#368 Chris Schrader: From Rainy-Day Idea to Global Movement—The 24 Hour Race Story–Part One
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Who are the hosts and guests of this podcast episode?
Hi, everyone. Welcome to our show, Chief Change Officer. I'm Vince Chan, your ambitious human host. Our show is a modernist community for change progressives in organizational and human transformation from around the world. Today's guest is Chris Schrader, founder and executive chairman of 24 Hour Race, which is a global movement against human trafficking that has raised over 20 million US dollars in the last decade. I've known Chris for almost 10 years. Our first encounter was back in 2016 when I invited him to be a panelist at an event I hosted on education technology. Chris is sharp, well-read, and definitely unconventional. He took a leave of absence from Harvard Spent an extended period of time away and eventually finished his studies in neuroscience while also building and growing tech businesses around the world. Along the way, he founded a charity based on his love for expeditions.
And it's safe to say he sees life and business leadership as a journey too. We'll be talking for about an hour, split into two parts. In this episode, part one, we'll dive into the genesis and evolution of 24-hour race. What started as a casual suggestion on a rainy day turned into a life-changing journey for a teenager. The world across England raised five figures in U.S. dollar and sparked an eight-figure U.S. dollar global movement. Tomorrow's episode, part two, will focus on Chris' approach to leadership and team building, drawing parallels between leading an expedition and managing a business team. This episode highlights how lessons learned from life or death situations in the wilderness translate into effective leadership strategies in the corporate world.
Chris also offers his heartfelt advice for young ambitious talents on balancing life goals, family expectations, and career direction. Welcome, Chris. Welcome to my show.
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Chris, do you remember that I invited you to an in-person event hosted by me back in 2016? And I can't believe that after so many years, I got the second chance of inviting you back now in a virtual format.
Thank you, Vince. They say that lightning never strikes the same place twice. But in this case, I think we can both agree that's a good thing. And I'm very excited to be chatting with you again for a second time with a decade that doesn't really feel like it should have been a decade later.
Chris, you and I are born and raised in Hong Kong, but I know you have a very interesting multicultural background. Tell us more about that.
Sure. So I'm a third generation Hong Konger. My grandparents moved here in 1960. My grandmother's family had been in Indonesia as Dutch colonists for something like 300 years. Her father and her uncles were all in government in the last colonial government of Indonesia. And of course, after World War II, they moved back to the Netherlands. And my grandmother was half Indonesian and she never quite felt like she fit in. So when she met my grandfather and he proposed, she agreed on the condition that they would find their way back to Asia. And sure enough, a few years later, they moved to Hong Kong and got married in Hong Kong just a few days after moving in.
What is the origin story of the 24 Hour Race?
And less than a few years later, less than a year later, my mother was born here. And I was actually a similar product. So my mother, who grew up in Hong Kong and went to school here, went to the Netherlands, found herself a hub and basically said, if you want to marry me, you've got to find your way back to Hong Kong. And that was my father, who was studying medicine at the time. For him to get qualified as a doctor, he had to go spend a year of training in London. And I have been there. Be Catholic accident, I think is the way to put it. But within a few months of my birth, we were all back in Hong Kong. And the rest of my siblings, I'm one of four, were all born in Hong Kong. So I grew up really at the tail end of Hong Kong's colonial era.
And I had, for all intents and purposes, a really happy childhood and upbringing. I got to the age of about 13 or 14, and then I went to school in the UK. I went to a small boarding school with a military background.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
Who are the hosts and guests of this podcast episode?
0:13–5:49
2
What is the origin story of the 24 Hour Race?
5:49–11:13
3
How did Chris Schrader's multicultural background influence his journey?
11:13–16:09
4
What inspired the first expedition walk across England?
16:09–19:46
5
How did the 24 Hour Race evolve from a walk to an endurance race?
19:46–26:48
Speakers
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