Jenna: Good evening and welcome to "MetroFocus."

I am Jenna Flanagan.

You probably know Sophia Bush from her starring roles on iconic TV shows.

What you might not know is Sophia is leading the charge in a new type of business approach called social entrepreneurship.

Along with her business partner, Sophia has been working to invest in projects that make a positive impact on society and uplift women across the country.

From creating a new hair salon that caters to Black and white women, partnering with the first fully woman-funded and owned and operated bank in the country, they are demonstrating how high-profile investors can leverage their fame, business, experience and access to capital to help others.

Joining me now with more of the impactful work that she and her business partner are doing is Sophia Bush.

Sophia is an actress, activist and entrepreneur.

Welcome to "MetroFocus."

Sophia: Thank you so much for having me.

Jenna: Let's start from the top.

Social entrepreneurship.

That might sound a little like an oxymoron to people.

From your perspective, what is that?

Sophia: For far too long, we have had this idea in society that you've either be successful and a selfish person or be dedicated to making the world around you a better place but she will probably not do that well in life.

Not only do we know that not to be true because we have incredible examples of people who have done good and done well, but I think more and more, you see people -- we are in this information age.

We understand more about what is going on in the world around us and how interconnected we are, people are waking up to the fact that if our community is healthy, we as individuals are healthy.

If our community is well-funded, we as individuals do well and live better lives.

My business partner and I met in our mid-20s.

We were at a social impact conference.

Most people in my day job line of work were not doing that 15 years ago.

She cracked a joke about why the girl from TV was there taking notes like a court stenographer.

That community is where we were socially raised together.

We grew up looking at people changing the world and decided we wanted to move the needle in that direction in whatever small way we could.

Jenna: One of the things I found so impactful about learning about the work you guys are doing is the focus on women.

First off, why is it important?

Some people might say there are so many people that need access to capital.

Why focus on women entrepreneurs?

Sophia: We talk a lot about the pay gap.

For every $1 men make, women make less.

Within our group, there are also disparities.

White women make less than men and Black women make less than white women and Latina women make less than everybody.

We know when you invest in women, you invest in families, invest in education systems and all communities.

It is not me being shady to men, it is math -- which is not emotional or partial -- proves when you invest in women, they spend their money different than men do.

When we think about the truths we all share, you and I share as two women, in New York and L.A., there are things we have in common.

When we became friends, we were really offended as a white woman and a Black woman that both worked in media, we could not get our hair done anywhere.

We looked at the fact that industry, there are gaps for women in industry and services, which means we do not get to be together.

Where do you spend time opening up about your life and who you are like you do in a hair salon?

If you and I, for example, never get to sit in a hair salon together, do we get to learn each other's stories?

What started as this desire to change hair and the way that we could all be socially integrated in the impactful ways let us to Small Business, Small Business financing, lending, and that was looked at the ways women were held out of this world to access to capital, you find a disparity for us as a gender group and disparities down racial lines.

To us, that is simply unacceptable.

Women are the number 1 creators of Small Business and that group happens to be led by Black women.

If women are only accessing a small amount of capital and women of color only access a fraction of that capital, -- the more businesses we have, the more money people are making.

The more everyone is flourishing in the larger our economy grows.

They say clichés are clichés because they are true.

We are very into figuring out how to push forward.

Jenna: You being in L.A. and me being in New York, it is interesting you took a specific interest in smaller locations that get overlooked, in flyover areas.

Why is that important?

Sophia: There is this idea of underrepresented founders.

That could be founders of color, queer founders and it is underrepresented geography.

You hear about venture capital happening in Silicon Valley, moving to Austin, all of the tech people moving to Miami.

These are big, big places.

There is incredible innovation happening around the country.

My partner grew up in Detroit.

It is my home away from home.

Her dad and my mom are my bonus parents.

I have spent so much time in Michigan and I love Detroit.

I love the Renaissance of a great American city.

It is incredibly important to make sure that native Detroiters have seats their city is being reinvested in.

That is why we wanted to open our salon in Detroit.

I fell in love with Oklahoma because that is where my husband grew up and we have done a lot of work in Tulsa and we chose to have our wedding there.

The people regrowing Black Wall Street and this incredible community that is so vibrant and pursuing a brighter future in the wake of tragedy while holding onto history, those are the sorts of places that inspire us most.

Jenna: As you speak about all of this, I wonder -- finances is like, that is an area known for men being strong in and vibrant and leaders.

Money is not something a lot of women are taught to engage in, understand or thrive in.

Just your take on creating a space where women, hopefully without shame, can learn some things that might not have been encouraged to learn about finances and capital.

Sophia: The idea that finance is a man's game, there will be some people who roll their eyes at this, that is a vestige of the patriarchy.

My grandmother could not have a credit card or sign a lease on an apartment without a husband as a cosigner, giving her permission to have her own financial account.

It is not that women are not good at finance or math.

The classic photo of the data scientist standing next to all the books of code that helped us go to space.

A young lady with big hair and big glasses, she did that way back then.

We are incredibly capable in these arenas but we have been historically held out of them.

In those arenas is where power is held.

Power in this country has historically been held by men, historically by older white men.

It is important for us to understand as women that we fully take control of finances, if we learn how to be our own versions of financial ninjas in our lives, we are growing our own power.

It inspires us.

It is a reason we chose to take on strategic advisors to the first women's bank.

It is crazy that the first women's bank was only opened in America in 2021.

I am so inspired that it was the brainchild of the women who ran the Small Business Association under President Obama.

They said we are working on supporting small business owners across America.

At the literal level of the presidential administration, we are seeing a gap for women and we have to fix this.

They have made that their mission and their work and we get to be a part of it and it is cool to hang out with Billie Jean King because she is a literal legend.

She is an advisor, as well.

You look at the worlds of sports and finance that women are staking their claim in and making their mark, using the women's basketball finals getting higher ratings than anything else in college sports this year and you see women who run financial management firms outperforming men.

It is important for us to be in the spaces and to understand that financial freedom is societal freedom.

We want to figure out how to speed up that freedom for as many people as possible with tools and opportunities for access that did not exist until very recently.

Jenna: For any women in the tri-state area who would be watching this interview and interested in what it is you are doing, if you had a piece of advice or a place to start, you have that idea but you do not know what the first step is, what advice would you give?

Sophia: I would say, certainly, look for the places you can be mentored.

Find out what sort of grants are available in your state and your city for small business owners with ideas.

So many of the grants you can apply for can help applicants go through programs to strengthen their business plans.

We would also say please visit us online.

Look at the first women's bank.

Come say a digital hello.

Make sure you are following us on social media.

We are building a curriculum and free tools to offer women wonderful help with financial work and also financial education at no charge.

Those are some of the resources I really believe in.

I love that there are phenomenal women who give great advice on Instagram.

Feel free to see who I am sharing, if you like.

I would say remember that it is something anyone can learn and something everyone deserves to learn.

It is a really wonderful place to start, to stake your claim in the world around us.

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