“Take risks, believe in yourself,
put your time in … look at failures
as a lesson for success, take ‘no’
and rejections gracefully, continue
to learn … stay positive, appreciate
people, be thankful, give back
to the community.”
Kevin Phan can remember the exact moment
he started his lifelong journey of hard work. It was
1992, and 7-year-old Phan and his family had just
moved to the United States from Vietnam. They
arrived in Pennsylvania in the middle of winter —
with no winter clothes.
“We came here with almost nothing,” says
Phan, 35, the founder, president and CEO of the
Capital Asian American Professional Society,
CAAPS Foundation and Merx Marketing. “It’s a really
tough life when you don’t know anybody, have
no job and no clear understanding of English. A
Christian church gave us our first six months of
housing and food vouchers. My parents shoveled
snow for extra cash. Seeing that kind of hard work
is something I’ve carried with me my whole life.”
Three months after coming to the U.S., the
family moved to Sacramento, and Phan later
volunteered at the Vietnamese Martyrs church, a
parish in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sacramento,
as its event coordinator — a position he
credits with giving him the “basic training ground
for learning about leadership, following through,
measuring your success and doing it again year
after year.”
Phan landed a job with the State of California
to help pay for undergraduate studies at Sacramento
State, but he soon discovered that despite
the salary and stability, he didn’t feel inspired.
After nearly nine years working for the state —
first for the Department of General Services as the
insurance administrator, then for the California
Energy Commission as an analyst — Phan quit
and was hired by Farmers Insurance based on his
insurance administration experience. To grow his
client base, Phan didn’t just join one chamber of
commerce — he joined six — and he eventually
opened his own insurance brokerage. He also
realized there was a need in the area for a young
professionals’ group that was focused on career
building for entrepreneurs, not just networking.
In 2016, Phan founded the all-volunteer-run
nonprofit trade association CAAPS and nonprofit
CAAPS Foundation. CAAPS provides resources,
educational programming and events around civic
leadership and business development — much
of which is now done online due to COVID-19 — to
approximately 1,200 members in Sacramento, the
Bay Area and Southern California.
CAAPS is also working with Senate Republican
Leader Shannon Grove (R-Bakersfield) to
help small businesses weather the pandemic by
providing translation of documents and resources
from the federal government and Small Business
Administration to minority-owned businesses, as
Phan explains, “to provide live data and information
in different languages so these mom-andpop
shops have the best tools to make the right
decisions for their businesses.” CAAPS is also
continuing to offer new initiatives and educational
opportunities online to keep its membership
learning and growing.
“The No. 1 thing I enjoy is seeing people come
together,” Phan says. “Sometimes young
professionals are too scared to go up to a head
honcho and request a meeting. But I always
remind them that you miss every shot you don’t
take. The worst they can say is no.”
BY JESSICA LASKEY
July 2020 | comstocksmag.com 55