, marketing, and communication with customers are all big needs for small business owners.