How gun violence prevention became the center of my career
I did not plan to become a gun violence prevention advocate. I planned to be a business owner. But there is a straight line from losing my mother Joyce when I was 20 months old to standing on stages forty years later talking about why this issue matters. The line just took decades to see.
TL;DR: Gun violence prevention found me, not the other way around. What started as personal grief became professional purpose over twenty years. The career I have now, speaking, advocacy, public office, grew directly from the loss I carried the longest.
The loss that started everything
My mother died from gun violence before I could form a memory of her. I grew up knowing the fact but not the feeling. It was a line in my biography, not a wound I could identify. Or at least that is what I told myself for thirty-five years.
The truth is the loss shaped everything. The constant need to prove myself. The workaholism. The discomfort with vulnerability. The way I built businesses the same way I built walls, thick enough that nothing could get through. I just did not connect those patterns to Joyce until I was in my late thirties.
The congressional run that changed the trajectory
When I ran for Congress in WI-5 in 2016, the gun violence issue was unavoidable. Sandy Hook had happened four years earlier. Pulse nightclub was in the news. People were asking candidates where they stood, and I had to decide whether to give the policy answer or the personal one.
I chose personal. I talked about Joyce on the campaign trail for the first time. The response was overwhelming. People did not want another politician reciting statistics. They wanted someone who understood what a bullet does to a family, not a talking point but the lived reality of growing up without a parent.
I did not win that race. But the advocacy work it opened up was more impactful than any single election. Everytown for Gun Safety brought me on as a Wisconsin Fellow. I joined boards. I spoke at events. The speaking career that I am building right now grew directly from that congressional campaign.
Where advocacy and career overlap
People ask me if advocacy hurt my business career. Some doors closed. There are companies that do not want to book a speaker who is publicly associated with gun violence prevention. That is their right, and those were never going to be good fits for me anyway.
The doors that opened were better. Organizations that value authenticity. Companies that want their leadership teams to hear from someone who has faced something real. Event planners who are tired of the same safe motivational speakers and want someone who tells the truth, even when the truth is uncomfortable.
My speaking topics, leadership, resilience, team building, all of them are rooted in the advocacy work. I cannot talk about resilience without talking about loss. I cannot talk about leadership without talking about the courage to be honest. The advocacy is not separate from the career. It is the center of it.
What I want people to understand
Gun violence prevention is not a political issue for me. It is a personal one. I lost my mother to it. Forty thousand Americans die from it every year. Some of them are somebody’s Joyce.
If that makes some rooms uncomfortable, I can live with that. The rooms that matter are the ones where someone hears my story and decides to have the conversation they have been avoiding. That is where change starts.
About Khary Penebaker
Khary Penebaker is a Regional General Manager at Great Day Improvements, overseeing operations across Chicago, Madison, Milwaukee, and Minneapolis. He previously built Roofed Right America from startup to $35M+ in revenue with 180 employees and founded Penebaker Enterprises, growing it from $1.5M to $15M. A gun violence prevention advocate and former Everytown for Gun Safety Fellow, Khary brings two decades of leadership experience in construction, operations, and civic engagement.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can advocacy be a career?
It can be a component of one. Pure advocacy work often does not pay well. But combining advocacy with speaking, consulting, or leadership roles creates a career where purpose and income overlap.
How do you stay motivated in advocacy work?
I think about the people who will be affected tomorrow if I stop today. Motivation is not a feeling. It is a decision you make every time you want to quit.
What is the hardest part of being an advocate?
The pace of change. You work for years and progress comes in inches. Meanwhile people are dying. You have to accept that slow progress is still progress and that giving up helps nobody.
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Last updated: March 13, 2026