As Junior Achievement of East Tennessee proudly celebrates the 2024 laureate inductees – and use their success stories as models for the next generation to follow — we look at Robert “Bob” Feathers.
Feathers serves as President and Chief Executive Officer of WorkSpace Interiors, Inc., a commercial furniture and interiors firm, with offices in Kingsport, Knoxville and Chattanooga. He has nearly three decades of experience in the industry.
The WorkSpace team — five individuals on the leadership group and more than 50 overall employees — received a KOSBE business award and has been recognized as a Pinnacle award recipient by the Knoxville Chamber of Commerce, as well as earning a Rocky Top Business award from the University of Tennessee.
They are also nine-time Premier Partner award winners by Steelcase, Inc. The international furniture manufacturer recognized WorkSpace’s growth, contributions to industry and communities, investments in team members professional and personal growth, and customer satisfaction measures in all East Tennessee markets.
Prior to WorkSpace, Bob was President and CEO of Barker Building Company, Inc. and participated in more than 350 building and renovation projects throughout our vast region, including the Johnson City Public Library, National Storytelling Center in Jonesborough, and the clubhouse at The Virginian Golf Club in Bristol.
But the story for Feathers and his businesses involves a long road, replete with advice and lessons.
Raised in Kingsport and a third generation Dobyns-Bennett High School graduate, Feathers says his main influences growing up were his parents, who both were entrepreneurial and ran small businesses. Professionally, he says his brother-in-law inspired his architectural education, where Feathers graduated in 1986 from the University of Tennessee College of Architecture and Design.
Subsequently, two great bosses — architects Luther Cain and Hiram Rash — “gave this cocky young graduate a chance, allowing me to run as fast and as far as the rope would allow, sometimes choking my ambition. Baut they patiently and wisely would focus my efforts and reel me in.”
This was Feathers’ first professional job, beginning in Kingsport, but then he relocated with them in 1986 to Atlanta and Houston just over a year later.
In 1993, Feathers moved back to Kingsport from Philadelphia after stints there and in the New Jersey suburbs outside New York City. He accepted the opportunity to run his sister and brother-in-law’s construction business.
“Once again, they provided an opportunity to jump at a dream,” he said during an interview. “Owning a commercial interior solutions company was not a business that I would have thought would be a path early in my career. Owning a construction business and having had experience with commercial furnishings in Philadelphia, working for the University of Pennsylvania Hospital as Project Executive, exposed me to the importance of the commercial furnishings world.”
That journey began with a chance discussion, as he puts it, with the Todd family in the late 1990s. It resulted in the purchase and rebranding of Todd Interiors, Inc. in 1999.
Feathers says success has many definitions, and the most important is family.
His wife, Jennifer, a Vanderbilt University School of Engineering graduate, “has been the single biggest influence on our success, with her ambition, expectations, unwavering trust (often blindly), and dedication to our young family.”
Included in that support system are adult daughters, Lauren and Rebecca – both college graduates in recent years — who aid his professional efforts. Feathers reiterates that achievements always take a team.
He’s acquired some mottos and words of wisdom from his lengthy career.
“Serve others first, whether family, team members, or community, and always give back,” Feathers explained. “Don’t ever think others don’t care; they do, so don’t ignore tough conversations. Don’t hold grudges for long, and always direct success to those around you, as they probably contributed the most.”
Feathers says interest in lending his time to others developed while working for the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
“Giving back to the communities we serve was something I watched my dad do his entire life, regardless of the demands of family and business,” he explained.
Returning to Appalachia, he served on the Board of Mountain States Health Alliance (MSHA) — one of the legacy systems that became Ballad Health — in various roles for more than 20 years, including twice as Chairman.
He also chaired the transition committee for MSHA, which concluded with the hiring of current Ballad Health Chairman and CEO Alan Levine.
Feathers’ relationship with Junior Achievement dates back nearly a quarter century.
He says the organization’s “passion and plea” for classroom volunteers at the Downtown Kingsport Rotary Club led to his initial interest in JA. He says he knew that JA existed while in high school “but knew little else about the program.”
“Once I built up the courage to stand in front of the first class of 25 second graders, I was hooked,” Feathers recalled. “Aside from the obvious fear of being in front of 25 pairs of eyes, the ability to be able to engage and have an impact on young kids with a valuable lesson was so rewarding.”
Feathers participated with JA for nearly 15 years as a volunteer, leading classes for every grade level offered in several schools around Kingsport and Sullivan County.
“Particularly in many of our schools today, especially K-5, I think it is imperative that businesses and business leaders engage with our presence as much as resources to provide a vision and affirmation to kids that life is gonna be tough, more for some than others but I am standing here as proof that you can succeed,” he said. “I have been told by students, years later, that the simple real-world lesson they heard from JA helped them realize the importance of education, learning, and seeing the bigger picture of the life journey, and realizing this classroom work is part of that journey and finishing school is not the destination.”
Feathers wishes to remind people that he does not believe that success is possible without a solid support system.
“I can’t reiterate how influential my wife, her late father and a few of the folks mentioned above have been in believing in my ambition and often reckless energy,” he added. “That support has allowed what some would term ‘high risk’ behaviors that sometimes did not work out so well but worked out really well most of the time. I am so fortunate in that statement and position.”
He concedes that challenges make people better so long as they can fall forward.
“Always communicate, regardless of whether it is not the best news,” he claims. “I firmly believe no person wants another to fail; we may fight for business or politics, but we should always pull for the person.”
