It was two in the morning.
A dark corporate edit suite, cold tea at my side, polishing sales videos to stay “on message,” with a bleary-eyed editor beside me … and it hit me: This can’t be it.
Even though I loved the craft and learned so much from that work, I realized I was missing the kind of social mission-driven storytelling that first inspired me – the stories that move hearts, shift systems, and spark change.
That moment took me back to my beginnings. To my mom, a single mother in the 1970s who left what was expected and built a life by breaking the rules meant to contain her. On a secretary’s salary, she bought and renovated a two-family house in a large suburban city and filled it with love, laughter, and tenants from around the world — Iraq, Hungary, Turkey, Italy. Growing up, our kitchen table was where cultures collided and stories unfolded. That’s where I learned that the personal is political, and that stories reveal how systems shape people’s lives.
In between her full-time work, raising me, scrimping to keep the bills paid, and frantically dealing with one house maintenance project after another, my mother’s resilience, conviction, and astounding capacity for generosity and good ‘ole sweat equity shaped me.
That night in the edit suite, wired, weary, surrounded by half-empty coffee cups, I realized it was time for me to walk away from what was safe and expected. So, I made my own leap from what was expected to head out on my own to tell stories that matter. Stories that reveal our shared humanity. Stories that spark understanding, and change thought and action.
Starting my own company wasn’t neat or easy. It was messy, scary, and full of nights staring at the ceiling, wondering if I’d lost my mind. But the pull to create something meaningful was stronger than the fear.
That’s why I founded For Impact Productions. To foster creativity and make a home for stories that move hearts and shift systems.
Because when you tell a human story, you don’t just change how people see the world …you change the world itself.
–Simone Pero